A Dram of Poison (1956), despite its serious
central situation, is a comic novel, with an unlikely set of characters uniting
in a common purpose and discovering in the process much that is admirable in
each other.[1]
Her Edgar award winning novel A Dram of Poison (1956), about a bottle of poison that inadvertently gets left on a bus, can't really be called a crime novel as I see it (there is really no intended crime to speak of)--though it certainly is suspenseful (and it was marketed as "a novel of suspense"). Rather, I find it simply a marvelously humanistic tale about the foibles of men and women.[2]
Here is the plot synopsis as noted in Mysterious
Press.
For fifty-five years,
Kenneth Gibson has lived in backwaters. A former army clerk, he makes a quiet
living teaching poetry to indifferent undergrads. His life is happily dull
until the day he meets Rosemary, a damaged girl whose frailty compels Kenneth
to try to make her well. They wed, and as Rosemary recovers from her
depression, Gibson falls in love, transforming his world. But his wife will
never love him.
She is smitten with
their landlord, a dashing young chemical engineer named Paul. Gibson wants to
let her go, but he cannot bear to be parted with the first love he has ever
known. In Paul’s house is a case of poison, and this love triangle can only end
in death.
In 2019, this story was optioned to Skalar, a German feature
film producer. After struggling to find financing, their efforts ground to a
halt in 2020 due to the COVID 19 pandemic and, in August 2021, they,
reluctantly abandoned their efforts. So, now rights to the property have
reverted to the author’s estate and are available to some other aspiring film
producer.
The dedication of this book arose when, at the last minute,
Armstrong remembered to dedicate the book to her housekeeper for her devoted
service to humor and joust with Armstrong’s elderly and frail father-in-law
living in the Lewi house.
[2]
The Passing Tramp, Aug 30, 2012
I am glad that publishers are paying attention to such gifted writers of previous decades as Ms. Armstrong. I have only read Seven Seats to the Moon, but look forward to reading many more.
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