Lately I’ve been watching the A&E Nero Wolfe mysteries, and, having so far not read this particular book, I have a question about the end of the story called Over My Dead Body.
What I’m wondering is how the character known throughout most of the story as Neya Tormic is killed at the end of the book. Was she shot by Archie, killed by the beer bottle blows delivered by Wolfe, or did she fall on the dagger? The final scene in the movie was rather frenetic and it’s unclear to me just how she is supposed to have died.
Thanks in advance for any answers as it may be a while before I get back to the board.
I inadvertently double-posted this thread when it didn’t show up at first. I’ve PM’d twickster and asked her to ether merge the two threads or delete one if no answers have been posted yet. My apologies for any confusion. (I’ll post this message in the other thread as well.)
I’ve never seen the TV show, and I don’t know what the producers were intending – perhaps they were deliberately trying to be ambiguous? – but in the book Archie makes it perfectly clear that she’d killed by the beer bottles that Wolfe is wielding.
Ah, just in time. Thanks. I was just getting ready to call it a night.
To describe the scene in the movie, Neya Tormic came running into Wolfe’s office trailed by Archie and some cops. As she ran toward Wolfe’s desk he grabbed the beer bottles and spun around in his chair to face her. She ran up to where he was sitting in his chair, and while standing erect right in front of him raised the dagger high above her head as though to try to plunge it all the way in. The camera then cuts to Archie who is pointing a gun at Neya and then back to Neya and Wolfe, only now Neya’s head is at the level of Wolfe’s chest and he breaks the beer bottles over her head. Archie then runs up and looks down at Neya and she is lying there dead with her eyes open and a relatively peaceful expression on her face for someone killed in the midst of a murderous attack by being hit over the head with a couple of beer bottles.
So it looked to me like she must have been shot and then collapsed, dying instantly and enabling Wolfe to strike her with the bottles. It’s never made clear how she went from standing at full height in front of him with the knife raised high above her head to bent over in front him so that he could hit her with the beer bottles. But the gunshot didn’t seem plausible either because no shot could be heard. So I guess then what must have happened is that she somehow managed to miss Wolfe when she came down with the knife even though she was standing right in front of him at the time, making it possible for him to strike her with the bottles.
I would suggest that if you like the Nero Wolfe books, you take a look at these shows. They were brilliantly executed with superb production values and a recurring ensemble cast of very good actors - Timothy Hutton, Kari Matchett and Francie Swift in particular. The only odd note is the portrayal of Wolfe himself. As played by Maury Chaykin (RIP), Wolfe behaves quite a bit differently from the literary Wolfe. He is petulant and grouchy and much more active physically than the the Wolfe of the books who hardly moves a muscle when sitting at his desk. And he delivers most of his lines in a sort of boistrous growl. At first I found this off-putting but after you get used to it, it’s really a more entertaining type of Wolfe than the literary Wolfe would have been if portrayed accurately onscreen.
The show only ran for two seasons before A&E discontinued it as being too expensive to continue to produce. DVD’s of all the shows produced are available for purchase through Amazon or on loan through Netflix.
Anyway, I’m calling it a night now. Thanks again for providing the answer.
Just to follow up on gregoriai’s post, here’s an excerpt from the book:
“I do not know how Wolfe did it and I never will know, though he has kindly explained it to me several times. He says that when he heard the commotion in the hall he stiffened into attention, which is the most incredible part of it; that when he saw her leaping in with the dagger flashing he grabbed a beer bottle with each hand; that when she was upon him he struck simultaneously with both hands, with his left at her descending wrist and with his right at anything at all. I don’t know. I do know that something broke her right wrist and something cracked her skull.”
For those unfamiliar with the Nero Wolfe series, the books are narrated in the first person by Archie Goodwin, Wolfe’s assistant.
A lot of people underestimate Wolfe physically. Yeah, he’s fat. But he’s not an invalid. He doesn’t do much physically by choice, not necessity. If you really want to see Wolfe breaking out of this stereotype, read “The Black Mountain”.
What’s funny is that when I saw there was a reply after I posted, my first thought was that someone had brought up the one where he goes underground to get Zeck…
Wolfe is also pretty active in the novella, Not Quite Dead Enough, at least until Archie convinces him to sit down and get back to work. Granted, he’s not quite as active as in ITBF, but if Archie hadn’t stopped him, who knows?
Thanks, KittenKat, for the excerpt, and everyone else for your comments and suggestions. I’ve heard of the Zeck books but just haven’t read any of them yet. I’m only about five books into the series right now.
Ah, a newcomer to Wolfe. Are you trying to read them in order, or just as you come upon them? A lot of Wolfe aficionados recommend that first time readers wait until they’ve read (substantially) all the other books before reading A Family Affair, the last Wolfe book Stout wrote.
I’ve been reading them as I come upon them, but after five books I’ve decided to start reading them in order. The last of the five I’ve read, Fer-de-Lance and The League of Frightened Men, are numbers one and two in the series. So I’m off to a pretty good start, having read only three books out of sequence.
And thanks for the advice on A Family Affair. I’ll be sure to save it for last.
Exactly. Wolfe is actually a better cook than Fritz, but he has Fritz on staff because there are certain things that only Wolfe can do. Wolfe COULD go out and do the legwork that Archie does, and do it better than Archie or even Saul Panzer could, but that would involve physical activity, and also it would mean that he wouldn’t be able to spend as much time on doing stuff that only he can do. He would also rather read, mess with his orchids, and eat than to do a lot of physical activity. But he’s actually physically capable of a lot more than his normal activity.
A nice thing about the series is that each story is pretty much self contained, so if they get read out of order it’s no big deal. The only mild exceptions are the Zeck books (And be a Villain, The Second Confession, and In The Best Families), and the pair Too Many Cooks and A Right to Die. Reading the Zeck books in order allows one to see the growing antagonism between Wolfe and Zeck. A character from TMC comes back in ARtD. It’s a little weird because the character has aged around 30 years (TMC was written in the '30s and ARtD was written in the '60s), but Wolfe and Archie haven’t aged.
What makes you think Wolfe is a better cook than Fritz? While Wolfe is certainly shown as being competent in the kitchen, I can’t think of anything in the corpus to indicate that his culinary skills are superior.
Some Buried Caesar introduces Lily Rowan, but it’s only the sixth book, so it’s not like a reader is going to have a long series of novels that act like Lily doesn’t exist…only five. And I think SA has mentioned that he’s already read the first five, so he should be on SBC, anyway.
ETA: I see on review that he’s read five, not necessarily the first five. Not a big deal, since SA is going to start reading in order now.
EATA: Incidentally, the “Wolfe at the county/state fair” scenes in Some Buried Caesar are treasures…
On the question of Wolfe’s fitness, I dont think Stout is a writer who understands fitness at all. Archie is supposed to be a tough guy, but his heaviest workout typically involves walking a few blocks. He outfights just about anyone who gets physical in Wolfe’s office, which is just not very credible. Archie does dance a lot but there’s no mention of strengthening exercises or martial arts practice. Wolfe is repeatedly described as physically inactive, needing the elevator to get up to the plant rooms, finding standing up for any length of time to be very uncomfortable. He’s not fit at all.
Contrast Robert Parker’s Spenser, an ex-pro fighter who is shown throughout the series to work out regularly in a gym, including weight lifting and hitting a heavy bag, running several miles several times a week … when Spenser beats someone else up, it seems quite credible.
