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Richard Hull

This page lists novels written by Richard Hull.

Richard Hull was the pen name used by Richard Henry Sampson for the series of detection fiction novels he wrote between 1934 and 1953.

The cover images shown are the first UK edition and, if available, a recent mass market paperback edition.

 

Richard Hull: Novels

The Murder of My Aunt

Richard Hull

Faber & Faber

1934

"Edward Powell lives with his Aunt Mildred in the Welsh town of Lywll. His aunt thinks Lywll an idyllic place to live, but Edward loathes the countryside and thinks the company even worse. In fact, Edward has decided to murder his aunt. A darkly humorous depiction of fraught family ties."
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Keep It Quiet

Richard Hull

Faber & Faber

1935

"In no place is man safe from murder nowadays, not even, as this story shows, in his club. It is not the business of his fellow members to interfere when the victim slumps in his chair; though when murder is suspected it becomes a tremendous pleasure for detective minded members to take part in the investigation; while all the time the categorical imperative laid on the Club Secretary, the soul of respectability if not discretion, is for the good of the club, to keep it quiet. For this is not the sort of club which can admit anything so disturbing as a murder inside its portals."
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Murder Isn't Easy

Richard Hull

Faber & Faber

1936

"Readers of Mr Hull's two previous blood curdlers, The Murder of My Aunt and Keep It Quiet, will know that they must expect a plot. Murder Isn't Easy, like its predecessors, is a cautionary tale for amateur murderers."
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The Ghost It Was

Richard Hull

Faber & Faber

1936

"When Gregory Spring-Benson reads in his morning paper that the uncle with whom he has previously quarrelled has bought the haunted Amberhurst Place, we realise that it will be no ordinary house. Nevertheless, it was perhaps eccentric of the ghost to collect three witnesses to watch the murder being committed. But was it murder? And did the ghost do it? James Warrenton, staunch in his spiritual convictions, said yes, but the secretary of the Departed Spirits Association would not have the character of any ghosts thus abused; so, somewhat unexpectedly, the Victoria and Albert Museum were called in."
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The Murderers of Monty

Richard Hull

Faber & Faber

1937

"Monty Archer meant well - excruciatingly well - and he was so anxious to please that he was even prepared to enter fully into the elaborate hoax by which a company was to be formed to murder hi. First he was to be poisoned, secondly stabbed, and thirdly shot, while the fourth shareholder was to administer comfort or tell the police. Consequently, when Monty was found to have been actually murdered, things look very nasty for the members of the company."
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Excellent Intentions

Richard Hull

Faber & Faber

1938

"Great Barwick's least popular man is murdered on a train. Twelve jurors sit in court. Four suspects are identified - but which of them is on trial? This novel has all the makings of a classic murder mystery, but with a twist: as Attorney-General Anstruther Blayton leads the court through prosecution and defence, Inspector Fenby carries out his investigation. All this occurs while the identity of the figure in the dock is kept tantalisingly out of reach."
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And Death Came Too

Richard Hull

Collins Crime Club

1939

"The opening situation is the night when Arthur Yeldham, a retired housemaster from Finchingfield School, invited four young people to come on to his house after a local dance; and when they get there, Yeldham is found stabbed. The story is told quietly, coolly, with utter detachment. Detective story readers will find this novel refreshingly different."
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My Own Murderer

Richard Hull

Collins Crime Club

1941

"One does not expect one's friends to drop in in the middle of the night and mention casually that they have committed murder that very evening. And yet that is what happened to Richard Sampson, solicitor and close friend of Alan Renwick, who sought shelter in his flat. Sampson agrees to help him to escape the law's clutches. The extraordinary consequences make a convincing and ingenious story of intense human appeal, seasoned however, with plenty of humour and irony."
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The Unfortunate Murderer

Richard Hull

Collins Crime Club

1942

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Left Handed Death

Richard Hull

Collins Crime Club

1946

"The Shergold Engineering Company was in difficulties with one of the ministries. Foster, a government official, was prying into their accounts and asking awkward questions about figures. The activities of Barry Foster had certainly obviously affected the fortunes of the company and they must be stopped once and for all. But the plot to get rid of Foster has ramifications at once intricate and exciting."
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Last First

Richard Hull

Collins Crime Club

1947

"Set in an hotel in Scotland with a background of lochs, mountains and good fishing, the story is itself an exciting open-air holiday told with that particular humorous flavour and ingenuity which have justly won for Mr Hull such a wide enthusiastic public."
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Until She Was Dead

Richard Hull

Collins Crime Club

1949

"Nobody but Yvonne De Belmont would have engaged Clara Fison as a companion so recklessly and without proper inquiry. Mrs De Belmont, a wealthy but slightly eccentric widow who possessed valuable furniture, liked beautiful china and collected the stamps of St Lucia with intelligence, certainly tooka rik there. Clara was a dark horse and her former employer had died in rather perculiar circumstances - in fact a little too suddenly. Her presence in the house at 17a Elizabeth Square had already resulted in a curiously sinister atmosphere."
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A Matter of Nerves

Richard Hull

Collins Crime Club

1950

"This is a most cleverly contrived murder story, told from an unusual angle against the background of an Essex village, where life centres around its church and its inn, and everyone not only what everyone does, but what everyone else says. It's guaranteed to please, interest and mystify all Crime Club readers."
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Invitation to an Inquest

Richard Hull

Collins Crime Club

1950

"A worthy successor to the author's much praised last novel, A Matter Of Nerves, this new crime story proves once again the cynical old adage that 'all men are liars'."
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The Martineau Murders

Richard Hull

Collins Crime Club

1953

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Last updated February 2018