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Tish #1
The Amazing Adventures of Letitia Carberry
About the Author
Mary Roberts Rinehart (1876-1958) was an American novelist and playwright best known for her mystery stories.
Rinehart's work is very different from the cliches of Rinehart criticism. It has a lot in common with hard-boiled school, in both style and subject. It also is part of the American school of "scientific" detection. In fact, all three groups, scientific, hard-boiled, and Rinehart show common features. They form an American school that mixes adventure and detection. There is an attempt at realism in the depiction of modern life, with many different classes, corruption high and low, and a great diversity of characters. Her most memorable tales combined murder, love, ingenuity, and humor in a style that was distinctly her own.
While her general novels were her best-selling books, she was most highly regarded by critics for her carefully plotted murder mysteries. It was one of her books that produced the phrase, "The butler did it," and in her prime, she was more famous than her chief rival, England's Agatha Christie.
Her autobiography, My Story, appeared in 1931 and was revised in 1948. At Rinehart's death her books had sold more than 10 million copies.
ebook
First published January 1, 1911
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180 people want to read
About the author
Mary Roberts Rinehart
556 books429 followersMysteries of the well-known American writer Mary Roberts Rinehart include
The Circular Staircase
(1908) and
The Door
(1930).
People often called this prolific author the American version of Agatha Christie. She is considered the source of the phrase "The butler did it," though the exact phrase doesn't appear in her works, and she invented the "Had-I-But-Known" school of mystery writing.
Rinehart wrote hundreds of short stories, poems, travelogues, and special articles. Many of her books and plays were adapted for movies, such as The Bat (1926), The Bat Whispers (1930), and The Bat (1959). Critics most appreciated her murder mysteries.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Ro...
People often called this prolific author the American version of Agatha Christie. She is considered the source of the phrase "The butler did it," though the exact phrase doesn't appear in her works, and she invented the "Had-I-But-Known" school of mystery writing.
Rinehart wrote hundreds of short stories, poems, travelogues, and special articles. Many of her books and plays were adapted for movies, such as The Bat (1926), The Bat Whispers (1930), and The Bat (1959). Critics most appreciated her murder mysteries.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Ro...
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Displaying 1 - 21 of 21 reviews
March 4, 2017
This was a collection of three short stories written in the early 1900's. The book was so much fun, and I loved the three middle aged spinsters who seemed to create havoc wherever they went. I would have liked to give this four stars, but I felt that the second and third stories were poorly structured.
The Librivox narrator was absolutely fantastic. I look forward to more from her and Mary Roberts Rinehart.
The Librivox narrator was absolutely fantastic. I look forward to more from her and Mary Roberts Rinehart.
January 19, 2023
Book 29 / 30 days challenge
I can't wait to read more Tish, its just absolutely adorable and fun. I couldnt stop listening to it. The humor is so ridiculous at times I just adore it.
I can't wait to read more Tish, its just absolutely adorable and fun. I couldnt stop listening to it. The humor is so ridiculous at times I just adore it.
May 12, 2023
I noticed a later book in the series on Project Gutenberg, and since Gutenberg didn't have the first one, I got a copy from archive.org instead. Be warned: the archive.org version is the raw scan right out of a poor-quality OCR program, has not been edited even a little bit or even spellchecked for the most blindingly obvious scan errors, and as a result is not at all recommended and borderline unreadable - though in most (not quite all) cases I could guess what a word was supposed to be despite the many distortions.
That may well have lowered my rating from what it otherwise would have been; it's maybe a three-star book, to be absolutely fair. According to Wikipedia, this series is comedy (though the author is mainly known for her murder mysteries), and that's why I picked it up; but what it turned out to be was a murder mystery, and not a good one. It kept me reading because I wanted to know the explanation for the bizarre series of events, but in the end, the explanation was completely absurd. Maybe that's meant to be the comedy, but if so, it didn't work for me.
There's a trio of unmarried women, middle-aged or older, at the centre of the story. The title character and main investigator, known as Tish, is stubborn and domineering; her friend Aggie is silly and neurotic; their friend Lizzie, who narrates most of the story before the narration switches to Tish's doctor nephew for some reason I've already forgotten, is sensible and otherwise rather characterless. None of them have much more depth than the descriptions I've just given. Possibly their characters and their interactions are meant to be the comedy, but if so, it still didn't work for me.
There's a half-hearted gesture in the direction of a romance subplot, between the doctor nephew and a nurse, but it doesn't receive any development to speak of.
Overall, it strikes me as half-baked, if that, and I couldn't find the comedy.
That may well have lowered my rating from what it otherwise would have been; it's maybe a three-star book, to be absolutely fair. According to Wikipedia, this series is comedy (though the author is mainly known for her murder mysteries), and that's why I picked it up; but what it turned out to be was a murder mystery, and not a good one. It kept me reading because I wanted to know the explanation for the bizarre series of events, but in the end, the explanation was completely absurd. Maybe that's meant to be the comedy, but if so, it didn't work for me.
There's a trio of unmarried women, middle-aged or older, at the centre of the story. The title character and main investigator, known as Tish, is stubborn and domineering; her friend Aggie is silly and neurotic; their friend Lizzie, who narrates most of the story before the narration switches to Tish's doctor nephew for some reason I've already forgotten, is sensible and otherwise rather characterless. None of them have much more depth than the descriptions I've just given. Possibly their characters and their interactions are meant to be the comedy, but if so, it still didn't work for me.
There's a half-hearted gesture in the direction of a romance subplot, between the doctor nephew and a nurse, but it doesn't receive any development to speak of.
Overall, it strikes me as half-baked, if that, and I couldn't find the comedy.
June 27, 2018
More entertaining characters from Mary Roberts Rinehart!
June 22, 2018
A collection of the madcap adventures of series character Tish. Must read more Rinehart!
August 22, 2019
Hilarious and an excellent narration of Sandra Cullum on Librivox.
I've read some of Rinehart's more serious books but here I found at last her true talent - humor. I just couldn't stop laughing at the description of Lizzie standing in the visitors' room of the zoo with her skirt pulled up, turning s-l-o-w-l-y her head from side to side looking for the snake, or at the amazing discovery that the rope might have been either cut with Tish's scissors or chewed off with Aggie's dentures, both found in the lake.
The structure of the last two stories is weird, beginning at the end and then jumping to the real beginning, but no matter once you get the hang of it.
I've read some of Rinehart's more serious books but here I found at last her true talent - humor. I just couldn't stop laughing at the description of Lizzie standing in the visitors' room of the zoo with her skirt pulled up, turning s-l-o-w-l-y her head from side to side looking for the snake, or at the amazing discovery that the rope might have been either cut with Tish's scissors or chewed off with Aggie's dentures, both found in the lake.
The structure of the last two stories is weird, beginning at the end and then jumping to the real beginning, but no matter once you get the hang of it.
April 12, 2021
I bought a (barely) used copy of the Forgotten Books edition off Amazon. So this review will deal with the stories as well as the edition I purchased.
Forgotten Books edition-
Let me start by expressing my gratitude that there is someone somewhere out there re-printing books (in this case, once very popular) that have fallen out of print and therefore out of mass memory. It is indeed better to have any sort of edition and be able to read the book than to have none at all. That being said...
My first clue was the cover. So little care was taken that the author's name is printed, as near as I can tell as: Mary Roberts Rinehart Dioberts)Rinehart. The font randomly alternated between at least two different sizes from page to page. Some portions of words were missing- that's OK, I can deal with that. On occasion, there appeared to be an attempt to print two pages on a single page so that words appeared randomly in the middle of a sentence which had nothing to do with the passage I was reading. The pictures...I think there were two? One was a nice soft sketch that added to the story. The other probably was as well at one point, but the print appeared to be a print of a copy of a pre-digitized photo. It was all dots and dashes and made the soft art nearly illegible. One of the figures in the corner of the sketch appeared kind of squished into the fram and at a bit of an odd angle. It was so rough, I would have preferred to not have this included at all.
The used copy was at least 6 dollars, and I was saving money by buying used. For 6 dollars for a used copy, I still have certain expectations. This isn't a penny dreadful, though I certainly felt like I was reading one at times (in terms of print quality). Very frustrating on all counts, but beggars can't be choosers.
The stories- I'm so delighted to have found this. At times I was laughing out loud. A nice light easy read. You'll definitely want to know what happens next. I sure did.
Recommended as an entertaining vacation read. Read it at a beach or in a tent.
Read it if you want main characters are spinster women age 50ish. None of them seek romance and none of them are pursued for it.
Read it if you like PG Wodehouse and the Mr. Finchley books.
Caution: a murderous psychopath is violent towards some small furry animals in the detective story, and one of the comedic stories had me rather concerned about the welfare of a dog for a while there. The murderous psychopath murders the small furry animals offscreen, but you do read about their bodies being found. Do not read if this will offend you.
Caution: although the 50ish spinsters are treated as active independent individuals with minds of their own, younger women are portrayed as capricious in matters of love, and rarely portrayed for any other purpose than romantic for the occasional male who makes an appearance and sets off a chain of events. Do not read if this will offend you.
Personally, I will be seeking out more of this author's work, even if I have to suffer through another bad reprint. No idea why this author was abandoned/lost.
Forgotten Books edition-
Let me start by expressing my gratitude that there is someone somewhere out there re-printing books (in this case, once very popular) that have fallen out of print and therefore out of mass memory. It is indeed better to have any sort of edition and be able to read the book than to have none at all. That being said...
My first clue was the cover. So little care was taken that the author's name is printed, as near as I can tell as: Mary Roberts Rinehart Dioberts)Rinehart. The font randomly alternated between at least two different sizes from page to page. Some portions of words were missing- that's OK, I can deal with that. On occasion, there appeared to be an attempt to print two pages on a single page so that words appeared randomly in the middle of a sentence which had nothing to do with the passage I was reading. The pictures...I think there were two? One was a nice soft sketch that added to the story. The other probably was as well at one point, but the print appeared to be a print of a copy of a pre-digitized photo. It was all dots and dashes and made the soft art nearly illegible. One of the figures in the corner of the sketch appeared kind of squished into the fram and at a bit of an odd angle. It was so rough, I would have preferred to not have this included at all.
The used copy was at least 6 dollars, and I was saving money by buying used. For 6 dollars for a used copy, I still have certain expectations. This isn't a penny dreadful, though I certainly felt like I was reading one at times (in terms of print quality). Very frustrating on all counts, but beggars can't be choosers.
The stories- I'm so delighted to have found this. At times I was laughing out loud. A nice light easy read. You'll definitely want to know what happens next. I sure did.
Recommended as an entertaining vacation read. Read it at a beach or in a tent.
Read it if you want main characters are spinster women age 50ish. None of them seek romance and none of them are pursued for it.
Read it if you like PG Wodehouse and the Mr. Finchley books.
Caution: a murderous psychopath is violent towards some small furry animals in the detective story, and one of the comedic stories had me rather concerned about the welfare of a dog for a while there. The murderous psychopath murders the small furry animals offscreen, but you do read about their bodies being found. Do not read if this will offend you.
Caution: although the 50ish spinsters are treated as active independent individuals with minds of their own, younger women are portrayed as capricious in matters of love, and rarely portrayed for any other purpose than romantic for the occasional male who makes an appearance and sets off a chain of events. Do not read if this will offend you.
Personally, I will be seeking out more of this author's work, even if I have to suffer through another bad reprint. No idea why this author was abandoned/lost.
August 8, 2024
Amusing and ingenious trio of stories about middle aged Miss ‘Tish' and her two friends, when they find themselves in a hospital where she is recuperating after crashing her new car. With Mary Roberts Rinehart, the element of suspense is shot through with menace and almost supernatural horror, and this book is no exception. The plots are ingeniously constructed, if a little far-fetched, but the best part about them is the rich vein of farce, comedy and humour all woven together. On the heartfelt advice of her friends, she puts up her car and her sailboat for sale, and at the close, we find her writing to the Wright Brothers for the purchase of their plane…
July 13, 2022
What Fun!!!
I really enjoyed these humorous tales of three older little ladies and their very light mysterious adventures! They are wonderful characters. Mary Roberts Rinehart was quite a writer...from deep, scary mystery you never figure out to the hilarious escapades of three older ladies who are so adorable. I want to read all of the amazing tales written by this fantastic author!!
I really enjoyed these humorous tales of three older little ladies and their very light mysterious adventures! They are wonderful characters. Mary Roberts Rinehart was quite a writer...from deep, scary mystery you never figure out to the hilarious escapades of three older ladies who are so adorable. I want to read all of the amazing tales written by this fantastic author!!
May 1, 2025
Normally I enjoy Rinehart's Tish stories and find them quite humorous, but this book didn't hit my funny bone the way they usually do. The first story, which takes up about half the book, wasn't funny at all, but a bizarre mystery with lots of unpleasant happenings for a reason which made no sense at all. The other two stories were more like the Tish, Aggie and Lizzie I've grown to love but still felt a little flat and formulaic. Maybe if I hadn't read them after the first one?
August 9, 2025
This book contains a novella and two short stories, all of which are laugh-out-loud funny and hugely entertaining. The solution to the novella's mystery came sort of out of the blue, but, as this is one of Rinehart's earliest published works she was still developing her talent and style. I will definitely read more of Tish's adventures!
June 22, 2022
Madcap murder mystery set in a hospital, involving an ape, an elevator, guinea pigs and the staff and patients, tied up in a bow by the doctor’s stubborn aunt and her sidekicks. Silly fun that would make a good movie, in the right hands.
May 17, 2025
There are not many (any other?) Mary Roberts Rinehart novels nearly as ponderously boring as this one. I recommend avoiding it... but that's just me. Most reviewers seem to have enjoyed the novel. I just can't figure out why...
July 4, 2018
Love the series and characters and narration (LibriVox). Recommended.
March 19, 2021
This is my third Rinehart read, her books start off well enough for me but fall apart towards the end.
September 15, 2023
Amusing.
April 22, 2025
Pretty dated. Listened on audio.
August 7, 2013
Tish and her two friends are ladies of a "certain age" who solve mysteries and have adventures because Tish's interests are definitely NOT those of the usual spinster aunt.
Having injured her knee after an accident in her roadster, Tish discovers that there is a ghostly mystery in the hospital where she is a patient. Part of the fun is Rinehart's comic sensibility which is seen throughout the book. As has been observed elsewhere, Rinehart's comic mysteries are not on par with P.G. Wodehouse but do contain something of that same spirit.
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Not gonna finish this one.
I didn't realize there was more than one mystery in this book, although I suppose that the title should've led me to that conclusion. I found the first mystery amusing and perplexing, but the solution unsatisfying and unnecessarily complicated.
The first chapter of the second mystery was so confusing, since it begins well toward the end of the story. Then it goes back to begin the tale. While this usually isn't a problem for me, for some reason I read the first chapter 3 times without getting that orientation.
This isn't a huge thing, but I have so many other books stacked up which I would rather read that this one is going to get put aside. I do have a couple of other Tish novels (free from Kindle) and probably will pick them up at some point despite this experience with Tish #1. Rinehart is too good an author normally to chalk this up to more than an oddball book from her.
Having injured her knee after an accident in her roadster, Tish discovers that there is a ghostly mystery in the hospital where she is a patient. Part of the fun is Rinehart's comic sensibility which is seen throughout the book. As has been observed elsewhere, Rinehart's comic mysteries are not on par with P.G. Wodehouse but do contain something of that same spirit.
============
Not gonna finish this one.
I didn't realize there was more than one mystery in this book, although I suppose that the title should've led me to that conclusion. I found the first mystery amusing and perplexing, but the solution unsatisfying and unnecessarily complicated.
The first chapter of the second mystery was so confusing, since it begins well toward the end of the story. Then it goes back to begin the tale. While this usually isn't a problem for me, for some reason I read the first chapter 3 times without getting that orientation.
This isn't a huge thing, but I have so many other books stacked up which I would rather read that this one is going to get put aside. I do have a couple of other Tish novels (free from Kindle) and probably will pick them up at some point despite this experience with Tish #1. Rinehart is too good an author normally to chalk this up to more than an oddball book from her.
February 7, 2017
I want soooooo badly to give this book 5 stars. It's basically Golden Girls meets Murder She Wrote set in the 1910s. It was so much fun to read, and I plan on reading more of Rinehart's work in the future.
But I'm leaving off one star because of (SPOILERS) the last of three mysteries. A man kidnaps a young woman because he's in love with her, and she chooses to stay with him in the end. Lizzie, the narrator, acknowledges that he should've been jailed for kidnapping and assault if the whole thing weren't so "romantic." Aggie, the romantic, takes the guy's side as soon as she finds out he's motivated by love. Tish, the title character, maintains to the end that the guy was wrong since the kidnapping was unquestionably nonconsensual and the guy should still go to jail, but her friends treat this as "Oh, that Tish, lol."
But I'm leaving off one star because of (SPOILERS) the last of three mysteries. A man kidnaps a young woman because he's in love with her, and she chooses to stay with him in the end. Lizzie, the narrator, acknowledges that he should've been jailed for kidnapping and assault if the whole thing weren't so "romantic." Aggie, the romantic, takes the guy's side as soon as she finds out he's motivated by love. Tish, the title character, maintains to the end that the guy was wrong since the kidnapping was unquestionably nonconsensual and the guy should still go to jail, but her friends treat this as "Oh, that Tish, lol."
November 5, 2010
I would have given this book four stars, but I didn't like how the title story (a mystery) ended. Tish and her friends are very interesting characters.
February 17, 2023
I devoured this book in just two days, and Tish, Aggie, and Lizzie's escapades had me in stitches.
3.5 stars rounded up
3.5 stars rounded up
Displaying 1 - 21 of 21 reviews