I need to start this essay with two apologies, one for the embarrassingly long hiatus since my last essay, and one for the fact that this essay is not about Ellery Queen.
1. I have been struggling with a variety of health problems since I broke my ankle last year. (I plan to celebrate the one-year anniversary by NOT BREAKING ANYTHING.) I don’t want to go into boring detail, but it’s been a year since I had an ordinary, restful night’s sleep without the use of prescription drugs. Ergo, it has gotten harder and harder to write (or to do much of anything else); these posts are one of the things that have suffered, and I apologize for that.
2. And I need to apologize for the fact that this essay is not about Ellery Queen. I’m not done writing about EQ by any means, but the mystery that’s been exercising my mind recently is The Skeleton in the Clock (1948) by a different Golden Age pseudonymous writer, Carter Dickson.
It’s hard to find a word to describe my relationship with dystopias. I don’t enjoy them, exactly. Or like them. Mesmerized is closer—and is certainly the exact truth for some moments in some dystopias, such as A Clockwork Orange or Lord of the Flies—but neglects the element of intellectual engagement without which I wouldn’t keep reading, see above re: enjoy. I’m going to go with fascinated.
This is the third in a series of posts by Sarah Monette on Ellery Queen. You can read the first two 
This is the second in a series of posts by Sarah Monette on Ellery Queen. You can read the first one 
The lovely people at Tor.com have agreed to let me play in their sandbox, but I thought before I start building castles, it would be polite to introduce myself, and, in progression, Ellery Queen.
