At the heart of The Murderer Is a Fox lies a puzzle to be solved, and as in all Queen's work the solution to the puzzle necessitates the development of a complex plot. The plot in this novel involves Queen in a detailed reconstruction of the events of the day, twelve years earlier, that Jessica Fox died. Still true to the tradition of empirical thought, Ellery conscientiously considers all the evidence, both the remaining physical evidence and the testimony of those present at the time of Jessica's death in order to arrive at the solution to the case. Given that the crime under investigation occurred twelve years earlier, the novel, to be successful, requires that the past be convincingly recreated. Such a recreation demands a fair measure of skill, for should the characters remember the past too clearly and precisely, the reader will feel that the novel lacks...