The Thirteenth Chair

You know that kind of detective story in which a crime (preferably a murder) is committed or discovered in the first chapter so that all the rest of the book may be devoted to running the criminal down with elaborate sometimes suspiciously elaborate red herrings drawn repeatedly across the trail lest you know more than is good for you before the penultimate page is reached. This is the method of a thousand and one tales from Gaboriau to Anna Katherine Green but it is a scheme that has been followed in mighty few plays and it has been followed in none written for the American stage quite as thoroughly as in The 13th Chair. New York Times November 21 1916.