Having spent the better part of my summer on a detective-novel binge, I'm still amazed that I had never heard of Rex Stout or his famous detective Nero Wolfe until this point. Turns out, they're Kind of a Big Deal. As my professor put it: "Nero Wolfe's fans are the detective fiction equivalent of Trekkies." There are Nero Wolfe websites. Nero Wolfe fan clubs. Nero Wolfe cookbooks. (I am not joking about that last one) He's basically to America what Miss Marple and Poirot were to England, and jus...

Not just vintage Wolfe but classic Wolfe. Aside from being a first-rate murder mystery, this novel from 1938 is remarkable for its handling of issues of racial prejudice. The setting is a resort hotel in South Carolina where the waiters and cooks are black, though the managers and guests are white -- all perfectly typical for America in the 1930s. However, invisible as the service staff would ordinarily be, merely assumed as part of the social landscape, in this story our attention is drawn to t...

Published in 1938, this is the fifth book in the Nero Wolfe series and the second one I have ever read, the first being The Red Box.Too Many Cooks was another enjoyable foray into the idiosyncratic world of the irascible, inscrutable, quirky, larger-than-life Wolfe as narrated by his able assistant, the world weary, hard bitten, cynical and slyly humorous Archie.Whilst another supremely enjoyable read, I thought Too Many Cooks was slightly less successful than The Red Box. Whilst following the m...

You know, I don't really care all that much about the mystery part of any Nero Wolfe mystery. Some are good, some are better, some tease, some deliver, some succeed, a few fail. I don't care cause a couple hundred pages of Archie and Nero going back and forth is always, always worth it. Archie with his easy going wise-guy banter and Nero with his prickly erudite blustering, fussing over his orchids, salivating over his supper, sipping his beer, closing his eyes, twitching his lips. Well, that pa...

The fifth Nero Wolfe book should probably come with a warning for modern readers. Of course, it's not fair to apply modern sensibilities to previous generations, although that is fairly common to do. But because of modern sensibilities there are going to be many readers who will be shocked at the causal use of, now derogatory, terms for Asians, various Europeans, and African Americans, that can be found in this book. I recommend you read it anyway and substitute whatever words you find appropria...

A fine Nero Wolfe, in which the great detective is invited to the annual meeting of a society of the greatest chefs of the world where--of course--a murder occurs. One unfortunate flaw: this novel was published in 1938, and its treatment of the black characters--all servants of course--contains stereotypes that will seem racist to most 21st century readers.Still, Nero Wolfe himself treats them with dignity and even courtesy, and his attitude goes a long way toward redeeming the book.

An early Nero Wolfe novel which is also one of the best. As much as Wolfe hates to leave home he accepts an invitation to give a speech to the fifteen chefs named the greatest in the world. That doesn't sound like enough incentive to get Wolfe to leave home but he has an ulterior motive. He wants a particular recipe from one of the chefs.Of course murder intervenes and the entire event goes off the rails. Wolfe and Archie find themselves embroiled in the investigation. Great premise for a great

Yes, there’s a mystery, and yes, there are great characters here, and yes, there’s a fascinating lecture on North American cuisine. There is excellent Wolfe and Archie interaction, including a scene where Archie undresses Wolfe while comparing himself to the heroine of a gothic novel. But this is all not so much overshadowed as obliviated by the racism. If you’re interested in how Nice White Liberals thought in the 1930s, this is the book for you. Stout was certainly a white liberal, and he defi...

This series continues to amuse. Archie Goodwin and Nero Wolfe continue to needle each other with an affection that neither would admit to if pressed. There are two issues worth mentioning.First, there are a *lot* of characters. There are all the cooks, and then all of the cooks have brought guests. There are also characters who are neither cooks nor guests and who also are not employees of Nero Wolfe. Their names also needed to be logged. At first I thought I wouldn't be able to keep them straig...

I have a confession to make: after finishing the book I added yet another item to my ever-growing list of things-to-do-before-I-die. In this case I really want to try saucisse minuit:Some explanation is in order; I also would like to apologize to the people already familiar with Nero Wolfe as they are already know everything I will say here. The eccentric genius detective also happened to be a gourmet, among other things. His cook, Fritz Brenner is a Swiss whose cooking Wolfe calls "not excellen...

Wolfe speechifying saves the day! I always enjoy Wolfe being forced to leave the house, and this is a good one.

This was an excellent and baffling mystery with a nice twist. In addition, it provided a fascinating, albeit disturbing, look at the casual use of racist terms without any hint that disdain was intended in 1938 when the book was published.

3.5*Nero Wolfe leaves his brownstone in NYC to attend a gastronomical gathering as the guest of honor. During the event, one of the chefs is murdered and Wolfe gets chivvied into investigating.

Too racist, too many characters + confusing dialog at times.

A neat mystery with Wolfe and Archie away from the NYC brownstone. Wolfe and Archie are away from the brownstone in the next book in the series as well.

It’s a truism about Nero Wolf that he doesn’t like to leave his house even though he does leave it in two of the first four novels. This time, the whole book takes place outside the Brownstone and the reader gets to see just how strong a phobia being out of his own controlled environment is for the detective. We also get to see the extra burden this places on Archie Goodwin.This is one of the very best Nero Wolfe novels. The event that gets Wolfe out of his house is the invitation to give a spee...

5 Stars. No lower it to 3 stars for the distasteful language and thoughtlessness portrayed. The "N" word abounds, but so do "coloured" and disparaging remarks against Chinese Americans. Collectively, among the worst for this I have read or experienced. There's even a blackface episode. In audio, the first use of the "N" word hits the listener like an unexpected sledgehammer. Nero Wolfe, a minor offender in comparison to Archie and a sheriff from West Virginia, turns the tables on the major ones

As a big Nero Wolfe fan, I expected to find this one a very enjoyable read. I read a lot of older stuff, and I am accustomed to overlooking certain racist and sexist language we find appalling today. But this book is so full of objectionable words that it really takes away from the reading experience. I just cringed when I read the casual references to coons and shines, not to mention the frequency of the N word. It is fractionally redeemed by a scene with Nero Wolfe speaking to some black male

AMAZING. Laughed out loud multiple times. Highly recommend this to any mystery fans- the best Nero Wolfe book of the series so far!

Nero Wolfe rarely leaves his brownstone on West 35th Street in New York City. In the fifth book in the series he has promised to be the keynote speaker at a gathering of top chefs, Les Quinze Maitres, at the Kanawha Spa in West Virginia. Of course he would not make such a journey without his assistant Archie Goodwin. The opening scene is quite humorous with Archie standing on the platform smoking a cigarette and Wolfe bellowing at him to get back on the train, fearful that the train will leave w...