Back from the Seabourn Ovation

Last spring, I had my first taste of life as a 'guest conversationalist' on board a Seabourn cruise ship. This was a short but delightful trip, so I was very pleased to be invited back by Seabourn, for a much longer trip. I was asked to become a conversationalist on a trip that involved flying to Barbados, where I stayed for one night, before boarding the luxurious Seabourn Ovation, with over 500 guests, as one of a team of four conversationalists working alongside the talented, highly capable, and incredibly hard-working entertainments team. 

The trip involved nine sea days as we headed for Morocco, with stops at Casablanca and Tangier, both of which I've visited in the past, and then at Portimao, for the Algarve, which was new ground for me. The crossing was, therefore, even longer than that I had on my trips as a speaker on the Queen Mary, but there was never a dull moment. I met some delightful people from all four corners of the world and had a fantastic time.

My brief was to hold six conversations, about different aspects of crime fiction, and also to host three dinners; in addition, I hosted a murder mystery event, the very first time I've done anything like that on board ship. It was a great experience, made all the better by the terrific performances of the cast - cruise director Nick Martland, entertainments manager Caroline Miller, and entertainers Nicole and Matthew. I was very pleased by reaction to the event and felt I learned a lot about how these things can be done to best advantage while on the ocean wave. I also met (for example) someone who had actually known Gladys Mitchell, someone who told me about G.K. Chesterton's old home in Buckinghamshire, and someone who had (by pure coincidence) brought several of my books on board. 

After so long at sea, it was fun to visit the medinas in Casablanca (and to see Rick's Cafe!) and Tangier, where it was fascinating to visit St Andrew's Church, a unique survival with gorgeous gardens. 

On the Algarve, there was a trip to Cape St Vincent, aka 'The End of the World', which is the south westerly most point of Europe and quite special. We also travelled to the historic and delightful town of Lagos. The ship finally docked at Lisbon, and the journey home took rather longer than the original trip to Barbados, thanks to the new ID requirements and the fact that everyone's luggage failed to arrive at Manchester airport. But it finally arrived the next day. All in all, a wonderful trip. I'm hugely grateful to everyone at Seabourn, not only for inviting me, but for making it such a great experience.  

Forgotten Book - Men for Pieces

Thanks to Steve Barge, who blogs as The Puzzle Doctor (and if you don't know his blog, it really is consistently interesting and I recommend it unreservedly) and Dean Street Press, most of Brian Flynn's long-neglected detective novels are available again at modest prices. I've read several of them, and the latest is Men For Pieces, which was the 36th Anthony Bathurst mystery and first hit the shelves in 1949.

The title comes from Omar Khayyam, suggesting that Brian Flynn was keen on literature. However, it has to be said that his own writing was unsophisticated. He was mostly published by John Long, whose main market was the libraries and they don't seem to have bothered much with the tedious task of editing. I could quote innumerable examples of Flynn's clunky prose, but perhaps this simple example will suffice: 'Senora Garcia looked incredulously surprised.' 

But even if Flynn wasn't, in terms of the quality of his prose, a good writer, he was a pretty good storyteller and more specifically he had a real gift for coming up with interesting ideas for mysteries. At the time this book appeared, he had been published for almost a quarter of a century, and there were times when I felt the padded and ornate style suggested a certain loss of energy. 

A young man who works for a bank goes missing unexpectedly, and a young woman who is devoted to him becomes concerned. She involves Bathurst and he discovers the missing man's body - an apparent suicide. There's a lot of inconclusive discussion, and no shortage of red herrings, one of them (an enigmatic note) a bit irritating - but the story really comes alive in the later stages. After a slow start, the puzzle proves to be unexpectedly ingenious. I'm not convinced, mind you, that Flynn plays totally fair with the reader in the way that he presents some information, especially relating to two key characters.

Good editors make a big difference to their authors. For instance, I have no doubt that my own writing has benefited from the work of several very good editors over a long period of time. Brian Flynn's writing gives me the impression of an affable man - in this book, for example, there's a very witty reference to a crime writer called Charles Wogan, which happens to be his own pen-name - and I think he would probably have been receptive had his editor made a serious effort to help him to improve his writing skills. Ruthless editing of the first two-thirds of this book would have improved it, for sure. Nevertheless, in all the books of his that I've read, there has - at the very least - been something of real merit that made me glad that I've overcome my reservations about his style. So I'll be very happy to read more.

Blood on Satan's Claw - 1971 film review

I like horror fiction and films, but there's no point in denying that quite a lot of it is...well, horrible. The title of the film Blood on Satan's Claw didn't exactly incentivise me to watch it, but then I discovered that Mark Gatiss, whose judgments on popular culture I always find interesting, rated it as an important example of 'folk horror'. He even ranked it alongside The Wicker Man, a film I have always admired. So I decided to give it a go.

Was it trashy or terrific? Well, I can see why there are arguments on both sides, but first things first. This is a movie that came out before The Wicker Man, but although the two films have one or two common elements (including the highly effective use of music), I don't think anyone can deny that the Anthony Shaffer film is much more sophisticated. Blood on Satan's Claw was written by a young Cambridge graduate, Robert Wynne-Simmons, and originally it took the form of an anthology film, with three stories in one. The director, Piers Haggard, persuaded him to combine the stories into a single tale, and this was a sensible idea. But the storyline remained somewhat fragmented. As a result, there's something disjointed about the film, a major difference from The Wicker Man. 

The story is set in the early 18th century. A farmer ploughing a field uncovers a deformed skull, which mysteriously vanishes. Shortly afterwards, a young woman (Tamara Ustinov) goes mad as a result of an encounter with a mysterious creature in the attic of a house where a judge (Patrick Wymark, in his last role before his tragically early death) is visiting. In the local village, a young boy is hunted and killed, and then his sister suffers a dreadful fate. It's clear that a girl called Angel (played by Linda Hayden in her customary sexy way) is at the heart of the mischief. But what exactly is going on?

This isn't a film for the squeamish, and it has exploitative elements, as Piers Haggard later acknowledged, which I didn't like. What's more, it's definitely not strong on subtlety. On the other hand, the cinematography has been rightly acclaimed - the visual presentation of the English landscape, lovely yet menacing, is impressive - and the very unevenness of the storyline contributes to the sense that rural life is unpredictable and disturbing. So, very far from a masterpiece, but a cult curiosity at the very least.  

Goldeneye - 1989 film review

Goldeneye is the title of a James Bond film, but before that it was the title of a 1989 biopic, the story of Bond's creator, Ian Fleming. And the first thing to be said is that it has some wonderful ingredients. Fleming's life, the subject of several published biographies, was very interesting. The cast, led by Charles Dance, who is ideally suited to the role of Fleming, is excellent. And the screenwriter, Reg Gadney, who has a cameo role in the film as James Bond, was undoubtedly a good writer.

Gadney is someone I never met, but he was a writer of varied accomplishments, whose career I've followed with some interest for many years. He wrote well-regarded spy novels, was a reputable academic, and also developed an expertise in art and art history. On top of that, he was a capable if occasional screenwriter. I remember The Sculptress, which he adapted from Minette Walters' novel, with particular admiration and indeed I fancy watching it again before long.

The trouble is, this is a slow-moving film, episodic and unsatisfactory. Fleming was, whatever his shortcomings, a gifted storyteller whose novels always moved at pace. So it's weirdly contradictory that a story about his life should plod along as Goldeneye does. Nor do I think that the characterisation of Fleming in the script is particularly compelling. There's too much about his complex love life, but we don't really get under the skin of the man or his motivations.

A shame, because this film brought together a number of talented people. The cast includes the excellent Phyllis Logan and also such interesting actors as Marsha Fitzalan and Richard Griffiths; Adrian Edmondson also features in a tiny part. I really wanted to enjoy this film, but I feel the definitive Fleming movie has yet to be made. Maybe one day... 

Forgotten Book - The Silent Murders

Over the course of just five years, between 1928 and 1933, A.G. Macdonell, the Scottish writer best-known as author of England, Their England, applied his wit and facility for writing entertaining prose to the detective genre. He co-wrote one novel, The Bleston Mystery, with Milward Kennedy, under the name Robert Milward Kennedy, produced six novels as Neil Gordon, and two as John Cameron. And then he moved on to other things. His early death in 1941, at the age of 46, means we'll never know if he would have returned to crime writing. Perhaps not. But his books deserve not to be forgotten.

The Silent Murders, which dates from 1929, is an example. In fact, I'd rank it as outstanding for its time, if it were not for the fact that the clever idea at the heart of the story had been used by another novelist a couple of years earlier. Whether Macdonell simply nicked it, or whether the idea was simply in the zeitgeist, I don't know. Either is possible. But he makes good use of it, and writes his book in such a different and agreeable way that it's definitely worth reading even if you have - as I did - a pretty good idea of where the story is ultimately heading.

The book begins with the murder of a tramp. Tramps were a regular feature of Golden Age detective fiction, and this reflects social issues that aren't so often discussed. For some people down on their luck, it really wasn't a golden age at all. But when someone else is killed and it emerges that there is an inexplicable connection between the two crimes, the story begins to take shape.

The main detective in the story, Inspector Dewar, is an appealing character, and Macdonell hit on a good way of complicating the mystery. The tension builds nicely, although one question (where was the culprit hiding out all the time?) didn't seem to me to be clearly answered, as the book ends rather abruptly, almost as if the author had run out of steam. So, not a masterpiece, and not totally original, but I really enjoyed it. It's a pretty rare book (the illustration comes from the excellent Hadwebutknown website, but that first edition will set you back £225), but deserves rediscovery. 

Guest post - Michael Ridpath and Operation Berlin

I've been a fan of Michael Ridpath's work since before I first met him, which in itself is quite a long time ago. He's a versatile and interesting writer and I'm very glad to feature a guest post from him:

'There comes a point in the middle of my research when it’s time to read The Times. 
I suppose it would be possible to do this online somehow, but that’s not the way I like to do it.  In the basement of the London Library in St James’s Square is The Times Room.  Large red leather-bound copies of The Times, each heavy, each three feet tall, line the shelves in cabinets, one for each month.  There are special lecterns upon which you can open them and browse; the Foreign and Colonial news is usually on about page 8.  I love it down there.

My latest novel, Operation Berlin, takes place in August and September of 1930, and so I read through copies of The Times for each day, taking notes of what the Berlin correspondent had to say.  At that time, he was an old hand named Norman Ebbutt, but he is never identified in the paper itself.  There is usually at least one article – or maybe two – on the goings-on in Germany each day.  But I allow myself to be distracted: by the advertisements on page 1 for domestic servants and enigmatic personal messages in a rudimentary code; by the page-long descriptions of the Belvoir Hunt’s outing a couple of days before; by the minutiae of cricket scores by batsmen with at least three initials and two hyphenated last names.  And the advertisements, of course, for Bovril, Beecham’s Laxatives, Imperial Airways and the Austin Seven.

But back to ‘our Berlin correspondent’.  My eye was caught by a short article on 29 August 1930 about a Frau Amlinger who had thrown herself out of a Lufthansa mail plane flying from Frankfurt to Erfurt.  She was the wife of a Reichswehr cavalry officer, Captain Sepp Amlinger, who served in the air force during the war and who had died in an aeroplane accident in Russia.

Interesting.  Very interesting.

Further investigation on my part paralleled that of The Times’s correspondent.  It turned out that Captain Amlinger was part of a secret contingent of the Reichswehr being trained as fighter pilots at a training facility in the Soviet Union.  Cover-ups ensued, and a nice little subplot was born.  Now, all I need to do is book myself onto an Imperial Airways flying boat to Alexandria for £55.  Not tempted by the Beecham’s Laxatives, though.'

Michael Ridpath’s Operation Berlin is published by Boldwood Books on 12 April

 

Sharp Corner - 2024 film review

Stories which focus on characters who experience gradual psychological disintegration are often harrowing, but if told well, they can be engrossing. Some of Julian Symons's best novels, such as The Narrowing Circle and The Man Who Killed Himself, are good examples. Sharp Corner, a newish film based on a short story by the Canadian writer Russell Wangersky, is another.

This is a slow-burning film, but it's never boring. Josh (Ben Foster) and Rachel (Cobie Smulders - quite a memorable name!) are a happily married couple with a young son, Max, whom they adore. They move out of the city to a new house and everything seems fine. But as Josh and Rachel celebrate their good fortune by making love in the front room, a tyre crashes through the window. There has been a fatal car accident on the sharp bend in the road just outside the house.

One small point I have to make is that the corner that causes all the trouble doesn't actually seem that sharp to me. There's a much more terrifying right-hand bend in a road close to where I live. No matter. This tragedy unsettles the family, and worse is to follow, as it becomes clear the sharp corner is an accident blackspot, and more crashes follow. Josh becomes obsessed with the crashes, and his work and personal life suffer. So, before long, does his marriage.

Josh is in many ways a frustrating character, and although one sympathises with him at first, it becomes increasingly difficult to do so. He is not a 'bad' man - far from it - yet eventually he will do something terrible. The end of the film came a bit unexpectedly and I'm still not quite sure what I make of it. Overall, though, this is a thought-provoking film and I was impressed.

   

Forgotten Book - Sweet Danger

My copy of Margery Allingham's Sweet Danger (1933) is a precious one, despite lacking a dust jacket, because it's inscribed by the author (and her husband Pip) to a friend. It also benefits from endpapers which have a rather splendid map labelled 'The village of Pontisbright where it all happened'. It's taken me a while to get round to reading it but I was amused to find that the prime villain rejoices in the name Savanake (so spelled differently from Rachel, whose name was inspired by Henrietta Savernake in Agatha Christie's The Hollow). 

The description often applied to Sweet Danger is 'romp' and that tells you most of what you need to know about the novel. A disputed territory in central Europe plays a significant part in the plot, so in some ways this is one of those Golden Age novels which have a Ruritanian element - rather like Christie's The Secret of Chimneys, for instance. 

Thankfully, the vast majority of the action takes place in Pontisbright, which is in Suffolk, and the story is particularly significant in the Allingham canon for introducing Albert Campion to Amanda Fitton, who at the tender age of seventeen makes a big impression on him and was to play a key role in several of Allingham's later books. Was this the influence of Sayers' success in introducing Wimsey to Harriet Vane? I tend to think so.

The storyline concerns inheritance and a coded message and it didn't make much of an impression on me. The chapter which made the greatest impact was the one in which Campion ventures to London and encounters Savanake at his HQ: this is very well done, and so is the climactic battle between the men in the mill at Pontisbright. But if anything this book reinforces me in the perhaps controversial view that much of Allingham's finest work was in the short story form, which compelled a discipline not always evident in her novels. 

Speak No Evil (2024) film review

Speak No Evil is a 2024  American remake - written and directed by the accomplished James Watkins - of a Danish film of two years earlier which I haven't seen. Both have enjoyed critical and commercial success. In essence, this is a psychological suspense story which edges into horror territory. But most of the creepier stuff, I'm glad to say, is handled subtly and by suggestion rather than directly graphic content.

The film benefits immeasurably from the presence in the cast of that fine actor James McEvoy. He has the key part of Paddy, a character with hidden (and, it must be said, foreseeably unpleasant) depths, but his ability to move seamlessly and yet with conviction from charmer to villain is impressive. A lesser actor might have struggled to make such an impact.

An American couple living in London, Louise and Ben Dalton (Mackenzie Davis and the splendidly named Scoot McNairy) make holiday friends with Paddy and Ciara (McEvoy and Aisling Franciosi, also very good). The Daltons have a daughter, Agnes, who is very anxious, while their new pals have a young boy, Ant, who has a condition which means that he cannot speak. Dan Hough, who plays Ant, is terrific in a tricky role. He has a bright future ahead of him as an actor.

The outgoing and slightly flaky Brits invite the American couple to join them in their remote farmstead in the west country. Obviously, the Americans should run for their lives at this point, but equally obviously they don't. What follows might have been predictable, but a good script and even better acting ensures that the tension ratchets up steadily and is maintained throughout. I wish I could have warmed to Louise and Ben more than I did, but irritating though they are, they don't deserve what Paddy has in store for them.

Announcement - What the World Needs Now - a new mystery anthology

 

I'm delighted to share, at long last, news of an anthology of mine that will be published in the summer. It's called What the World Needs Now: Mysteries Inspired by the Music of Burt Bacharach and it will be published by Level Best Books. It's a very special book for me for a number of reasons, and one of them is that proceeds will go to autism charities in the UK and US. I've been advised by people with expert knowledge of the subject about suitable charities, and all contributors have been hugely generous in donating their stories for this very worthwhile cause.

And what a marvellous list of contributors, what a wonderful and diverse range of stories. We have big international bestsellers like Ragnar Jonasson, Charles Todd, Abir Mukherjee, and Sarah Hilary, alongside people better known in other fields like Simon Guerrier and Rhian Waller. Plus many others, all of them writing at top form. I'll have more to say about the contributions another day.

The foreword was kindly written by Rupert Holmes, the multi-talented crime novelist, playwright, and composer, who just so happens to come from the same Cheshire town as me. In fact, Northwich now holds a very popular annual Pina Colada Festival in Rupert's honour - named, of course, after his famous hit, 'The Pina Colada Song'. 

This is a book that has been a long time in the making. It brings together my twin passions, for Burt Bacharach's music, and for crime fiction, in a way that I'm very, very happy with. And the book is dedicated to a friend of mine from my schooldays, Elizabeth, who sadly died while this book was in the course of preparation. I told her when I visited her in the hospice that I would be dedicating the book to her, and I also promised that I'd give a mention in my own story to her old favourite pop performer from those long ago days when we spent much time together. Who was that? Well, you ought to read the book to find out!