Search results for ""Author John Curran""

Winner of the 2019 H.R.F. Keating Award for best biography or critical book related to crime fiction! A lavish full-colour celebration of the 2000 books by more than 250 authors published by the iconic Crime Club between 1930 and 1994. The Hooded Gunman was the sinister figure who, having appeared in various guises on the covers of Collins’ various series of Mystery and Detective books in the 1920s, finally gained recognition with the launch of Collins’ Crime Club, becoming the definitive imprint stamp on more than 2,000 books published by that august imprint between 1930 and 1994. From Agatha Christie to Reginald Hill, the Hooded Gunman was a guarantee of a first-class crime novel for almost 65 years, and those books are now as sought after and collectable and almost any other book series, with many commanding high prices and almost impossible to find. In the year that Collins – the publisher founded by William Collins in Glasgow in 1819 – is enjoying its 200th birthday, this book celebrates probably its most famous publishing imprint. Written and researched by Agatha Christie writer, expert and archivist Dr John Curran, this sumptuous coffee table book looks back at the history of the Crime Club and its authors, showing the jackets of every book published by the imprint over seven decades, and the descriptive ‘blurbs’ of every book, running to more than 350,000 words. With facts, figures and lists, and drawing on rare archival photos, correspondence and marketing materials, it is the first time that anyone has attempted to chronicle the publishing of the Crime Club – the ultimate book for fans of crime fiction and also of twentieth century book jacket design. The Hooded Gunman won the H.R.F. Keating Award for best 2019 biography or critical book related to crime fiction, and was also nominated for an Edgar Award from the Mystery Writers of America.

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From the Collins Crime Club archive, the third standalone novel by Freeman Wills Crofts, dubbed ‘The King of Detective Story Writers’. Seymour Merriman’s holiday in France comes to an abrupt halt when his motorcycle starts leaking petrol. Following a lorry to find fuel, he discovers that it belongs to an English company making timber pit-props for coal mines back home. His suspicions of illegal activity are aroused when he sees the exact same lorry with a different number plate – and confirmed later with the shocking discovery of a body. What began as amateur detective work ends up as a job for Inspector Willis of Scotland Yard, a job requiring tenacity, ingenuity and guile . . . Freeman Wills Crofts’ transition from civil engineer on the Irish railways to world-renowned master of the detective mystery began with The Cask when he was fully 40 years old; but it was his third novel, the baffling The Pit-Prop Syndicate, that was singled out by his editors in 1930 as the first for inclusion in Collins’ prestigious new series of reprints ‘for crime connoisseurs’. This Detective Club classic is introduced by John Curran, author of The Hooded Gunman, and includes the bonus of an exclusive short story by Crofts, ‘Danger in Shroude Valley’.

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A perfect introduction to Agatha Christie - four of the best Hercule Poirot stories, chosen for their readability and sense of adventure. A man is found shot through the head in a locked room. A wealthy banker vanishes while posting a letter. A thief disappears with a haul of rubies and emeralds. And, in the golden sands of Egypt, the men who discovered an ancient tomb are dying one by one . . . Hercule Poirot, the fussy Belgian detective with the egg-shaped head and immaculate moustache, solved some of the world’s most puzzling crimes. This book contains four of the very best stories, selected by John Curran, author of Agatha Christie’s Secret Notebooks, and Sophie Hannah, who wrote the brand new Hercule Poirot novel, The Monogram Murders. Includes the stories ‘The Double Clue’, ‘The Market Basing Mystery’, ‘The Disappearance of Mr Davenheim’ and ‘The Adventure of the Egyptian Tomb’.

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Poison, knives and bullets riddle the stories of Agatha Christie but so does food, which she uses to invoke settings, to develop characters and, of course, to commit murder. This to-die-for cookbook offers one accessible, easy-to-make dish or drink for each of the Duchess of Death’s 66 novels. Karen Pierce has diligently selected a most delectable range of intriguing dishes mentioned throughout the collected works of Agatha Christie and recreated the recipes to satiate our culinary curiosity. Recipes include A Perfect Cup of Coffee (The Mysterious Affair at Styles), Rice Pudding (The Murder at the Vicarage), Oysters Rockefeller (Murder on the Orient Express), Lemon Squash Cocktail (Death on the Nile) and “Thomas Roger’s” Potatoes (And Then There Were None). Learn how to make an exquisite omelet, how to roast a leg of lamb properly and how to serve perfectly timed steak frites .The collection offers insightful details about the recipes’ histories and their context in Christie’s life and times. All dishes appear respective to their eras—so steak fried for 1923 but marinated and grilled for 1964. It’s a filling tribute to the grand dame of detective fiction. Recipes for Murder has not been prepared, approved, or licensed by Agatha Christie Limited, RLJ Entertainment, or any individual or entity associated with Agatha Christie or her successors

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Agatha Christie’s Complete Secret Notebooks brings together for the first time Secret Notebooks and Murder in the Making, two volumes that explore the fascinating contents of her 73 notebooks. This includes illustrations, deleted extracts, unused ideas, two unpublished Poirot stories and a lost Miss Marple. When Agatha Christie died in 1976, aged 85, she had become the world's most popular author. With sales of more than two billion copies worldwide in more than 100 countries, she had achieved the impossible – more than one book every year since the 1920s, every one a bestseller. So prolific was Agatha Christie's output – 66 crime novels, 20 plays, 6 romance books under a pseudonym and over 150 short stories – it was often claimed that she had a photographic memory. Was this true? Or did she resort over those 55 years to more mundane methods of working out her ingenious crimes? Following the death of Agatha's daughter, Rosalind, at the end of 2004, a remarkable secret was revealed. Unearthed among her affairs at the family home of Greenway were Agatha Christie's private notebooks, 73 handwritten volumes of notes, lists and drafts outlining all her plans for her many books, plays and stories. Buried in this treasure trove, all in her unmistakable handwriting, are revelations and details that will fascinate anyone who has ever read or watched an Agatha Christie story. Christie archivist and expert John Curran leads the reader through the six decades of Agatha Christie's writing career, unearthing some remarkable clues to her success and a number of never-before-published excerpts and stories from her archives. This book features Agatha's original ending of her very first book, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, painstakingly transcribed from her notebooks. It also includes a number of short stories from the archives reproduced in full, including the unpublished The Man Who Knew, How I Created Hercule Poirot, and an early draft for a Miss Marple story, The Case of the Caretaker's Wife.

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Written in reaction to what Bentley perceived as the sterility and artificiality of the detective fiction of his day, Trent's Last Case features Philip Trent, an all-too-human detective who not only falls in love with the chief suspect but reaches a brilliant conclusion that is totally wrong. Trent’s Last Case begins when millionaire American financier Sigsbee Manderson is murdered while on holiday in England. A London newspaper sends Trent to investigate, and he is soon matching wits with Scotland Yard's Inspector Murth as they probe ever deeper in search of a solution to a mystery filled with odd, mysterious twists and turns. Called by Agatha Christie "one of the best detective stories ever written," Trent's Last Case delights with its flesh-and-blood characters, its naturalness and easy humor, and its style, which, as Dorothy Sayers has noted, "ranges from a vividly coloured rhetoric to a delicate and ironical literary fancy."

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