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Celia Fremlin

This page lists books by Celia Fremlin.

Cover images are, when possible, the first UK edition and a recent paperback or digital edition.


This page is divided into two sections.

- crime novels
- selected other books

 

Celia Fremlin: crime novels

The Hours Before Dawn

Celia Fremlin

Gollancz

1958

"Louise would give anything - anything - for a good night's sleep. Forget the girls running errant in the garden and bothering the neighbours. Forget her husband who seems oblivious to it all. If the baby would just stop crying, everything would be fine. Or would it? What if Louise's growing fears about the family's new lodger, who seems to share all of her husband's interests, are real? What could she do, and would anyone even believe her? Maybe, if she could get just get some rest, she'd be able to think straight."
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Uncle Paul

Celia Fremlin

Gollancz

1959

"Fifteen years ago Uncle Paul was exposed as a murderer by his wife Mildred, and sent to prison. Now a seaside holiday for Mildred's half-sister Isabel and her family seems to be the venue for Uncle Paul's revenge. Mildred arrives at a lonely cottage near to Isabel's caravan site, and Isabel's urgent summons to her sister Meg brings the three women together to play out a drama of fear and suspicion, betrayal and revenge."
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Seven Lean Years

Celia Fremlin

Gollancz

1961

"Ellen Fortescue, engaged to be married, but oddly uneasy about her approaching wedding. Her fiance Leonard is a man of varying moods, most combustibly where the subject of his stepmother Laura is concerned. Ellen is inclined to a kinder view; but then the woman Ellen calls 'Cousin Laura' does have a complicated history with the Fortescue family."
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The Trouble Makers

Celia Fremlin

Gollancz

1963

"All of the housewives on the block complain about their domineering husbands, their noisy children, and their dreary chores. The women's only consolation lies in getting together to vent their frustrations and share the latest gossip. But when Mary spies a man in a raincoat, lurking about the neighborhood, she develops a panicky obsession with the stranger that her friends can't soothe - and the frustrations of everyday life suddenly take a sinister turn. In this terrifying mystery classic, Edgar Award-winning novelist Celia Fremlin blends the desperation of 1960s domesticity with gripping suspense."
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The Jealous One

Celia Fremlin

Gollancz

1964

"Rosamund and Geoffrey's new neighbor, Lindy, is smart, good-looking, friendly, and delightful in every way. The problem is Geoffrey's a little too delighted with her, and his wife is not happy about it. While Rosamund is in a feverish state from a bout of the flu, she dreams of murdering Lindy -- and upon waking is horrified to discover that she has inexplicably disappeared. What could possibly have happened? Was it more than just a terrible nightmare?"
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Prisoner's Base

Celia Fremlin

Gollancz

1967

"Margaret, her daughter Claudia, and Claudia's daughter Helen, who share a home from which Claudia's husband is frequently absent. Claudia has a penchant for taking strangers under her wing and into the house, the danger being that they never leave. But a different danger is proposed by Maurice, a self-styled poet who boasts that he has served seven years in prison for manslaughter."
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Possession

Celia Fremlin

Gollancz

1969

"Middle-class mother Clare Erskine initially thinks it a great stroke of luck when her 19 year-old daughter Sarah becomes engaged to a young man with a steady job. However Clare's betrothed, Mervyn Redmayne, has a notable black mark against him: a widowed mother with a petulant, inescapable grip on her son."
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Don't Go to Sleep in the Dark

Celia Fremlin

Gollancz

1970

"Don't Go to Sleep in the Dark was the first gathering of Celia Fremlin's short fiction, a form in which she had published prolifically - for the likes of She, Playmen, and Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine - while building her reputation as a novelist of psychological suspense. Female characters predominate in these tales, as does the doom-filled atmosphere that was Fremlin's metier. She explores her familiar theme of strained mother-child relations, but she also delves into the supernatural realm as well as the psychological. As ever, her capacities for making the everyday unnerving and keeping the reader guessing are richly in evidence."
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Appointment with Yesterday

Celia Fremlin

Gollancz

1972

"Appointment with Yesterday concerns a woman who calls herself Milly Barnes. But this is not her real name - for 'Milly' is on the run, driven by her terrible panic that at any moment the remorseless arm of the law will catch up with her."
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By Horror Haunted

Celia Fremlin

Gollancz

1974

"By Horror Haunted was Celia Fremlin's second collection of stories, and it runs the gamut of her many talents. The nightmarish plots, wit, elegance, and domestic details with an undertow of unease have lost none of their edge. 'Her Number On It' is a compelling portrait of kleptomania; the 'Unsuspected Talent' of a dissatisfied wife has dangerous consequences; while 'Don't Tell Cissie' is a superbly original ghost story."
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The Long Shadow

Celia Fremlin

Gollancz

1975

"The Long Shadow tells a Christmas story with a difference. Imogen Barnicott's husband - a celebrated, cruel and egocentric professor of Classics - has recently died in a car accident. Now, to the pain of widowhood is added the attentions of an anonymous phone-caller who accuses Imogen of murder and alleges that he can prove it. But can Imogen be certain her husband is truly dead and gone?"
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The Spider-Orchid

Celia Fremlin

Gollancz

1977

"Peggy has divorced Adrian but she accepts his deep attachment to their fourteen-year-old daughter, Amelia, and hers to him. Rita is Adrian's mistress, and he believes he is in love with her - until her husband Derek agrees to a divorce. Then Adrian is appalled when Rita moves in, destroying his privacy and endangering his relationship with Amelia."
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With No Crying

Celia Fremlin

Gollancz

1980

"With No Crying tells of Miranda, a daydreaming fifteen-year-old schoolgirl who has encouraged a boy to seduce her and is glad to find herself pregnant, but then bitterly resentful when her parents talk her into an abortion. She pads up her stomach, runs away from home, and finds refuge in a squat where her new housemates await the newborn keenly. How, though, can Miranda save face?"
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The Parasite Person

Celia Fremlin

Gollancz

1982

"The tale of Martin Lockwood, a man stuck between a wife and a mistress and frustrated by his faltering doctoral thesis on depression. Then he encounters Ruth Ledbetter, a smart, unbalanced, potentially dangerous young woman who soon insinuates herself into Martin's life, his home - and his PhD."
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A Lovely Day to Die and Other Stories

Celia Fremlin

Gollancz

1984

"Celia Fremlin's third collection of stories, first published in 1984, is a baker's dozen of gripping tales by the mistress of suspense. Within these covers are stories of family frustrations and fury - a young wife who wants rid of her husband, an elderly daughter who cannot endure her mother. Fremlin deals in the uncanny, too, constantly confounding our expectations, and those of her characters."
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Listening in the Dusk

Celia Fremlin

Gollancz

1990

"Listening in the Dusk concerns Alice Saunders, a woman striking out on her own following a traumatic marital breakup. But when she rents a drafty attic room in a ramshackle London boarding house she meets the mysterious Mary - a young woman clearly terrified of something, or someone."
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Dangerous Thoughts

Celia Fremlin

Gollancz

1991

"Clare Wakefield is more dismayed than elated when she learns of her journalist husband's escape from Middle Eastern kidnappers. Edwin is a difficult man, and home life had been so much more relaxed without him. But dismay turns to fear once Clare begins to suspect that Edwin has practiced an extraordinary deception - and for the purpose of murder."
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The Echoing Stones

Celia Fremlin

Severn House

1993

"Arnold Walker's decision to take early retirement and become caretaker and tourist guide at a Tudor mansion changes his life dramatically. His wife Mildred leaves him, and his wayward daughter Flora arrives unexpectedly and agrees to help out. Together, they must reckon with Emmerton Hall's former curator, Sir Humphrey Penrose, a sufferer from senile dementia given to spontaneous acting out of bizarre historical events, whose antics will lead to sheer bloody murder."
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King of the World

Celia Fremlin

Severn House

1994

"King of the World, Celia Fremlin's final novel, is the story of flat-mates Bridget and Diane. Despite ten years in age between them they get on well - aside from the constant presence of Alistair, Diane's self-impressed boyfriend, in the flat. The women decide to look for a third tenant, and find Norah, who claims to be a battered wife seeking refuge. But Norah is telling lies that will put all of them in mortal danger."
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Celia Fremlin: non-crime novels, non-fiction and poetry

The Seven Chars of Chelsea

Celia Fremlin

Methuen

1940

A novel.

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War Factory

Mass Observation

Text: Celia Fremlin and Tom Harrisson

1943

"War Factory was originally published in 1943. It was largely the work of one 'observer', Celia Fremlin, also known as a thriller writer. It records the experiences and attitudes of women war workers in one particular factory just outside Malmesbury, Wiltshire specializing in the making of radar equipment (neither location nor purpose are, of course, revealed in the book). On publication the book's importance was quickly spotted. The New Statesman described the book as the 'first coherent and serious study' of a wartime industrial community lodged in the middle of the countryside. The Manchester Guardian called it 'a remarkable study' and the Sunday Times 'a fascinating examination'. The Daily Herald having pointed out 'the girls were grossly - and it would seem, indefensibly - overworked went on to say 'What is certain is that those who are responsible for maintaining the rhythm of war production in the fifth year of war will find no adequate solution to war-weariness if they ignore the penetrating human facts which are brought to light in such investigations as are recorded in this important book."
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Duet in Verse: Some Occasional Poems

Celia Fremlin / Leslie Minchin

Pioneer Arts

1996

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Last updated March 2018