Forgotten Book - The Progress of a Crime

One of the first contemporary crime novels I read - in fact, I think it may have been the very first after my early diet of Christie and Sayers - was Julian Symons' The Progress of a Crime. It was first published in 1960 and I read it about ten years later. I remember borrowing it from a friend of my father's, having spotted it on his bookshelves. It's a drab title, and a bleak book, but it won an Edgar, and it's widely regarded as one of Symons' best books. I was probably too young for it at the age of 13 or 14, but I liked it, and I enjoyed it all over again when I reread it recently.

The setting is a provincial newspaper, and the protagonist is a young and rather naive reporter called Hugh. By accident, he gets mixed up in a murder case on Guy Fawkes night. But this isn't a classic whodunit. There's no doubt that a man called Corby has been killed by one or more members of a gang of youths. The interest of the story lies in Symons' merciless portrayal of damaged lives - the gang members, the failed journalists, the bullying policemen - and of the shortcomings of the justice system.

There is a very good extended trial scene. Symons had a real gift for courtroom drama, and he was advised by his friend, the author Michael Underwood, on legal procedure, so there is an authentic feeling to this section of the book, which was written long before the controversial development of the "joint enterprise" principle in gang cases. Symons also spent some time in a Bristol newspaper office, so as to capture the whiff of life among the reporters; this too is very well done.

With hindsight, reading this book was an important milestone for me, the beginning of a transition as a youthful reader from the classic world of Poirot, Marple, and Wimsey to modern realism: this is certainly Symons' grittiest book. What I've learned since then, is that both types of novel, as well as other types, have the potential to be highly entertaining. The key question is: how well has the writer told the story? Here, in crisp, sardonic prose, Symons tells a dark and often depressing story very well.

Forgotten Book - The Man Whose Dreams Came True

My choice for Patti Abbott’s series of Forgotten Books today is The Man Whose Dreams Came True, by Julian Symons. Symons was one of the first contemporary crime writers to whom I graduated once I’d read my way through Agatha Christie and Dorothy L. Sayers. A family friend lent me The Progress of a Crime, which I enjoyed, and I sought out more of Symons’ work.

I’ve forgotten much about many of the books I’ve read over the years – inevitably, I suppose. But strangely enough, I can vividly recall taking The Man Whose Dreams Came True out of our local library at Northwich, one day after school, before catching the bus home. I started reading it at the bus terminus (now, it’s a supermarket car park) and was instantly hooked.

The book was first published in 1968, and was Symons’ latest at the time I read it, so I suppose this was around 1969. I found the character of Tony Jones, a con man and dreamer with big ambitions, truly intriguing. Now I come to think of it, possibly there are traces of Tony in Guy, who features in The Arsenic Labyrinth. I do find people who fake their identities interesting, and I loved writing Guy, just as I enjoyed reading about Tony’s misadventures.

Tony gets a chance of the big time, but needless to say, things go rapidly downhill from there. This is an entertaining and cleverly plotted book, one of Symons’ best. He was a very harsh judge of his own work, but even he liked this one, and I think others will too.