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Fer-de-Lance (Nero Wolfe, #1)

Rex Stout

Start date: January 1, 2017

Finish date: January 31, 2017

Discussion: Group reads

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Group reads

* December 2025 group read - Winner!
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last updated Oct 15, 2025 10:39AM

* Oct 25: Murder Included (#1 D.I. Price) by Joanna Cannan
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What Members Thought

Jul 17, 2015 Judy rated it liked it

Just adding a note in January 2017 to the start of my review from 2015 to say I clearly liked this book more than I thought I did at the time, as I've gone on to read several more Rex Stout books since and now want to read them all! I also now love his writing style. The rest of this is my original review:

I'd heard good things about Rex Stout, but must admit I was rather disappointed with this book, the first in his classic series about overweight detective Nero Wolfe and his sidekick Archie Goo Just adding a note in January 2017 to the start of my review from 2015 to say I clearly liked this book more than I thought I did at the time, as I've gone on to read several more Rex Stout books since and now want to read them all! I also now love his writing style. The rest of this is my original review:

I'd heard good things about Rex Stout, but must admit I was rather disappointed with this book, the first in his classic series about overweight detective Nero Wolfe and his sidekick Archie Goodwin. My rating is really 2 1/2 stars, if anyone cares!

The 1930s New York setting immediately grabbed me, but quite a lot of the book is set within the house where Wolfe spends all his time, eating gargantuan meals and admiring his collection of orchids. I'll admit I found some of these sections rather boring and in general found it hard to warm to Wolfe and his roundabout style of conversation. For me the book comes alive when Archie goes out of the house and into the streets and speakeasies.

Archie's cynical first-person narrative contains some great one-liners, but overall the writing style is rather stodgy compared to Hammett or Chandler and sometimes gets a bit repetitive.

I've been told by Wolfe fans that this is one of the lesser books, so I may try another - but I do have some problems with this one which involve spoilers, detailed below.

(view spoiler)

...more

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Jun 18, 2023 Nanosynergy rated it really liked it

Shelves: mysteries-thrillers-espionage, series, fiction, british, fiction-1930s, 2023read

First book in the Nero Wolfe series.

1 like · Like · see review

Feb 25, 2012 Laura Anne rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Shelves: mystery, north-america, noir

The mystery plot plays second fiddle to the entertaining dialogues and characters. Didn't care for it enough to seek out the next book in the series, but I may have to re-watch the TV show with it's hyper color scheme. ...more

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