This was my first experience reading this author. Competent short stories, some very good.
The author has a knack for creating a mood and for creating an arc of tension and release. See for example the short story "Rain" where the reader really feels the smothering monsoon on the islands of Samoa, or see the story "P.&O." with its atmosphere of genuine foreboding as one of the main characters lies ill in a ship's sick bay, but then an expiation and release of that tension as the story's central character puts her own mind right about a past wrong done to her.
Finally, an auxiliary benefit to readers: we get a well-fleshed out picture of the British Empire in the early 20th century. If we had to name this era, maybe we could call it "post-peak UK." It was a time of clear class distinctions, obvious-but-unwritten proprieties and competent English functionality worldwide: on transcontinental train trips, on multi-week steamer passages--wherever the "sun never set." The modern reader gets the feeling that back then life maybe wasn't all that fair, but at least you knew how to behave.
The Letter
A "cluster B" woman murders a man in British colonial-era Singapore and nearly gets away with it.
The Verger
A church caretaker gets fired from his job as verger of St. Peter's Church when found out as illiterate. He then starts up a chain of tobacco stores--thanks to an idea that struck him while walking home after losing his position!--and gets rich. The irony here was that had he actually learned to read and write, he'd still be working as a church caretaker...
The Vessel of Wrath
An unexpectedly good story here: an uptight missionary tames an uncouth man into a good husband.
The Hairless Mexican
A sort of World War 1-era spy story in the style of John Buchan, with an underlying theme of the northern European's conflicted feelings of jealousy and condescension toward Latin culture.
Mr. Harrington's Washing
Another Ashenden story like "The Hairless Mexican": here the main character is suddenly far more self-possessed, it's a bit of a shock to the reader who just finished the prior story. This is about an American who is rigid about a lot of things and can't handle the fact that he's in Russia during a revolution, where things are nowhere near as safe or orderly as he thinks.
Red
A really sad, engrossing story about the idealization of young love, and how it all falls apart as you get old. Striking here to see the word "chink" used openly in a story, even with a capitalized C ("...the Chink brought them a cup of tea.")
Mr. Know-All
Cute story about a blowhard who protects a woman by deliberately losing a bet about whether her pearls were real.
The Alien Corn
Ferdy Habenstein, a Jew in London society, who is a little too Jewishy according to all the other Jews in the same social circles, all of whom want to play down their Jewishness to blend in. If you linked to this story today, you'd lose your Adidas contract overnight.
The Book-Bag
About an English sister and brother on the Malaysian peninsula; an absolutely creepy-as-fuck story about incest.
The Round Dozen
A cute, forgettable story about a sneaky little bigamist.
The Voice of the Turtle
The narrator, an author, takes another author under his wing, introduces her to a famous, insufferable prima donna. "I thought then I would sooner have her as she was, with her monstrous faults... She was hateful, of course, but she was irresistible." This book offers readers a truth bomb that will save a lot of time. "I have learnt by experience that when a book makes a sensation it is just as well to wait a year before you read it. It is astonishing how many books then you need not read at all."
The Facts of Life
A father comes to grips with the idea that all the rules he wants his son to follow don't really apply at all.
Lord Mountdrago
A Poe-like story where a gifted psychoanalyst meets with an important member of England's government to help him with increasingly horrifying dreams. "Punctuality is a compliment you pay to the intelligent and a rebuke you administer to the stupid."
The Colonel's Lady
An English gentleman's loveless marriage is upended when his wife publishes a very successful book of poetry about a love affair. It turns out she's got a lot more depth to her than he realized.
The Treasure
An English gentleman hires a housemaid... and I don't want to give away any more. There's an excellent tension in the story, and it's one of the best of the book.
Rain
Really interesting morality tale with a twist ending: sin and seduction wins out as a prostitute seduces a minister on the eve of redeeming herself; another story featuring a well-constructed atmosphere and well-managed tension.
P. & O.
A woman, seeking a divorce from her husband during his midlife crisis, lets go of her anger and resentment, as a young Irishman on her ship dies suddenly and unexpectedly.
To Read:
Rosmersholm (play) by Henrik Ibsen
Of Human Bondage by Somerset Maugham:
The Ashenden stories by Somerset Maugham:
The short stories of de Maupassant