Ellery Queen Popular Books

Ellery Queen Biography & Facts

Ellery Queen is a pseudonym created in 1928 by the American detective fiction writers Frederic Dannay (1905–1982) and Manfred Bennington Lee (1905–1971). It is also the name of their main fictional detective, a mystery writer in New York City who helps his police inspector father solve baffling murder cases. From 1929 to 1971, Dannay and Lee wrote around forty novels and short story collections in which Ellery Queen appears as a character. Under the pseudonym Ellery Queen, they also edited more than thirty anthologies of crime fiction and true crime. Dannay founded, and for many years edited, the crime fiction magazine Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, which has been published continuously from 1941 to the present. From 1961 onwards, Dannay and Lee commissioned other authors to write thrillers using the pseudonym Ellery Queen, but not featuring Ellery Queen as a character; some such novels were juvenile and were credited to Ellery Queen Jr. They also wrote four novels under the pseudonym Barnaby Ross, which featured the detective Drury Lane. Several movies, radio shows, and television shows have been based on their works.Dannay and Lee were cousins, who were better known by their professional names. Frederic Dannay was the professional name of Daniel Nathan and Manfred Bennington Lee that of Emanuel Benjamin Lepofsky. Since 2013, the complete works of Ellery Queen have been represented by JABberwocky Literary Agency. Personal life of Dannay and Lee Manfred Bennington Lee was born as Emanuel Benjamin Lepofsky on 11 January 1905 in Brooklyn, New York. He graduated from the New York University with a summa cum laude degree in English in the 1920s. He died on 3 April 1971 in Roxbury, Connecticut.Frederic Dannay was born as Daniel Nathan on 20 October 1905 in Brooklyn, New York. He married Rose Koppel, an assistant registrar at the Ethical Culture Fieldston School, in 1975. He died on 3 September 1982 in White Plains, New York. Ellery Queen, the pseudonym Ellery Queen was created in the fall of 1928 when Dannay and Lee entered a mystery novel writing contest offering a prize of $7500 (equivalent to $128,000 in 2022) jointly sponsored by McClure's magazine and Frederick A. Stokes Company. They decided to use as their collective pseudonym the same name they had given to their detective as they believed readers tended to remember the names of detectives but forget those of their creators. They were informed that they had won the contest, but McClure's magazine went bankrupt and was absorbed by The Smart Set magazine before they received any money.The Smart Set magazine rejudged the contest and awarded the prize to an entry by the writer Isabel Briggs Myers but in 1929, Frederick A. Stokes Company agreed to publish Dannay and Lee's story under the title The Roman Hat Mystery. Buoyed by its success, they were contracted to write more mysteries and they went on to write a successful series of novels and short stories that lasted 42 years.During the 1940s, Ellery Queen was probably the most popular American mystery writer. More than 150 million copies of Queen's books were sold globally and 'he' remained the best-selling mystery writer in Japan till the end of the 1970s.Many short stories were also published under the Queen name, which were mostly well-received. The novelist and critic Julian Symons called them "as absolutely fair and totally puzzling as the most passionate devotee of orthodoxy could wish" and said they were "composed with wonderful skill" whereas the historian Jaques Barzun said they were "full of ingenious gimmicks and adorned with excellent titles".Dannay, without much involvement from Lee, founded the crime fiction magazine Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine in 1941, and served as its editor-in-chief until his death in 1982. However, they together edited numerous collections and anthologies of crime fiction such as The Misadventures of Sherlock Holmes and 101 Years' Entertainment, The Great Detective Stories, 1841–1941. They were awarded the Grand Master Award by the Mystery Writers of America in 1961 for their work under the Ellery Queen pseudonym.From 1961 onwards, they allowed the 'Ellery Queen' nom de plume to be used as a house name for several novels written by other authors. None of these novels feature Ellery Queen as a character. Three of them star "the governor's troubleshooter" Micah "Mike" McCall and six of them feature Captain Tim Corrigan of the New York City Police Department. The prominent science-fiction writer Jack Vance wrote three such novels including the 1965 locked room mystery A Room to Die In.Dannay and Lee remained reticent about their writing methods. Novelist and critic H.R.F. Keating wrote, "How actually did they do it? Did they sit together and hammer the stuff out word by word? Did one write the dialogue and the other the narration? ... What eventually happened was that Fred Dannay, in principle, produced the plots, the clues, and what would have to be deduced from them as well as the outlines of the characters and Manfred Lee clothed it all in words. But it is unlikely to have been as clear cut as that."According to the crime fiction critic Otto Penzler, "As an anthologist, Ellery Queen is without peer, his taste unequalled. As a bibliographer and a collector of the detective short story, Queen is, again, a historical personage. Indeed, Ellery Queen clearly is, after Poe, the most important American in mystery fiction."British crime novelist Margery Allingham said that Dannay and Lee had "done far more for the detective story than any other two men put together" and critic Anthony Berkeley Cox famously quoted "Ellery Queen is the American Detective Novel".Although Dannay outlived Lee by eleven years, the Ellery Queen nom de plume died with Lee. The last novel featuring the character Ellery Queen, A Fine and Private Place, was published in 1971, the year of Lee's death. However, Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine is still in print as of 2023, now published as six "double issues" per year by Dell Magazines. Barnaby Ross In 1932 and 1933, Dannay and Lee wrote four novels using the pseudonym Barnaby Ross featuring Drury Lane, a Shakespearean actor who had retired from the stage due to deafness and is now often consulted as an amateur detective. The novels also feature Inspector Thumm (initially as a member of the New York police, later as a private investigator) and his crime-solving daughter Patience. From the 1940s, republications of the Drury Lane books were mostly under the Ellery Queen name.In the early 1930s, before their identity as the authors behind Ellery Queen and Barnaby Ross had been made public, Dannay and Lee staged a series of public debates with Lee impersonating Queen and Dannay impersonating Ross, both of them wearing masks to preserve their anonymity. According to H.R.F. Keating, "People said Ross must be the wit and critic Alexander Woollcott and Queen [must be] S.S. Van Dine, creator of the super-snob detective Phil.... Discover the Ellery Queen popular books. Find the top 100 most popular Ellery Queen books.

Best Seller Ellery Queen Books of 2024

  • Eine Leiche zum Advent synopsis, comments

    Eine Leiche zum Advent

    Otto Penzler, Barbara Röhl, Axel Franken, Winfried Czech, Thomas Schichtel, Dietmar Schmidt, Rainer Schumacher, Daniela Jarzynka, Stefanie Heinen, Stefan Bauer & Dr. Helmut Pesch

    Das größte WeihnachtskrimiBuch aller Zeiten als hochwertiges Geschenk für alle Krimifans mit teils raren GeschichtenVerdächtige Weihnachtsmänner, skrupellose Nikoläuse, tödliche We...

  • The Yellow Cat Mystery synopsis, comments

    The Yellow Cat Mystery

    Ellery Queen

    On vacation in Florida, Djuna meets a cat with a peculiar secret Djuna steps off the bus and into the Florida heat, ready for a few weeks of slowpaced Southern living with his frie...

  • Becoming the Boogeyman synopsis, comments

    Becoming the Boogeyman

    Richard Chizmar

    The terrifying sequel to the acclaimed New York Times and USA TODAY bestselling novel Chasing the Boogeyman, which was hailed as “genuinely chilling and something brandnew and exci...

  • The Black Dog Mystery synopsis, comments

    The Black Dog Mystery

    Ellery Queen

    A gang of young sleuths and a trusty terrier put their noses to a bank robbers’ trail Ellery Queen’s young apprentice, Djuna, is preparing for an afternoon of fishing when a strang...

  • The Crooked Road synopsis, comments

    The Crooked Road

    Janet Hutchings, Lawrence Block, Doug Allyn, Helen Tucker, Ken Bruen, Liza Cody, Raymond Steiber, Florence V. Mayberry, Barbara Paul, Tom Tolnay, Therese Greenwood, Gary Phillips, Olen Steinhauer, Susan B. Kelly & Clark Howard

    A story in the famous Keller series by Mystery Writers of America Grand Master Lawrence Block provides the first stop in this anthology’s journey along the road taken by profession...

  • The Adventures of Ellery Queen synopsis, comments

    The Adventures of Ellery Queen

    Ellery Queen

    In eleven stories, the brilliant sleuth tangles with a book thief, an assassin who targets acrobats, and more . . . For Ellery Queen, there is no puzzle that reason canno...

  • The Green Turtle Mystery synopsis, comments

    The Green Turtle Mystery

    Ellery Queen

    To rescue a friend’s pet turtle, Djuna must solve the riddle of a haunted house His new shoeshine box under his arm, boysleuth Djuna is looking for customers when he meets a young ...

  • The Mystery of the Merry Magician synopsis, comments

    The Mystery of the Merry Magician

    Ellery Queen

    When Ellery Queen goes out of town, his nephew takes on a cosmic case For weeks, Gulliver Queen has looked forward to going on vacation with his uncle Ellery, the worldfamous autho...

  • The New Adventures of Ellery Queen synopsis, comments

    The New Adventures of Ellery Queen

    Ellery Queen

    The classic mystery novella The Lamp of God is paired with eight short stories in this collection featuring “the prince of American detective fiction” (Kirkus Reviews). I...

  • The Purple Bird Mystery synopsis, comments

    The Purple Bird Mystery

    Ellery Queen

    At the local golf course, Djuna discovers a centuryold mystery It’s the first day of summer, and the brilliant teenage sleuth Djuna is looking for a job when he meets a young boy n...

  • The Complete Ellery Queen Jr. Mysteries synopsis, comments

    The Complete Ellery Queen Jr. Mysteries

    Ellery Queen

    Two brave young sleuths connected to one of the greatest detectives of all time tackle their own cases in these eleven whodunits. For mystery fans, the name Ellery Queen brings to ...

  • Nur einmal werden wir noch wach synopsis, comments

    Nur einmal werden wir noch wach

    Otto Penzler, Barbara Röhl, Axel Franken, Winfried Czech, Thomas Schichtel, Dietmar Schmidt, Rainer Schumacher, Daniela Jarzynka, Stefanie Heinen, Stefan Bauer & Dr. Helmut Pesch

    Verdächtige Weihnachtsmänner, skrupellose Nikoläuse, tödliche Weihnachtsbraten und Leichen unter Mistelzweigen vergessen Sie den Einkaufsstress, achten Sie nicht auf das ungewohnt...

  • The Crooked Road, Volume 2 synopsis, comments

    The Crooked Road, Volume 2

    Janet Hutchings, Doug Allyn, Janice Law, Edward D. Hoch, Mark Coggins, Lawrence Block, Peter Lovesey, Dana Cameron, Michael Z Lewin, Lou Manfredo, Ed McBain, Kevin Wignall, Perri O'Shaughnessy, Andrew Taylor, Andrew Klavan, William Link, S. J. Rozan & Clark Howard

    In this anticipated follow up to Ellery Queens Mystery Magazines first digitalonly anthology, youll once again take the “low road” of grifters, hit men, and other career crooks, an...

  • Chasing the Boogeyman synopsis, comments

    Chasing the Boogeyman

    Richard Chizmar

    The acclaimed New York Times and USA TODAY bestselling novel of smalltown evil that “is genuinely chilling and something brandnew and exciting” (Stephen King) and “unforgettable” (...

  • Speaking in Tongues synopsis, comments

    Speaking in Tongues

    Jeffery Deaver

    ​From the New York Times bestselling author of Coffin Dancer and The Final Twist comes a gripping story about Two men of words, one who seeks only peacethe other, violence. Tate Co...

  • Golden Age Whodunits synopsis, comments

    Golden Age Whodunits

    Otto Penzler

    Fifteen puzzling tales from the masters of the mystery genre Depending on who you ask, the term “whodunit” was first coined sometime around 1930, but the literary form predates tha...

  • The Brown Fox Mystery synopsis, comments

    The Brown Fox Mystery

    Ellery Queen

    During a lakeside vacation, Djuna hunts a mysterious fire starter Whenever Djuna leaves the house, he seems to get into trouble. Whether it’s catching bank robbers or sniffing out ...

  • The Red Chipmunk Mystery synopsis, comments

    The Red Chipmunk Mystery

    Ellery Queen

    Lost in a strange town, Djuna stumbles on an adventure On his way home after a summer of fun with his friends, Djuna and his dog, Champ, take advantage of a pit stop in Thompsonvil...

  • Death at the Inn synopsis, comments

    Death at the Inn

    R. Austin Freeman

    John Gillum arrives in London from Australia apparently a wealthy man and then proceeds to cheerfully gamble his entire fortune away. During this period he cultivates the friendshi...

  • The Golden Eagle Mystery synopsis, comments

    The Golden Eagle Mystery

    Ellery Queen

    In a seaside town, Djuna discovers theft, secretsand murder When Djuna goes to spend the summer with troubled Aunt Patty, he passes the time swimming, eating steamed clams, and cat...

  • The Blue Herring Mystery synopsis, comments

    The Blue Herring Mystery

    Ellery Queen

    An ancient whaling journal sets Djuna on course for buried treasure When old Captain Beekman was on his deathbed, he turned to his daughter and muttered, “Lift the blue herring.” I...

  • The Crooked Road, Volume 3 synopsis, comments

    The Crooked Road, Volume 3

    Janet Hutchings, Liza Cody, Art Taylor, Doug Allyn, Mike Baron, V. S. Kemanis, Roger Jones, Jeffery Deaver, Therese Greenwood, Tim L. Williams, Clark Howard, Toni LP Kelner, Chris Muessig, Steve Seder, Marilyn Todd, Stephen T. Vessels, Lawrence Block, Mary Jane Maffini & Steve Hamilton

    Volume Three of The Crooked Road, Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine’s highspeed pursuit of fiction’s criminal underworld, makes its first stop in the urban landscape of Liza Cody’s E...

  • The Mystery of the Vanished Victim synopsis, comments

    The Mystery of the Vanished Victim

    Ellery Queen

    A strange bird leads Gully to a bloody mystery at the United Nations Gully Queen is lounging around the apartment of his uncle, the worldfamous sleuth Ellery Queen, when a knock co...

  • The White Elephant Mystery synopsis, comments

    The White Elephant Mystery

    Ellery Queen

    Under the big top, Djuna tangles with an unscrupulous gang of con men The circus is coming to Riverton! And even better, Djuna’s friend the carpenter has four free passeswhich mean...

  • Ellery Queen e il ladro di H synopsis, comments

    Ellery Queen e il ladro di H

    Federico Bini

    Perché sono sparite tutte le matrici con la lettera H da una delle linotype del New York Times? E chi è stato a uccidere il tipografo Desmond Clayle? Ellery Queen affronta un caso ...