Death Among The Sunbathers

E.R. Punshon

Jun 2015 · Dean Street Press

About this eBook

Description The body of a brilliant woman journalist is recovered from the wreck of a burning car. It is soon discovered that the smash did not kill her; she was dead already, shot by a Browning automatic that was found near by. Superintendent Mitchell, with the help of Owen, a young University graduate turned policeman, follows the enigmatic clues backwards and forwards between a furrier, a picture dealer, and the establishment of a fanatical sunbathing enthusiast. Then dramatically the story begins to repeat itself, as the persistently recurring figure of an old lag who calls himself 'Bobs-the-boy' carries another body out into the night. Death Among The Sunbathers is the second of E.R. Punshon's acclaimed Bobby Owen mysteries, first published in 1934 and part of a series which eventually spanned thirty-five novels. This edition features a new introduction by crime fiction historian Curtis Evans. "What is distinction? The few who achieve it step - plot or no plot - unquestioned into the first rank. We recognized it in Sherlock Holmes, and in Trent's Last Case, in The Mystery of the Villa Rose, in the Father Brown stories and in the works of Mr. E.R. Punshon we salute it every time." Dorothy L. Sayers

About the author

Ernest Robertson Punshon (1872-1956) was an English playwright who created a series detective, graduate police officer Bobby Owen. He also wrote as H Robertson Halkett. ER Punshon is one of the most shamefully neglected writers of detective fiction. His ability to construct labyrinthine plots that keep the reader fascinated but not confused is rivalled only by John Dickson Carr, with whom he shares a powerful imagination, a gift of conveying atmosphere and setting, and a most ingeniously fertile mind, adept at devising clues and situations. Yet his work is not only exemplary detective fiction, but studies of character, of the catalyst that drives an ordinary human being to commit the ultimate crime. In their emphasis on bizarre psychology, fantastic (but logical and convincing) plots, and the ability of the past to influence the present (whether it be in the form of past crimes or literary or artistic treasures), his work resembles a combination of H.C. Bailey, Gladys Mitchell, G.K. Chesterton and Michael Innes.