Eunice Mays Boyd
Award Winning Author & An Inspiration to Betsy
The Legacy of Eunice Mays Boyd
Elizabeth Reed Aden’s literary accomplishments are intertwined with those of Eunice Mays Boyd, her godmother.
Elizabeth, or Betsy as she is known to friends, found sanctuary in Eunice’s Berkeley home during the student riots of 1969 in the “battle” for People’s Park. There she read a draft of Eunice’s last mystery, A Vacation to Kill For. Eunice was an award-winning mystery writer during the Golden Age of Agatha Christie. Her books were intelligent, cozy whodunnit murder mysteries with many twists and turns. Watching Eunice go through the process of writing ultimately inspired Betsy to write her debut novel, The Goldilocks Genome (SparkPress/May 21, 2024), a medical thriller based on her deep knowledge of the pharmaceutical industry.
When preparing her mother’s house for an estate sale, Elizabeth found additional cozy mystery books that Eunice had written, each with a female hero. Wanting to honor her godmother, who died in 1970, she obtained the rights to publish the four new mysteries written between 1945-1970 and to republish Eunice’s other books including the award-winning mystery Murder Breaks Trail, all from the 1940’s set in Alaska featuring F. Millard Smythe. The new books are: Dune House (2021), Slay Bells (2021), A Vacation to Kill For (2023), and One Paw Was Red (ca. 2027). The republished works are: Murder Breaks Trail (1943/2024), Doom in the Midnight Sun (1944/2024/2025), and Murder Wears Mukluks (ca. 2026), all of which will be published by Level Best Books in 2024. She collaborated with other Berkeley mystery writers and Anthony Boucher in writing The Marble Forest which was made into the movie Macabre in 1955.
Discovering Eunice’s New Mysteries
Read how Eunice’s novels were discovered & are being published
Vintage Mysteries
Classics from the Golden Age by Eunice Mays Boyd
with Elizabeth Reed Aden
PUBLISHED BY LEVEL BEST BOOKS
A VACATION TO KILL FOR
with Elizabeth Reed Aden
written ca. 1968-1970
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F. Millard Smyth Award Winning Mysteries
The Award Winning Alaska Mysteries with F. Millard Smyth
MURDER BREAKS TRAIL
by Eunice Mays Boyd
Originally published by Farrar Rinehart, 1943
Republishing in 2024
DOOM IN THE
MIDNIGHT SUN
by Eunice Mays Boyd
Originally published by Farrar Rinehart, 1944
Republishing in 2024/2025
MURDER WEARS
MUKLUKS
by Eunice Mays Boyd
Originally published by Farrar Rinehart, 1945 and republished by Dell Publishing, 1948
Republishing in the future
Illustrative Cover
ONE PAW WAS RED
by Eunice Mays Boyd
with Elizabeth Reed Aden
written ca. 1947
Coming 2024
Eunice & The Marble Forest
About The Marble Forest
How long could a four-year-old girl live buried in a casket? The man on the phone said five hours, maybe six.
Dr. Barret had known that there were those in Red Forks who disliked him, but only a madman would have tried to strike at him through Midget. Telling Dr. Barratt that his daughter was buried alive in the cemetery might have been a trick, but as he dug frantically, a pattern appeared. And as the story flashes back to the lives of the people in whose graves he is hunting, and they tell their tales the jigsaw of his horrifying puzzle fits together bit by bit.
This is a high-tension and frightening mystery, unusual in concept, express-train fast, and genuinely different.
The Marble Forest was made into the movie Macabre (1958)
Dedication in The Marble Forest
Theo Durrant dedicate this book to the twelve who have recalled me to life: Terry Adler, Anthony Boucher, Eunice Mays Boyd, Florence Ostern Faulkner, Allen Hymson, Cary Lucas, Dana Lyon, Lenore Glen Offord, Virginia Rath, Richard Shattuck, Darwin L. Teilhet & William Worley.
“…whether or not they ever discover the committers of this crime matters little to me now, for I, before the whole world, announce my innocence…” (my words on the scaffold)
Review of The Marble Forest
BY THEO DURRANT ‧ RELEASE DATE: FEB. 5, 1950
Agrim graveyard tryst in which Rod Barratt, attempting to find his little girl who had been kidnapped and buried alive in a stolen casket, spends a long night in the cemetery, opening up graves. And as their tenants speak, a ghost town comes to life, as do the scandals of the past. There is Doc Whittleby, distorted by his wife’s infidelity; Donna Parks, the young girl he helped to kill; Barratt’s wife, prim and protected; Tyloe, the chief of police, who had driven his sister into marriage with the local undertaker from which she could only escape in death; etc., etc. And from the cemetery to the funeral parlor and back again, Barratt’s desperate search is finally rewarded with the rescue of his child and an exposure of crazed hatreds. Strong stuff- for a carrion trade.
–Kirkus Reviews (1950)