I agree with your comments listed above. This is Earl Derr Biggers at his best. His attention to location detail made Old Hawaii come alive for me. 84 years after the original release of the book, one can still find many of the sites mentioned in the novel, i.e. Honolulu Harbor, the old hotel on Fort Street, Royal Hawaiian Hotel, the old Police Dept building, etc.
After reading this novel, one can see elements of character development and story structure in the Chan films that followed "The Black Camel."
For example, in the films, there is usually a rich playboy type romancing some pretty young thing. And there's usually a character pretending to be somebody else.
From time to time, when Charlie is about to reveal a clue to a gathered group of suspects, the lights go off in the room. When the lights come back on, the clue is gone and somebody is lying on the floor. In "The Black Camel," it's Inspector Chan who's been knocked to the floor. Am I right?
For Chan fans, it should be required reading to read "The Black Camel" (1929). Of the six Chan novels, this may be the darkest story of them all.
