Room 13

Preface by Giancarlo Rossini

Preface by Giancarlo Rossini

Johnny Gray has been chilled for a few months. He, like all prisoners, professes himself innocent, but how many guys in the cool are really so? Peter Kane was a thief, now happy to be retired, whose only concern is his beloved daughter Marney who, shortly, will marry the Canadian officer, Captain Floyd. Johnny Gray wants to find who framed him and still loves the beautiful Marney. Peter Kane will be caught, along with Johnny, in a fake money story. Emmanuel Legge wants to take revenge on Peter Kane because, according to him, it is he who framed him, sentencing him to fourteen years in prison. Jeff Legge, Emmanuel's son, turns out to be Major Floyd. Jeff Legge will be shot in the back in room thirteen, but he is saved. But who shot? And there is a great forger, among the protagonists, who will it be? Room 13 is reminiscent of a noir book, without being one, but also a classic thriller, without being.

The narrative is tied around the plot and the characters are in no way characterized. The motivations that push the characters to action are superficial and, at times, very implausible. The only sentiment Wallace seems to recognize as a valid motive for evil is revenge.

He, in fact, is the singer of this sad, albeit popular, characteristic trait of some human beings: Gray wants to take revenge on whoever framed him, just as Jeff Legge wants to take revenge on whoever made his father suffer and Emmanuel Legge, father of Jeff, in turn, wants to take revenge on Peter Kane who, according to the law, had cheated him while the thief Fenner wants to take revenge on Emmanuel Legge because he had framed him.

All a turn in such a way that each character has a solid motive when, in reality, it is all a bit forced, mechanical and very unlikely, both in terms of abstract motivations for acting and concrete ones.

We are dealing with a good book, from the point of view of the history of detective literature, for a book that is neither noir nor "classic" thriller despite having many qualities of both but not their distinctive peculiarities: it will take a little more evolution to separate the two narrative strands.