Shedunnit and The Poisoned Chocolates Case

One of my favourite Golden Age detective novels, a book that to my mind ranks with the very best of Christie, Sayers, and Wade, is Anthony Berkeley's The Poisoned Chocolates Case.  It was one of the honours of my literary career to be commissioned by the British Library to write a fresh solution to the mystery, and the extremely positive critical response to my coda to this classic novel, from the national press, bloggers, and other readers, has been heartwarming. 

So when I was asked to talk about this book on Shedunnit, you can guess that I needed no second invitation! Over the past few years, Caroline Crampton has steered Shedunnit so ably that it is now one of the most successful of all crime fiction podcasts, and is available on BBC Sounds. Caroline is an intelligent and thoughtful commentator and we agreed that, as she doesn't live too far away from me, she'd record the episode in my home.

Shedunnit is running a series of episodes about old green Penguins, and the collectability of these books is one of the topics that will come up for discussion when I talk with Jean Briggs about collecting crime fiction at Death in the Dales, a festival to be held in Sedbergh, England's book town, next weekend. Jean and her team have organised a great programme and I'll be doing two other panels. Do come along if you're in the area! 

It was great to have the chance of a long conversation with Caroline in addition to our chat during the podcast recording, and to show her my own collection. She also was kind enough to present me with inscribed copies of her two books (not about crime fiction). I've started A Body Made of Glass and it's very well-written. Meanwhile, I did enjoy taking part in Shedunnit and reflecting on the strange brilliance of Anthony Berkeley.