Nipped in the Bud by Stuart Palmer is the last review for the 20 books of summer reading challenge. I had so much fun doing this challenge and appreciate everyone who has read and shared my reviews!
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Plot Synopsis
In her twelfth mystery, Hildegarde Withers, a formidable figure with a sharp mind and a no-nonsense attitude, retrieves an essential witness for the state of New York in prosecuting Winston H. Gault (a.k.a. Junior Gault) for beating comedy legend Tony Fagan to death after Fagan made fun of his sponsor Junior Gault on his variety program.
The critical witness, the young and star-struck Ina Kell, who was staying in her cousin’s apartment next to Fagan’s, heard everything on her first night in the city. Ina’s sudden disappearance right before the trial is a devastating blow, potentially allowing Gault to escape justice..
Hildegarde Withers, undeterred, follows Ina Kell’s trail and embarks on a journey from New York to Mexico to bring her in. However, Miss Withers soon finds herself in a precarious situation with the Mexican police. Bringing Ina Kell back to the United States proves to be a daunting task, and Miss Withers suspects this bright young thing knows more than she’s letting on.
The Review
I’m somewhat lukewarm on this Miss Withers story. It starts with the usual sparring between a New York policeman and Miss Withers, who is visiting New York and mostly retired from sleuthing and teaching. Oscar Piper pleads with her to help him find Ina Kell. While Miss Withers is initially resistant to starting private detecting again due to her age and weakened health, she is intrigued by the strange violence of the killing and that one of her former pupils is the defendant’s lawyer.
Miss Withers slowly came around to getting involved with finding Ina Kell, which was a change of pace. I liked the book’s opening, where Withers interviews TV executives and her old student Sam to get a feel for the case. The reader gets a lot of insight into Miss Withers’s conflicted nature, her desire to retire permanently, and how she struggles with this little spark of curiosity and doubt in the legal system. We also get some hilarious moments between her and her former pupil, which give further insight into Miss Withers as a teacher. There’s a lot of clashing of identities, and it’s interesting watching her navigate who she was, who she is, and who others perceive her to be.
That being said- it takes way too long to wade through the introductory phase of the novel- precisely one-third of the book, before the fundamental conceit of the story begins, which isn’t precisely what Oscar Piper presented to Miss Withers, which pisses her off enough to start the investigation and honestly pissed me off a little too, however I almost DNF’d the book.
However, I followed Miss Withers, who followed Ina Kell to Mexico. The story takes on a more comedic tone once she’s in Mexico and totally eschews the introspective and ponderous tone of the setup of the story.
However, the broad comedic antics- which usually revolve around Miss Withers’s apricot poodle getting her in trouble with the Mexican police, really didn’t gel for me. Miss Withers is running hither and thither trying to find, control, or get papers for her dog. She runs across the Mexican border several times before settling down and looking for Ina Kell. This whole dog needs papers to get back into the United States, and Talleyrand’s galavanting around Mexico takes way too long, and this b-subplot doesn’t ever tie into the plot of finding Ina Kell and, at times, almost squeezes out a plot.
Ina Kell and her companion aren’t too hard to find, but they escape Miss Withers’s clutches time and again because of Withers’s stupidity and the lack of manpower and goodwill of a police agency. I guess the dog subplot is to make it so she can’t turn to the Mexican authorities for help and get this thing sewed up quickly.
Ina escapes Miss Withers and goes deeper into the interior and more remote cities in Mexico, which gives Miss Withers some time to think about what Ina says she saw and how that actually differs from what she can prove. A second death occurs in the case, and a dramatic twist ending highlights Palmer’s ingenuity for plot twists.
If you get to the denouncement and are surprised by the twist ending, your enjoyment of the book will be much higher than mine. I figured out what Ina Kell’s game was before Miss Withers was even officially on the case and then spent the rest of the book waiting for everyone to catch up. I actually think the twist is well-hidden and not super obvious; I just had a lucky hunch.
Nipped in the Bud really suffers from its languid pacing and jarring tone shifts, but the final third of the book has a lot of action, which builds to a fantastic and very satisfying solution to the mystery. It’s an uneven mystery, for sure, but still worth reading in spite of its flaws.
20 Books of Summer Reviews
Golden Age of Detective Fiction 
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