Christopher Fowler, I'd hazard, is One of Us. He's written newspaper columns praising John Dickson Carr, Margery Allingham, Gladys Mitchell, and S.S. Van Dine (as well as later writers like Peter Dickinson and H.R.F. Keating). He's a fan of Michael Innes, while one of his books is a nod to Edmund Crispin's Moving Toyshop. He laments … Continue reading Bryant & May On the Loose and Off the Rails (Christopher Fowler)
By Gwendoline ButlerFirst published: UK: Collins, 1988 ★★ People die at No. 22, Church Row. The cleaner mops up blood on the front stair - but the stain grows back every year. A diplomat's daughter buys a game in New York. A violent criminal goes gunning for Coffin and the informer who put him away. A … Continue reading Coffin Underground (Gwendoline Butler)
By Gwendoline ButlerFirst published: UK: Collins, 1987; USA: Thomas Dunne Books ★★★ "The murders in Mouncy Street with boys, drugs, sadism had been thoroughly fashionable crime, really Sixties." It's 1966 - the height of Cool Britannia. The Beatles are bigger than Jesus; miniskirts are on the rise; and LSD has hit the streets. Sergeant Coffin is … Continue reading Coffin in Fashion (Gwendoline Butler)
By Gwendoline ButlerFirst published: UK: Collins, 1986; USA: Minotaur ★★★ I've meant to read Gwendoline Butler for a long time. "Her inventiveness never seems to flag; and the singular atmosphere of her books, compounded of jauntiness and menace, remains undiminished," critic Patricia Craig wrote in the TLS. Craig was a Gladys Mitchell enthusiast, and another review (on … Continue reading Coffin on the Water (Gwendoline Butler)
By Ruth Rendell First published: UK: Hutchinson, 2011 ★ The "vault" is what Wexford (now retired) calls the cellar of Orcadia Cottage, where four skeletons are found. At the end of A Sight for Sore Eyes, there were three bodies down there. We know whose they were. What, then, is the fourth corpse doing down there? Wexford, armed … Continue reading The Vault (Ruth Rendell)
By Ruth RendellFirst published: UK: Hutchinson, 1998; US: Crown ★★★★ They fuck you up, your mum and dad.They may not mean to, but they do.They fill you with the faults they hadAnd add some extra, just for you. - Philip Larkin Working-class Teddy Brex's parents neglect him – and produce a psychopath, who prefers objects to people. … Continue reading A Sight for Sore Eyes (Ruth Rendell)
By Ruth RendellFirst published: UK: John Long, 1964 Source: Facsimile Dust Jackets LLC ★★ This is Rendell's first – and it’s a dreary story, with a not-quite-clever -enough twist. Rendell''s interest really lies in the human situation, rather than the detection (which is routine and unfair). The crime is as featureless and uninteresting as you can find. … Continue reading From Doon with Death (Ruth Rendell)
I'm at cross purposes with Double Cross Purposes (1939). Ronald A. Knox is leisurely but elegant. He is, though, leisurely. His books are, as they say, easy to put down. He meanders, rather, like a stream. Here you'll find him waxing lyrical about the landscape; there, wondering why people stop and look at running water, wasting … Continue reading School of Hard Knox
By J. J. ConningtonFirst published: UK: Hodder & Stoughton, 1942; US: Little & Brown, 1942 ★★★★ Source: Facsimile Dust Jackets LLC After our foray into decadence with Lynn Brock, we return to the sober, straightforward detective story – where the victim is eaten by an African big cat, somewhere in the Home Counties. White cocks are beheaded … Continue reading No Past is Dead (J.J. Connington)
By Lynn BrockFirst published: UK: Collins, 1927 ★★ EX-P.M. IN SEX FILM SCANDAL! There are queer goings-on at Dyke's Court. Source: Facsimile Dust Jackets LLC Lord Haviland, statesman and Silenus, watches pornographic films in his private cinema. He stars in them, too. His elder daughter holds orgies in 18th-century costume for a coterie who collect Crébillon … Continue reading Colonel Gore’s Third Case: The Kink (Lynn Brock)
The Grandest Game in the World 