'Do You Write Under Your Own Name?'

Forgotten Book - The Bleston Mystery

2012-01-27T00:56:00.000Z

My forgotten book today is The Bleston Mystery, first published in 1928. The author is named as Robert Milward Kennedy, but that pen-name concealed a writing duo. One of the collaborators was Milward Kennedy, whom I’ve written about several times in this blog. The other was someone who had been to the same school as Kennedy – A.G. Macdonell, who later became well known as a humorous writer, his most famous title being England, Their England.

This book is quite different from Kennedy’s solo efforts. It’s a fast-moving, rather light-hearted story, slightly reminiscent of some of the lively thrillers that Agatha Christie wrote in the 20s, especially those featuring the Beresfords. I thought it stood up to the test of time rather well – better than I had expected, to be honest. There is a twist in the tale, and although I foresaw the surprise revelation, I thought it was skilfully handled.

Oddly enough, the main protagonist in this romp is called Kennedy, but his first name is Philip. The book opens with a visit to his home by a sinister foreigner, quickly followed by the news that he is one of two legatees of a dead friend, and the promise of something both mysterious and valuable about his inheritance. Several killings follow, and it becomes clear that Philip’s life is also at risk unless and until he solves the puzzle of a deserted camp at Bleston which had once housed German prisoners of war.

After this collaboration, Kennedy and Macdonell seem to have gone their separate ways, at least in literary terms. I can trace no further joint efforts of theirs. They each achieved a measure of success with solo efforts – perhaps especially Macdonell, prior to his early death in 1941. But The Bleston Mystery ranks as an enjoyable, if little known, piece of light entertainment.

The Travelling Writer - and Reader

2012-01-26T20:42:00.001Z

I'm going to be away for a few days, although there are blog posts scheduled to appear in the usual way, starting with a Forgotten Book tomorrow that is both rare and enjoyable.

I'm looking forward to the chance to do a bit more thinking about my current novel in progress. It took ages for me to get going with this one, but now I've got over the mental barriers that were in the way, I'm quite excited by the story-line. And for an author, that's important, for if we are not excited by what we write, how can we expect our readers to be?

I don't expect to do much actual writing while I'm away, though. I have still not got into the habit of writing fiction on a laptop, a failing I really ought to correct one of these days. There is a view that writers should write each and every day, without fail, and I can see the logic of this, but I'm afraid I never quite manage to achieve it.

I'm also eagerly anticipating the chance to catch up with some reading - a mix of Golden Age and more recent books, I guess: some material for future posts! Unfortunately, I expect to have limited access to the internet whilst I'm away, so I apologise in advance for any tardiness in responding to any comments on the posts that you may be kind enough to make.

But I'll be back very soon!

Unfinished

2012-01-25T00:34:00.000Z

Unfinished, presented by Alastair Sooke, was shown by the BBC to coincide with its airing of The Mystery of Edwin Drood. Sooke, who is an art critic for The Daily Telegraph, started with Droodism, and interviewed the screenwriter Gwyneth Hughes, before moving on to consider other unfinished works, continuations of characters or story-lines begun by others, and other variations on the theme of completion (or its absence.)

His range was broad, taking in Sanditon by Jane Austen, a portrait of George Washington, poems by Siegfried Sassoon, Franz Kafka, Sherlock Holmes, James Bond, and The Sopranos. There might be a risk that such diversity would lead to superficiality, but Sooke managed to surmount the hurdle with ease, presenting in an intelligent yet accessible and engaging style that made the programme quite fascinating.

I found that my thoughts were provoked on several levels. This is a subject that has intrigued me ever since I finished Bill Knox’s The Lazarus Widow, and I was also shown an incomplete manuscript by another deceased writer some time ago, which I felt was too fragmentary to complete in a meaningful way. Jill Paton Walsh has, impressively, finished one Lord Peter Wimsey novel, and written two others, and her work in this field is also fascinating, though it did not earn a mention in the programme. Has anyone ever written a novel about an unfinished book? I am sure it must have been done plenty of times, but off-hand I can’t call any examples to mind.

One final point about Alastair Sooke. I’d never heard of him before this programme, but I did take to him, and towards the end of the show, I suddenly realised why. Odd as it may seem, he reminded me, just a bit, of my personal vision of Daniel Kind.

Suspense and The Innocents

2012-01-23T11:01:00.000Z

During the first term of my A Level English Literature course at school, my two English teachers decided to try out a very enlightened experiment. Rather than teaching to the syllabus for the examination, they would introduce the class to a wide range of other books, almost all of them written in the 20th century. To this day, I am grateful that this caused me to read some books that otherwise I might have missed. It really benefited my appreciation of literature.

Amongst many other things, we read Henry James’ novella, The Turn of the Screw. This was the earliest of the books on our list, first published in 1898. I was greatly impressed, as I was with the film version – which was also screened for us in the classroom . This was The Innocents, a film made in 1961 and starring Deborah Kerr as the governess. The script had input from Truman Capote and John Mortimer, and music by Georges Auric – no wonder it’s widely regarded as a classic.

On New Year’s Eve, we watched The Innocents – the first time I’ve seen it since I was 16. Half a century after it was made, it remains a very striking piece of work, genuinely memorable. What impresses me most is the way the suspense is created. It’s a marvellous example of how tension can be built with subtlety. The film captures the ambiguity of James’ text brilliantly, even though he isn’t the easiest writer to adapt for film or TV by a long chalk.

Seeing the film again has prompted me to think about ambiguity in fiction, and how it can be used to enhance a story, rather than irritating the reader, if carefully handled. The film also suggests a number of techniques (such as foreshadowing) for developing suspense without resort to crude effects (lots of dead bodies, in a nutshell!) There is, for instance, a sexual sub-text to the story, but James handles it sensitively, and indirectly, and although I gather the film originally attracted an ‘X’ certificate, it is all the more powerful because the sexual elements are under-stated.

Of course, we live in an age when many readers and moviegoers demand action. And I’m one of the first to complain if a supposed thriller is “too slow”. But The Innocents is a powerful reminder of the fact that it is possible to make a lasting impact through nuanced film-making, and of course the same principle can be applied to writing fiction. Even in an unashamedly commercial genre such as crime, it isn’t always necessary to resort to lots of gore and explicit violence.

Birdsong: review

2012-01-22T22:42:00.000Z

Birdsong, by Sebastian Faulks,has finally made it to television, and I've just watched the first episode. Faulks, of course, isn't a "crime writer", despite his recent foray into the world of James Bond with Devil May Care, but along with Ian McEwan (who is possibly my favourite - I'll be writing more about him before long) and one or two others, he is in the top rank of contemporary British novelists. There is a lot that genre writers can learn from studying such masters of the craft of fiction.

I very much enjoyed the TV version of Birdsong. Briefly, it tells the story of Stephen Wraysford and Isabelle Azaire, who meeet when he visits Amiens during the Edwardian era - she is the wife of a hard-nosed French businessman with whom he has an association. The pair enjoy a torrid affair, and memories of it return to Wraysford when he is fighting for his life in the Somme.

The lead roles are taken by Eddie Redmayne and Clemence Poesy, and both gave strong performances. The scenes set in pre-war Amiens were quite beautifully photographed, but it was the graphic scenes set in the horrors of the trenches that made by far the biggest impact. This was television drama at its most powerful.

As it happens, I haven't read Faulks' book: one of all too many gaps in my mainstream reading. Does not knowing the book make a difference to the viewing experience? Possibly, although when I watch (say) adaptations of crime novels by the likes of Mark Billingham, Ann Cleeves or Peter Robinson, I don't find it difficult to draw a distinction between original material and the TV version. I'm equally happy to come to a TV adaptation fresh, or to try to assess it on its own merits as distinct from the source. Certainly, Reg Hill was strongly of the view that the TV versions of Dalziel and Pascoe were very different works from his novels about the duo. I prefer the books of Mark, Ann, Peter and Reg to the TV versions, but to say this is not to denigrate the adaptations. And I can think of one or two other adaptations that outshine the originals. This drama has made me want to read Birdsong, but when I do, I'll treat it as a different experience from watching Abi Morgan's script brought to life on the screen.

Short Stories

2012-01-21T13:38:00.001Z

"Clutter", a short story I wrote for the CWA anthology Original Sins, is due to be published shortly in the latest volume of The Mammoth Book of Best British Crime edited by the tireless Maxim Jakubowski. It's one of my darkest stories, it has to be said, very different in tone and subject matter from, say, the Harry Devlin books or the Lake District Mysteries. But the central idea seemed to me well suited to the short form.

A fellow contributor is Nigel Bird, whose Sea Minor blog features on my blogroll, and he kindly invited me to answer a few crisp questions about short stories.

A word about that marvellous short story "The Lottery". By coincidence, this morning I've received from that excellent bookseller Jamie Sturgeon a copy of a book by Shirley Jackson in which she describes the baffled reaction to that amazing story after it first appeared in The New Yorker. She makes many thoughtful comments about both writing and reading that also have a bearing on some current discussions about reviewing on the blogosphere. Fascinating topic,and one I'll return to in future.

Remembering Two Stars

2012-01-20T22:57:00.004Z

A time for reflection, today. Along with Jessica Mann, I was interviewed for Radio 4's obituary programme, Last Word, which aired this afternoon and which featured a tribute to Reg Hill. There were some quotes from interviews with Reg himself, and it was sad and strange to think that I won't be hearing that distinctive, civilised voice again.

And today, Etta James died. Evidently someone who had a very troubled life, to put it mildly, but a great singer. My favourite of her recordings, although it was never a hit, and is little known, is Waiting For Charlie To Come Home. It's a superb song, and you can hear it on Youtube - there is also a very good version by Trinitje Oosterhuis, and quite a good one by Karima, but Etta James' original remains definitive. How sad, again, that we won't be hearing that voice again, but at least we have the recordings.

Forgotten Book - Dorothy and Agatha

2012-01-20T00:05:00.002Z

My Forgotten Book for today dates back just 20 years. It is an American mystery, Dorothy and Agatha, and the author is Gaylord Larsen. The eponymous ladies are, needless to add, Sayers and Christie, and the supporting cast includes various prominent members of the Detection Club.

Regular readers of this blog can probably guess at my delight when I learned of and tracked down this novel. Larsen’s lovely idea of setting a story around the Club offers terrific potential, and I wish I’d been the first to think of it. But of course, an idea is one thing. Executing it successfully is something very different.

The story opens with the discovery of a dead man at Dorothy’s home in Essex. He is found slumped over a typewriter, and there is with him an apparent suicide note. Was he a distraught lover? No, it turns out that murder has been done, and Sayers and in particular Agatha Christie are the ideal people to solve it.

The dust jacket claims that Larsen “has rendered every detail of character and place with uncanny accuracy”. Unfortunately, this is so far off the mark as to be hilarious. Take for instance the author’s apparent belief that Chester (where Agatha watches a soccer match...) is located in the Lake District, and is a shortish drive away from Essex. Now, I wouldn’t want to be excessively pedantic about the countless factual errors and historical and chronological anachronisms. When writing about a foreign country and different era, mistakes are almost inevitable, and I’m as likely to get things wrong as most other writers. But here there are just too many howlers, page after page, and most could have been avoided by elementary care. The bizarre portrayal of Oxford life, for instance, might be forgivable, but the repeated references to “Summerville College” and the suggestion that Anthony Berkeley was president of the Detection Club are just lazy. Whatever happened to fact-checking and the editorial process?

And then there is the dialogue. Where do I begin? Dorothy saying to Agatha, “We’re a couple of stodgy, middle-aged storytelling dames.”? Agatha saying to E.C. Bentley , “Edmund, I’m sorry. I’ve gotten you out of bed?” You get the picture.

In defence of Gaylord Larsen, he can write agreeably, and the pages turn quickly. He deserves genuine praise for coming up with a concept of real interest and exciting potential. What is more, his “least likely person” plot isn’t at all bad. These positive points do need to be made, not least because I don't care much for reviews that are wholly negative. It's not right to overlook redeeming features. But I'm afraid that, overall, Dorothy and Agatha has to rank as, to put it kindly, a missed opportunity.

The Danish Scene of Crime

2012-01-18T00:25:00.003Z

That splendid blogger, and great crime fan (and nowadays, crime writer) Dorte H is someone whose fair and thoughtful observations about the genre are always well worth studying. She was one of a number of bloggers I met in person, along with her husband (at a pub quiz!) for the first time last year, and now she's kindly agreed to contribute to this blog a study of the Danish crime scene. I found it fascinating and I am sure other readers will agree.

"When I was young, so little happened on the Danish scene of crime that we had to turn to either America for hardboiled thrillers or Britain for police procedurals (to generalize a tad....)

In the late 1990s, a few things began to happen, though. Inspired by our Swedish and Norwegian neighbours, the ´femikrimi trend´ hit Denmark. Actually there were two trends by the same name; first the serious trend where former journalists wrote crime fiction with a strong, feminist message. The Danish writer Elsebeth Egholm carved a name for herself in Denmark in the same way as Liza Marklund did in Sweden with their independent, female journalists who wouldn´t take no for an answer when they were on a mission. Another Danish writer of this category is Gretelise Holm whose sixtyish protagonist is a free and active spirit, also sexually. A mature woman who puts up a fight when male bosses and colleagues try to keep her down.

The other femikrimi trend is not as common in Denmark but represented by well-known Swedish writers such as Camilla Läckberg and Mari Jungstedt. Some Scandinavian reviewers have dubbed their books chicklit with crime or lipstick literature, and instead of the anger and injustice which colour some of the feminist books, they deal with the female characters´down-to-earth struggles with love and family life. The only Danish writer who springs to my mind is Sanne Udsen.

Finally, a pre-millenium writer who is difficult to pin down but deserves a paragraph. And how to introduce Susanne Staun? Readers of my blog will know she has been one of my favourites ever since I read the first Fanny Fiske mystery. Staun did not only chose an old, female protagonist. She let her go through so much plastic surgery that her surgeon had to remind her of Michal Jackson! Nevertheless this tough and sturdy profiler is never short of young flesh (do you smell a crime fiction cliché turned upside-down here?) The books are well-written, terribly exciting and full of pitchblack humour.

Unfortunately the global recession also hit the publishing business in Denmark a few years ago. Traditional publishers are very unwilling to take chances with new writers, and just like the rest of the world, they have been busy looking for the next Stieg Larsson.

So for a couple of years we have seen a boom of fastpaced thrillers (but without any Lisbeth Salanders to make them stand out). For a Swedish example of these Larsson lights, I could mention Lars Kepler´s The Hypnotist, but I believe the Danish debut Svinehunde (which means pigs or bastards) by Lotte and Søren Hammer is also on its way in English. What they have in common is lots of action. The Hypnotist begins with the truly horrible slaughtering of a family, Svinehunde with five bodies swinging from the ceiling of a gymnasium. At least Svinehunde offers some kind of moral message though not quite successfully. Well, it seems that Scandinavian readers want these less than credible orgies in violence, but the reviews are mixed...

Finally the really good news (if you ask me). After some meagre decades when we secretly envied the Swedish writers who achieved worldwide fame, three of our very best series are on their way to a wider audience. One of them is Elsebeth Egholm´s Next of Kin, her fourth Dicte Svendsen mystery (see above) which was published in Australia last year.

Jussi Adler-Olsen´s first police procedural about Carl Mørck was published in Britain last spring, and I have enjoyed reading a handfuld of enthusiastic, English reviews of this excellent series. I have read four volumes now and believe me, they grow better and better. Mørck is a somewhat reluctant police officer, but he is spurred on by his unorthodox sidekick, the immigrant Assad. Dark, exciting and with some comic relief.

Furthermore, a great series written by two female writers, Lene Kaaberbøl and Agnete Friis, has been snatched by the American publisher Soho, also in the past year. They have both written children´s fiction before, but the series about Red Cross nurse Nina Borg is their first thriller. You could say that this series has a bit of it all. At first I feared Nina Borg would be too bland and idealistic, but as the plot develops, we realize that she is nicely flawed. When I reviewed the first one, I stated that it was the best Danish thriller I had ever read. So perhaps this book is closer to Stieg Larsson´s series than any of the others: a drama that keeps you on the edge of your chair, but also a female protagonist you cannot get enough of.

What these series have in common are that even though they are exciting, the writers put character development & detection above sheer action, and they all offer interesting settings.

Available in English:

Elsebeth Egholm, Next of Kin (Australia)

Jussi Adler-Olsen, Mercy (Britain)

Kaaberbøl & Friis, The Boy in the Suitcase (the USA)"

Dorte Hummelshoj Jakobsen is a Danish blogger and writer of crime fiction. Her debut novel, the humorous mystery "The Cosy Knave" was published in August this year, and her latest publication is an anthology of funny Christmas crime stories, "Christmas in Knavesborough". They take place in the same fictional Yorkshire village but can be read separately.

Blogging thoughts

2012-01-17T16:51:00.000Z

Such is the interest in Sherlock that my post on The Reichenbach Fall seems already to have become comfortably the most viewed post I've ever placed on this blog. Blimey - had I anticipated that, I'd have written it more elegantly instead of last thing on Sunday night!

I must admit that I am slightly wary of blog statistics - they seem a bit erratic, and since the changes to my blog template, figures for the first year or so have disappeared into the ether. Figures do seem to be generally higher in winter months than in summer, although that makes sense. But it does seem clear that this blog is visited more often now than ever before, even though I no longer post each day.

I'm glad that people keep finding and then returning to the blog, and I'm grateful in particular to those who read it regularly, many of whom, I know, don't necessarily comment. This level of interest is truly rewarding, especially given that pressure of work means I often don't find the time to do as many links and include as many images as would be desirable (the achievements in this respect of some other bloggers are much more impressive.) I must add that when I was experiencing a variety of stresses over the past couple of years, the support I received from you was enormously positive and meant a great deal.

There's not much more I can do than once again say thank you. But as a special treat for you, tomorrow I'm including a longer than usual post from one of the most impressive crime bloggers around. It's full of interest, I think, and I'm confident you'll agree.

Sherlock: The Reichenbach Fall - review

2012-01-15T23:23:00.000Z

Sherlock concluded its all too short three-episode run tonight with another cunningly titled episode - The Reichenbach Fall. Of course, I say "all too short", but part of the success of the series has been to leave viewers wanting more. The temptation for any writer is to outstay his or her welcome, whether with a series that has run out of steam, or a type of book that has passed its sell-by date. But this episode was probably as good as any we've seen to date. Will there be any more? We can only hope so.

I'm going to avoid spoilers, but I think even a Holmes super-purist would be impressed with the way the writers have taken themes from Conan Doyle's original stories, and updated them so cleverly that the effect is always of homage, not parody. And as the title of this episode suggests, there was a duel of wits between Sherlock and Moriarty which resulted in a dramatic climax.

Benedict Cumberbatch was as good as ever in the title role, but I was impressed also by Andrew Scott as Moriarty. At first, I wasn't convinced by the casting of Scott, which is certainly audacious, but the quality of his acting has won me over, as I'm sure it has won over many other doubters. The roof-top encounter brought out the best in both actors, while Martin Freeman was again excellent as the devoted Watson.

One of the many small touches that I've admired in this series was the casting of Douglas Wilmer, who celebrated his 92nd birthday earlier this month, as a guest in the Diogenes Club. Wilmer played Holmes in the TV series that I enjoyed very much as a young boy. He's not as celebrated as Basil Rathbone or Peter Cushing but I felt he was a very good Sherlock, and it was great that he was included in this terrific show.

Reginald Hill R.I.P.

2012-01-13T18:26:00.000Z

I write this post with a very heavy heart, since I learned not long ago that Reg Hill died yesterday. He is an author I admired enormously – this week, by coincidence, I’ve been re-reading Pascoe’s Ghost – and I was proud to call him a friend. I’ve written about his work on a good many occasions, and his latest novel, The Woodcutter, was one of his very best. But what I want to do right now is just say a few words about the man himself.

When I first met Reg, on a memorable Sunday in Yorkshire nearly 25 years ago, he was already established as a prolific and highly successful author, although his greatest literary achievements still lay in the future. A couple of days earlier, I’d just finished reading a review copy of his short stories, There Are No Ghosts in the Soviet Union, and it was terrific to have the chance to talk to him, and his always charming wife Pat, at a lunch that marked the very first meeting of the Northern Chapter of the Crime Writers’ Association. Reg christened the group who met that day “the few”, and those who attended became my first friends in the crime writing community.

What I found then, and what never changed, was that Reg in person was exceptionally intelligent, but never condescending, strong-minded and honest but unfailingly generous, and, despite appearing on occasion to be quiet and reserved, quite simply, the wittiest person I’ve ever met.

We met many times after that – the photo was taken at Harrogate a couple of years ago, shortly after his famous conversation with John Banville - and most recently at a Detection Club dinner in London. He showed me many kindnesses, not least writing a fantastic intro to a collection of my short stories, and writing brand new stories of the highest quality when I sought contributions for anthologies. He also gave me a lot of very good advice, even though he maintained generally that the only advice that one writer should give to another is: "Don't wait for the post." (One specific piece of advice he gave me, I have yet to follow, but one day I will, and I bet he'll be proved right.) He even put me in touch with a TV company who were interested in filming a series set in the Lake District and who had initially approached him. Mind you, he also relished breaking the news to me on one occasion that he was working on a book to be called Killing the Lawyers.

For years, he chaired the sub-committee that short-lists notable crime writers for the CWA Diamond Dagger, and persuaded me to join; I found I was, in fact, the only other member. His theory was that committees should always be small, and in that, as in so many other judgments, he was wise. Suffice to say that, although his standards were properly exacting, he was the easiest and most agreeable of colleagues, and reaching a consensus on our short-list was always the prelude to a thoroughly enjoyable conversation on other things.

I have a great many happy memories of time spent with Reg Hill, including at a number of week-end conferences he organised in his beloved Lake District, and I have no doubt that, as well as missing him, I’ll often reflect in future on how lucky I was to get to know one of the most gifted British crime writers of the past half-century. But for now, it feels so sad that the world has lost a brilliant novelist, that many of us have lost a true friend, and most of all that Pat has lost a wonderful husband.

Forgotten Book - End Game

2012-01-13T00:27:00.000Z

The Mystery of Edwin Drood's appearance on BBC 2 this week inspires my choice of a non-fiction Forgotten Book today - it is End Game by Richard F. Stewart, who was almost universally known as Dick Stewart. Dick, who died not too long ago, was a great guy. I used to visit his home in South Manchester, sometimes taking my long-suffering son along, and buy books from him. He and his wife made a delightful couple, and Jonathan still remembers those visits as happy occasions, because the Stewarts were so kind to him. I miss those visits a lot.

Anyway, back to End Game, which was published in 1999 by a very enterprising small publisher. Dick's idea was to list and assess all the main solutions to the Drood mystery, as well as all the completions actually written, and the commentaries. He acknowledges at the outset that so much has been written about Drood that a totally comprehensive account is impossible, but this is still a very substantial volume.

Dick quotes G.K. Chesterton's excellent line that "the only one of Dickens's novels which he did not finish was the only one that really needed finishing" - the story is a pleasing, if tantalising paradox. He lists eight basic questions that anyone trying to solve the puzzle needs to address. They admit of many answers. "Droodism has become a productive cottage industry during the 20th century", he notes, and of course this has continued into the 21st century.

All manner of sleuths have over the years, as Dick says, invoked "mesmerism, telepathy, serial photography, Thuggee, Sherlock Holmes and schizophrenia (to name but a few) in the search for a solution. The composer Rupert Holmes, one of whose excellent songs I featured in The Serpent Pool, wrote a musical based on the story. It's a great game, and Dick Stewart's book is a fascinating guide to it. Dick inscribed my copy "All you never wanted to know about Edwin Drood". Too modest, as he always was.

The Mystery of Edwin Drood - part two - review

2012-01-11T23:09:00.005Z

The Mystery of Edwin Drood concluded this evening, and I thought Gwyneth Hughes did a pretty good job in making this a watchable drama. I'm going to avoid spoilers in this post, but suffice to say that the screenplay included a couple of plot twists that were enjoyable, without resulting in a masterpiece.

I do think the adaptation was a worthwhile project, and what will stick in my mind about it longest, apart from the excellent portrayal of Jasper, is the atmosphere, in particular of the cathedral and its environs, which played a suitably important part in the resolution of the story.

Finishing a story that the original author left unfinished is a fascinating and extraordinary thing to do. I've written before about my work on completing The Lazarus Widow, begun by the late Bill Knox, and that experience has made me more interested than ever in the craft of completion. With The Mystery of Edwin Drood, a contemporary writer has the privilege of working with characters created by a literary genius, but also the challenge of producing a whole story which pleases a modern reader, whose tastes in crime and mystery are arguably more sophisticated and difficult to satisfy than those of Dickens' time. So I can guess that Hughes found the task demanding, but ultimately very rewarding.

I'm tempted to write more about the challenges posed by Edwin Drood's story. Perhaps on Friday, in the context of a Forgotten Book that I'm rather fond of.

The Mystery of Edwin Drood - review

2012-01-10T22:22:00.001Z

The Mystery of Edwin Drood is a two-part BBC TV adaptation of Charles Dickens' last, unfinished novel. It's a very long time since I read the original, but it's always fascinated me that Dickens moved in the direction of the crime and mystery genre in the later part of his career. Bleak House is one of my favourite novels, not only because of its portrayal of legal life, and the endless litigation of Jarndyce v Jarndyce, but also because of the part played by Inspector Bucket, a splendid character. Dickens was, like his friend Wilkie Collins, very interested in true crime, as well as having his imagination sparked by an element of mystery.

I've often wondered if, had he lived, Dickens would have made a greater contribution to the development of the crime genre - it is, surely, highly probable. In the past, I've published two short stories featuring the great man, once detecting alongside Collins, and once in partnership with Elizabeth Gaskell. They were great fun to write, and one of these days, I might do another.

Back to the BBC TV show. The screenplay was written by Gwyneth Hughes, who once wrote a screenplay for The Mrs Bradley Mysteries, in which Diana Rigg was unexpectedly cast as Gladys Mitchell's saurian detective. But the mood here was far removed from Golden Age territory - it was dark, hallucinatory and (or is there a twist up Hughes' sleeve?) a study of crime rather than a whodunit.

Matthew Rhys was impressive as the opium-tormented John Jasper, and Freddie Fox, from the famous acting family, played Edwin. The first episode began with a nightmare and ended with a killing. Yet the action was stripped down and this meant that the development of the story was not as labyrinthine as I'd rather expected. Writing this post immediately after watching, I still feel as though I want to mull over my reaction to this particular take on the story. But it has gripped me sufficiently for me to be keen to watch episode two tomorrow.

Sherlock: The Hounds of Baskerville review

2012-01-08T23:07:00.001Z

Sherlock continued brilliantly this evening with The Hounds of Baskerville, second in the three episode run starring Benedict Cumberbatch as the sage of 221B Baker Street, Martin Freeman as Dr Watson, and Una Stubbs as an unlikely but appealing Mrs Hudson.

The Hound of the Baskervilles is far and away the best of the four longer Holmes stories. The idea came from a man called Fletcher Robinson (whose family business in Liverpool I've long had a happy relationship with, oddly enough) and I recall that the press once gave some publicity to a strange theory that Conan Doyle was responsible for Robinson's death. A book was supposed to be being written about it, but as far as I know, it never saw the light of day. If anyone knows otherwise, I'd be interested to hear more.

Back to Sherlock in the 21st century. Mark Gatiss used elements from the original story very cleverly. There was even a character called Fletcher. Baskerville turned out to be a sinister research centre, and the character given the name of Stapleton proved to be female. She was played by the excellent Amelia Bullimore, last seen as as a senior cop in Scott & Bailey. Sherlock's first visit to Baskerville was a marvellously funny and clever scene.

As with last week's A Scandal in Belgravia, I found the story very enjoyable - perhaps even better. I am sure many others did too, given that my post about last week's episode seems (if Blogger stats are to be believed, which I'm not sure about) to have attracted more page views than all but four of over 1300 previous posts.

Celia Dale R.I.P.

2012-01-06T12:12:00.003Z

Celia Dale died on the last day of last year, just a few days short of her 100th birthday. She was a crime writer of some distinction, and yet to the best of my knowledge, this post is the first to note her passing.

Her first book appeared as long ago as 1943. She'd worked at one time, I gather, as a secretary to that fine writer Rumer Godden, and it was quite a while before she began to focus primarily on the crime genre. But when she did so, her spare and highly effective style, coupled with a good deal of insight into human nature, made her a most accomplished practitioner.

She won the CWA Short Story Award in 1986, and her collection A Personal Call and other stories, which gathers 18 stories, is a very good read. Sheep's Clothing and A Helping Hand are excellent novels which I much enjoyed. The late Harry Keating said that she had "the accuracy, understanding and quiet wit of Jane Austen", and Susan Hill lauded her as "a past mistress of the bizarre truth behind normal facades".

Yet, although Faber Finds have happily made a few of her books available again, today Celia Dale is not well remembered by modern crime fans, and I think that's a real pity. She's also been neglected by the crime reference books. When I researched her career for this post, in fact, the only passing mention I found in seven or eight weighty tomes was one by - me, on the subject of her sympathetic portrayal of victims. I do hope this post will encourage fans of quiet psychological suspense to seek out her work. They won't be disappointed.

Endeavour: review

2012-01-02T23:21:00.001Z

Endeavour, shown this evening on ITV, is a relative rarity in detective fiction, a prequel. You can guess from the title that it concerned the early days of Colin Dexter's much-loved Inspector Morse. We have, of course, seen attempts at the early life of Sherlock Holmes, although as yet we've been spared stories about the youthful exploits of Hercule Poirot and Jane Marple (though, who knows, perhsaps some TV mogul somewhere is even now thinking about suitably inappropriate casting ideas.)

The first question I asked myself before watching was: do we really need a prequel? It is clearly a money-spinner, but does it really add anything to our appreciation of the character? After all, there are plenty of excellent books (and also some written by me!) that it would be good to see on TV, yet which are unlikely to make the small screen any time soon. You can argue that it's a pity that TV companies prefer the safe, the tried and tested, to taking a risk with something unfamiliar. And, joking and personal bias apart, I do think this is a pity. But it's also commercial reality. TV is a business, and the Morse franchise has been hugely successful. Artistically succesful, too. What's more, although I was initially resistant to the concept of Lewis, I've found it so entertaining that I've become a real fan. So I was more than ready to set aside instinctive prejudice against the concept.

My conclusion is that the experiment was definitely worthwhile. Russell Lewis, the scriptwriter, did an extremely good job (again I find myself doing a bit of teeth-gnashing, since although I've never met him, Russell Lewis was once mooted as a prospective scriptwriter for a TV version of the Harry Devlin stories, which more than once were the subject of an options deal that never turned into something that was filmed.) In particular, I liked the nods to the original stories - not just the cameo appearance of Colin Dexter, or the casting of Abigail Thaw, daugher of the irreplaceable John, but various neat bits of scripting. Oxford, of course, remains one of the most photogenic of settings for a classic mystery.

Shaun Evans did a decent job of the very difficult task of playing young Morse. I also very much liked Roger Allam's performance as his boss, Inspector Thursday. As for the whodunit plot, it followed a formula familiar to Morse fans. I shall say no more! But it was entertaining from start to finish.

The big question now is whether Endeavour will prove to be a pilot for a series. I have mixed feelings, for the reasons I've mentioned. But I did enjoy this show, and I certainly wouldn't bet against our seeing more stories about Morse's early career before too long.

One final thought. I remember clearly watching the very first episode of Inspector Morse. Apparently it was back in 1987, four years before I had a mystery of my own published. Talk about time flying...

Sherlock: A Scandal in Belgravia: review

2012-01-01T22:06:00.001Z

Sherlock returned to the screens this evening for a very welcome second series with A Scandal in Belgravia. The title is, of course, a play on the title of the first Holmes short story, 'A Scandal in Bohemia', but I wonder if the scriptwriter, Steven Moffat, is aware that it is also the title of a very good book by Robert Barnard? In fact, it might just be my favourite of Bob Barnard's many entertaining novels.

Back to Sherlock. Benedict Cumberbatch is splendidly cast as the great detective brought up to date for the 21st century, while Martin Freeman is a likeable Watson. If you buy into the basic concept - and I do - then there's much to enjoy in these shows, given that the scriptwriters have a real feel for detective fiction and an evident respect for Conan Doyle's achievements. Moffat has also done great work on Doctor Who, but there's a danger, as one or two episodes of Doctor Who have shown in the last couple of years, that the demands of filling an extended time slot can lead to some narrative padding. Happily, that wasn't a problem in this episode, even though it lasted for 90 minutes. It was very well crafted.

There were plenty of witty lines (I enjoyed "The Geek Interpreter", for instance), but the story was also strong, with seemingly random jokes at the start of the story turning out to form a part of quite an intricate plot which avoided tedious over-elaboration. It involved Irene Adler as a dominatrix, in possession of compromising material kept on her mobile phone. Sherlock got hold of the phone - but what was the password to unlock it? The solution to this particular puzzle was very neat.

The supporting cast was strong. Mrs Hudson is given a distinctive personality by Una Stubbs, while Mycroft Holmes is played in suitably aloof fashion by Mark Gatiss, co-creator of this series, and a succesful detective novelist himself (I haven't read his books yet, but this is a gap in my reading I must fill). And Lara Pulver was suitably glamorous as Irene Adler. You could see why Sherlock thought she was the woman.

Looking back on 2011

2011-12-31T00:44:00.005Z

So, today we say goodbye to 2011, and for me it’s been an immeasurably better year than the previous two. Events on the day job front dominated, above all negotiating and helping to implement my firm’s merger, and as a result of that, I’ve done much less fiction writing than usual. A pity, but a price worth paying, as I am now hopeful that I will have more time to devote to fiction in the future, reducing from full time working in the not too distant future. The photo was taken on a research trip around Ullswater and I hope the memories of that lovely day will inspire me to write more next year.

In publication terms, it was a productive year, though largely because of work I’d done in 2010. The Hanging Wood was published, and earned terrific coverage in The Times, The Guardian, The Literary Review and elsewhere. I was really gratified about that. Reviews are bound to be subjective, but they do matter to any writer (as well to his or her publisher.) And I also edited two anthologies, Guilty Consciences and Best Eaten Cold.

I was lucky enough to be directly involved in some great events, including no fewer than six festivals of different kinds – The Wordsworth Festival, the Newcastle Winter Books Festival, the Lymm Festival, Crimefest, the Harrogate Theakston’s Festival, and St Hilda’s Crime and Mystery Week-end. I wrote a new murder mystery event set in the 1920s, gave a range of talks, and was awarded a Red Herring for services to the CWA. So perhaps I was busier on the literary front than I realised at the time.

I was also very fortunate to spend a delightful week-end on the Isle of Man, much of it spent in the company of that fine writer Chris Ewan and his wife, as well as going on four trips overseas – all of which provided me with background material for future short stories.

I’ve read excellent novels by friends such as Peter Lovesey, Ann Cleeves and Kate Ellis, and the most impressive contemporary American book I read this year was The End of Everything by Megan Abbott. I also continued my research into the Golden Age and read some excellent books from the past. For me, the highlight among the latter was The Pursued by C.S. Forester, a remarkable discovery. I've also enjoyed discovering Jessica Mann's early work, and some classics by John Dickson Carr, Henry Wade, J.J. Connington, C.Daly King and others.

One area where I have been remiss is in keeping up with other people’s blogs. I’ve spent much less time on this than I’d have wished, but I must say that the quality of some of the crime-related blogs, many of which are listed on the blogroll, is quite splendid. And it seems to keep improving. An interesting feature is the increase in the number of blogs dealing with Golden Age books - very pleasing to see this trend.

I do feel very grateful for the interest taken in this blog by so many people, and when I get the chance to meet some of you in person (for instance, this year I’ve had the very welcome opportunity to chat with Dorte, Kerrie, Karen and Paul Beech among others) I find it an enormously enriching experience.

So – thanks for all your support and generosity in 2011 and let’s hope that 2012 is a good year for the crime fiction community, and (is this too much to hope for, given the economic climate?) is a better year for the world as a whole.

Fear in the Night - review

2011-12-29T00:30:00.000Z

Fear in the Night is a film noir directed by Maxwell Shane in 1947 on a rather obviously low budget. It was based on a short story by William Irish, aka Cornell Woolrich, and was re-made a few years later as Nightmare starring Edward G. Robinson. In this version, Forrest DeKelley, later Bones in Star Trek, made his movie debut.

The set-up is pleasing. A man has a nightmare, finding himself in a weird, octagonal room with mirrors for walls. A murder takes place - and he commits it. He is thankful to wake up back in his hotel room, only to find that he still has the key to the room from his nightmare....

It may not be the most sophisticated mystery I've ever watched, but I found it rather enjoyable. There is a highly-wrought atmosphere from start to finish, as the man who believes he is guilty finds he cannot live with himself, even though he does not have a clue why he would have killed someone he didn't know. The solution is rational, and reasonably entertaining.

Woolrich was a master of the 'emotional thriller'. The only writers to equal his mastery in this field were Boileau and Narcejac. It's no coincidence that their books, like Woolrich's, were often made into films. They are highly visual, as well as dark. Woolrich, by the way, was gay, and I've read an article which suggests the film has a strong homosexual sub-text. But if that's right, it was lost on me.

21 Today!

2011-12-28T00:10:00.006Z

Although this blog is about crime writing and not about my family, it wouldn’t exist without the young man who designed the template (and updated it recently) and set me on the right road, and who also designed and continues to maintain my website. As Jonathan is 21 today, I should take the chance to pay tribute to his good humoured support and encouragement for his technologically incompetent father, and thank him for all his hard work. And to thank him also for his terrific companionship, not least when he and I went on a short holiday to Rome earlier this year, when the photo was taken.

I still can’t believe that it’s 21 years since that amazing day when he was born. A day which will always remain among the most memorable of my life. Well done on 21 great years, Jonathan, and all the very best in terms of health and happiness in the years to come.

Agatha Christie's Poirot - The Clocks: review

2011-12-27T00:05:00.000Z

Agatha Christie's Poirot remains a real treat whenever I come across a new episode, and The Clocks has been the highlight of my holiday viewing so far (not that the competition has been hot or even warm, admittedly, given that I've never got to grips with Downton Abbey).

The Clocks is a relatively late Christie novel, first published in 1963, and it's not rated very highly by connoisseurs - though I have always liked the story. The discovery of a corpse surrounded by a mysterious array of clocks is a great plot device, and even though Christie's explanation is, some would argue, a cop-out, I find it striking and memorable. Another pleasing aspect of the book is Poirot's discussion of great detective novelists, including a passing reference to John Dickson Carr, whom Christie knew and admired. There is also mention (crucial to the story-line) of a prolific author called Garry Gregson, who I believe was based on John Creasey.

I wondered how the scriptwriter would adapt the novel for television, because the story-line does throw up a lot of challenges - not least the fact that Poirot only takes centre stage quite late in the book. Stewart Harcourt's solution was to adapt very freely indeed, and move the story back in time by a quarter of a century - a risky course. There have been all too many Christie adaptations over the years where radical changes have been made, and the result has been a bit of a mess. But that isn't always the case, by any means, and I'm not one of those purists who believes that a novel must invariably be translated to the small screen in a totally faithful fashion. The screenwriter often needs to have some licence. And in this case, I felt that the end justified the means. The mystery was pleasingly unravelled, and although I had one or two quibbles, I found the two hours passed very agreeably: Harcourt did a good job.

David Suchet, as usual, was splendid as Poirot. It was especially poignant to see the late Anna Massey playing the part of the blind but sharp-witted Millicent Pebmarsh - she was a terrific actor. And the supporting cast was good, with none of the over-the-top acting we've seen in one or two Poirots and Marples.

Merry Christmas!

2011-12-24T13:42:00.001Z

I've now finished work for the Christmas break, one that I've been looking forward to. A chance to relax and also reflect on what has been a momentous year for the whole world, and certainly momentous and memorable for me.

I'm also hoping to do plenty of reading - got to make an impact on that TBR pile somehow! In fact, it's not so much a pile, more a mountain range of Himalayan proportions.

There have been, of course, plenty of mysteries set at and around Christmas. Hercule Poirot's Christmas is probably the most famous, but my favourite is Cyril Hare's An English Murder. This is a classic mystery by one of the most agreeable stylists at work in the genre in the 20th century. If you like older books, and don't know this one, do consider giving it a try.

And now all that remains is to wish you all a very happy Christmas, and to express my grateful thanks for your support for this blog, and for your consistently constructive and thought-provoking comments. More posts soon, but now I'm off to wrap presents!

Forgotten Book - In Whose Dim Shadow

2011-12-23T00:02:00.000Z

J.J. Connington was a reliable Golden Age writer, and it’s rather surprising that In Whose Dim Shadow, published in 1935, truly is a Forgotten Book. The copy I’ve just read, generously lent to me by a keen collector, boasts a wonderful pictorial dust jacket with a map of the scene of the crime, perfectly in keeping with Golden Age tradition.

This novel features his regular “Holmes and Watson” duo, the Chief Constable Sir Clinton Driffield, and his friend Wendover. They are upper class figures, but decent men who are not snobbish – in fact, their attitude towards characters who are dismissive of working class people is one of disgust. This slant on the class system is a reminder that class divide issues in Britain were, and perhaps still are, rather more complex than they might seem.

Connington is not known for his characterisation, but there are a number of points in the story when he makes observations about human nature that I thought were quite acute. And as detective novelist, he strikes me as under-rated. This case involves the discovery of a body in a flat, and the victim proves to have been a bigamist.

The mystery is cleverly contrived, with a neat story-line, not too much padding (though I admit the pace isn’t electric) and a good solution. The only real snag is that Connington is so keen to play fair with the reader that, to my mind, he gives too many clues and makes it too easy to solve the problem. But it’s an enjoyable story, all the same.

The return of All the Lonely People

2011-12-21T00:32:00.000Z

It’s now over 20 years since Harry Devlin made his debut, when my first book, All the Lonely People, was originally published. It was a marvellous experience for me, becoming a published novelist at long last, and not surprisingly I have very fond memories, not only of the book but of that whole period in my life.

The book was published in paperback by Bantam, a division of Transworld. When the Devlin series was acquired a few years later by Hodder, a new paperback edition was produced. Sadly, though, this edition has been out of print for quite a while.

This is a common problem for authors – unless they are best-sellers. One’s early books are no longer available in current editions, so it's hard for readers to track down those books. However, I am very happy to say that All the Lonely People will next year enjoy its third incarnation in a paperback edition.

This is because those enterprising publishers Arcturus have decided to include the book in their Crime Classics series. Given that other authors featured include Anthony Berkeley, whom I admire so much, and the likes of Francis Durbridge and Ethel Lina (The Lady Vanishes) White, I am flattered, as well as delighted. I’m fortunate indeed to have a book which has been paperbacked by three different publishers, and All the Lonely People has certainly been a very lucky book for me.

The Killing II - review

2011-12-19T00:50:00.001Z

The Killing II finally came to an end this week-end. I'm not going to talk about the story-line in detail, because I imagine that some readers of this blog will be wanting to catch up with the later episodes in the near future. But a few thoughts do strike me.

This was a show of ten episodes of an hour each, which I felt began very well, and also ended strongly. At first I thought there was a tocuh of early Taggart in the enigmatic and inter-related story-lines, but this comparison only survived the first couple of episodes. Althought the plot was tangled, and had one or two good aspects, it wasn't as clever as the work of Glenn Chandler, who created Taggart.

The acting was good and the production values were pretty high. However, I felt the story sagged very badly in the middle. There were stretches when I was rather bored, and this was because the characters' relationships, although not without interest, weren't compelling enough to sustain such a protracted exercise. The political aspects of the story really didn't excite me at all.

I am still intending to watch the original series of The Killing, which attracted so many rave reviews. But overall, I'd have to rate The Killing II as a disappointment. It had a number of strengths, but to justify ten hours of story-telling, you need to have a really outstanding tale to tell. For me, at least, The Killing II too often felt like an endurance test. The story simply wasn't strong enough to justify such an investment of time.

Forgotten Book - Careless Corpse

2011-12-16T00:01:00.001Z

My forgotten book today is an obscure but extraordinary novel written by a fascinating, idiosyncratic and sometimes maddening American Golden Age storyteller. The book is Careless Corpse, first published in 1937, and the author C. Daly King. And it included that odd paragraph on economics that I teased you with yesterday.

I’ve mentioned King before in this blog. He was a psychologist who wrote books on the subject, and he drew from his professional expertise for his novels. But this did not take him down the road of “psychological suspense” – his fiction bears no resemblance to that of Francis Iles, say, or C.S. Forester. On the contrary, he specialised in elaborate puzzles, often weighed down by strange digressions into academic debates. An example is the passage I quoted in my quiz question.

In this novel, a series of deaths occur among members of a party of celebrities – including a concert pianist, a violinist, a dancer, a composer, and a musical critic. The party is organised by a wealthy scientist, and the setting is an island amid the ice-floes of the Hudson River.

As so often, King provides helpful diagrams – no fewer than five – and arranges the text in a series of “movements” to underline the musical aspects of the story. The plot is elaborate and wildly ingenious (and, of course, improbable) and there is some entertaining writing mixed in with a bit of padding here and there. I don’t claim this book is great literature, but I really did enjoy it as a light, escapist read.

Quiz Question

2011-12-15T00:52:00.000Z

Here’s an extract from a book I’ve just read. It amused and intrigued me because the passage was written in 1937, yet arguably it has a modern resonance in these troubled economic times.

But the question is – do you know which book it appeared in? I will be very impressed if anyone knows the answer – but I’ll put you out of your misery tomorrow!

Here’s the quote:

“Why, this, country is on the skids properly now! With your taxes boosted practically to the British level, what do you do with them? The British use theirs to balance their budget, set their nation in order, pay for their necessary current running expenses; you use it for political bribery of the most corrupt kind and still pile up deficits twice or more as large as the increased taxes.”

Any ideas?

R.I.P. Gilbert Adair

2011-12-14T00:56:00.000Z

I never met Gilbert Adair, but I was sorry to learn of his death a few days ago. He was only 66, and suffered a second stroke; the first, it seems, had robbed him of much of his vision, a tragedy for anyone, but certainly for someone who loved reading as much as Adair must have done.

I've mentioned Adair once or twice before in this blog. He was a sophisticated writer, with a real interest in detective fiction. I read his A Closed Book when it first came out years ago, and enjoyed it. Some people see it as a sort of updating of Francis Iles, one of my favourite crime authors of the past.

In recent years, Adair had dabbled in pastiche, and he produced three books boasting titles which are riffs on Christie classics – And Then There Was No One , a very tricky piece of work, was his last published novel, as it turns out. His books tended to get a mixed reception from Golden Age fans, but there was no doubting Adair’s flair, intelligence or ability to see things differently. One of his titles was The Postmodernist Always Rings Twice. You either like that kind of joke, or you don't, and I definitely do.

In an excellent obituary in The Daily Telegraph, Jake Kerridge highlighted an excellent passage from A Mysterious Affair of Style (2007) which is worth quoting:

“It’s my theory...that the tension...of a whodunit....has much less to do with, say, the revelation of the murderer’s identity...than with the growing apprehension in the reader’s own mind that...the ending might turn out to be, yet again, a letdown...the reader’s fear [is] not that the detective will fail...but that the author will fail.”

A fascinating, if controversial proposition – and thus typical of Gilbert Adair’s work.How I wish I’d had the chance to meet and talk with him and get a better insight into a brilliant mind.

Dorothy and Wilkie

2011-12-12T01:00:00.002Z

Dorothy L Sayers had a huge admiration for her Victorian predecessor Wilkie Collins. I too am a Collins fan, and it's interesting to see the ways in which his work sometimesinfluenced hers. Perhaps the most notable example is to be found in theepistolary form that she adopted for her non-Wimsey novel The Documents in theCase.

For many years, Sayerstalked about writing a biography of Collins. She did start work on it, butnever managed to complete it – for reasons that are not entirely clear. She hadall the attributes, certainly including a gift for scholarship, that would haveequipped her ideally for the task.

I've often wonderedabout the incomplete biography, and recently John Curran told me that it hadbeen published, but was very difficult to obtain. Now, thanks to the kindnessof Christopher Dean, the chairman of the Dorothy L Sayers Society, I have beenable to borrow a copy, which I read with much interest.

There are one or twopassing observations to her fellow detective story writers, J.J. Connington andHenry Wade, but sadly, the manuscript finishes before Sayers reaches the pointin Collins' life when he wrote his masterpieces, The Moonstone and The Woman in White. What a pity that we do not have a really detailed study of those booksfrom Sayers in the context of Collins' life story. Perhaps she meant to returnto the book one day in the future. Her sudden and rather premature death meantthat she did not have the chance to do so – and we are the poorer for it, eventhough it is pleasing that the fragment remains in existence.

Blogs

2011-12-11T17:26:00.009Z

Jessica Mann is a writer of very interesting novels, some of which I’ve mentioned in the past. She’s also a critic and commentator, with a very good full-length study of female crime writers, Deadlier Than the Male, to her name.

Jessica has now started a blog with discussions about “pre-feminism for post-feminists”, a topic that really is much more fascinating than that tag-line may suggest. You could argue that feminist issues are at the heart of much of Jessica’s fiction, but her novels are certainly not didactic, and any points she wants to make don’t get in the way of the story.

The blog anticipates the appearance next spring of her latest non-fiction book, The Fifties Mystique, which evidently talks about some issues of concern to feminists. But whether or not one labels oneself as feminist, I’d expect it to be a very interesting piece of work. As a male reader who enjoys many books written by women and featuring female characters, I’m looking forward to it.

On the subject of blogs, you’ll have gathered that I’ve been having continuing problems with the new version of Blogger. My apologies – and thanks for your patience. My webmaster is now back to help me get things sorted out - hence the new layout. There are still some issues to iron out, but I hope that both the blog and my website will be looking better and more up to date before Christmas.

The Oliva Reader

2011-12-10T16:00:00.002Z

Spangle, who has kindly contributed quite a few comments to 'Do You Write Under Your Own Name?', has a blog herself, which I've belatedly added to the blogroll. She invited me to contribute a piece to her 'Chapters in My Life' series, and this is the link to her blog.

Forgotten Book - Bennett

2011-12-09T00:30:00.000Z

My Forgotten Book fortoday was published in 1977. Desmond Cory (a pseudonym) was a prolific writerof thrillers who occasionally dabbled in psychological suspense. Bennett washis last foray into that field, and I suspect that it was not a particularlysuccessful book. It is, however, by any standards a pretty extraordinary pieceof work.

Part of the book takesthe form of a journal, ostensibly written by a detective novelist calledWilliam Bennett. He has gone missing inSpain, and a young cop called Hunter has come out to try and find him, inconnection with the death of an au pair girl back in Britain.

The case has someechoes of the Lord Lucan case, but Cory’s concern is not to offer a “solution”to that famous mystery, but rather to indulge in an intellectual game with thereader. Are there two journals, are there two men claiming to be Bennett? Anddoes Hunter have a close personal connection with the man he is... hunting?

I first read this booknot long after it came out. I was disappointed by its anti-climactic nature,and I suspect most other readers shared my frustration. At least one reviewerdescribed the book as boring. But on re-readng it, I had more sympathy with Cory’sattempt to do something very different with the crime novel. It’s certainly intelligent, original and unrepeatable. Andthere are some fascinating allusions to classic detective fiction – such as TheWraith, an obscure book by PhilipMacdonald – which are not fully developed, but which somehow give the book abit more depth. Bennett may be a failure, but it’s an intriguing failure and iswell worth inspection – as long as you don’t expect the orthodox.

Devil - film review

2011-12-08T00:36:00.000Z

Whilst on holiday recently, I had the opportunity to watch the recent movie Devil and I found I enjoyed it immensely. It’s a modern film, and yet it has some distinctly classic elements. So when, after watching it, I read about the film on the internet, I wasn’t surprised to learn that M. Night Shamaylan, one o the team behind the film, and famous for the spookiness of his work, acknowledged that the story involved a nod to Agatha Christie.

More than a single nod, in fact. The main story is a riff on And Then There Were None, but in the dialogue there is also a hint of the plot-line from The ABC Murders. Suffice to say that I thought the film-makers used the Christie inspiration pretty well.

The story is taut (the film only lasts 80 minutes, and the brevity of the film helps to ensure that the intensity of the narrative is maintained) and compelling. An elevator in a skyscraper gets stuck and it seems that Satan is in there along with the five passengers. One by one, they meet grisly ends.

None of the actors was familiar to me, but they all did a decent job, and I felt that the film was well done, and the story presented in compelling way. The claustrophobic environment of the elevator in particular is beautifully conveyed. Devil is a world away from Fatal Descent, an elevator based novel I discussed here recently. But it’s much better than the Golden Age book by John Rhode and Carter Dickson, and, despite the lurid nature of the plot, it is strangely more credible.

End In Tears

2011-12-07T01:30:00.000Z

I have written beforein this blog of my huge admiration for Ruth Rendell. At one time, I had readevery novel and short story she'd published, both under her own name and asBarbara Vine. In the past 10 years or so, however, I've missed a few titles,and I've rather felt that (with a few notable exceptions) her most recent bookshave not quite reached the remarkable standards of excellence that she set inthe past. But she remains a gifted writer, and I'm keen to fill in the gaps.

I decided that I'd tryan audio book version of one of her Wexford stories, and was tempted by End inTears, especially as it was read by Christopher Ravenscroft, who was so good ontelevision in the role of Detective Inspector Mike Burden. I really like theWexford series, and I also admired the performance of the late George Baker asa very believable television Wexford.

Again,however, I have felt that there has been something of a falling-off in the morerecent Wexford books. For my taste, Rendell became a little too anxious toshove some social comment into the stories, and in such a long-establishedseries, this occasionally seems a bit awkward and unconvincing. But I make thisobservation simply because I think Ruth Rendell is such a fine writer that sheought to be judged by the most demanding standards (most of the rest of us needjustice to be tempered with a liberal dose of mercy!)

Endin Tears is a well-constructed mystery, although not ideally suited to audiobook abridgement, which led to a slightly fragmentary narrative and perhaps toomany characters. The social comment element here is about surrogacy, and Ifound this fairly interesting. But the actual murder motive was, to my mind, genuinelyfascinating, and neatly concealed. This book may not rank with the best ofWexford, but it is still enjoyable and I'm glad I've caught up with it at last.

The Resident

2011-12-07T01:00:00.002Z

I started watching a 2010 movie, The Resident, with high hopes. It’s a short thriller from Hammer, starring that very appealing actress Hilary Swank. She plays a doctor who does a lot of running to exercise her mortification at having split up with her philandering ex. She decides to move apartments, and finds a new home that is full of character and remarkably cheap.

There is a ‘but’, of course. As soon as we meet the owner of the building, played by Jeffrey Dean Morgan, we somehow suspect (for this is scarcely an original situation) that, for all his superficial likeability, he may well turn into a deranged killer. This impression is confirmed when we find that his strange granddad is played by – yes! - Christopher Lee.

Short the film may be, but I’m afraid that for me, it was still too long at an hour and a half. I thought the screenplay was clunky as well as predictable, with a long-winded flashback killing suspense quite early on, and although visually the film is quite effective, with the weirdness of the building well evoked, overall it was a dreadful waste of the talents of three excellent actors.

Aspects of the story are salacious, voyeuristic, and gory, and although very good films can be composed with such elements The Resident is too crassly put together to survive its flaws. It hasn’t received generally good reviews, and even some of the indifferent notices strike me, I’m afraid, as rather on the generous side. Very disappointing.

Cry of the Owl - movie review

2011-12-05T00:05:00.000Z

John Curran recommended me to give a try to Cry of the Owl, a 2008 movie based on Patricia Highsmith's book, written nearly 50 years ago and previously filmed, in a version I haven't seen, by Claude Chabrol. It's an interestingly different film, and you can never be sure how things are going to develop.

As so often with Highsmith, the characters behave oddly. A man called Forester, played by Paddy Considine, who has suffered depression and is getting a divorce from his gorgeous but rather unpleasant wife becomes obsessed by a couple who live in an isolated house in the woods. He spies on them, but in a curiously innocent way. The couple's relationship is in difficulty, and one night Jenny, the woman, played by Julia Stiles invites in the watcher. This is unexpected enough, but soon she starts stalking him. Her lover takes this amiss, and in a struggle, Forester hits him, but doesn't kill him.

However, the man disappears, and before long Forester is suspected of his murder. His world continues to fall apart. Jenny commits suicide and someone tries to kill Forester. The police react disbelievingly and he is suspended from work. I found a lot of this implausible, to say the least. And yet, strangely, I remained intrigued and wanted to find out what would happen next.

Suffice to say that the story didn't become any more plausible - far from it - but despite its flaws, I was glad I watched it. There was one nice twist and Considine's performance is very watchable. He is an actor with a good line in innocent weirdness.

Forgotten Book - The Players and the Game

2011-12-02T01:00:00.000Z

I first read JulianSymons’ 1972 novel The Players and theGame as a break from A Level exams revision shortly after it first appeared. Iwas a huge Symons fan then – as I still am – and I really enjoyed the book. Awelcome distraction which did me a lot of good at the time, despite its grimsubject matter. So I wondered how well it would stand up to re-reading.

The answer was –extremely well. I now knew the trick solution, but this time had the chance toadmire how Symons concealed it from the reader. This is a book influenced bytrue crimes – notably the Moors Murders – where two people combine to wreakhomicidal mayhem. I’m one of the many who have more recently written such astory, but few of us have matched Symons’ skill.

The book opens with anextract from a journal written by a mentally disturbed man who confuses himselfwith Count Dracula/Bela Lugosi, and meets a woman who sees herself as BonnieParker. The action then switches to a husband and wife buying a house; PaulVane is a personnel manager who is moving to be nearer his work, but the move proves to have disastrous consequences.

Two young women gomissing. One eventually turns up, but it soon becomes apparent that a serialkiller (or, rather, two serial killers) are on the loose. Symons shiftsviewpoint rapidly, introducing a good many characters, but he sketches themwith great clarity. Which man and which woman form the killer couple?

It’s a really ingeniousstory, as clever as most Golden Age efforts, but it’s worn really well, withonly a couple of aspects that seem dated. Symons explores the way that peoplewear masks to conceal their identities, and also provides a bleak picture of aman, Paul Vane, whose life falls apart. This is a really excellent mystery,much shorter than most present day serial killer stories and the better for it.I can’t understand why it isn’t more widely known.

Ten Little Indians movie review

2011-11-30T00:44:00.000Z

To be perfectly honest, I was expecting to hate the 1965 movie version of Agatha Christie's masterpiece And Then There Were None. Which is why I've managed to avoid watching it until now. But I decided to bite the bullet, and to my surprise found the film surpassed my admittedly low expectations.

The setting is a country house, of course, but this one is to be found at the top of an Alpine mountain accessible only by sleigh and cable car. The servants who greet the guests who have been invited by the mysterious U.N. Owen are locals, and when Owen's voice is played on a tape recording, I discovered that the uncredited actor who spoke the words was Christopher Lee (in a later version of the film, Orson Welles did the same job.)

The cast is pretty good, including Stanley Holloway, Dennis Price and Wilfrid Hyde White, as well as the ultra-glamorous ex-Bond girl Shirley Eaton, who gets to play a sex scene, albeit mild in the extreme, with Hugh O'Brian.

A notable feature of the movie is the 'whodunit break', an updated version of the Challenge to the Reader introduced in the Golden Age by Ellery Queen and also used by the likes of Rupert Penny and Anthony Berkeley. A gimmick, yes, but a pleasing one, at least to my mind. I enjoyed this film more than I should have done, perhaps. It ain't Martin Scorsese, but as light entertainment, it ain't that bad, either.

Newcastle

2011-11-28T00:30:00.000Z

I’m just back from a delightful week-end taking partin the Newcastle Winter Books Festival. It’s really only in the past three orfour years that I’ve started to get to know the North East, and I must say thatNewcastle grows on me each time I visit the city.

I took part in two events, both of them held at awonderfully atmospheric venue. The Lit and Phil is a fascinating library and great gatheringplace for people keen on the arts right in the centre of the city. Kay Easson of the Lit and Phil is very welcoming, and if you live inthe area, and you aren’t a member, it’s surely worth considering.

I gave a talk on Agatha Christie on Saturdayafternoon, and this was followed by the premiere of my latest murder mysteryevent, this time set in the 1920s. Both were very well attended, and I wasreally pleased to be part of the Festival.

On Friday evening I stayed with Ann and Tim Cleevesin Whitley Bay, and on Saturday evening I had a meal with Jean and Roger fromCornwell Internet, an excellent website business. Great mates and great company,all combining to make a memorable couple of days.

Forgotten Book - Tour De Force

2011-11-25T01:30:00.000Z

Tour De Force byChristianna Brand, first published in 1955, is today a Forgotten Book, perhapsbecause, after it appeared, the author turned away from the genre for a numberof years. But many connoisseurs think highly of it.

The novel featuresBrand’s most regular detective, Inspector Cockrill, and also a character whoappeared in an earlier mystery (and therefore seems by definition to be anunlikely killer) but the setting isunusual – a fictitious island off the Italian coast. Cockrill is part of a tourparty, and Brand clearly enjoyed writing about the island, as she set asubsequent book there as well.

A member of the tourparty is found dead. She has been stabbed to death with a dagger, andthere is a suggestion that she may have liked to indulge in blackmail. She wasalso at the centre of some romantic convolutions, involving one of thesuspects, Leo Rodd. Rodd is a one-armed musician who appears highly attractiveto women, although he was so unpleasant that I struggled to figure out why anyof them would bother with him. A map is supplied in the best Golden Agetradition.

A fairly obvioussolution to the murder mystery is put forward, but then Brand supplies a cleverand unexpected (at least by me) twist – although it depends on something sounlikely that I didn’t find it easy to suspend belief. There are variouspleasing features in the book, not least the setting, but I’m afraid thatBrand’s novels seem to me to suffer from a recurrent weakness. There is alwaysa closed circle of suspects, which is fine, but those suspects always seem to succumb beforelong to “rising hysteria” and their highly-strung behaviour and chit-chatrather gets on my nerves. So it was here.

However, Brand’s skillwith plot was formidable. She isn’t too far behind Christie and Berkeley inthat respect and I also gather that in person she was truly charismatic. To my mind, her short stories tend to be more satisfying than hernovels, because they are punchier and the characters in them don’t have time tograte on the reader. One of these days I will say more about her short stories,but for now I’ll rank Tour De Force as well-constructed, but a long way shortof a masterpiece.

Guilty Consciences

2011-11-23T00:30:00.001Z

I have finally receivedmy copy of the brand-new Crime Writers Association anthology that I haveedited. Guilty Consciences is published by Severn House, who have built up avery impressive crime list, and I must say that the dust jacket artwork is verymuch appeals to me. (Sorry I haven't been able to expand the image to make it more easily viewed - I'm still failing to get to grips with various aspect of posting on the updated Blogger system, as will be all too evident to those of you who have no doubt spotted a few glitches in the past couple of months....)

The book boasts aforeword by the bestselling novelist Peter James, who also contributes abrand-new story. Peter is the current chair of the CWA, and I was delighted tobe able to include a story by one of his most distinguished predecessors, thelate Harry Keating. Harry edited a couple of CWA anthologies, and as a tributeto him, I wanted to include one of his stories. Happily, his widow SheilaMitchell was generous enough to locate and provide an obscure but veryagreeable story about Inspector Ghote which had previously only been publishedin India.

There are a number ofother delights in the book. We have, for instance, a story by that verydistinguished writer Robert Barnard, and also a terrific story by Ann Cleevesfeaturing Vera Stanhope. But one of the great pleasures for me about editingthese anthologies is the chance to include work by very good writers who areeither not especially well known (yet) or who have not in the past focused onshort stories.

A number of thecontributors were persuaded to take a break from their novels to makesubmissions to the anthology, and they included Claire Seeber, Len Tyler, SarahRayne and Dan Waddell. I hadn't read short stories by any of them previously,but I was really delighted to read, and include, their contributions. Theresult, I very much hope, is a book which lives up to the high standards of theanthology over the past half-century, whilst giving it a fresh and distinctiveidentity of its own.

The Town - movie review

2011-11-23T00:30:00.000Z

Films about bankrobberies run the risk of following a formula, and one of the things that Ienjoyed about the 2010 movie The Town was that it offered a fresh (at least tome) variation on the theme. In this film, the smartest of the robbers doessomething not very smart – he falls in love with the manager of the bank he hasjust robbed. Mind you, given that the manager is played by the very attractiveRebecca Hall, it's not entirely an implausible plot twist.

The film is set inBoston, and the "town" of the title is Charlestown, an areaapparently associated with violent crime, although on one view, that negativeimages unfair and out of date. I don't know the truth of it, but I must saythat, the more I see of Boston in the movies, the keener I am to visit the cityone day. I get a very strong impression of a truly fascinating place.

Ben Affleck directs thefilm and also plays the lead character – very effectively and sensitively, Ithought. His backstory is neatly conveyed, without slowing the action, as ishis relationship with his fellow criminals. The mastermind behind the robberiesis, of all things, a florist (that was a touch of imaginative storytelling thatI enjoyed!) played by Pete Postlethwaite, who is very well cast as a menacing villain.Postlethwaite, who died of cancer earlier this year, is an actor who always madea strong impression, and he's a real loss to the cinema.

I found this filmgripping throughout. I've seen one or two reviews that compare it to Heat,starring Al Pacino, but personally I thought The Town was significantly better.Affleck and Rebecca Hall are both highly charismatic, and Jon Hamm does a goodjob as the detective pursuing them. Among heist films, I'd rate this one veryhighly.

The Killing II - review

2011-11-20T22:59:00.001Z

The Killing II startedon BBC Four this week-end and I made sure I watched it. I missed out on thefirst showing of the original cult hit series from Denmark The Killing, a gap in my TVviewing I mean to fill as soon as I can, given the enormously positivereception it received.

So what do I make ofthe follow-up? Well, the first two episodes were extremely watchable (the moreso by comparison, since the previous night I’d watched a rubbishy film calledThe Resident which was shorter than the two hour-long episodes but was soannoying that it felt as though it might never finish).

The story is a mix ofthe personal and the political, a bit like the recent UK series Hidden, butbetter. A woman is found murdered in bizarre circumstances. Her husband is asuspect, but it soon seems that there may be a link with a second killing. Thewoman was a military lawyer who worked in the Middle East, the man was anex-soldier. A third strand of the story involves another ex-soldier, nowconfined to an institution and mysteriously denied his release.

The structure of TheKilling II reminded me of the early series of Taggart. Three or four enigmaticstory-lines, connected in some (we hope) ingenious way. And, as in theGlaswegian series, dogged detective work, this time by Sarah Lund and UlrikStrange. The suggestion at the moment isthat Muslim fundamentalists are responsible for the killings, but we don’treally believe that, do we? Could the military man who is father-in-law to theinstitutionalised bloke be key to the story? That’s my bet at the moment, but weshall see. I certainly plan to keep watching.

Festival Time

2011-11-20T11:39:00.001Z

I seem to be here,there and everywhere at the moment. Yesterday was truly enjoyable: I visited a pleasant library withaccompanying museum in Buckley, North Wales, and next week-end I’ll be up in theNorth East.

I’ve been invited to participatein the Newcastle Winter Book Festival, and next Saturday I shall be involved intwo events. Both are to be held at a fabulous venue, the Lit and Phil, anamazing and atmospheric library which I last visited nearly three years back. In the afternoonI’ll be giving a talk on Agatha Christie and Golden Age detective fiction, andin the evening, there will be the premiere of a brand new interactive murdermystery event that I’ve just written.

But there’s much, much moreto the Festival than my two events. The programme is packed and impressive andI’m gratified to be part of it. As well as my Murder Squad mates Chaz Brenchleyand Ann Cleeves, events will feature the likes of M.C. Beaton, Allan Massie and TamDalyell.

This is the first yearof the Festival and I hope it gets plenty of support so that it grows and grows in the years ahead. If you are in that partof the world, do check it out.

Forgotten Book - Plain Murder

2011-11-18T01:00:00.000Z

I so much enjoyedreading the re-discovered crime novel by CS Forester, The Pursued, that Idecided to have another look at his second novel of psychological suspense,Plain Murder, which was first published in 1930. It is a book which, like hisdebut, Payment Deferred, has tended to be forgotten by crime fans – but itcertainly does not deserve such a fate.

I first read PlainMurder as a teenager, shortly after being blown away by the brilliance, as itseemed to me, of Payment Deferred. Perhaps inevitably, it suffered bycomparison with its remarkable predecessor, and I have said as much once ortwice in articles I've written over the years. But I'm now tempted to revise myopinion to some extent. The finale of this story is not quite as dazzling andoriginal, but the book as a whole is short, snappy and highly enjoyable.

Three advertising menhave been discovered by their boss in a minor fiddle. They face the sack, andthe poverty that dismissal for gross misconduct almost always meant in 1930.The ringleader, Charlie Morris, persuades his colleagues to help him kill theboss, and they duly get away with murder. However, the crime feeds Morris'egotism, and he finds himself on a downward spiral of homicide.

One of the strikingfeatures of the book is the well-realised office setting. I can think of veryfew office-based mysteries written before 1930 – any suggestions? Certainly,Forester anticipated Dorothy L Sayers, who published Murder Must Advertisethree years later. Her enjoyable novel is much better known than Forester's, butI do wonder if his book to some degree inspired hers.

London Boulevard - film review

2011-11-16T00:30:00.001Z

It's not very easy fora gangster film to avoid cliches of the genre, and I was rather worried whenthe 2010 movie London Boulevard began in a way strongly reminiscent of TheItalian Job. A London criminal (Colin Farrell, rather than Michael Caine) isreleased from prison, and a celebration is laid on for him by his friendsbefore he is offered the opportunity of "one more job".

At this point, however,the script takes off. It is based on a novel by Ken Bruen and the title is aspin on Sunset Boulevard. A pretty girl introduces Farrell to a retiredactress, and he takes on the task of looking after her at a time when she isbesieged by the paparazzi. But the actress is no Norma Desmond – she's playedby Keira Knightley.

Unfortunately, Farrellgets mixed up with the activities of a tough criminal played by (inevitably?)Ray Winstone, and before long he has good cause to be worried about the safetyof his beautiful but totally flaky sister – a very good part for yet anothergorgeous actress, Anna Friel. The plot developments come thick and fast asFarrell also sets out to avenge the brutal murder of a disabled friend of hisby a couple of young hoodlums. An irony of the story is that, on one occasionwhen Farrell resists the urge to mete out violent retribution, he lives toregret it.

There is a good deal ofviolence in this film, but the quality of the screenplay is such that it neverseems to become gratuitous. I've read a number of deeply unenthusiastic reviewsof this film, but the negative reaction of some critics really surprises me. Ithink London Boulevard is one of the best films about gangsters that I've everseen.

Marrakech and Murder

2011-11-15T10:03:00.001Z

I’m just back from aquick trip to – of all places – Africa. Morrocco, to be specific, and Marrakechto be even more precise. It was really an impulse decision to go off for a longweek-end in search of a bit of sun before the run-in to Christmas, and veryenjoyable it was too. I’ve never been to Africa before, but I was very takenwith what I found.

I can’t recall everreading a crime story set in Marrakech, though I’m sure there must be some;perhaps my memory is at fault. Any suggestions of titles? I’d really like totry a book set there. And there are surely bound to be plenty of thrillers set inMorocco. Certainly, it’s an atmospheric city; the souks are amazing, and I alsosaw my very first snake charmer. Not that I took a photo of the snakes, mind;you never know how they might react!

I read two contrastingbooks on the trip. I’ll be reviewing both The Players and the Game byJulian Symons and Tour De Force by Christianna Brand shortly. I’d read theSymons before but admired it all over again. Both books were highly ingenious –but Symons’ cleverness at plotting is sometimes overlooked by those who focusmainly on his criticisms of some classic detective novelists.

As for Brand – my feelingsare mixed, in that I admire her work a good deal, yet find some of her writingrather frustrating. She and Symons were friends and contemporaries, but she washurt when he gave one of her books a less than glowing review. He described her approach as “hectic”, whichisn’t the adjective I’d use, but there are, I think, reasons why she is muchless well remembered today than her talents would have justified. More of thisanother day.

Betty Fisher movie review

2011-11-14T00:57:00.000Z

When I visited John Curran in Dublin, I had not only the chance to admire his book collection, but also his very wide-ranging collection of DVDs, and he recommended a number of films to me that I'd never even heard of before. Among them was a French film, directed by Claude Miller with the frankly unpromising title Betty Fisher and Other Stories.

I was startled to find that the film is based on a novel by Ruth Rendell. The source book is Tree of Hands, a suspense story I enjoyed reading when it first came out. But that was a long time ago, and I must admit I've forgotten how the story goes. That was probably an advantage, given that Betty Fisher focuses on the core themes, but with many changes of detail.

To some extent, it's a story about maternal instincts, as well as about grief and guilt. Betty is a successful novelist with a crazy mother. When her son dies in an accident, her mum kidnaps another child, whose mother is an occasional prostitute, and who doesn't seem to miss him much. The strands of the two women's lives intertwine time and again, ultimately with bloody results. The use of coincidence is very typical of Rendell, but the treatment somehow seems very Gallic, and the effect is rather stylish.

It's one of those films where you really can't be sure what is going to happen. I found I just about believed in the story, despite various implausibilities, and it certainly kept me gripped from start to finish. An odd movie, perhaps, but a good one. John is a sound judge!

Forgotten Book - The Pursued

2011-11-11T00:30:00.000Z

My forgotten book fortoday is a rarity – a lost book that has just resurfaced and been published forthe very first time, 76 years after it was written. The Pursued is the thirdcrime novel C.S.Forester wrote before he turned his attention away from thegenre.

His crime debut,Payment Deferred, is a bleakmasterpiece, and Forester really could write – anyone who dismisses him becausehe is best known for his naval tales about Horatio Hornblower is making amistake, in my opinion. In The Pursued, he evokes the desperate gentility of suburbanlife between the wars with great skill, and his characterisation is excellent.

Marjorie Graingerreturns home one night to find that her sister Dot has gassed herself. Atleast, the inquest verdict is suicide, but it turns out Dot was pregnant, andMarjorie begins to fear that her randy, aggressive husband Ted was responsiblefor both the pregnancy and the death. But Marjorie is a weak woman in manyways, unwilling to act. Very different is her mother, Mrs Clair, who embarks ona relentless yet ultimately incoherent plan to achieve revenge....

This is a terrificread, with elements drawn from true crime cases, including the Crippen story. Idid feel that the latter stages of the novel were rather hurried, as thoughForester wanted to get back to his naval stories. But I really enjoyed ThePursued and to my mind it’s a milestone in the genre’s history. Thank goodnessthe manuscript, lost for so many years, finally turned up.

Paranormal Activity

2011-11-09T02:00:00.000Z

Paranormal Activity is a low-budget movie that has achieved a great deal of popularity. Rather like The Blair Witch Project, it’s a wobbly-camera film, with little-known actors. And it’s also quite good at building suspense.

The set-up is simple. A young couple, Katie and Micah, have moved in to a nice new home, only to find that Katie is pursued by the eponymous activity. They call in an expert, only to find him less than helpful. Micah’s big idea is to buy a camera so that he can film whatever is happening in their home. And the action takes place through the camera lens. So we get a great deal of inactivity, punctuated by bursts of drama.

The relationship between the characters is well done, and in many ways is the best part of the film. As doubts rise to the surface, their contented life together comes under fatal pressure. This is at least as gripping as what is happening in the house, which – one guesses – will not be clearly explained at the end.

I thought this was a good film, although not as brilliant as its reputation might suggest. Perfectly watchable, though, and with a climax that leaves the way open for a sequel.

Bruce Montgomery/Edmund Crispin

2011-11-09T00:37:00.000Z

Bruce Montgomery was the real name of the detective novelist Edmund Crispin, who wrote his first novel while he was still an undergraduate at Oxford. I read his most famous book, The Moving Toyshop, when I was about 14, some time before I thought about going to university. It's a book full of high spirits, which makes good use of the Oxford setting. It appealed to me more than Gaudy Night, that's for sure.

Crispin was influenced by John Dickson Carr, rather more than by Michael Innes, who wrote even more stories with an Oxford background, and I must say Carr is more to my taste than Innes, because the mystery plots are more compelling. But Crispin produced nothing for many years, and when his amateur sleuth Gervase Fen finally reappeared, I found The Glimpses of the Moon a sad disappointment.

David Whittle's sympathetic biography, Bruce Montgomery/Edmund Crispin: a life in music and books, explains the downward trajectory of his subject's life. He was an alcoholic, who suffered a good deal of ill health in his later years. It's a sad story, and his rather inept love life sounds rather depressing.

And yet he achieved a good deal. Not only those excellent early mysteries (though as a crime novelist he was burned out at 30) but also light music - he wrote often for films, including Carry On and Doctor movies. He was friendly with Kingsley Amis and Philip Larkin, and in some ways as talented. Whittle gives a good deal of insight into a life that began brilliantly, but all too soon entered a decline. A pricey but worthwhile biography.

Wake Wood - movie review

2011-11-07T14:00:00.000Z

It's a long time sinceI read much horror fiction, although in my teens I devoured a number of theshort story collections published by Pan, Faber and Fontana. As for horror films, manyof them seem obsessed with gore and violence, so I usually give them a miss.But fictional horror at its best can be terrific, as Mary Shelley, Robert LouisStevenson and others have shown.

My favourite horrormovie is The Wicker Man, and the very recent film Wake Wood does have someechoes of its brilliant predecessor. The only daughter of a vet and pharmacistis mauled to death by a dog, and in an attempt to cope with their overwhelminggrief, the couple move to a small and remote village where they can try torebuild their life together.

However, it soonbecomes clear that there are dark goings-on in the nearby woods. Somehow, thevillagers have discovered the secret of bringing a person who has died withinthe last 12 months back to life – but for three days only. And there are somerather spooky conditions to be met by anyone who wants to avail themselves ofthis chance to say goodbye for the last time.

Needless to say, thecouple cannot resist temptation, and enter into a sort of Faustian pact, whichhas foreseeably terrible consequences. It's hokum, of course, but donesurprisingly well, and the final scene is genuinely memorable and chilling.Much of the power of the film derives from the performances of Aidan Gillen andEva Birthistle as the bereaved couple, and of Timothy Spall, who presides overthe village's rituals with a mixture of geniality and menace that avoids therisk of over-acting the part into absurdity. Although there are some graphicscenes, I would recommend this film to horror fans. It isn't in the same leagueas The Wicker Man, but it's still a pretty good example of its kind.

Oxford Today and Crime Fiction Reviews

2011-11-06T11:59:00.000Z

Why is it that somebooks attract more attention than others? I’m not sure there’s a definitiveanswer. I’ve written at least one book – Take My Breath Away – that I thought wasgood but which made little impression on reviewers. But, thankfully, the LakeDistrict Mysteries have done better. And, when you’ve been around for a longtime, it is often hard to get attention for your work.

The Hanging Wood hasnow become one of my more successful books in terms of reviews. It’s attractedfavourable attention in The Times and The Literary Review, a column in TheGuardian, and pleasing comments elsewhere, here, in the US, and on Amazon. And now it’s been highlighted inOxford Today, a glossy magazine with a big readership: “stylish writing and agripping plot make the perfect crime thriller.”

I’m very gratified,since reviews do matter. And the merit of positive reviews is that they aregood for morale and motivation. There’s no doubt that, this week-end, I’llwrite with greater zest because of this latest review.

And this is something Ibear in mind when reviewing the books of others, especially those of livingwriters. It’s not about offering constant praise without a single caveat,because that tends to devalue the review. But I do like to look for thepositives, especially with writers who aren’t best-sellers, and who deserve tobe better known. Above all, I think it’s right to try to review a book on thebasis of what it is trying to achieve, rather than what it isn’t.

That Woman Opposite

2011-11-04T00:09:00.000Z

Today - a forgotten film, based on a relatively forgotten book. I have John Curran to thank for recommending that I take a look at a 1957 black and white mystery movie, That Woman Opposite (the title seems very dated now, doesn't it?) I'd never heard of it before, nor did I realise that a John Dickson Carr novel had been adapted for film. The book was The Emperor's Snuffbox, which I haven't read, so I'm not sure if it's faithful to the original.

The cast is very good. Wilfred Hyde White, whom I always enjoyed watching, plays an old buffer who collects pricey antiques. His son is played by Jack Watling, who long ago starred in a TV series called The Plane Makers which I distantly recall my Dad watching avidly. And his daughter is played by...Petula Clark, whom I associate more with that great song 'Downtown'.

The old chap witnesses a crime committed by a bad hat (William Franklyn, best known for the Schweppes ads of the 60s) who is the ex-husband of a pretty woman who is engaged to the priggish son. An insurance investigator takes a shine to her, and we can bet that sooner or later she will succumb to his charm, even though she is about to marry. And then the old chap is murdered, and she becomes the prime suspect.

The story moves along at a decent pace, and although the mystery was more inconsequential than I'd expected (not a locked room in sight) I enjoyed it a lot. One of the better period pieces of its era, I'd say, and if you're looking for an agreeable piece of light entertainment, I'd recommend it to you, as John did to me.

The Devil's Priest lives again

2011-11-02T00:01:00.000Z

Like most writers at present, I find my thoughts much occupied by ebooks. And I'm not the only one. Kate Ellis has used digital publishing to bring back to life her historical mystery The Devil's Priest. So I invited her to tell me, and us, more about it.

'History has always featured strongly in my Wesley Peterson novels, which are set in the modern day but always have an additional mystery from the past somewhere in the background. However, several years ago I wrote a novel set entirely in the sixteenth century during the reign of Henry VIII. As I was concentrating on Wesley and his heavy caseload at the time, it was taken on by a small publisher and a few years ago it went out of print, which was a pity because many of my readers told me they loved it…and even asked when I was going to make it into a series. Because I was busy with other projects, The Devil’s Priest lay forgotten for a while…until the advent of the e-book revolution!

All my other novels have been issued as e-books but, as The Devil’s Priest wasn’t with a major publisher, it fell to me to arrange for it to be brought out on Kindle. My husband and my Systems Analyst son tackled the difficult technical stuff and now I’m very proud to see it there on Amazon, available to my readers at a bargain price.

Although I wrote The Devil’s Priest some time ago I recall vividly how much I enjoyed carrying out the extensive research into life in Tudor Cheshire and Liverpool. The initial idea emerged from the history of my local church. Back in the 1530s, the Rector of Cheadle in Cheshire had a sister who was Abbess of Godstow in Oxford. Her name was Lady Katheryn Bulkeley and, as Abbess of a major religious house, she must have been one of the most powerful women in the land. In the course of my research I found letters written by her to Thomas Cromwell during the dissolution of the monasteries, in which she stood up for the rights of her abbey and her Sisters with a remarkable blend of tact and defiance. On the closure of Godstow Abbey this feisty woman came home to live with her brother in Cheshire where she died in 1559 and was buried in the chancel of the parish church where he was Rector.

With such a strong historical character so close at hand I couldn’t resist giving her a mystery to solve so at the beginning of The Devil’s Priest she receives word that one of her former novice nuns is facing deep trouble in the small port of Liverpool some forty miles away. Of course Lady Katheryn answers the desperate cry for help with dark and sinister consequences.

So, thanks to the development of e-books, readers can again enjoy Lady Katheryn’s perilous investigation. And I hope everyone enjoys reading it as much as I enjoyed researching and writing it!'

Hidden and The Field of Blood - reviews

2011-10-31T00:30:00.000Z

I’ve caught up with thefinal episode of Hidden, which I’ve reviewed here before, and also seen anotherrecent BBC TV crime show, The Field of Blood. The contrast between the two wasstriking.

Hidden first. It wasfull of action and plot developments, but it all became pretty incoherent. Asad waste of the talents of a cast that included David Suchet as well as thecharismatic Philip Glenister. Disappointing.

The Field of Blood,unlike Hidden, was not originally written for TV. It was a two-parter adaptedfrom a novel by a talented author, Denise Mina, though I haven’t read it. Setin 1982, the story concerns a young woman, Paddy Meehan, who is keen to makeher way in journalism. The abduction andmurder of a young boy gives her a chance. But her own youthful cousin becomes asuspect.

The script was an oddmixture. There were some good lines, but the first episode was painfully slowat times, and there was a weird and monotonous insistence that Paddy was fatand plain. Jayd Johnson, who played Paddy, is certainly neither. And I alsofelt the repellent sexism of the newspapermen was rather unsubtly depicted.

But the pace picked up,and the second episode was excellent. David Morrissey and Peter Capaldi, inrelatively small parts for such notable actors, were very good, but JaydJohnson was at the centre of everything that worked best. And the story had some interesting thingsto say about families - also a theme of Hidden. The Field of Blood tried to do less than Hidden, but inthe end made much more of an impact.

Was Corinne's Murder Clued?

2011-10-28T00:30:00.000+01:00

Was Corinne's Murder Clued? is the intriguing title of the latest CADs supplement, and it is written by Curtis Evans, whose knowledgeable comments will be familiar to readers of this blog. The idea of a supplement to CADS was editor Geoff Bradley's way of publishing pieces of work on crime fiction too lengthy to fit into the magazine itself. Previous authors of supplements include such experts as Barry Pike and Philip Scowcroft.

The sub-title of this supplement is "The Detection Club and Fair Play, 1930-1953" and I devoured it with great interest. Curt's idea was to explore how rigidly - or not - the Club stuck to its professed enthusiasm for "fair play" in clueing detective novels so that readers had a decent chance of figuring out the solutions for themselves. Not surprisingly, there isn't a straightforward answer, but perhaps many will be surprised by the care that Club members devoted to analysing the technical skills of prospective members. They did take it all pretty seriously.

Curt has - lucky man! - been able to read the correspondence of Dorothy L. Sayers with fellow Club members, held at Wheaton University in the US. He has - hard-working man! - noted with a scholar's scrupulous care a wide variety of comments made in the letters which cast interesting light on the personalities of the Club members. Suffice to say that Anthony Berkeley, whose books I so admire, doesn't come out of it all especially well. He was, undoubtedly, a man whose behaviour was a mass of contradictions.

Because this subject is one of great personal interest to me, I found this supplement absolutely fascinating. Would it appeal to others? I think so, because it's about a slice of literary history, not just as the product of very diligent research. For instance, I've wondered why an interesting writer like C.H.B. Kitchin was not a Club member. According to Curt, he was considered for membership, so perhaps he declined to join. The same seems to have happened with Georgette Heyer. There's no mention of Josephine Tey, but I speculate that the same was true in her case.

And finally, that title. It refers to a book by Douglas G. Browne which was dissected by Sayers and her colleagues as they wrestled with the question of whether Browne was worthy of Club membership. There was a lot of doubt about his account of poor Corinne's demise. But he was elected anyway. And I should add as a footnote that the current assistant secretary of the Club is also called Corinne. Which is why I did a double take the first time I saw the title of Curt's supplement! Suffice to say that I hope that his, and Geoff |Bradley's, enterprise attracts plenty of attention and purchases. They deserve it.

Independent bookshops

2011-10-26T17:00:00.000+01:00

We all know thatindependent bookshops have been having a tough time for a number of years, buton Saturday, I had the encouraging experience of visiting two excellent indiesthat have not only survived the recession, but flourished.

After visitingLancaster and Kendal earlier in the day, I headed for Ambleside – home, atleast for the moment, to Hannah Scarlett – and Fred Holdsworth's nicely locatedshop, run by Steve with excellent support from knowledgeable assistants. Iremember calling in there one miserable January afternoon when I wasresearching The Serpent Pool, in which some of the action takes place inAmbleside.

Then it was a shortdrive through Wordsworth country to Grasmere, and Sam Read's shop, run by Elaine,again with keen staff support. Elaine and her husband then kindly invited us totheir house, just across the road, for a welcome cup of tea before the journeyback down the motorway to home.

Why have Steve andElaine succeeded when so many others have failed? There is bound to be acombination of reasons. Hard work and determination are musts. Both shops occupy good locations in lovely touristdestinations which don't possess a major chain store such as Waterstones. But there's more to itthan that. I was struck by the genuine love that Steve and Elaine have forbooks, and by the way they command the enthusiastic support of the people whowork for them. For any book buyer visiting either of these shops, there is sureto be a genuine welcome, and good deal of well-informed advice andrecommendations. And Steve and Elaine are prepared to innovate, sellingvarying lines from time to time, and showing the kind of enterprise thatmakes all the difference in a small business. An example is the postcards that Elainesells, from photographs (of very high quality) taken by her husband.

All in all, my trip leftme more hopeful about the future of well-managed bookshops than I have been fora long time. The economic climate present endless challenges, but there isstill room for really good retailers, and it was a pleasure to meet so many ofthem on Saturday.

Death in Paradise - BBC TV review

2011-10-25T23:03:00.001+01:00

Death in Paradise is abrand new BBC TV detective drama with some interesting ingredients, and Isettled down to watch the first episode tonight with a good deal of optimism. Above all, Iwas intrigued by the fact that we were presented with – yes! – a 21st century locked room mystery.A sort of Guadeloupe-based homage to John Dickson Carr, if you can imagine sucha thing.

A British cop who isworking on a lovely little Caribbean island is found shot to death in a sealedpanic room belonging to a millionaire. The only two people with access to thepanic room are the millionaire and his wife, both of whom are conductingaffairs. But which of them is guilty?

Another British cop, DIPoole (no relation to Henry Wade’s cop with the same name) is sent out toinvestigate. Poole is played by comedian Ben Miller, who is inexplicably grumpyabout being posted to a truly beautiful place. The casting gives a clue to thefact that this is a light-hearted drama, a contrast to the bleak and grittyshows that have become over-familiar on our screens.

The solution to themystery has a clever twist, and although this show is certainly not in the sameleague as early Jonathan Creek – which provided a masterclass in scriptwriting- I found it watchable. After all, givenmy enthusiasm for impossible crime stories, I’m naturally pleased to see thatthey are still finding favour with the TV programme makers. Admittedly, therewere various flaws in the script, and some of the humour seemed forced. Nor wasI really carried away by Miller’s performance, which struck me as less than subtle. I can imagine that some viewers willhave been seriously unimpressed. But this was an establishing episode, with seven more tocome. As for making a definitive judgment on the show’s quality, the jury is still out.

Waterstones

2011-10-24T00:30:00.001+01:00

I had a very enjoyableSaturday, touring around a number of bookshops in, or just outside, the LakeDistrict. The trip had been arranged by my publishers, and I had the pleasureof signing plenty of books – which is always something an author enjoys! But aneven greater pleasure proved to be the chance to meet, and talk books with,quite a number of very likeable people.

The tour began inLancaster, a city I know reasonably well from many visits over the years. In fact,it was over a restaurant dinner in Lancaster that I had a conversation thatgave me the idea for the sub-plot of The Cipher Garden. This time I was callingat the Marketgate branch of Waterstones, where I had the chance to talk to bothreaders and members of staff, including Penny and Lynn.

Waterstones has changedover the years, and for quite a period of time it was difficult to avoid thefeeling that there was heavy emphasis on bestsellers and "three-for-the-price-of-two"offers. Mid-list writers like me, who were given great support by Waterstonesfor many years, found it increasingly difficult to feature on the shelves. Butthings seem to be taking a real change for the better, following the change inownership of the company. The impression I have is that the people at the topare taking the business in a new direction, not necessarily trying to competesimply on price with Amazon – which strikes me as a losing battle – butoffering a crucial personal ingredient in bookselling with enthusiastic andknowledgeable staff. I'm sure that this is the right way to go from a businessperspective, and it also makes Waterstones increasingly attractive to bookbuyers. I'm not saying the price isn't important, especially in tough economictimes, but it is not the only factor that matters.

Then it was onto Kendal,one of my favourite northern towns, and one which features regularly in theLake District Mysteries. Once again, the local Waterstones featuredknowledgeable and – so very important – enthusiastic staff, managed byCaroline, who is clearly a real book lover. We all know that things aredifficult in the retail sector these days, and staff who have a genuine passionfor the products they sell are the key to making a success of any retailbusiness in competing with online stores. Amazon reviews and ratings havebecome really important for writers – perhaps disproportionately so – but there'sno doubt that word-of-mouth recommendation from readers and booksellers remainsenormously valuable.

All in all, I wasgreatly heartened by these visits to Waterstones, not just from a personalperspective, but more generally as a book fan. And after that, it was on to twoindependent bookstores of great appeal – more about them soon.

Forgotten Book - The Crooked Hinge

2011-10-21T00:25:00.000+01:00

My Forgotten Book for today is another novel written by John Dickson Carr in his prime, The Crooked Hinge, first published in 1938 and dedicated to Dorothy L. Sayers ‘in friendship and esteem’. It features Dr Gideon Fell, who is pretty much on top form.

The starting point is an impersonation riddle reminiscent of the case of the Tichborne Claimant. Sir John Farnleigh, recently returned to his home to claim his inheritance, has married his childhood sweetheart - but someone else has come forward, claiming that Farnleigh is an impostor and that he, Patrick Gore, is the real Farnleigh.

The cleverness of the mystery is that when murder occurs, the victim is unexpected – he is the ‘original ‘ John Farnleigh. How was he killed, and who was responsible? The claimant seems to be in the clear, but can we be sure? Carr rings the changes on the list of suspects with his usual ingenuity, and the atmosphere darkens as Satanism makes its presence felt in the story.

Dr Fell propounds an apparently brilliant solution – but it emerges that this is simply a device on his part to expose the principal culprit. I thought this use of the ‘alternative solution’ type of plot was very well done, and although the book sagged a bit in the middle, on balance I found it highly enjoyable. Definitely worth reading, a book that should not be forgotten.

The Oxford Mysteries

2011-10-19T00:30:00.000+01:00

It's been a lousy summer in Britain, but of course there have been some exceptional days, and two of the last three Saturdays have been terrific. Last Saturday I walked in the sun around a relatively unfrequented part of the Lakes - gorgeous. And a fortnight earlier, it was baking hot in Oxford, quite amazingly so for early October, as I set about installing my children and their countless belongings in their college rooms.

Oxford was full of life, and I found myself wondering why it is that fictional death in the city has featured so often when compared to Cambridge. The Oxford crime mystery got going in the 30s, with books like J.C. Masterman's An Oxford Tragedy (a pretty good one I shall talk about in more detail one day). Michael Innes and Edmund Crispin set plenty of stories there, and then in the modern era Colin Dexter made the place his own.

But there have been plenty of other Oxford mysteries. I have in my TBR pile a book called The Body in the Turl, which I really must read now my daughter lives in Turl Street. And I was once responsible for a short story set in 19th century Oxford - 'The Mind of the Master'. Benjamin Jowett was my choice as a legendary armchair detective, and I did contemplate writing a whole series of stories about him. But I've never got round to it. One day, perhaps.

As for the photos, they show some of the views that greet the young Edwardses when they finally get round to opening the curtains in their college rooms. Lucky things.

Research

2011-10-17T00:30:00.000+01:00

I've found it a struggle to get started with the next Lake District Mystery. Lack of time is an easy excuse, but it isn't really good enough. I did write a first chapter, but it didn't live up to my ambitions, so I've binned it, retaining only the opening line.

So - how to get going? I decided I really needed to soak myself in the locale, and luckily last Saturday was sunny enough to allow me to do just that. The result was a walk that was hugely enjoyable, with magnificent views. Here are some photos of the area where I'll be setting the book.

If that doesn't inspire me through the winter, I don't know what will!

Curtain and Take My Breath Away

2011-10-15T00:41:00.000+01:00

Kerrie Smith, of Mysteries in Paradise, whom I was so pleased to meet at Crimefest, suggested I contribute to the celebrations of the anniversary of Agatha Christie's birth 121 years ago, and I'm very glad to do so.

Curtain, the last Hercule Poirot novel, boasts a fascinating modus operandi. Agatha Christie explicitly gives a nod of gratitude to a play by Shakespeare and another by the rather less celebrated St John Ervine. In both plays, the same pattern of murderous behaviour is deployed. She had briefly toyed with the idea earlier, in the excellent Peril at End House. Its sheer cleverness has always appealed to me, but I agree with Robert Barnard’s verdict on Curtain. ‘For a long-cherished idea…this is oddly perfunctory in execution’. In particular, the murdererer’s character, crucial to the whole concept, is inadequately portrayed.

For years, I thought about reviving the idea. But how to do it? In the end, I decided that the secret lay in a combination of a law firm setting and a dose of political satire. The result was Take My Breath Away, published in the UK some years ago but only just now published in the US by Five Star. It marked a complete departure from my earlier books about the lawyer-detective Harry Devlin. Given that I was building upon foundations laid by Christie and the Bard, I am ashamed to say that it took me two and a half years, and endless re-writing, to produce the book. But I like to think that at least the effort was worth it.

And an odd thing happened while I was writing the novel; I received a book which featured Ellery Queen’s plot outline for a novel never actually published, The Tragedy of Errors. It boasts the same central concept. Like Christie and like me, Ellery Queen makes due acknowledgment to the inspiration that he drew from the Bard. As I understand it, Curtain was written before, but not published until after, The Tragedy of Errors plot was concocted. Great criminal minds thinking alike? I'm sure it wasn't plagiarism on Queen's part.

Forgotten Book - Hangover Square

2011-10-14T00:22:00.000+01:00

Patrick Hamilton is one of those writers who teetered on the brink of greatness, but never quite made it. He is, however, in the top echelon of literature’s nearly men, hence the intermittent revivals of interest in his work. And there is a modern type of edge to his best books that has helped to cement his reputation.

Hangover Square, published in 1941, is my choice this week as a Forgotten Book that deserves to be remembered. It is the story of George Harvey Bone, a burly but quiet man who is undone by his passion for the worthless Netta. An alcoholic who suffers from a touch of schizophrenia, he torments himself so much that the reader almost forgives him both his stupidity (Netta clearly wasn’t worth it, as his smarter friends instantly recognise) and his homicidal tendencies.

My copy of this book is the current Penguin reprint, which includes an introduction by J.B. Priestley. Now, I am keen on intros, which can add a great deal of value to a classic title. And Priestley, who knew Hamilton personally, makes several interesting points. But his piece is flawed, above all because he discloses what happens at the end of the book .This isn’t a conventional whodunit, far from it, but Priestley shouldn’t have been so crass

I think it’s interesting that this book prefigures the interest of modern readers in the psychology of the criminal. Bone is portrayed in some depth, though his ‘dead moods’ did not strike me as entirely convincing. Yet the novel is well worth reading, at a time when the psychology of crime is a big topic. Patrick Hamilton was a pioneer of the crime genre, much more so than his capable but less gifted brother Bruce. It’s no surprise that he remain a crime writer of choice for a good number of critics. This book is, by some standards, a failure. But it is a rather brilliant failure.

The End of Everything

2011-10-12T00:44:00.000+01:00

Megan Abbott is a rising star in the world of crime fiction, and I’m not sure why it’s taken me so long to read one of her books, but on holiday I caught up with The End of Everything, her latest, a novel that has earned glowing reviews on both sides of the Atlantic.

It’s not hard to see why this book has earned such acclaim. The writing is absolutely top notch, and Megan Abbott’s style is such that she can achieve in the space of a relatively slim volume effects which others struggle to pull off in much bulkier novels.

This is a story about the relationship between fathers and daughters, or more broadly, between older men and teenage girls. The subject matter is delicate, but it is handled well and never sensationally. The story is told from the viewpoint of Lizzie, a thirteen year old whose best friend goes missing. There isn’t much doubt that she’s been abducted by a man called Shaw, but Abbott is more interested in the relationships between her characters than in a mysterious plot. And those relationships are depicted in a compelling way which had me gripped.

The one drawback to a crime novel written by a top flight author is that the culprit’s motivation is often inadequately drawn. So it is here. I anticipated the final ‘twist’ (though to call it that suggests this is a whodunit, which it isn’t, in any conventional sense) at an early point of the story, and I did wonder why the police did not focus their attention more on a particular individual rather than the obvious suspect. But this is a quibble – The End of Everything is a shining example of high calibre writing, and a fine achievement.

Hidden - TV review

2011-10-11T00:14:00.001+01:00

A downmarket, dogged criminal lawyer called Harry works in a scruffy city backstreet. Harry has been damaged by the death of someone very close to him and has a troubled love life, as well as an eye for a pretty woman. When he gets dragged into a murky case involving the murder of an attractive woman, he visits a gym as part of his enquiries, and runs into more trouble for his pains.

These were all elements of my first novel, All the Lonely People, so I was intrigued to see them reprised in the new four part BBC TV thriller Hidden, by Ronan Bennett. Hey, I knew my story-line was a good one! Joking apart, I won't be sueing for plagiarism, because in fact what Bennett has written is not a whodunit but a conspiracy thriller, with a political dimension (a bit like Take My Breath Away!) And Bennett's Harry is known to some of his mates as 'H', which reminded me of Harold Shand in The Long Good Friday.

All this shows, of course, is that there's nothing new in the world. Bennett has, however, tried to give the material a fresh feel by interweaving several convoluted plot elements, with copious flashbacks. A great deal of suspension of disbelief is required, especially when a mystery woman claiming improbably to be a lawyer offers Harry a large sum of money to find a man. In the Google era, it takes seconds to discover that she is not who she claims to be. As for the political storyline (is the Prime Minister the victim of a plot orchestrated by his smug colleague?), it struck me as not much more authentic than the portrayal of legal life.

And yet there's something about Hidden that encourages me to watch episode 2. That something is the presence of Philip Glenister, a very enjoyable actor, in the role of Harry. He carries the whole thing along with his usual rugged charm. I'm not sure I care much about the various mysteries, but I'll be interested to see how Bennett weaves all the strands together.

Eyes Without a Face

2011-10-10T00:13:00.000+01:00

I was drawn to the 1960 French film Eyes Without a Face, directed by Georges Franju, by the names of Boileau and Narcejac. They worked on the script, but it was in fact based on a novel by Jean Redon, of whom I really know nothing. A bit of research suggests that the original book may have been rather pulpy and that B and N added more sophisticated elements.

It's a film about a number of murders, but it's widely described as a horror movie, and for good reason, even though that label does not adequately convey the strangely lyrical nature of many of the scenes. Suffice to say that it's one of the most chilling and disturbing films I have ever seen.

When the film first came out, it was only a minor success and some critics and audiences were appalled by it. More than half a century later, it's been re-evaluated, and its excellence is now very widely acknowledged. Briefly, the story concerns the attempts of a plastic surgeon to reconstruct the face of his terribly disfigured daughter - played, quite brilliantly I thought, by Edith Scob. The doctor is assisted by an equally obsessed woman whose face he had previously restored.

The direction is excellent, and the score, by the legendary Maurice Jarre, makes a real impact, especially in the opening scene, when a woman is driving a car through the night with a mysterious passenger.

Choosing Boileau and Narcejac to work on the story was an inspired decision. The dialogue is sparse, but the terrible story is gripping throughout, all the way to its remarkable conclusion. Not an easy watch, but an impressive piece of work. And if anyone knows more about Jean Redon, I'd be interested to learn it.

R.I.P. George Baker aka Inspector Wexford

2011-10-08T17:22:00.004+01:00

I was sorry to read of the death of George Baker, at the age of 80, today. Many people assume he made his name playing Inspector Reg Wexford in the long-running adaptations for TV of those very enjoyable Ruth Rendell novels set in fictional Kingsmarkham, and I'm sure that's the role he will remain best known for. But there was much more to him than that.

Baker was a staple of film and TV during my youth. Apparently he was one of those considered for the role of James Bond, but he wasn't always a good guy. I remember him playing a criminal, Stanley Bowler, in The Fenn Street Gang, a sitcom spin-off from Please, Sir! And so good was he that a further spin-off series, Bowler, came into being, although it didn't last long. But Baker did the menacing yet pretentious villain (his door chime was Beethoven's Fifth) very well.

When I was a student, and visited the BBC, he was there in his toga, recording an episode of I, Claudius, in which he had a leading role. But the Ruth Rendell Mysteries enabled him to bring his greatest strength as an actor, his essential warm humanity to the part of a shrewd and likeable cop.

Ruth Rendell has already indicated she has no plans for any more Wexford novels, probably a good decision as the character has, I think, reached his sell-by date. But the series includes some great titles, and on television, Baker brought the stories, and the character, splendidly to life.

Forgotten Book - She Had to Have Gas

2011-10-07T00:12:00.001+01:00

I’ve mentioned before my enthusiasm for the work of the little known Golden Age writer Rupert Penny, and my choice for today’s Forgotten Book is the last mystery that Basil Thornett wrote under that pen-name, She Had to Have Gas. It was published in 1939; during the war, Thornett worked, most appropriately, as a cryptographer, and after peace was declared, he did not return to the genre.

In this book, as with other mysteries featuring Penny’s regular investigator, Inspector Beale, the cop’s pal, stockbroker and journalist Tony Purdon, is on hand to assist. But it has to be said that Tony’s presence in the stories was never easy to justify, and here his role is pretty superfluous.

The book begins splendidly, with the owner of a modest East Anglian B&B worrying about the creditworthiness of her sole guest. She is right to worry: soon she has good reason to believe the woman has gassed herself. But then the body of the apparent victim disappears – what is going on? Meanwhile, the spoiled niece of a famous crime writer has vanished, and one is tempted to believe that she was living a double life in the guest-house. With Rupert Penny, though, nothing is simple.

In fact, the plot is so elaborate that it comes close to sinking under the weight of its own cleverness. As with a number of similar books, I found the opening scenes and the revelations by far the best parts of the story. In between,there was much that was verging on the turgid. But there is a 'challenge to the reader' and a cluefinder to compensate. Penny was an appealing author and this book, for all its flaws, appealed to me.

R.T. Campbell

2011-10-05T00:39:00.001+01:00

I’ve been rather intrigued by the work of R.T Campbell ever since, many years ago, I first read about him in Bloody Murder, the superb history of the genre written by Julian Symons. Symons was a friend of Ruthven Todd, a Scots poet who dashed off crime novels under the Campbell name. Todd contributed, if only as a character model, to Symons’ crime debut, The Immaterial Murder Case.

As Symons said, there was even a lack of certainty about how many of the Campbell books were actually published. Todd himself didn’t seem to know. But now, at last, there is a solution to the mystery. I’m not going to reveal it, because the book which tells the story of Todd’s crime writing is well worth obtaining. Take Thee a Sharp Knife has just been published by Lomax Press in an attractively produced limited edition. I think it’s marvellous that such an obscure book should be granted a new life, in high quality format.

A couple of the Todd books were reprinted a couple of decades back, byDover. Of these, I have read Bodies in a Bookshop, which entertained me without being so memorable that I can now recall the story-line. Campbell didn’t rate his work as Todd, but I think he was being too hard on himself.

The story is annotated by Forbes Gibbs, and contains a note by Peter Main on the Campbell novels, as well as nice reminiscence piece by Todd’s son. This material does add to our stock of knowledge about a likeable writer, and I’m looking forward to reading the book from cover to cover.

CADS 61

2011-10-03T00:12:00.001+01:00

I've written before in praise of Geoff Bradley's marvellous magazine CADS, and the recent arrival of the latest issue is cause for celebration, as usual. Its appearance may be irregular, but the high standard of the contents is very regular indeed.

We have another nice mix of material again this time, with pieces from a range of excellent familiar contributors such as Liz Gilbey and Philip Scowcroft - the latter writes interestingly about the John Dickson Carr book I featured a while back, The Problem of the Green Capsule.

The highlight is the lead article, by Peter Lovesey, a very informative piece on the Detection Club. I had the pleasure of seeing a draft of this article, which Peter prepared for a lecture, and it's characteristically enjoyable. Peter's lecture, by the way, was the annual lecture for the Dorothy L. Sayers Society last March. I was asked to speak there myself, but had to pull out because of the day job. However, I'm glad to say that I've been invited to give the annual Sayers lecture next year, and I'm really looking forward to it.

Finally, Curt Evans has unearthed some fascinating correspondence involving J.J. Connington. I haven't yet read all of his article, since he kindly includes spoilers about revealing the solutions to a couple of Connington books I have yet to read. But as ever his research is intriguing and welcome.

Forgotten Book - Jumping Jenny

2011-09-30T00:23:00.000+01:00

You can tell that I've been on an Anthony Berkeley binge lately, can't you? My choice for today's Forgotten Book is a novel he wrote in 1933, which I read years ago and have now enjoyed again a second time around. Unfortunately, the plot of Jumping Jenny - which has one feature that I think is quite unique in the genre- is such that I don't want to say too much about it, for fear of saying too much. Suffice to say that there is a great twist in the very last line.

But there is plenty to enjoy in the story, that's for sure. I liked the opening lines a lot - they tell you so much about Berkeley's style that I'd like to quote them:

" From the triple gallows three figures swung lazily, one woman and two men.

Only a gentle creaking of their ropes sounded in the quiet night. A horn lantern, perched above the triangle of the crosspieces, swayed in the slight wind, causing the three shadows to leap and prance on the ground in a grotesque dance of death, like some macabre travesty of a slow-motion film in silhouette.

'Very nice,' said Roger Sheringham.

'It is rather charming, isn't it?' agreed his host."

The oddest feature of the story, by far, is the attitude taken to women in general terms - the victim is a truly awful person, although I should add that there are also sympathetic female characters. But Berkeley clearly had 'issues' with women. Perhaps that's why both of his marriages broke down. Then again, in his defence, there is plenty of evidence that he remained on very good terms with both his ex-wives. A complicated man, for sure. But a very entertaining writer, and this is a book well worth reading. In the US, it is known as Dead Mrs Stratton.

The Northerner

2011-09-28T23:26:00.008+01:00

I was delighted to read a very generous blog post in The Guardian yesterday about The Hanging Wood. Here's a link to David Ward's piece

As David Ward says, the Theatre by the Lake features more prominently in the synopsis for the next instalment of the Lake District Mysteries than in The Hanging Wood. It's an excellent place, and deserves every support.

Triangle at Rhodes

2011-09-28T00:21:00.001+01:00

During my recent holiday in the Med, one port of call that was just possibly my favourite was the island of Rhodes. I'd never been there before, and knew little about it other than that the long vanished Colossus had been a wonder of the ancient world. What I found was a place that combined beauty with history and character in abundance.

The trip also reminded me of an Agatha Christie story, 'Triangle at Rhodes', which appears in Murder in the Mews, and which bears a strong resemblance to the plots of two of her later novels. It's a very good story, but on re-reading it, I was a little surprised that Christie said so little about the island on which she set it.

I suppose this is one of the characteristics of her work - its universality means that there isn't much scope for specific detail. I first read the story when I was about 9 or 10, and had never travelled to London, let alone overseas. It wasn't until much later that I became interested in seeing the world. So the absence of background colour didn't bother me. But now it seems a bit like a missed opportunity.

The short story I plan to write set on Santorini won't be a travelogue, but I will hope to include some feel for the place that inspired me to write it. And who knows, one of these days I might write something set on Rhodes too. I've certainly made some notes as well as taking loads of photos, of which these are just a few!

Short Stories

2011-09-26T00:50:00.000+01:00

I'm delighted to say that my story 'Clutter' has been chosen to appear in Best British Mysteries, edited by Maxim Jakubowski, and in the US, in The Best Crime and Mystery Stories 2010, edited by Martin H. Greenberg and Ed Gorman.

Meanwhile, Murder Squad's second anthology is due out shortly and I've just received my author copies - and very good the book looks too, in my admittedly biased opinion.

I'm setting out below the official press release. Review copies can be obtained from Ross Britton at rbritton@thehistorypress.co.uk or alternatively on Tel: 01453 732505. I do think that The History Press have done a great job with this book, and I'm hoping that readers will agree.

Best Eaten Cold and Other Stories
A Murder Squad Anthology

Edited by Martin Edwards
To be published 3rd October 2011, £6.99 Paperback Original, 978-0-7524-6300-1
Also available in Ebook

A collection of murderous tales from the countries
premier crime fiction writers

Best Eaten Cold and Other Stories showcases a group of highly regarded, award winning crime writers who all share a special passion for crime, which is reflected in this superb new volume. Funny and sad, atmospheric and dark, ingenious and frightening, each of the thirteen stories in this collection will keep you guessing to the very end. From the creepy undertones of Riviera to the mystery of The Habit of Silence, this Murder Squad anthology has something for crime fiction lovers everywhere.

• Foreword by Barry Forshaw, editor of Crime Time magazine.
• Includes previously unpublished material written especially for this anthology.
• Murder Squad was the first ‘virtual collective’ of British crime writers.
• Includes award winning authors, such as Ann Cleeves, creator of the ITV drama series Vera starring Brenda Blethyn.

MURDER SQUAD are a group of leading crime fiction writers comprising Stuart Pawson, Martin Edwards, Margaret Murphy, Chaz Brenchley, Cath Staincliffe and Ann Cleeves. Murder Squad was set up in 2000 by Margaret Murphy, and since then Ann has won the CWA Gold Dagger, Martin has won the CWA Short Story Dagger, and Ann and Cath have had their books successfully adapted for television. All of them have been published internationally and between them they have published over 80 novels, and over 70 short stories. Martin has edited 20 crime anthologies.

Visit http://bit.ly/rcp39T for a free online sampler of ‘Best Eaten Cold’; including a piece by Martin Edwards on his writing experiences, and 2 extracts from the 13 stories.

CSI Portsmouth

2011-09-24T10:37:00.000+01:00

There aren't many sizeable towns in Britain that I haven't visited, but Portsmouth is one of them. It's an omission I shall need to repair in years to come if a new crime event develops further in the future. I've received an interesting news release from Pauline Rowson, and here is a shortened version of it.

"Portsmouth BookFest has scoured a coup by securing the appearances at the 2011 CSI Portsmouth event of four internationally acclaimed crime authors: Mark Billingham, John Harvey, Michael Ridpath and Pauline Rowson who will join experts from the Crime Scene Investigation team and Fingerprinting Bureau of Hampshire Constabulary and experts from the International Centre for Research in Forensic Psychology to discuss crime fiction and fact in a lively panel debate at John Pounds Community Centre, Portsmouth on Saturday 5 November.

Last year’s inaugural event attracted an audience of over two hundred people and it is anticipated that a packed programme this year with a line up of top crime authors and experts will see numbers increase.

The morning programme will comprise of talks featuring experts in Victorian Crime, Fingerprinting, forensic psychology and a talk by former Detective Superintendent Bob Bridgestock who will be telling audiences how he has used his experience of twenty-six murder investigations, and countless investigations to shape his crime novels featuring Jack Dylan, written in partnership with his wife Carol, who also worked with the police as a support worker for seventeen years.

There will be a chance for delegates to see how the fingerprinting bureau works and have their fingerprints taken, as well as talk to the crime authors to find out how they come up with their intricate plots and research their novels.

CSI Portsmouth 2011 is being held on Saturday 5 November at John Pounds Community Centre. Tickets cost £5 for the morning and £7 for the afternoon with a discounted ticket of £10 for the day and discounts for Portsmouth library members. It also includes £3 off the price of a book bought at the event. Tickets are on sale from 12 September from the Box Office on 023 9268 8685.

For more details on CSI Portsmouth 2011 visit http://www.rowmark.co.uk/csi_portsmouth_bookfest.php

And for the Portsmouth BookFest visit www.portsmouthbookfest.co.uk. "

Forgotten Book - Fatal Descent

2011-09-23T00:09:00.000+01:00

It is rare for two crime writers who have established significant personal reputations to collaborate on a novel. But there are some notable examples, and one of them is my choice for today's Forgotten Book, Fatal Descent. The authors were an Englishman and an American who became good friends through their membership of the Detection Club. The Englishman was John Rhode, and American John Dickson Carr, here writing under his alternative pen-name of Carter Dickson.

The story is set in the offices of a publishing magnate, who is duly found dead in his own personal elevator – which nobody else was allowed to travel in. But no weapon can be found, although the skylight of the elevator has been damaged, and there is no doubt either that he has been shot to death or that it is a case of murder and suicide.

As you might expect from these two authors, it is a classic "impossible crime" situation, and I thought that the solution was highly ingenious, although it depended upon so much mechanical cleverness that there was no chance that I would ever have guessed how it was done. Once you knew how, you knew who, and I was not convinced that the authors played entirely fair with regard to the question of motive, giving no real details of what drove the killer before the final explanation.

A very similar setting was used by Kenneth Fearing in that wonderful novel, later wonderfully filmed, The Big Clock. But in Fatal Descent, the authors make no attempt to exploit the setting for its atmospheric potential. The impossible crime mystery is everything. And, much as I like sealed room mysteries, this sealed elevator mystery has to rank as a missed opportunity. It’s not really surprising that Rhode and Carr never wrote a joint novel again.

Santorini

2011-09-21T00:22:00.001+01:00

Well, you didn't think that you'd get away with just one set of my holiday snaps, did you?! These photographs were all taken on a memorable visit to Santorini, a Greek island as fascinating as it is beautiful. In fact, I liked it so much that I was immediately inspired to think up a story set on Santorini.

I suppose that most sensible travellers research their destinations in depth before they set off. However, I must admit that I didn't know anything about Santorini before I arrived there. This was partly because I hadn't had much time prior to the cruise to think about it in any detail – but it was also partly because one of the joys of cruising, at least to me, is that of arriving in fresh and unknown places morning after morning and then discovering them at close quarters. You only have time to get a brief flavour of the place, but of course, if you like it enough, you can always go back at a later date for an extended visit.

Suffice to say that I'm keen to return to Santorini one of these days. Mind you, next time, I may take the cable car to the top of the cliff where the main town of the island is located, rather than flogging up the 600 steps which wind to the top. I did the walk both ways which gave me a rare sense of virtue, and managed to avoid being crushed to death by the masses of donkeys that carry nervous passengers up the same path. Anyway, the walk was worth it, both for the breathtaking views and for the delightful nature of the town. I thought it was a fantastic place.

Santorini was created by a volcanic eruption, and the town was destroyed less than 60 years ago by an earthquake. The geology is part of the fascination of the place, and it has influenced the theme of my story – which is provisionally entitled "Fault Line".

Back in Britain

2011-09-20T15:54:00.008+01:00

I'm back from a wonderful cruise in the Eastern Mediterranean, and acclimatising to a drop in temperature of about 15 degrees Celsius, but I think I should apologise for not being able to post any of your comments, let alone reply to them, while I was away. I did have limited access to the internet, but Blogger refused to allow me any access to this blog. Since returning, I've had to change my password and the Blogger site leads me to believe their service is now being revamped and improved. We'll see.

Apart from visiting many marvellous places, and eating too much food, I also read five crime novels and watched a couple of films that will provide material for future blog posts. And I started a short story inspired by one of our ports of call, the amazing island Santorini.

The photos, by the way, indicate sunsets over the bay at Rhodes, the Aegean Sea, the bay of Naples. And there's a shot of the windmills at Mykonos, another overlooking the blue grotto at Capri as well as one of one ancient ruin visiting another ancient ruin at Ephesus.

Simon Brett

2011-09-19T00:58:00.000+01:00

It must be 25 years or more since I first came across the crime fiction of Simon Brett. I enjoyed a number of his very witty novels about the actor and amateur detective Charles Paris before moving on to his second string sleuth, Mrs Pargeter. More recently, he has enjoyed good deal of success with his Fethering novels.

But this very prolific writer has, quite apart from his work for radio and television and some non-fiction, which includes an admirable anthology of parodies, also written successful stand-alone novels of psychological suspense. Not long ago, I posted a review of A Shock to the System, the film based on one of those books, and I can also recommend Dead Romantic, one of his strongest novels.

He is as witty and urbane in person as in print, and many years ago, I heard him give a highly entertaining talk at a writers' festival. I have to confess that I was too shy to introduce myself as a fan, but it did give me great pleasure to meet him at last some time later. More recently, I was quite thrilled to receive a letter from him, out of the blue, telling me I'd been elected to membership of the Detection Club, of which he is President.

A couple of times, I've had the happy experience of including Simon Brett stories in anthologies that I've edited - most recently, a new Charles Paris story for Original Sins. He is a first rate short story writer, and his collected crime stories, in a couple of volumes, are definitely worth seeking out. As the title of one of hose books, A Box of Tricks, implies, he is very good on plot and twists, but he is also keen to keep trying something new - he's even written crime fiction in verse. I saw Simon fleetingly at the recent Crimefest, and here's a photo of the two of us during the CWA Dagger shortlist event. My thanks, as ever, to Ali Karim, for allowing me to reproduce it.

Forgotten Book - Trial and Error

2011-09-16T00:51:00.000+01:00

Another Anthony Berkeley for today's Forgotten Book! And this one is an absolute classic - Trial and Error, first published in 1937, and reissued by Penguin a decade later with an introduction in which Berkeley defends his plot twist which depends upon a private prosecution for murder.

This is, from the opening scene to the twist in the final sentence, a joy to read. It blends humour and mystery with a deep cynicism about justice, politicians, and newspapers. Could have been written yesterday, then!

The set-up is brilliant. Mr Todhunter is terminally ill, so he decides to do the world a kindness by murdering someone who is truly appalling. He carries out his plan, only to find that an innocent person is charged and convicted. When Todhunter confesses, nobody believes him. So he has to prove his guilt - but it turns out to be very tricky to do so. he turns to Ambrose Chitterwick, one of Berkeley's series sleuths, for help.

Berkeley was here at the very top of his form, producing plot twist after plot twist with seemingly effortless skill. Yet within a couple of years, he had given up novel writng for good. He was a real loss to the genre. Some may argue that he was a writer of his time,but I think there's something very contemporary about his best work, which makes it timeless. In my opinion, he wrote four outstanding books, plus some other good ones. This is one of the top four, no question.

The Secret in Their Eyes

2011-09-14T00:39:00.000+01:00

The Secret in Their Eyes is a film from Argentina which won the Oscar in 2009 for Best Foreign Language Film. However, I must admit that I was unaware of it until it cropped up on the satellite movie schedule. A glowing description prompted me to give it a try – and I was really glad that I did.

The story is set partly in the past and partly in the present. In the present, a retired cop has a call on a woman judge he used to work with. He explains that he has turned into a novel his recollections of a case that obsessed him, and which clearly had an impact on his relationship with the (very attractive) judge.

We revisit the past to find out about the cold case. A young married woman was brutally raped and murdered. The cop was fascinated by the fact that her husband, a quiet bank clerk, was so utterly devoted to her. He becomes determined to track down the killer and, assisted by an alcoholic colleague, he does just that. But it is impossible to secure a conviction, and after his colleague is murdered, the cop relocates for his own safety, and in the process loses touch with the woman he loves.

This is a film about the fine line between passion and obsession. The consequences of obsession, it is clear from the story, can be hugely destructive. But with passion, the message seems to be – seize the moment. It is a powerful drama, with a compelling late twist which involves the husband of the murdered woman in a very unexpected way. I can well understand why this film won an Oscar, and it certainly is well worth watching.

Memento - review

2011-09-12T00:14:00.000+01:00

Memento, directed by Christopher Nolan, is unquestionably a film that needs to be seen more than once. Even if you figure out what is going on in good time during the first viewing (and I have to admit that I didn't), it is a film that really does repay careful study.

The idea – based on a short story written by Jonathan Nolan, the director's brother – is fascinating. There are two contrasting sequences – a chronological sequence of events, shown in black and white, and a reverse sequence, showing colour. This effect is confusing and unsettling, but also intriguing.

Guy Pearce plays the part of Leonard, a young insurance investigator, who is determined to avenge the death of his wife, who was raped and murdered by one or more intruders. During the attack, he was hit on the head, and as a result, he loses his short-term memory. To keep his investigation on track, he has vital clues tattooed on his body, takes Polaroid photographs of various people and places, and makes notes on the wall chart that he keeps in his motel room.

Leonard is, to say the least, an unreliable narrator. As a result of his unreliability, it isn't easy to get a handle on exactly what has happened. But it is definitely worth making the effort. This is a very interesting film by one of the most interesting contemporary film directors.

Forgotten Book - Blueprint for Murder

2011-09-09T00:05:00.000+01:00

My choice for today's Forgotten Book is another entry in the impressive new series of classic crime novels published by Arcturus. This one is called Blueprint for Murder, and the author is Roger Bax. If the name of Roger Bax is unfamiliar to you, you might be familiar with the work of Andrew Garve. Both were among the pseudonyms used by the journalist and prolific author Paul Winterton, but it is as Garve that he carved out a considerable reputation.

I had never previously read any of the books he wrote as Roger Bax, but even if I had not known the identity of the author before reading the book, I might have guessed it because of the focus on small boat sailing – clearly this was one of Winterton's great passions.

The book changes character in its last quarter. It starts out as an "inverted" crime novel, tracing how a man made ruthless by his wartime experiences sets out to kill a wealthy benefactor, contriving an ingenious alibi so as to escape justice. But his plan has some rather obvious flaws, and after it falls apart, but the book is in the form of an adventure thriller as he tries to flee across the Channel.

The book is set in the immediate post-war period, and the horrors of the concentration camp that so corrupted the villain are conveyed tersely but well. This is a readable and entertaining story, and although the outcome is only foreseeable, I enjoyed it from start to finish. Had it not been reissued, I'm sure I would never come across it, and Arcturus are to be congratulated for publishing a novel that, although hardly well-known, deserves a new lease of life as a lively period piece.

Travels

2011-09-08T21:44:00.001+01:00

It's more than a year since I had a full week off on holiday, so suffice to say, I'm more than ready for a decent trip away. Mind you, in the past twelve months, I have had quite a number of hugely enjoyable long week-ends, as well as four nights in Rome, so I'm not complaining.

However, the chance to recharge my batteries at greater length is something I've been looking forward to and I hope to make the most of it - and do plenty of reading too! I have scheduled in advance regular blog posts as usual, but as I shall not have regular access to the internet over the next ten days, please forgive me if I'm slow in publishing or responding to any comments.

And I'll soon be back, duly refreshed and - I hope! - in the right frame of mind to get going with my next novel...

Key Largo

2011-09-07T00:40:00.000+01:00

Key Largo is a classic black and white thriller, set on one of the Florida Keys during the hurricane season. The cast is outstanding, with Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall, Edward G. Robinson and Claire Trevor. I enjoyed it.

The story is straightforward. Bogey drops in at a hotel on Key Largo, to see the owner and his daughter, having fought alongside the owner's late son during the war. It's apparent that Bogey was a war hero, but he gives the impression that his colleague, Temple, was the heroic one. And this idea of heroiosm is a key element in the story. At some points, Bogey's character appears weak and irresolute. But the viewer is always optimistic that he will in the end assert himself - and that's a tribute to the iconic actor's powerful character.

A supposed fishing party, whose members are rather disagreeable, is staying at the hotel. It turns out that they are a gang of crooks, led by Johnny Rocco - played by Edward G. Robinson. The battle of wills between Robinson and Bogart is as compelling as the chemistry between Bacall and Bogart.

A word for Claire Trevor, who plays a drunken former nightclub singer. She puts in a very good performance, and plays a crucial part in the story-line. The story is sound, but it's the acting, and the powerful personalities of the actors, that make this movie memorable.

A Criminally Good Break

2011-09-06T00:37:00.000+01:00

When Agatha Christie's Secret Notebooks, by John Curran, was published, I felt that it was the most fascinating book about the genre that I had read for a long time. The notebooks that John Curran has so painstakingly transcribed give a fascinating insight into the thought processes of the most successful crime writer of all time.

So when John invited me to attend the launch in Dublin of his follow-up volume, Agatha Christie's Murder in the Making, I seized the chance to combine the get-together with a long weekend in the Irish capital. And it all worked out marvellously well – even the weather was pretty kind.

The launch was held at a prestigious venue, the Civic Offices on the banks of the River Liffey, and was attended by well over 100 people. The following evening saw a private party hosted by friends of John at their house in Clontarf, which was another highly enjoyable event. Amongst the highlights, as the photograph shows, was the production (and consumption!) Of a cake featuring a facsimile of the book. Mathew Prichard, Christie's grandson (and the father of James Prichard, whose Langtail Press I have featured a few times in this blog) was present on both evenings, and there's no doubt that his support of the project has been crucial to the success of John's work, and that it has been absolutely justified by the dedication John has shown.

I'll be reviewing the book shortly, and I'm delighted that its publication gave me the excuse (if one were needed) for a brief but fascinating break. Dublin is a fairly compact city, and we covered a lot of ground in a short time. And, as unexpected bonus, whilst I was there I not only dreamt up a new short story, but got an idea for the title for my next Lake District Mystery.

Dublin

2011-09-04T22:32:00.007+01:00

I'm just back from Dublin and am due at a meeting early tomorrow, so I'll be posting on my very enjoyable trip - which had a strong detective fiction theme - on Tuesday.

In the meantime, one or two photos to give a flavour of one of my favourite cities.

Forgotten Book - Death Walks in Eastrepps

2011-09-02T00:10:00.000+01:00

It is always a real cause for celebration when the forgotten books of the past are resurrected in new print versions (or as e-books, come to that). Assuming, of course, that they are not books that deserve to be forgotten! In my opinion, Death Walks In Eastrepps most definitely deserves to be remembered. In fact, one critic described it as one of the 10 greatest detective novels of all time. This may be a bit over the top, but nevertheless, it certainly qualifies as a classic.

In a post on this blog almost four years ago, I talked about the book in the context of a discussion on interesting motives for murder, and the motive is certainly distinctive and memorable. But the book as a whole is a lively and entertaining read, and since it is 80 years since its original publication, the time was certainly ripe for its resurrection.

I'm very glad to say, therefore, that a brand-new, attractively produced edition has now become available in an interesting series of Crime Classics from Arcturus Publishing. I'll have more to say about Arcturus in the future, because I do think that their enterprise deserves both praise and encouragement.

Death Walks in Eastrepps is an early example of the serial killer story. In fact, I'd be very interested to hear about any Golden Age detective novels about serial killers that pre-date it – Agatha Christie and Philip MacDonald ventured into this territory a little later, but did anyone get there sooner?

Of course, the story has its unlikely (you might say, exceptionally improbable) aspects. But the atmosphere of the seaside resort terrified by the work of the mysterious multiple murderer is nicely done, and the narrative pace is kept up pretty well.

The author was Francis Beeding, the pseudonym for two writers, Hilary St George Saunders and John Palmer. They wrote a couple of excellent classic detective novels after this one, but later became better known for thrillers. Again, I'd be glad to hear from anyone who has sampled some of their other work.

All Yours - review

2011-08-31T00:07:00.000+01:00

All Yours, written by Claudia Pineiro and translated by Miranda France, is a new title from those enterprising publishers Bitter Lemon Press. First published in Spanish eight years ago, it is a short and snappy story about infidelity, obsession and murder.

In telling her tale, Claudia Pineiro makes clever use of shifting viewpoints. Most of the story is described from the point of view of Ines, the long-suffering wife of an errant businessman called Ernesto. But there are also segments dealing – mainly through dialogue – with the misadventures of their teenage daughter, and sections seen from an alternative perspective. The combination is effective, and the pace brisk.

Ines discovers that Ernesto has been having an affair. When she spies on him, she witnesses the accidental death of his secretary, who has been haranguing him. Stunned, and Ernesto dumps the body in a lake. His wife's reaction is to help him cover up his crime. But she does not fully understand what has been going on.

There are a number of pleasing plot developments as the story progresses. I enjoyed it, and look forward to reading more by this author. Oddly enough, I read this book in between re-reading a couple of novels by Anthony Berkeley, and I was struck by one or two similarities of approach between the author of those classic detective novels of the Golden Age and the cool and cynical approach of Claudia Pineiro to her characters. Of course, there are many differences between the two writers, but both of them strive for originality in constructing their entertaining mysteries.