The very first case for Oxford-based sleuth Gervase Fen, one of the last of the great Golden Age detectives. As inventive as Agatha Christie, as hilarious as P.G. Wodehouse, this is the perfect entry point to discover the delightful detective stories of Edmund Crispin - crime fiction at its quirkiest and best. A pretty but spiteful young actress with a talent for destroying men's lives is found dead in a college room just yards from the office of the unconventional Oxford don Gervase Fen. Anyone who knew the girl ...
Read More
The very first case for Oxford-based sleuth Gervase Fen, one of the last of the great Golden Age detectives. As inventive as Agatha Christie, as hilarious as P.G. Wodehouse, this is the perfect entry point to discover the delightful detective stories of Edmund Crispin - crime fiction at its quirkiest and best. A pretty but spiteful young actress with a talent for destroying men's lives is found dead in a college room just yards from the office of the unconventional Oxford don Gervase Fen. Anyone who knew the girl would gladly have shot her, but can Fen discover who did shoot her, and why? Published during the Second World War, The Case of the Gilded Fly introduced English professor and would-be detective Gervase Fen, one of crime fiction's most irrepressible and popular sleuths. A classic locked-room mystery filled with witty literary allusions, it was the debut of 'a new writer who calls himself Edmund Crispin' (in reality the choral and film composer Bruce Montgomery), later described by The Times as 'One of the last exponents of the classical English detective story . . . elegant, literate, and funny.' This Detective Story Club classic is introduced by Douglas G. Greene, who reveals how Montgomery's ambition to emulate John Dickson Carr resulted in a string of successful and distinctive Golden Age detective novels and an invitation from Carr himself to join the exclusive Detection Club.
Read Less
Add this copy of The Case of the Gilded Fly to cart. $14.96, fair condition, Sold by ThriftBooks-Reno rated 5.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Reno, NV, UNITED STATES, published 1979 by Walker & Company.
Add this copy of The Case of the Gilded Fly to cart. $40.00, very good condition, Sold by McCormick Books rated 5.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Hartland, MI, UNITED STATES, published by Walker and Company.
Choose your shipping method in Checkout. Costs may vary based on destination.
Seller's Description:
Very Good in Very Good dust jacket. 0802754104. Staining to endpapers and flaps of jacket else a tightly bound and still handsome copy now in protective mylar. The first Gervase Fin novel (originally published in the U. S. as Obsequies at Oxford).; MCF04427; 8vo 8"-9" tall; 223 pp.
Add this copy of The Case of the Gilded Fly to cart. $53.16, good condition, Sold by Bonita rated 4.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Newport Coast, CA, UNITED STATES, published 1979 by Walker.
Add this copy of The Case of the Gilded Fly to cart. $111.75, new condition, Sold by GridFreed rated 5.0 out of 5 stars, ships from North Las Vegas, NV, UNITED STATES, published 1979 by Walker.
This was a delightfully complicated mystery story. It's British mystery - in the same genre as Christie and Doyle. It's in the high brow style - the vocabulary is a notch above the usual whodunit. fait attention - there are the politically incorrect comments peppered throughout revealing how much our language has changed. This will definitely please you if you like are a connoisseur of mysteries. I have since bought and read 3 more Crispins and will continue to look for them.
