A blunder at the right moment is better than cleverness at the wrong time.

Among the most famous of her mystery novels were the Fleming Stone Detective Stories which—according to Allen J. Her first book At the Sign of the Sphinx (1896) was a collection of charades. According to her autobiography The Rest of My Life (1937) around 1910 Carolyn Wells heard one of Anna Katherine Green's mystery novels being read aloud and was immediately captivated by the unravelling of the puzzle.

She died at the Flower-Fifth Avenue Hospital in New York City in 1942. and Anna Wells. Born in Rahway New Jersey Carolyn Wells was the daughter of William E.