Works by
Thorne Smith
(Aka J. Thorne Smith Jr.)
(Writer)
[March 27, 1892 -- June 21, 1934]

Children

• Lazy Bear Lane (1931)

Collections

• The Thorne Smith 3-Decker (1933)
  Includes The Stray Lamb, Turnabout, and Rain

Novels

1. Bats in the Belfry (1942) with Norman H. Matson
   Posthumously published sequel to The Passionate Witch.

2. The Passionate Witch (1941) with Norman H. Matson
   Posthumously published.
   Movie: I Married a Witch (1942)

3. Glorious Pool (1934)

4. Rain in the Doorway (1933)

5. Skin and Bones (1933)

6. The Bishop's Jaegers (1932)

7. Topper Takes a Trip (1932)
   The beloved characters -- mortal and immorta -- of Topper return in this uproarious romp through the south of France. One of Thorne Smith's best-loved comedies, it proves once again that he is the undisputed master of urbane wit and sophisticated repartee.
   
   Cosmo Topper, the mild-mannered bank manager who was persuaded to take a walk on the wild side by the ghosts of George and Marion Kerby in Topper, finds himself reunited with his dyspeptic wife for an extended vacation on the Riviera. But he doesn't have long to enjoy the peace and quiet before the irrepressible Kerbys materialize once again and start causing fracases, confusing the citizenry, alarming the gendarmes, getting naked, and turning every occasion into revelry or melee. Soon Marion decides that Topper as a ghost would be even more laughs than Topper in the flesh. And all she needs to arrange is one simple little murder.  Sequel to Topper.

8. The Night Life of the Gods (1931)
   Thorne Smith's rapid-fire dialogue, brilliant sense of the absurd, and literary aplomb put him in the same category as the beloved P. G. Wodehouse. The Night Life of the Gods--the madcap story of a scientist who instigates a nocturnal spree with the Greek gods--is arguably his most sparkling comedic achievement.
   
   Hunter Hawk has a knack for annoying his ultrarespectable relatives. He likes to experiment and he particularly likes to experiment with explosives. His garage-cum-laboratory is a veritable minefield, replete with evil-smelling clouds of vapor through which various bits of wreckage and mysteriously bubbling test tubes are occasionally visible.
   
   With the help of Megaera, a fetching nine-hundred-year-old lady leprechaun he meets one night in the woods, he masters the art (if not the timing) of transforming statues into people. And when he practices his new witchery in the stately halls of the Metropolitan Museum of Art -- setting Bacchus, Mercury, Neptune, Diana, Hebe, Apollo, and Perseus loose on the unsuspecting citizenry of Prohibition-era New York--the stage is set for Thorne Smith at his most devilish and delightful.

9. Turnabout (1931)
   Movie (1940)
   TV Series (1979)

10. Did She Fall? (1930)
    A mystery novel.

11. The Stray Lamb (1929)

12. Dream's End (1927, Copyright renewed 1955)

13. Topper (1926, Copyright renewed 1953)
    Thorne Smith is a master of urbane wit and sophisticated repartee. Topper, his best-known work, is the hilarious, ribald comedy on which the hit television show and movie (starring Cary Grant) were based.
    
    It all begins when Cosmo Topper, a law-abiding, mild-mannered bank manager, decides to buy a secondhand car, only to find it haunted by the ghosts of its previous owners--the reckless, feckless, frivolous couple who met their untimely demise when the car careened into an oak tree. The ghosts, George and Marion Kerby, make it their mission to rescue Topper from the drab "summer of suburban Sundays" that is his life -- and they commence a series of madcap adventures that leave Topper, and anyone else who crosses their path, in a whirlwind of discomfiture and delight.
    
    As enchanting today as it was when first published in 1926, Topper has set the standard in American pop culture for such mischievous apparitions as those seen in The Ghost and Mrs. Muir, Heaven Can Wait, Beetlejuice, and Bewitched.  See also Topper Takes a Trip.
    Movie (1937), Norman Z. McLeod, director with Cary Grant, Constance Bennett, and Roland Young  DVD  VHS
    Movie sequel: Topper Takes a Trip (1939), Norman Z. McLeod, director with Constance Bennett and Roland Young  VHS
    Movie sequel: Topper Returns (1941), Roy Del Ruth, director with Joan Blondell and Roland Young  DVD  VHS
    TV Series: The Adventures of Topper (1953+) with Leo G. Carroll, Robert Sterling, and Anne Jeffreys

    • Vol. 1, (DVD)

    • Vol. 2, (DVD)

Short Stories

• Biltmore Oswald: The Diary of a Hapless Recruit (1918)