Tuesday, May 20, 2008

Happy birthday, Margery Allingham.

Margery Allingham, creator of mysterious detective Albert Campion and his sidekick Magersfontein Lugg, was born today in Ealing in 1904. Luckily for readers everywhere, Felony and Mayhem Press is reprinting all of the Campion books, including, eventually, The Tiger in the Smoke (1952), selected by the Times of London as one of the Best 100 Mysteries of the twentieth century. I'm partial to her nonfiction work The Oaken Heart (1941), which is a penetrating look at life in an English village with World War II refugees. Clues ran, in the summer 2007 issue, a discussion of Allingham's short stories by B. A. Pike, chairman of the Margery Allingham Society. Here is an interesting discussion of Campion and Allingham from the Times Literary Supplement.

About the photo: Margery Allingham by Philip Youngman Carter. Image courtesy of B. A. Pike, Margery Allingham Society.

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