CLUBHOUSE: Guest Review: The Connecticut Gumshoe Trilogy by Randy McCharles

OBIR: Occasional Biased and Ignorant Reviews reflecting this reader’s opinion.

CLUBHOUSE GUEST REVIEW – by Arlene F. Marks.

THE CONNECTICUT GUMSHOE TRILOGY – by Randy McCharles

The novels: A Connecticut Gumshoe in King Arthur’s Court, A Connecticut Gumshoe in Sherwood Forest , and A Connecticut Gumshoe in the Cavern of the Weird Sisters

Publisher: Tyche Books (www.TycheBooks.com). Calgary, Alberta. Published Feb. 2021, August 2021, and Oct. 2022.

Editorial by: M.L.D. Curelas

Interior Layout by: Ryah Deines and M.L.D. Curelas

Cover Art and Layout by: Indigo Chick Designs

I love a well-written reimagining. Not a simple homage or retelling of an iconic story, but rather, a mind-bending revision that puts an author’s unique twist on an already entrenched narrative. Among the ones I’ve enjoyed in the past are Not Wanted on the Voyage by Timothy Findley (his own take on the Noah’s Ark tale), Sherwood by Parke Godwin (Robin Hood, unromanticized), and Nova by Samuel R. Delany (Moby Dick as space opera). I’ve even contributed a story of my own to an anthology of reimagined fairy tales.

Years ago, I also read and enjoyed A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court, by Mark Twain. So, I was curious to see what sort of spin Randy McCharles would put on a reimagining so established that it was considered to be a classic literary work on its own. I was pleased to discover that his Connecticut Gumshoe trilogy takes Twain’s work and kicks it up a level by blending it with reimaginations of other classic tales, two per book, linking them together into a single, overarching storyline. That the originals are well known makes it difficult to avoid spoilers. Then again, does the term “spoilers” even apply when the source material is such well-trodden ground?

I’ll do my best.

Twain’s book posits a contemporary man magically transported to Camelot and using Yankee ingenuity to solve Arthurian problems. McCharles is a crime and mystery writer, so it makes sense that his time traveller would be a detective. But not just any detective. He’s Sam Sparrow, a second-rate PI with trust issues who idolizes Humphrey Bogart in all the tough-guy-hero roles he’s played and yearns to be like one of them. The only Bogie film Sam hasn’t seen is The Maltese Falcon.

This detail is important. Conscripted by Merlin to fill in for him in Arthur’s castle when the wizard is called away, Sam instinctively assumes an alias, and it’s Sam Spade—presciently, as it turns out, since he soon finds himself embroiled in a case that strongly resembles Dashiell Hammett’s famous novel. Being ignorant of its plot and characters means that Sam has no idea what to expect, and any familiarity the reader might have with the story is offset by the suspense of watching this fish-out-of-water navigate his way through it, using Bogart’s hard-boiled detective skills.

But that’s just the first half of the book. After being returned to Connecticut, Sam is summoned back to Camelot, this time to resolve a matter lifted from Arthurian legend. The Arthurian tales have been rendered so often and in so many different ways that there is no “right” version of the story. As a result, the author’s imagination is free to play. Sam returns as Sam Spade to a now-familiar setting and a cast of characters who remember and either like or dislike him, and it’s the reader who has no idea what to expect.

McCharles must have had a lot of fun writing this. The narration is from Sam’s point of view and sounds as if it comes straight out of a detective novel from the 1940s or 50s. Meanwhile, the denizens of Camelot communicate with a kind of language that popular culture has trained us to expect from that time period—a mixture of stilted, formal syntax and modern-day conversational English. They also, with some exceptions, understand Sam’s tough-guy vernacular quite well (or at least, aren’t offended by it), and this is a good thing. If every slang word he uttered were questioned and had to be explained, the story would creep along at a snail’s pace. Instead, it races along in a Medieval-ish environment that McCharles brings to life with considerable skill and attention to detail. To paraphrase something Shacklebolt says of Dumbledore in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, “The man has style.”

In a word, A Connecticut Gumshoe in King Arthur’s Court is a romp. It’s well conceived, well written, laced with humour, suspense, and pop culture allusions, and immensely entertaining to read. It stands alone nicely, if the reader stops there. However, it’s actually the overture to a much larger story.

The second part of the trilogy, A Connecticut Gumshoe in Sherwood Forest, keeps the promise made by the inclusion of Friar Tuck and Robin of Locksley in the first novel. In book 1, when Sam returns to Camelot after six months in the real world, he finds that six years have passed, and these two characters have already begun evolving into the figures of legend. Tuck is no longer a skinny young monk but rather a portly, mead-loving friar; and Robin has grown from a castle page running errands to a squire from Nottinghamshire training with the bow and the sword. In book 2, it’s years later again. Tuck is balding as well as rotund. Robin is a knight and expert archer heading up a band of outlaws. Camelot has fallen, its very existence obliterated by Arthur’s enemies, and magic is gone from the land. (Oh, come on, you knew all that already, right?)

Having stumbled back into Robin’s England while searching for Nora Clark, his missing partner, Sam throws in with his old friends and makes a bunch of new ones. He also spars with some old enemies, carried over from his cases in Camelot. There is treachery afoot — it seems Prince John is plotting to usurp King Richard’s place on the throne. How he plans to do it is a mystery, and solving mysteries is right up Sam’s alley, so as long as he’s in the neighbourhood… sure, why not?

This time, the English legend merges with the plot and characters of another hard-boiled detective novel and the resulting tale is narrated from the point of view of another of Bogart’s famous tough-guy screen characters, Philip Marlowe from The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler. Once again, the pace is lively, there’s plenty of suspense, and nods to modern popular culture abound.


This pattern continues in the third book, A Connecticut Gumshoe in the Cavern of the Weird Sisters, which was inspired not only by Shakespeare’s Macbeth but also by the movie Casablanca and another of Bogart’s famous portrayals, nightclub owner Rick Blaine. As before, Sam takes over the role when he is coerced by the “weird sisters” into furthering General Macbeth’s royal ambitions by starting up and running a nightclub. I laughed out loud when I read that, but considering who’s cast as one of the witches and how lucrative nightclub ownership can be, it’s not that far-fetched an idea. And since doing the sisters’ bidding is the price of Sam’s return home, he has no choice but to give it a go.

McCharles’s choice to pair Macbeth with Casablanca is interesting. Unlike King Arthur and Robin Hood, both legendary figures who may or may not have existed, Macbeth was a real person, and some of the events that transpire in Shakespeare’s play of that name are part of recorded history. However, Shakespeare had to make some alterations to the factual account, not only to improve the story as a piece of theatre but also to keep his head attached to his body.

Here is the story that I learned and then taught to my students: It seems the person occupying the English throne at that time, King James I, claimed to trace his lineage back to Banquo, believed to have been Macbeth’s co-conspirator in the assassination of King Duncan of Scotland. Since King James was the patron of Shakespeare’s acting company, every play they mounted was first performed at court, and representing His Highness’s ancestor onstage right in front of him as a traitor would almost certainly have cost the playwright his life. So, Shakespeare revised the tale. He made Banquo one of the good guys and Macbeth solely responsible for Duncan’s death. He also portrayed it as a much worse crime than it actually had been: no longer a killing on the battlefield, it became the cold-blooded murder of a guest by his host, committed while Duncan was sleeping under Macbeth’s own roof.

Macbeth’s monstrous betrayal of Duncan’s trust echoes another betrayal, the one from Sam’s past that shaped him into the man we first meet in book 1. The way Sam reacts to and deals with Macbeth’s treachery in book 3 provides a satisfying bookend to a major theme in the trilogy.

Conclusion:

To say more would be spoilers, so I’ll sum up with this: I hugely enjoyed reading all three of the Connecticut Gumshoe books and recommend them to anyone who likes a masterfully-wrought detective story. Book 1 is a romp, book 2 an adventure, and book 3 a tale of intrigue and suspense. Each installment can stand on its own, but together they are much more than the sum of their parts and well worth a reader’s time and attention.

About the Guest Reviewer:

Arlene F. Marks has been a professional writer, editor, and educator for going on fifty years. Since retiring from the classroom, she has written and had published several short stories and 21 books, including two literacy programs, a collection of stories containing a 2022 Year’s Best Canadian SF Novella, and 13 speculative fiction novels. She has two more books coming out in 2025 from Brain Lag Books:  The Stragori Deception (January 31) and a paranormal mystery, Remains To Be Seen (July). For more information and to view her portfolio, visit her website: www.thewritersnest.ca

Find “Connecticut Gumshoe (1)” < in King Aurthur’s Court >

Find “Connecticut Gumshoe (2)” < in Sherwood-Forest >

Find “Connecticut Gumshoe (3)” < In the Cavern of the Weird Sisters >

Please take a moment to support Amazing Stories with a one-time or recurring donation via Patreon. We rely on donations to keep the site going, and we need your financial support to continue quality coverage of the science fiction, fantasy, and horror genres as well as supply free stories weekly for your reading pleasure. https://www.patreon.com/amazingstoriesmag

Loading comments from Bluesky post
Previous Article

Amazing News: Where Is It Safe To Host A Worldcon?

Next Article

Speaking Bear Leader’s Quest by James R. Hardin – FREE STORY

You might be interested in …