Murder in February

HOME SWEET HOMICIDE-- Craig Rice-- Simon & Schuster ($2). The three active children of mystery-writing Marian Carstairs were practically in at the death when murder came next door, and in their own inimitable fashion pointed out the solution to a brace of long-suffering detectives. You may forget the murder while you laugh at the kids, but from all angles it's about the best bet of the year.

THE DELICATE APE-- Dorothy B. Hughes --Duell, Sloan & Pearce ($2.50). Piers Hunt, field assistant to the murdered Secretary of Peace in a postwar Cabinet, dodges death just long enough to thwart the schemes of the "delicate apes" of diplomacy to bring on another world war. Imaginative, melodramatic, continuously suspenseful. An unusually effective tour de force.

LET THE SKELETONS RATTLE-- Frederick C. Davis-- Crime Club ($2). The arrival of newlywed Criminologist Hatch and his bride in a sleepy Pennsylvania village precipitates a hecatomb. Four murders and two natural deaths, all linked in the same grisly puzzle, make it a real busman's honeymoon. A shrewdly plotted and super-shivery affair, with logical detecting and a leaven of dese-dose-&-dem humor.

HE WOULDN'T KILL PATIENCE-- Carter Dickson -- Morrow ($2). A variation, with herpetological trimmings, on the time-honored "sealed room" puzzle. Sir Henry Merrivale is the gustily amusing detective, and two young magicians supply a Montague-and-Capulet romance and divulge some interesting secrets of their craft. The solution of the central problem is disgustingly simple, but takes a deal of guessing.

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