The Man Who Killed Houdini--an Investigation.

The Man Who Killed Houdini--An Investigation

Don Bell

Vehicule Press

Montreal, Canada

www.vehiculepress.com; [e-mail]

dist. in U.S. by Independent Publishers Group

800-888-4741; [e-mail].

ISBN 1550651870 $17.95 260 pp.

Houdini died of a ruptured appendix nine days after being sharply punched in his stomach by a man named J. Gordon Whitehead. At the time, the connection between the punch and Houdini's death was debatable; as it was debated with respect to the payment of Houdini's life insurance. The incident was witnessed by two individuals; Whitehead had disappeared. The experienced eclectic Canadian writer Bell (d. 2003) has been investigating facts and theories concerning Houdini's death for the past 20 years. One of the most tantalizing theories is that Houdini was the victim of a "spiritualist contract killing." This is based on the growing tensions between popular spiritualists and Houdini, who at times went out of his way to expose their artifices. Bell was able to interview survivors who had some connection to the incident of the fierce blow Houdini received and its aftermath. In a popular work that is absorbing from first to last, Bell revives the mystique of Houdini in recounting known facts and his own long, methodical investigation of circumstances surrounding his strange, untimely death.