Undisputed Classic 1

American Mystery Classic with a Series Character. When the creator of Charlie Chan, Earl Derr Biggers, died in 1933, the editor of the Saturday Evening Post, the biggest player in magazine fiction and the highest payer of writers, asked author John P. Marquand to develop an Oriental detective to replace Chan in the hearts and minds of Americans that wanted to read the adventures of an Asian detective. Marquand wrote six novels starring Kentaro Moto, from 1935 to 1957. The novels inspired Hollywood to yellowface poor Peter Lorre in eight Moto movies between 1937 and 1939. When asked how he could handle such a grueling pace of work, Lorre replied, deadpan no doubt, “I had to take a lot of drugs.”

Your Turn, Mr. Moto - John P. Marquand

In this 1935 mystery Marquand sought to mine the gold field of public interest in current events in a simmering East Asia. China was popular at the time with Lin Yutang’s engaging books, Pearl Buck’s best- selling novels such as The Good Earth, and an oriental detective like Earl Derr Biggers’ Charlie Chan.

Writers exploit their own experience so Marquand used impressions he had gained in a tour of the Far East and - voila! -  developed the character Mr. Moto, man of the world and runner of spies for the Nipponese emperor. Mr. Moto believes in his divine cause though he wishes some of his compatriots were less brutal in their imperialism. What a liberal. The enigmatic Moto entangles a washed-up Navy flyer Casey Jones in an interesting afterthought of a plot.

The interest of this novel lies in the characters, the evocation of China, and Marquand’s smooth elegant style. Marquand’s WWI was an operative in military intelligence so he has an insider's sense of the moral squalor of spying, which will call to mind Maugham’s Ashenden and Graham Greene, though he lacks the grit and action of Eric Ambler's novels written in the 1930s.

I'm glad I read it but then I'm glad to read anything to do with Nationalist China in the 1930s. Don't be put off by the antique stereotypes. Never say never say when it comes to personal names, but the fact is that Moto is unlikely to stand on its own as a surname – it is usually the second character in a Japanese surname as in 山本 Yamamoto, 松本 Matsumoto, 橋本 Hashimoto, or 坂本 Sakamoto.