Our Thriller of the Month for July is Celia Fremlin’s Uncle Paul from 1959 - a glorious rediscovered seaside mystery, freshly republished by Faber. In this piece, Ella Griffiths, the editor of Uncle Paul and the publisher of Faber Editions, recommends thrilling classic seaside crime novels, perfect for holiday reading.
To celebrate Faber's relaunch of Celia Fremlin's wonderful mid-century thriller, Uncle Paul (1959) I've been basking in that most glorious of genres: classic seaside crime.
Sandcastles, deckchairs, ice creams and murder in an idyllic coastal community. Darkness threatening languid ocean dips; menacing happenings amidst frolics on the pier; paranoia tainting cliffside rambles - these perennially popular tales expose the mysteries lurking behind glossy summer holiday brochures, rich in (actual!) red herrings, vacationing detectives and suspicious tourists. And Uncle Paul is the perfect manifestation of this age-old recipe that always delights, as in this gripping tale, 'the grandmother of psycho-domestic noir' (Sunday Times) exposes one family's buried skeletons when a released prisoner disrupts the peace of three sisters' caravan holiday, with dramatic consequences...
To whet your appetite for this forgotten archive gem, here are a few favourite beach reads from some of the most admired names in seasonal crime to keep you chilled to core, even as you sunbathe ...
Murder by the Seaside is the perfect introduction to the joys of Golden Age coastal crime. This delectable anthology is like being at a picnic of all the big names in classic capering, from Arthur Conan Doyle to Cyril Hare, with a range of eccentric heroes solving conundrums in sun-kissed scenery from English resorts to the French Riviera.
Margery Allingham’s Mystery Mile (1930) follows famed sleuth Albert Campion, who comes to the aid of Judge Lobbett as he is pursued by the Simister Gang. But despite sending him to hide in a secluded marshy island getaway - inspired by the author's Essex childhood holidays - it's soon a race against time to expose the criminal mastermind bent on their target.
Dorothy Sayers' Have His Carcase (1932) stars the beloved Lord Peter Wimsey and detective novelist Harriet Vane in a dreamy postcard setting with a haunting underbelly. On a hiking holiday on the South West coast, she finds the corpse of a man with his throat cut, soon to be washed away by the rising tide - and their investigations plunge us into a twisting tale of Russian royalty, cryptic ciphers and erotic dancers...
John Bude's The Cornish Coast Murder (1935) transports us to a seemingly sleepy fishing village in Cornwall. Reverend Dodd may love reading detective stories, but the prospect of a real-life murder is beyond his wildest dreams - until a local magistrate is found shot dead, without a clue in sight; and suddenly his criminal expertise becomes vital to the police in pinning down the suspects ...
Queen of Crime, Agatha Christie, loved staying in a beach house writer's retreat near the glamorous Art Deco hotel on Burgh Island in Devon in the 1930s (apparently, she was known for keeping a pot of clotted cream by her desk to eat neat with a spoon: iconic!) This ‘little windswept gull-haunted promontory' brimming with tidal pools, coves and vertiginous cliffs inspired two of her most adored whodunits: And Then There Were None (1939) and Evil Under the Sun (1941). The latter especially charms with its depiction of ingenious detective Hercule Poirot attempting to holiday at a retro hotel in peace, only to become entangled in unpicking the murder of a sun-loving femme fatale, found strangled on the sand - in a crime of passion, or an even darker deed...?
Margaret Kennedy's The Feast (1950) is an intriguing extension of the genre: a delectable puzzle to unpick that also becomes a mischievously wise moral fable. When Pendizack Manor Hotel is found buried in the rubble of a landslide on the post-war Cornish coast, the reader is invited to work out what brought the seven victims - all holidaying guests - together: and as their romances, friendships and desires are revealed, we learn not only who was saved, but why ...
P.D. James' Unnatural Causes (1967) sees superintendent Adam Dalgliesh eager for a well-earned rest, eating crumpets at his aunt's windswept cottage on the remote Suffolk coast. But when the mutilated body of a neighbouring crime writer - 'a corpse without hands...a dapper little cadaver' - floats ashore in a dingy, he becomes embroiled in a plot more disturbing than he could have imagined...
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