Catherine Aird R.I.P.

I was deeply saddened to learn of the death yesterday, following a severe stroke, of Kinn McIntosh O.B.E., better known to crime readers as the Diamond Dagger winning author Catherine Aird. She was 94, born in the same year that the Detection Club, of which she was a loyal member for more than forty years, was founded. Catherine - I'll use that name in this post - is someone who has been a friend for more than thirty years. I always enjoyed her writing - in fact I read and reviewed Parting Breath on this blog just three weeks ago - but more than that, I had huge admiration and respect for her as a person.

As an author she will be remembered for twenty-six novels, almost all of them featuring her Calleshire cop DI Sloan, as well as a good many short stories. One of those stories, by the way, is due to appear in a forthcoming Detection Club anthology next March. Whenever I approached her with a view to writing a short story, she was always glad - and quick - to oblige. She really enjoyed the short form. Her fiction pays tribute to Golden Age traditions whilst remaining distinctive - and consistently witty.

I first met Catherine through the CWA, which she chaired for a year in 1990-1. She was a charming and supportive companion to her many friends and a leading figure in the Dorothy L. Sayers Society as well as in the Girl Guide movement. She suffered ill-health in her youth, and I think that health problems probably troubled her for the greater portion of her life. But she was uncomplaining and great fun. I have a prized photograph, taken by the Independent newspaper, of several of us, including Val McDermid, Chaz Brenchley, and Catherine, wandering around under Brighton pier during a CWA conference. Another treasured memory is of spending a good deal of time with her during the 2015 CrimeFest at Bristol, when she was a guest of honour. We were on a 'forgotten authors' panel together, and she joined my wife and me and other friends for a very enjoyable evening. So was the Daggers Dinner at which she was awarded the Diamond Dagger. 

I last saw her in person when I visited her at her home in Sturry, near Canterbury, two and a half years ago. By that time her mobility was much diminished, but her good humour and lively intelligence were much in evidence. She very kindly gave me a number of books from her collection, as well as signing several of her books that I'd collected over the years, and writing a few notes about the background to each. During the course of the day neighbours kept popping in to see that she was okay. She was, at that time, working hard on her next novel. It was an extremely pleasant day and quite a real privilege to see her in the home she'd had since the late 1940s. From time to time she'd drop me a line, to pass on information about crime fiction heritage that she thought would be of interest to me. And it always was. I shall miss her a great deal.   

 

Forgotten Book - Bland Beginning

I must at some time have read Julian Symons' early (1949) mystery Bland Beginning, but it left no impression on me. Having now had another read of the story, I guess that partly this is due to the fact that I probably read it the best part of forty years ago, partly due to the fact that the story is about old (and possibly forged) books, so it's a bibliomystery - and while such stories didn't appeal too much in my younger days, they do now. I really enjoyed this one.

The title references the fact that this story, set in 1924, is a sort of prequel to Symons' earlier detective novels, in that it introduces (at a late stage) a young man who indulges in amateur detection and is in fact, Bland, the inspector who was Symons' first series character. It was also Bland's final appearance, as Symons turned decisively against the use of series detectives and also segued from traditional detection to psychological suspense.

Symons was more interested in, and more adept at writing, carefully plotted detective stories with a twist than he liked to admit in later life, and than his various detractors have acknowledged. This is, in some ways, an apprentice effort, but it's written with exuberance and good humour and the storyline derives from the Thomas Wise forgery case. There is even a gesture towards the Cluefinder! At the end of the story, a footnote refers back to an early clue.

The mystery concerns an attempt by four nicely contrasted young people to uncover the secret of some apparent forgeries of a book of poems by a long dead author called Martin Rawlings. Some of the poems are included in the text, and it's worth paying attention to them. Symons was a poet himself - in the Thirties he edited a poetry magazine - and this book includes a dedicatory poem to his baby daughter Sarah, whose sad death as a young woman would later cast a cloud over Symons' life. Symons' lifelong love of cricket is well to the fore in this story (it crops up in some of his later and better-known novels too) and there's a dramatic finale on the cricket pitch. Very good light entertainment.  

Short Stories

Two of my short stories have recently appeared in lovely American anthologies. The first is 'No Peace for the Wicked', which is included in an Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine collection edited by Janet Hutchings and titled Twisted Voices. Janet has just announced her retirement after a long and distinguished career as editor of EQMM. I first met her in New York City back in the mid-90s and I've spent a good many happy hours in her company since then. 

Janet has accepted many of my short stories for inclusion in EQMM and 'No Peace for the Wicked' is the most recent. There was a mishap with its original publication, when the final part of the story was omitted, rather in the manner of 'Lady Don't Fall Backwards' in that famous Tony Hancock show. But all was well in the end, and I'm delighted to see it in this book. Janet discussed the concept with me when we had a drink together at Malice Domestic last spring and said she wasn't sure what the title should be. Given that the connecting theme was unreliable (or unusual) narrators, I suggested Twisted Voices and she very kindly acknowledges this in the book. There are stories by some wonderful writers, including Ian Rankin and Joyce Carol Oates, and I'm very glad to be part of the project.

The second collection is seasonal - Christmas Crimes at the Mysterious Bookshop, edited by Otto Penzler. This includes my story 'End Game', which Otto commissioned from me last year. Each year the bookshop gives a copy of the latest Christmas mystery to its most valued customers, and some wonderful writers have been commissioned by Otto over the years. Again, I'm truly thrilled to be rubbing shoulders, at least as far as our stories go, with such luminaries as Jeffery Deaver Thomas Perry, Ragnar Jonasson, and Laura Lippman.   

I haven't written many short stories this year, though 'The Widow' appeared in Midsummer Mysteries, the 2024 CWA anthology. This is simply due to lack of time, because of my other writing commitments. However, two more of my stories are slated to appear next year, and in 2025 I'll be editing no fewer than five anthologies. More details before long. In the meantime, I'm delighted to see these two collections. 

The Desperate People - vintage TV review

The Desperate People, first screened by the BBC in 1963, is said to be the earliest of the Francis Durbridge TV serials to survive in its complete form. There's always, of course, the hope that long-lost episodes will eventually come to light, but in the meantime I'm very glad to have the chance to watch this show, which I'd never come across before.

As usual, there are some very capable actors in the cast. Denis Quilley plays the successful photographer Larry Martin, while Nigel Hawthorne is entertainingly cast as an out-and-out villain whose methods are much less subtle than those he demonstrated years later as Sir Humphrey Appleby in that wonderful comedy Yes, Minister. Renny Lister (wife of Kenneth Cope, who died recently) is Larry's secretary and potential love interest, while Stanley Meadows and June Ellis, who also had major roles in subsequent Francis Durbridge serials, also contribute to the cliffhanger-heavy excitement.

The first episode in particular is full of plot twists. Larry is visited by his brother Phil, who is about to set off for Dublin. Phil tells Larry about the death of a colleague and his plan to visit the widow, and shows Larr a photo of the couple. But instead, Phil heads for a hotel, where (despite his lack of interest in poetry) he takes a remarkable interest in a book of poems by Hilaire Belloc. Phil is found dead in his hotel room and the inquest verdict is suicide, but Larry isn't satisfied and visits the hotel, encountering several people who act suspiciously. A colleague of Phil's is then shot from a passing car. In a delirious state he makes an enigmatic remark about a photograph. And then Larry receives a photograph of his brother, which should be in a display case outside his studio. Instead, it's been replaced by the photo of the mysterious couple that Phil showed him. 

And all that is in the first twenty-five minutes! Francis Durbridge was an absolute master of the art of mystification, and he does manage to explain everything by the end of episode six. Yes, you have to suspend your disbelief, but this is very agreeable escapist viewing. And with none of the padding that disfigures so many big-budget TV serials of the present day.

Forgotten Book - The Disappearance aka Echoes of Celandine

When I met Nicholas Royle at the Richmond festival a few weeks ago, it turned out that we had a shared interest in the work of Derek Marlowe, of whom Nick is a great admirer. A couple of days later, Nick kindly sent me a copy of a Marlowe novel I hadn't read; it's the film tie-in Penguin edition of The Disappearance, which was originally published in 1970 under Marlowe's own, more evocative title Echoes of Celandine. 

On the surface, this is a story about one of the most hackneyed thriller plots imaginable: a criminal is lured into undertaking 'one last job' prior to retirement, and mayhem ensues. The criminal in question is a hired killer, an ex-soldier who is ruthlessly efficient in hunting and destroying his prey. But in Marlowe's hands, the familiar material becomes strangely unsettling. Yes, there is pace and there are numerous plot twists. Yes, there is violence and quite a lot of misogyny (there are some scenes that wouldn't be written, or published, today, in my opinion). But this is also a literary novel of considerable merit.

I admire crime novels that are written with ambition by authors who are trying to do something different. And I'm definitely prepared to forgive such writers if what they produce doesn't quite work as well as it might have done. Give me a Sayers novel, however flawed, any day over (say) half a dozen Patricia Wentworth stories about Miss Silver. And Marlowe's ambition is clear. He's writing a study of character and mental disintegration, coupled with a strange, twisted love story. Yes, the book has various failings. But it's never less than intriguing.

Marlowe's writing was distinctive and stylish, if at times somewhat mannered, in A Dandy in Aspic. The same is true of this novel. Jay Mallory, our narrator, has grown weary of killing people (although he is responsible for several deaths in this book) and is obsessed with the need to find his gorgeous but unreliable wife Celandine. That quest drives his actions from start to finish. Along the way, there are some terrific lines, often laced with cynical humour. And a very dark ending.

I haven't seen the film based on the book, which starred Donald Sutherland, but even though I assume it wasn't a great success, I'm interested to see what the film-makers made of such an intriguing scenario.

The Day of the Jackal - Sky Atlantic - episode 10 and TV series review

I've enjoyed watching The Day of the Jackal, with tonight's final episode living up to the standards set by the previous nine in this Sky Atlantic TV series. Yep, ten episodes - a lot more screen time than the excellent film from 1973 - so naturally there's quite a bit of padding. But thanks to a truly mesmeric performance by the brilliant Eddie Redmayne as the cold-blooded killer nicknamed the Jackal, and several scenes of gripping suspense, the series was a success.

How much does the TV show owe to Frederick Forsyth's original novel, a masterly thriller which I devoured with relish as a teenager, as soon as it came out in paperback? Very little, is the answer. Yes, it tells the story of a brilliant assassin who prepares meticulously, and it involves a game of cat and mouse between those hunting him and the man himself. But overall, it's very different. (That's what they mean when they say the story has been 'reimagined'). But presumably it suited both Mr Forsyth and the TV company to make profitable use of such a well-known story brand.

Ronan Bennett's script, which brings the action into the present day, has great strengths and also some noticeable weaknesses. The idea of making the intended target of the Jackal's hit an IT mogul with a social conscience strikes me as inspired. I also like the way the shadowy figures who are responsible for hiring the Jackal are presented; their leader is Charles Dance at his most sinister, and he makes the most of his relatively limited screen time. Two other ingredients in the story helped to stretch the material to fit ten episodes, but didn't - in my opinion - work as well.

First, the Jackal may be a sociopath, but he is given a human side, with a wife (Nuria, played by Ursula Cobero) and child to whom he is devoted. He's even bought the family a fancy house in Spain and made himself vulnerable by doing his best to chum up with Nuria's useless brother and her mother. Given the Jackal's extreme ruthlessness (brilliantly shown in a flashback to Helmand, when he was still in the army), I didn't find the psychology of this scenario convincing, but such is Redmayne's skill as an actor that he just about persuaded me to swallow it.

Less effective, I felt, was the depiction of the MI6 hunt for the Jackal. Bianca Pullman (Lashana Lynch) is a mix of comic book action hero and soap opera character with a troubled family life and a working life plagued by useless and venal bosses. There were moments when these parts of the script resembled something AI might have cobbled together, so predictable and formulaic did they seem. Thankfully, there were a number of scenes - above all those in Helmand and the Jackal's murderous activities, perhaps most notably his scheme to shoot his target whilst the man went out for a swim - which were so powerful that the weaknesses paled into insignificance. And as a final episode bonus, it was wonderful to see Philip Jackson, better known as Chief Inspector Japp from Hercule Poirot, in a genuinely poignant and compelling cameo.

Agatha Christie's Marple: Expert in Wickedness

Mark Aldridge is one of a group of people, with John Curran to the fore, who are academic experts with a specialism in Agatha Christie. He's also one of a growing band of academic writers who is able to write accessibly in a way that will inform and also entertain a wide readership. His recent book about Hercule Poirot was a case in point, and now he's followed it up with Agatha Christie's Marple: Expert in Wickedness.

I've been a fan of Miss Marple ever since I discovered her at the age of eight thanks to the film Murder Most Foul (which I enjoyed) and The Murder at the Vicarage (the first adult novel I ever read, and one that I absolutely loved). So I fell on this book with enthusiasm, and I was not disappointed. It's a wide-ranging study, although not quite wide-ranging enough to include mention of the premiere of Murder Most Foul in a marquee in Great Budworth!

I'm the first to admit that - overall - the quality of the Poirot novels in terms of plotting is generally higher, but there are several very strong Marple novels. As well as The Murder at the Vicarage, I'm a big fan of The Body in the Library and A Murder is Announced, while I have a soft spot for 4.50 from Paddington, A Caribbean Mystery, and The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side. 

The approach of the book is basically chronological, and quite rightly the emphasis is on the novels and short stories featuring Jane Marple. However, there is also more than adequate discussion of the character's appearances on stage (in two plays based on the books), radio, film, and television. Personally I go along with the majority view that Joan Hickson was by far the best screen Miss Marple, but Mark Aldridge is quite generous to her successors, while pointing out gently that some screenplays based on books in which the character did not appear were not well-suited to having the old lady parachuted in. He includes some anecdotes related to the character and her creator with which I wasn't familiar. Overall, then, an enjoyable and worthwhile read. 

 

The Best UK Crime Fiction Blogs and Websites in 2024

Yesterday I received an unexpected message from some people called Feedspot. They have created a Top Thirty of UK crime fiction blogs and websites. The details are here and if you take a look, you'll see that this blog ranks fourth. In fact, of the blogs created by a single person, it is top of the chart. So I'm duly gratified.

The list is said to rank the best blogs 'from thousands of book blogs on the web and ranked by traffic, social media followers and freshness'. When I enquired further, I learned that Feedspot's editorial team searches for relevant blogs and measures them against various criteria. I must confess that I don't really understand how such things are evaluated, since I've always been remiss in figuring out the technical side of things when it comes to my website and blog. I'm well aware that there are various techniques to improve search engine ratings, but I simply don't have the time or expertise to attend to these things as efficiently as would be ideal. Given the need to prioritise, my energies are focused on the actual writing of material rather than tech stuff. I'm pleasantly surprised that, on objectively assessed measures, the blog is doing so well.

Having said that, I should repeat what I've said before. I write these blog posts for one simple reason - because I enjoy doing so. There are all sorts of benefits to running a blog like this, most of which I never anticipated when I started out in 2007. The reason the blog is called Do You Write Under Your Own Name? is because, back then, despite the fact that I'd been a published novelist for sixteen years plus, relatively few readers were familiar with my work. 

To some extent, this blog forms a record of my writing life, so that I can look back and remember past events and trips. That in itself is very rewarding. And it's a great memory jogger. There have been many times when I've been about to watch a film, for instance, only to check the blog and realise that I'd not only watched it before but written a review. Eeek! It's sometimes fun to watch again anyway and see if my opinion of the film (or, on occasion, TV show or novel) is the same as it was the first time around.

Above all, I value the personal contacts I've made through this blog. Some people who have got in touch over the years have become good friends. There are many who have given me information that is helpful to my researches - or just plain interesting. Your comments are always a delight to read. And the messages of encouragement I get from blog readers are enormously motivating. 

At the moment, I feel my writing is going as well as it's ever done, perhaps better than it's ever done. There are several reasons for this, but undoubtedly they include the motivation I get from responses to my blog posts. I don't take these things for granted, believe me. I'm very grateful to all those people, from around the world, who support this blog. You've given me a great deal and I hope to return the compliment by keeping the blog going for a long time to come.

From Hemlock Bay to Whitley Bay

It's been a busy and enjoyable few days - unseasonally connected with the seaside! I was very pleased to see that The Critic magazine ranked Hemlock Bay as a runner-up in the list of crime books of the year. Thanks also to Mat Coward of the Morning Star: 'If you’re longing for a wholly satisfying Golden Age-style whodunnit, fully and fairly clued, and with every revelation followed by another twist, you need the 1930s-set Rachel Savernake series by Martin Edwards.' 

So the book has had glowing reviews from both the Daily Mail and the Morning Star - definitely appealing across the political spectrum, I'd say! As if to celebrate, Apple is currently giving a special offer on ebook editions of Hemlock Bay - see the screenshot at the top of this post. A good way to bring the publishing year to a close.

Meanwhile, I've taken part in my last literary event of the year. This was a conversation with Ann Cleeves as part of Newcastle Noir. It was great to get back to the north east and to enjoy some sunshine in between the stormier moments. I visited Ann in her home town of Whitley Bay and she introduced me to a couple of local bookshops, both excellent, and one with a terrific second hand stock.

Life in Whitley Bay is, it must be said, rather calmer than life in Hemlock Bay, and none the less appealing for that. I had a very good time and enjoyed having a pre-dinner drink with Ann at the Spanish City before a very good meal at Hinnie's, a restaurant I last visited when Murder Squad was celebrating its 21st birthday. And next year, we will be 25...

Forgotten Book - He Arrived at Dusk

It's ten years since a review by John Norris of a book by R.C. Ashby (who was to become much better-known as Ruby Ferguson, a popular author of 'pony' books) aroused my interest in Ashby's crime fiction. It took a long time, but I've finally acquired a copy of He Arrived at Dusk, which John also reviewed, in laudatory terms, describing it as 'a little masterpiece', and comparing Ashby's skill at misdirection with Agatha Christie's. 

Ashby wrote a number of detective novels and it seems that her forte was combining a fair play puzzle with strong elements of the supernatural. This is certainly the essence of He Arrived at Dusk, which was published in 1933. My copy is the Hodder file copy, which is dated 9 February in that year. It has crossed my mind that the timing was unfortunate, because this was just before Dorothy L. Sayers started reviewing crime for the Sunday Times. Had she covered this novel - and had she liked it - it would have given Ashby's career and reputation a significant boost.

My guess is that Sayers would indeed have liked it. This is not only a clever story, it is unusual and it is well-written (I am pretty sure Sayers would have approved the prose, which struck me as clear, but evocative and definitely better than the writing of many detective novels of the early Thirties). After an intriguing opening in a London club, we're plunged into a narrative written by a researcher called Mertoun, who is summoned to catalogue the library of Colonel Barr, who lives in a lonely house close to the coast of Northumberland. But Mertoun doesn't actually get to meet Barr, who is so ill that he remains in his room, fiercely guarded by Nurse Goff, who won't allow anyone - not even his nephew Charlie - to see him.

We soon hear about a strange local legend involving a Roman gladiator, a sort of ghost who haunts the locality. There have already been deaths in the Barr family and eventually someone else dies - but it is not Colonel Barr...

I did feel that the book lost some pace in the middle section, and when the narrator switches to the nurse's brother. But the finale is excellent and I appreciated the cunning with which Ashby had told a relatively simple story, embellishing it very nicely so as to create her surprise solution. Recommended.