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This page lists selected biographies of major crime fiction authors and biographical books that cover more than one author.

For more detailed lists of biographical and critical books about crime fiction authors see pages for individual authors.

Conan Doyle: His Life and Art

Hesketh Pearson

1943

The Life Of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

John Dickson Carr

1949

The Man Who Was Sherlock Holmes

Michael & Mollie Hardwick

1966

The Man Who Hated Sherlock Holmes: A Life of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

James Playsted Wood

1965

The Real Sherlock Holmes

Mary Hoehling

1965

Conan Doyle

Pierre Nordon

John Murray

1966

Originally published in French in 1964.

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Conan Doyle: A Biography

Ivor Brown

1972

Such a Strange Lady: A Biography Of Dorothy L. Sayers

Janet Hitchman

1975

" A life history of the creator of Lord Peter Wimsey provides information concerning her religious writings as well as her detective stories."

The Life Of Raymond Chandler

Frank MacShane

1976

"Draws upon Chandler's interviews and his correspondence with colleagues and lovers to recreate the world and illuminate the works of the novelist who gained fame as the creator of private detective Philip Marlowe."

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Conan Doyle: a Biographical Solution

Ronald Pearsall

1976

"Details the personal adventures of the Scottish-born doctor-author and the many, revealing parallels between his life and his stories."

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Maker and Craftsman: The Story of Dorothy L. Sayers

Alzina Stone Dale

1978

A revised edition was published by Shaw Books in 1992.

"Maker and Craftsman examines Sayers' enthusiasms and creativity, her miraculous gift of language, her sly sense of humor and her brilliant intellect.Best known for the Lord Peter Wimsey detective stories that have charmed and fascinated fans for several generations, she also wrote plays for the B.B.C. and London's West End, translated Dante's Divine Comedy and still found time to speak and write forthrightly in defense of her beliefs, the arts, and women's rights."

Erle Stanley Gardner: The Case of the Real Perry Mason: A Biography

Dorothy B. Hughes

1978

"An intriguing biography of an author who knew worldwide popularity thanks to the success of his Perry Mason stories, which, of course, became one of the best-known detective series on TV in the USA and in Great Britain. Erle Stanley Gardner was an unusual man who wrote 131 works of fiction, including 82 full-length Perry Masons."

Conan Doyle: Portrait Of An Artist

Julian Symons

1979

"Presents a biography celebrating the active and impassioned public life and prolific literary career of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle."

Dorothy L. Sayers: The Life Of A Courageous Woman/h3>

James Brabazon

Gollancz

1981

Published in the US by Scribner's with the title Dorothy L. Sayers: A Biography.

P.D. James

Norma Siebenheller

1983

"Based on interviews with the author, this study provides biographical and critical information about James's personal life, mystery writings, novels, complex characterizations, and attitudes toward justice, retribution, and the effects of crime."

Agatha Christie: A Biography

Janet Morgan

1984

Also published by Knopf (1984), Fontana (1985), Harpercollins (1986), HarperCollins (1997), HarperCollins (2017)

"Agatha Christie (1890–1976), the world’s bestselling author, is a public institution. Her creations, Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple, have become fiction’s most legendary sleuths and her ingenuity has captured the imagination of generations of readers. But although she lived to a great age and was prolific, she remained elusively shy and determinedly private. Given sole access to family papers and other protected material, Janet Morgan’s definitive biography unravels Agatha Christie’s life, work and relationships, creating a revealing and faithfully honest portrait. The book has delighted readers of Christie’s detective stories for more than 30 years with its clear view of her career and personality, and this edition includes a new foreword by the author reflecting on the longevity of Agatha Christie’s extraordinary success and popularity"

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Agatha Christie Companion: The Complete Guide to Agatha Christie's Life and Work

Dennis Sanders & Len Lovallo

1984

Also published by W.H. Allen (1985), Avenel Books (1985), Berkley (1989)

"Provides information on Christie's personal life, examines all of her work - ranging from mysteries and romances to poetry and an autobiography - and discusses the characters, plots, and reviews of each book, play, and film."

Ross Macdonald

Matthew J. Bruccoli

1984

Welcome to America, Mr. Sherlock Holmes: Victorian America meets Arthur Conan Doyle

Christopher Redmond

1987

"Christopher Redmond's fascinating account of Doyle's first trip to America has been reconstructed from newspaper accounts describing the places Doyle visited, from the Adirondacks to New York, Chicago, and Toronto. Despite the gruelling tour schedule, Doyle met dozens of the most important literary and social lights of America. Everywhere he went he was mobbed by public hungry for news of the man he had 'killed off' a year earlier Sherlock Holmes, who was front page news. In Redmond's lively narrative, which is based on letters, newspaper reports, and other newly unearthed sources, you will discover, as Doyle himself put it, 'the romance of America'."

The Quest for Sir Arthur Conan Doyle: Thirteen Biographers in Search of a Life

Editor: Jon L. Lellenberg

1987

"Many engage in the quest, but no biographer yet has captured the enigmatic Doyle. Conan Doyle deliberately obscured his life, and his heirs remain keen to guard his papers. Yet the contributors - Conan Doyle scholars and collectors, English literature professors, research librarians, editors, and critics - concur that better biographical material is needed and that now - 100 years after the birth of Sherlock Holmes - is an appropriate time to examine the biographical problems. They concentrate on the ways Conan Doyle himself and his biographers have handled these problems—or failed to handle them. In the process of evaluating and criticizing earlier biographical efforts, the contributors present an effective portrait of Conan Doyle. All agree, however, that much more remains to be done, and they suggest fruitful areas for further research."

Ink in Her Blood: The Life and Crime Fiction of Margery Allingham

Richard Martin

1988

"Traces the life of the popular writer, looks at how she helped develop the modern mystery, and analyzes her major works."

Chester Himes: Author and Civil Rights Pioneer

M.L. WIlson

1990

"A biography of the Black novelist renowned for his series of detective stories."

Eric Ambler

Peter Lewis

1990

A revised edition was published in 2014.

"Eric Ambler is widely regarded as one of the most important thriller writers of the twentieth century. In the 1930s he set out to give respectability to a genre that he rightly recognized needed to be rescued from its status as pulp fiction. With six landmark novels published between 1936 and 1940, Ambler laid the foundations for the postwar generation of writers who raised the spy novel to a form of literature. Like Graham Greene, Ambler used the ingredients of a thriller to create a series of novels that investigated many aspects of modern life, from totalitarian political regimes to white-collar crime. And with those books, he transformed the scale and scope of the genre. But who was the man behind the work? Peter Lewis gives us the first full-length study of Amber’s life and work. …. By examining the individual books, Peter Lewis shows us how Ambler’s work changed throughout his life – while remaining always topical. As this book argues, no novelist did more to dissolve the boundaries that separated 'popular' from 'serious' fiction."

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Agatha Christie : The Woman and Her Mysteries

Gillian Gill

1990

Revised edition published by Robson Books in 1998.

"In this sensitive and revealing biography of Agatha Christie, Gillian Gill probes the mysterious private life and motivations of one of the bestselling authors of all time."

Margery Allingham: A Biography

Julia Thorogood

1991

A revised edition of this book was published as The Adventures of Margery Allingham in 2009.

"An examination of the life and work of crime writer Margery Allingham. The book draws on previously undisclosed records, letters and other documentation."

Dorothy L. Sayers: A Careless Rage for Life

David Coomes

1992

"This biography of the novelist Dorothy Leigh Sayers - the creator of Lord Peter Wimsey and the bestselling author of a dozen detective novels - brings out the spiritual pilgrimage and struggle at the heart of Sayers' life story. The author, who draws on thousands of letters Sayers wrote, reveals her to be a complex woman. Sayers was a very private person who even hid the existence of an illegitimate child from her closest friends. She was also someone to whom faith was central and wrote many theological books as well as the famous detective novels. Her radio play on the life of Christ, "The Man Born to be King", caused a furore when it was first broadcast and went on to win acclaim."

Dorothy L. Sayers: Her Life and Soul

Barbara Reynolds

1993

"Mystery writer Dorothy Sayers is loved and remembered, most notably, for the creation of sleuths Lord Peter Wimsey and Harriet Vane. As this biography attests, Sayers was also one of the first women to be awarded a degree from Oxford, a playwright, and an essayist--but also a woman with personal joys and tragedies. Here, Reynolds, a close friend of Sayers, presents a convincing and balanced portrait of one of the 20th century's most brilliant, creative women."

Difficult Lives: Jim Thompson – David Goodis – Chester Himes

James Sallis

1993

Tony Hillerman: A Public Life

John Sobol

1994

"The unique mix of Navajo culture and police work is the subject of John Sobol’s first-ever biography of Tony Hillerman. From his childhood spent in Oklahoma, to his journalism/ public relations career; from his return to school, to his success as a best-selling author, Tony Hillerman: A Public Life offers rare glimpses of a fascinating and highly varied life."

Conan Doyle

Michael Coren

1995

"Conan Doyle is best known for his creation of Sherlock Holmes, but he was much more than a facile populist writer, a symbol of the triumphalism of Edwardian England. He was also an ambitious man of letters, a searcher for political and theological truth, and a leader and shaper of opinion. This biography analyzes the man behind the mask: the Catholic who rejected Rome and religion; the atheist who later adopted spiritualism; the family man who loved another woman throughout his marriage; and the father of Sherlock Holmes, who wished to destroy his detective son."

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The Several Lives of Chester Himes

Edward Margolies, Michel Fabre

1997

"Drawn from his letters, notebooks, memoirs, and his fiction, this straightforward account of Himes' varied, episodic life attempts to trace the origins of his significant literary gift. It details the socioeconomic, familial, and cultural background which fed his ambivalent views on race in America. Himes' Deep South childhood, his adolescence in the Midwest, his young manhood in prison (1928-1936), his years as a menial laborer, his struggles as an author in California and New York City, and finally his glory days as an expatriate and celebrity in France and Spain are plumbed deeply for their effects upon his works. This is the bittersweet story of a man who found salvation in writing."

Raymond Chandler: A Biography

Tom Hiney

1997

"For this major new biography, Tom Hiney has had some access to unseen personal papers, as well as previously unrecorded reminiscences by those who knew him well and he vividly evokes the strange early years, brings alive the dangerous glamour of the Hollywood era, and puts Chandler`s writing in the context of the crime and corruption in Prohibition LA. He gives illuminating details of friendships with Ian Fleming, Somerset Maugham, the Spenders, Alfred Hitchcock and fully records for the first time his relationship with Cissy, his wife of 30 years, 17 years his senior, and his paradoxical relations with other women."

In The Footsteps of Agatha Christie

Francois Riviere

1997

"In the county of Devon lie the roots of Agatha Christie's world. She lived most of her life there, and it provided the setting for many of her novels. Francois Riviere guides us on a romantic journey in Christie's footsteps, tracing the interleaved patterns of her private and fictional worlds."

Agatha Christie and the Eleven Missing Days

Jared Cade

1998

"In December 1926 Agatha Christie disappeared in bizarre circumstances from her home in southern England. The discovery of the crime writer’s abandoned car led to the biggest manhunt in British history for a missing person. Eleven days later she was found in a northern spa town claiming to be the victim of amnesia. Until the publication of this book in 1998 none of her biographers had come up with conclusive evidence as to what Agatha Christie did within the first twenty-four hours after she disappeared or whether her memory loss was genuine. Although the newspaper headlines made her famous, the private anguish that surrounded the episode ensured that she made no reference to it in her memoirs. Jared Cade’s acclaimed biography provides the answers to the mystery, including Agatha Christie’s long forgotten explanation of the notorious episode, along with startling accounts by her surviving relatives that reveal for the first time why she staged the disappearance with the help of a co-conspirator and how it all went terribly wrong. His sympathetic investigation reveals the incidents that shaped her character and how the fall-out from the episode affected the rest of her life"

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The World of Agatha Christie - The Facts and Fiction Behind the World's Greatest Crime Writer

Martin Fido

1999

"Agatha Christie's works remain a literary phenomenon and many of her mysteries have been immortalized through sumptuous television and cinema adaptations. Christie herself was a discreet, private and ladylike person. Yet her life was far from dull: she travelled widely and in 1926 she hit the headlines when she disappeared, creating a mystery around her life as intriguing as any plot she had ever written. The World of Agatha Christie looks at this and other factors that have shaped her life, providing a colourful and informative look at the originator of the ingeniously constructed whodunits. Revised and updated for 2012 and highly illustrated, "The World of Agatha Christie" is the perfect companion to the work of this most popular of mystery writers."

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Ross Macdonald: A Biography

Tom Nolan

Scribner

1999

"Now, in the first full-length biography of this extraordinary and influential writer, a much fuller picture emerges of a man to whom hiding things came as second nature. While it was no secret that Ross Macdonald was the pseudonym of Kenneth Millar -- a Santa Barbara man married to another good mystery writer, Margaret Millar -- his official biography was spare. Drawing on unrestricted access to the Kenneth and Margaret Millar Archives, on more than forty years of correspondence, and on hundreds of interviews with those who knew Millar well, author Tom Nolan has done a masterful job of filling in the blanks between the psychologically complex novels and the author's life -- both secret and overt."

Teller of Tales: The Life of Arthur Conan Doyle

Daniel Stashower

1999

"More than a hundred years have passed since the creation of Sherlock Holmes, perhaps the most famous fictional character of all time. But while the legendary detective lives on in the popular imagination, the man who created him is often overlooked and frequently misunderstood. This fresh and compelling biography examines the extraordinary life and strange contrasts of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the struggling provincial doctor who became the most popular storyteller of his age. From his youthful exploits aboard a whaling ship to his often stormy friendships with such figures as Harry Houdini and George Bernard Shaw, Arthur Conan Doyle lived a life as gripping as one of his own adventures. Exhaustively researched and elegantly written, 'Teller of Tales' sets aside many myths and misconceptions to present a vivid portrait of the man behind the legend of Baker Street, with a particular emphasis on the psychic crusade that dominated his final years - the work that Conan Doyle himself felt to be 'the most important thing in the world'."

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The Doctor and the Detective: A Biography of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

Martin Booth

2000

"This entertaining, smart biography of Arthur Conan Doyle presents a modern day interpretation of the man who, contrary to his best efforts, will always be known as the creator of the great detective, Sherlock Holmes. Doyle was, however, much more, as Booth shows us in this intriguing study of a man who thrived on the times in which he lived. While Holmes fans will be captivated by the various tidbits that offer insight into their hero's creation; others will be fascinated by this living embodiment of the Victorian masculine ideal."

Get Dutch: A Biography of Elmore Leonard

Paul Challen

2000

"For six decades now, American crime novelist Elmore 'Dutch' Leonard has been entertaining readers around the world with his unique style, gritty dialogue, and quirky characters. This first full-length biography of Leonard in over a decade reveals the story of this remarkable writer, including in-depth interviews with Leonard himself, his personal research assistant, the screenwriter responsible for bringing Out of Sight and Get Shorty to the big screen, academics who have studied Leonard and his place in the literary world, and with crime fiction experts who have analyzed the impact of Leonard's novels on the reading public."

Chester Himes: A Life

James Sallis

2000

"Chester Himes's novels and memoirs represent one of the most important bodies of work by any American writer, but he is best known for The Harlem Cycle, the crime stories featuring Coffin Ed Johnson and Gravedigger Jones. His writing made him a major figure in Europe, but it is only recently that his talents have been acknowledged in the country that spurned him for most of his life, though his work is recognized as being on a par with that of Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammett, and Jim Thompson. In this major literary biography, acclaimed poet, critic, and novelist James Sallis explores Himes's life as no writer has attempted before. Combining the public facts with fresh interviews with the people who knew him best, including his second wife, Lesley, Sallis casts light onto the contradictions, self-interrogations, and misdirections that make Himes such an enigmatic and elusive subject. Chester Himes: A Life is a definitive study not only of the life of a major African-American man of letters, but of his writing and its relationship to the man himself, drawing a remarkable, deeply affecting portrait of a too often misunderstood and neglected writer. This is a work of high scholarship and of penetrating and passionate insight, a rare conjoining of two fine writers-and as much a work of literature as any of their novels."

The Red Hot Typewriter: The Life and Times of John D. MacDonald

Hugh Merril

2000

From the paperback edition:

"John D. MacDonald created the tremendously popular Travis McGee series. This is the single, most complete biography of MacDonald thus far, available for the first time in paperback. Also included in this new edition is a comprehensive bibliography, updated from the original hardback edition, plus two new afterwords that highlight some of MacDonald’s 66 books."

Like Hot Knives to the Brain: James Ellroy's Search for Himself

Peter Wolfe

2005

"Often more disturbing than entertaining, James Ellroy is an author who never shies away from the ugly or repellent. Eminent crime fiction scholar Peter Wolfe examines how Ellroy transcends the genres of pulp and neo-noir fiction to write stories that are both psychologically haunting and culturally relevant. Wolfe skillfully combines biography-including the unsolved murder of Ellroy's mother-with literary analysis to provide a fascinating and readable study of this popular author. The first in-depth companion to the work of James Ellroy, Like Hot Knives to the Brain will interest students of popular culture, mystery readers, and crime buffs everywhere."

Agatha Christie : The Finished Portrait

Andrew Norman

2006

Also published by Lustre / Roli Books in 2009.

"When Agatha Christie, the so-called 'Queen of Crime', disappeared from her home in Sunningdale in Berkshire for eleven days on 3 December 1927, the whole nation held its breath. This work explains, in the light of scientific knowledge, her behaviour during that troubled time."

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The Long Embrace: Raymond Chandler and the Woman He Loved

Judith Freeman

2007

"In this compelling, wholly original book, Judith Freeman sets out to solve the puzzle of who Chandler was and how he became the writer who would create in Philip Marlowe an icon of American culture. Freeman uncovers vestiges of the Los Angeles that was terrain and inspiration for Chandler’s imagination, including the nearly two dozen apartments and houses the Chandlers moved into and out of over the course of two decades. She also uncovers the life of Cissy Pascal, the older, twice-divorced woman Chandler married in 1924, who would play an essential role in how he came to understand not only his female characters–and Marlowe’s relation to them–but himself as well. A revelation of a marriage that was a wellspring of need, illusion, and creativity, The Long Embrace provides us with a more complete picture of Raymond Chandler’s life and art than any we have had before."

Bruce Montgomery/Edmund Crispin: A Life in Music and Books

David WHittle

2007

Also published by Routledge in 2016

"Under his real name, Bruce Montgomery (1921-1978) wrote concert music and the scores for almost 50 feature films, including some of the most enduring British comedies of the twentieth century, amongst them a number in the series started by Doctor in the House and the first six Carry On films. Under the pseudonym of Edmund Crispin he enjoyed equal success as an author, writing nine highly acclaimed detective novels and a number of short crime stories, as well as compiling anthologies of science fiction which helped to increase the profile of the genre. A close friend of both Philip Larkin and Kingsley Amis, Montgomery did much to encourage their work. In this first biography of Montgomery, David Whittle draws on interviews with people who knew the writer and composer. These interviews, together with in-depth research, provide great insight into the development of Montgomery as a crime fiction writer and as a composer in the ever-demanding world of films. During the late 1950s and early '60s these demands were to prove too much for Montgomery. Alcoholism combined with the onset of osteoporosis and a retreat into a semi-reclusive lifestyle resulted in him writing and composing virtually nothing during the last 15 years of his life. David Whittle examines the reasons for Montgomery's early and rapid decline in this thoroughly researched and engagingly written biography."

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Agatha Christie: An English Mystery

Laura Thompson

2007

"A passionate and accomplished writer, Laura Thompson now turns her highly acclaimed biographical skills to Agatha Christie. Arguably the greatest crime writer in the world, thirty years after her death Christie's books still sell over four million copies worldwide a year. Thompson describes the Edwardian world in which she grew up, explores the relationships she had, including those with her two husbands and daughter, and investigates the mysteries still surrounding Christie's life - including her disappearance in 1926. Agatha Christie is a mystery and writing about her is a detection job in itself. But, with access to all of Christie's letters, papers and writing notebooks, as well as interviews with her grandson, daughter, son-in-law and their living relations, Thompson is able to unravel not only the detailed workings of Christie's detective fiction, but the truth behind her private life as well."

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The Man Created Sherlock Holmes: the Life and Times of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

Andrew Lycett

2007

"Based on thousands of previously unavailable documents, Andrew Lycett, author of the critically acclaimed biography Dylan Thomas, offers the first definitive biography of the baffling Conan Doyle, finally making sense of a long-standing mystery: how the scientifically minded creator of the world's most rational detective himself succumbed to an avid belief in spiritualism, including communication with the dead. Conan Doyle was a man of many contradictions. Always romantic, energetic, idealistic and upstanding, he could also be selfish and fool-hardy. Lycett assembles the many threads of Conan Doyle's life, including the lasting impact of his domineering mother and his wayward, alcoholic father; his affair with a younger woman while his wife lay dying; and his nearly fanatical pursuit of scientific data to prove and explain various supernatural phenomena. Lycett reveals the evolution of Conan Doyle's nature and ideas against the backdrop of his intense personal life, wider society and the intellectual ferment of his age."

The Adventures of Arthur Conan Doyle

Russell Miller

2008

"Conan Doyle grew up in relative poverty in Edinburgh, with the mental illness of his artistically gifted but alcoholic father casting a shadow over his early life. He struggled both as a young doctor and in his early attempts to sell short stories, having only limited success until his Sherlock Holmes stories became a publishing phenomenon and propelled him to worldwide fame. Whilst he enjoyed the celebrity Holmes brought him, he also felt that the stories kept him from more serious work. Beyond his writing, Conan Doyle led a full life, participating in the Boer War, falling in love with another woman while his wife was dying of tuberculosis, campaigning against injustice, and converting to Spiritualism, a move that would ultimately damage his reputation. During his lifetime Conan Doyle wrote more than 1,500 letters to members of his family, most notably his mother, revealing his innermost thoughts, fears and hopes: Russell Miller is the first biographer to have been granted unlimited access to Conan Doyle's private correspondence. The Adventures of Arthur Conan Doyle also makes use of the writer's personal papers, unseen for many years, and is the first book to draw fully on the Richard Lancelyn Green archive, the world's most comprehensive collection of Conan Doyle material."

Ngaio Marsh: Her Life in Crime

Joanne Drayton

2008

The paperback edition was published in 2009.

"This fascinating biography of Ngaio Marsh pieces together both the public and private Marsh in a way that is as riveting as a crime novel. Through her writing and her theatre work, Joanne Drayton assembles the pieces to the puzzle that is Marsh, proving that life can be as thrilling as fiction. Marsh wrote her first detective novel in a London flat in the depths of the 1930s Depression, bringing life to Detective Inspector Roderick Alleyn in her first book, A Man Lay Dead. Through 32 novels he would establish himself as one of the great super-sleuths, and Marsh as one of the four Queens of Golden Age detective fiction, alongside Agatha Christie, Dorothy Sayers and Margery Allingham. In 1932, a family tragedy brought Marsh home to New Zealand, to a life divided - between hemispheres, between passionate relationships at home and abroad, and between the world of publishing and her life as a stage director."

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Agatha Christie at Home

Hilary Macaskill

2009

"Agatha Christie’s first home was at Ashfield in Torquay, a house that she retained for nearly half a century, until she sold it in 1938 in order to buy Greenway, her ‘dream house’ on the River Dart. She spent all her summers there till she died in 1976. It was, she wrote: ‘the loveliest house in the world.’ Now owned by the National Trust, Greenway was opened to the public in 2009. Both Devon homes, which featured in several of her novels and stories, were central to Agatha’s life, but she also loved the process of acquiring and planning houses in other places – from Sunningdale to Baghdad: at one time, before the Second World War, she owned eight properties in London. Her enthusiasm for buying, restoring and decorating houses is one of the lesser-known aspects of her life, but one that was very important to her. Agatha Christie at Home – illustrated with photos of her life, her homes and of the Devon she loved – recounts this side of her life, and its author, Hilary Macaskill, writes about some of the houses Agatha Christie lived in, her relationship with the staff who ran them, and her love of domesticity."

Duchess of Death: The Unauthorized Biography of Agatha Christie

Richard Hack

2009

Also published by JR Books in 2010.

"Agatha Christie lived a fascinating life by anyone’s standards, achieving incredible accolades and experiencing fabulous, far-flung adventures around the world. Although the most popular novelist in history, with over two billion books sold worldwide, Agatha Christie lived a life shrouded in secrecy and fuelled by curiosity. Nearly as notorious for her aversion to the press as she was for her 80 books and collections of short stories, Christie made no secret of her need for privacy. Now, utilising over 5000 previously unpublished letters, notes and documents, award-winning biographer Richard Hack allows Christie to write again, 33 years after her death. Duchess of Death is her story, as full of romance, travel, wealth and scandal as any mystery that Christie ever crafted. Starting with Christie’s biggest mystery – her own disappearance, Hack takes us through her youth in Devon, the break up of her first marriage and global escapes with her second husband, her strained relationship with her daughter, and much more. The most authoritative, penetrating look at the personal and literary life of Agatha Christie yet, Duchess of Death is a fascinating and compelling portrayal of this unique and much-loved writer."

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The Adventures of Margery Allingham

Julia Jones

2009

This is a revised edition of Margery Allingham: A Biography (1991)

"Margery Allingham, the creator of Albert Campion, is one of detective fiction's greatest "Queens of Crime". From the late 1920s until her death in 1966 she produced a series of novels as deliciously humorous as they are surreally strange. Friends and fans alike remember her warmth and wit; few, if any, sensed the fear and depression that tormented her. This biography was researched in the very room where Margery Allingham worked, and written with the full cooperation of Margery's sister, her secretary and her housekeeper. It was first published in 1991. Since then, however, new material has become available, including the revelatory collection of letters and the startling truth about her husband's relationship with the writer Nancy Spain. The book's new title, new introduction and afterword invite the reader to look again."

Agatha Christie

Andrew Norman

2009

"Agatha was a quiet and retiring person who shunned publicity and rarely gave interviews, and therefore discovering the real Agatha is a challenge almost worthy of her own detectives. But vital clues to unravel the mystery of the author, including her disappearance in 1926, are to be found in her writings, and in particular in the novels which she penned under a pseudonym. A true Pitkin guide - for her fans and for visitors to her home too."

Ian Rankin and Inspector Rebus: The Story of the best-selling author and his complex detective

Craig Cabell

2010

"In this fascinating biography, author Craig Cabell presents a thought-provoking insight into the minds of the writer and his creation, and how their relationship has developed over the years. Includes material from interviews with Rankin himself. Learn about the unusual connection between Rankin and Rebus; how the author was a punk musician and swineherd before he became a writer; and why he was so inspired by fellow-Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson and his gothic masterpiece, Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde."

The Norwood Author: Arthur Conan Doyle and the Norwood Years (1891 - 1894)

Alistair Duncan

2010

"Sir Arthur Conan Doyle is one of the most written about men who ever lived but despite this some parts of his life get little attention. One such period is between 1891 and 1894 when he lived in South Norwood in present day south east London. During this period he wrote and published much of his best work including the first two series of Sherlock Holmes short stories. This book looks at his life during this period and, in contrast to other biographies, spends time looking at some of his input into local Norwood life."

A Mysterious Something in the Light: Raymond Chandler: A Life

Tom Williams

2012

"What we know of Raymond Chandler is shrouded in secrets and half-truths as deceptive as anything in his magisterial novel The Long Goodbye. Now, drawing on new interviews, previously unpublished letters and archives on both sides of the Atlantic, literary gumshoe Tom Williams casts light on this most mysterious of writers. The Chandler revealed is a man troubled by loneliness and desertion from an early age – experiences that fuelled his writing as much as they scarred his life."

George V. Higgins: The Life and Writings

Edwin H. Ford II

McFarland

2014

"Best known for his popular crime fiction, Boston novelist George V. Higgins (1939-1999) should stand among the top ranks of the American literary canon. In his 26 novels and dozens of short stories, Higgins chronicled the lives of Boston’s Irish with his trademark hard-boiled dialogue, exploring the criminal underworld, American democracy, Boston politics, personal redemption and New England life in the tradition of Hawthorne and Thoreau. This intimate biography explores his turbulent life and career, including his working-class Irish Catholic roots, his two stormy marriages, his ambivalence toward the city of his birth, his passion for the limelight, and his drinking, which disrupted his family life and led to his early death at age 59. Discussions of Higgins’ individual works and excerpts from his correspondence, writings, and thoughts on literature complete this revealing portrait."

John le Carré: The Biography

Adam Sisman

2015

"Over half a century since The Spy Who came in from the Cold made John le Carré a worldwide, bestselling sensation, David Cornwell, the man behind the pseudonym, remains an enigma. He has consistently quarried his life for his writing, and his novels seem to offer tantalizing glimpses of their author - but in the narrative of his life fact and fiction have become intertwined, and little is really known of one of the world's most successful writers. In Cornwell's lonely childhood Adam Sisman uncovers the origins of the themes of love and abandonment which have dominated le Carré's fiction: the departure of his mother when he was five, followed by 'sixteen hugless years' in the dubious care of his father, a man of energy and charm, a serial seducer and conman who hid the Bentleys in the trees when the bailiffs came calling - a 'totally incomprehensible father' who could 'put a hand on your shoulder and the other in your pocket, both gestures equally sincere'. And in Cornwell's adult life - from recruitment by both MI5 and MI6, through marriage and family life, to his emergence as the master of the spy novel - Sisman explores the idea of espionage and its significance in human terms; the extent to which betrayal is acceptable in exchange for love; and the endless need for forgiveness, especially from oneself."

Curtain Up: Agatha Christie: A Life in Theatre

Julius Green

2015

"Published in celebration of Agatha Christie's 125th birthday, Curtain Up! is an essential purchase for Agatha Christie fans worldwide. Everyone knows that The Mousetrap is the world’s longest-running play, but this first ever book dedicated to Agatha Christie as a playwright tells how Christie prevailed against the male-dominated establishment to be the only woman to have three plays in the West End at the same time and became the most popular and successful female playwright in the world. Author and theatre producer Julius Green has been given unprecedented access to archives in the UK and USA and has uncovered more than ten unpublished and unperformed plays, as well as previously unknown facts and correspondence. Agatha Christie was a skilful and accomplished stage writer, and this long-awaited book is a fascinating, funny and revealing tale that theatregoers and Agatha Christie fans won't want to miss."

Agatha: the Real Life of Agatha Christie

Anne Martinetti, Guillaume Lebeau, Alexandre Franc

2016

"In their intriguing graphic novel Agatha, Anne Martinetti, Guillaume Lebeau and Alexandre Franc use Christie’s enigmatic disappearance as a gateway to explore the life and character of the Queen of the Whodunit. Taking in her childhood in Torquay and her early attempts at writing, the authors chart Christie’s development into a free-spirited and thoroughly modern woman who, among other things, enjoyed flying, travel and surfing. As her memorable characters take on case after case, we come to understand the events that inspired their adventures and made Christie the person she became."

Chester B. Himes: A Biography

Lawrence P. Jackson

2017

"In this definitive biography of Chester B. Himes (1909-1984), Lawrence P. Jackson uses exclusive interviews and unrestricted access to Himes's full archives to portray a controversial American writer whose novels unflinchingly confront sex, racism, and black identity. Himes brutally rendered racial politics in the best-selling novel If He Hollers Let Him Go, but he became famous for his Harlem detective series, including Cotton Comes to Harlem. A serious literary tastemaker in his day, Himes had friendships - sometimes uneasy - with such luminaries as Ralph Ellison, Carl Van Vechten, and Richard Wright. Jackson's scholarship and astute commentary illuminates Himes's improbable life - his middle-class origins, his eight years in prison, his painful odyssey as a black World War II-era artist, and his escape to Europe for success. More than ten years in the writing, Jackson's biography restores the legacy of a fascinating maverick caught between his aspirations for commercial success and his disturbing, vivid portraits of the United States."

Agatha Christie: Traveler, Archaeologist, and Author

Meghan M. Cunningham

2017

"Listed as the best-selling novelist of all time by the Guinness Book of World Records, Agatha Christie can easily be considered a household name, but writing amazing stories is not all she accomplished. This book discusses her life including her experiences as a volunteer during World War I, archaeologist, traveler, and Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire, as well as her continued influence on the world today."

Arthur & Sherlock: Conan Doyle and the Creation of Holmes

Michael Sims

2017

"From Doyle's early days surrounded by poverty and violence, to his escape to University and finally to his first days as a surgeon in his own practice, acclaimed author Michael Sims traces the circuitous yet inevitable development of Arthur Conan Doyle as the father of the modern mystery, whose most famous creation is still the most well-known and well-loved of the canon's many members. Through Sims's deft analysis of Doyle's childhood and adult life, the incomparable Sherlock Holmes emerges as a product of Doyle's varied lessons in the classroom and professional life. Building on the traditions of Edgar Allan Poe, Emile Gaboriau, and even Voltaire, Doyle's new detective is not just a skilful translator of clues, but a veritable superhero of the mind in the tradition of his most esteemed teacher, Dr Joseph Bell. Sims's Arthur is just as vivid Doyle's own Sherlock Holmes in this enthralling biography of the man behind the most famous detective of all time."

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The Man who Would be Sherlock: The Real Life Adventures of Arthur Conan Doyle

Christopher Sandford

2017

"When Arthur Conan Doyle was a lonely 7-year-old schoolboy at pre-prep Newington Academy in Edinburgh, a French émigré named Eugene Chantrelle was engaged there to teach Modern Languages. A few years later, Chantrelle would be hanged for the particularly grisly murder of his wife, marking the beginning of Conan Doyle’s own association with some of the bloodiest crimes of the Victorian and Edwardian eras. This early link between actual crime and the greatest detective story writer of all time is one of many. Conan Doyle would also go on to play a leading role in the notorious case of the young Anglo-Indian lawyer George Edalji, convicted and imprisoned as the ‘mad ripper’ who supposedly prowled the fields around his Staffordshire home by night looking for animals to mutilate; and the equally chilling story of Oscar Slater and his alleged murder of an elderly spinster as she sat in her Glasgow home one winter’s night in 1908, a crime with a spectacular denouement 18 years later. Using freshly available evidence and eyewitness testimony, Christopher Sandford follows these links and draws out the connections between Conan Doyle’s literary output and factual criminality, a pattern that will enthral and surprise the legions of Sherlock Holmes fans. In a sense, Conan Doyle wanted to be Sherlock – to be a man who could bring order and justice to a terrible world."