Norman Geras

Norman Geras,who died a few days ago, was the husband of Adele Geras, with whom I spent a memorable week-end at the Kidwelly ebook festival last year, and the father of Sophie Hannah, a crime writer of distinction who has recently been appointed to write a brand new Poirot story. I'm optimistic that she'll make a very good job of it.

Adele and Sophie are charming, but Norman himself, I am sorry to say, I never met. It's clear from the many warm tributes that have been paid to him that he was a man of real distinction, and I'm sure that I would have enjoyed his company, had I been fortunate enough to share it.

Anyway, a few years ago, Norman got in touch with me via email and said that he'd picked up on the fact that I'm a great admirer of Julian Symons. I gather he was, too. So he asked me to write something for his blog about Symons, and I was glad to do so here.

I'm extremely sorry that he won't be around to see the publication of Sophie's take on Poirot. But I'm glad that he knew all about it, and I bet he was very proud indeed. Rightly so.