Monday 3 June 2024

Bodies from the Library 2024



This year's Bodies from the Library was a great success, and I gather that audience numbers are now back to pre-pandemic levels, which is good news. Congratulations to John, Mark, Susan, Liz, and everyone at the Library who was responsible for the smooth organisation (and thanks to HarperCollins for the wine reception which made a lovely end to a very good day).

I was due to be in conversation with Chrissie Poulson, but unfortunately illness intervened at the last moment to prevent Chrissie attending. Luckily our mutual friend Moira Redmond stepped in and did a great job. The subject of my talk was John Bude and Ten Years of the British Library Crime Classics, and this followed a presentation by Simon and Lucy Brett about the Lord Peter Wimsey radio shows, complete with sound effects.

There were several excellent talks, by Tony Medawar, Dolores Gordon Smith, Jake Kerridge, Ronaldo Faragazzi (on the Detective BBC TV shows - fascinating!), Moira, Mark Aldridge, and John Curran. Special mention to Jim Noy for a very funny account of Enid Blyton's Five Find-Outers and their take on the Detection Club. It was also great to get my own first sighting of my new Classic Crime anthology Lessons in Crime: academic mysteries.

There's never enough time at these events to have a long chat with everyone one would like to chat to. However, it was great to see a number of friends, including Richard Reynolds, Nigel Moss, Christina Koning, Clint Stacey, and Jasmine Simeone and also to talk to up and coming writers such as Emma O'Driscoll. All in all, a marvellous day, and I'm now gearing up for Alibis at the Archive this coming weekend...

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