"The First Genuine Locked-Room Mystery"

THE BIG BOW MYSTERY.
By Israel Zangwill.
Henry Publishers. 1892.

"To dash a half-truth in the world's eyes is the surest way of blinding it altogether."

The Rap Sheet Blog (August 8, 2008) features a review of Israel Zangwill's book by an author who has used Zangwill as a character in some of his own novels: 

It wraps us in fog and sets us down in the mean streets of Jack the Ripper's London, complete with a freshly cut throat. It offers humor and pathos, a whiff of Dickens, and a skillful locked-room mystery.

Several other reviews can be found on the GAD Wiki.
BIG BOW is readily available on Project Gutenberg.

THE VERDICT, a fascinating movie version featuring the great Sydney Greenstreet and Peter Lorre, was released in 1946.

Category: Detective fiction