First, there are two seemingly unrelated events: the murder of a constable in pursuit of a diamond thief and the attempt to poison a potter by using arsenic. The connection lies in the presence of Dr.
Thorndykes former student, who happened to find the constable body and served as the consulting physician of the potter. His inquiries results in the discovery of the real felon while the secret is concealed in the hideous figurine of a stoneware monkey.
The Stoneware Monkey has everything that weve come to expect from a Thorndyke novel a highly complex and creative murder, a damsel in distress, telltale fingerprints, chemical analysis, brilliant theorizing by Thorndyke, faulty thinking by everyone else, and a dramatic surprise ending.