"Death, Adjourned" by Simon Michael

Times have changed rather dramatically for barrister Charles Holborne. The Kray twins, London’s premier gangsters of the 1960s, are behind bars, and better still, they were tricked into giving up the hold they had over Charles. He’s proposed to Sally, his girlfriend, and the wedding appears to be sooner rather than later. He’s even thinking about becoming Queen’s Counsel, or “taking silk,” as the British call it. Not bad for a Jewish boy who grew up rough and tumble in the East End. 

A wealthy building developer and his son are accused of forcibly removing tenants in the path of a new housing development project. One tenant, in fact, was itched though a second-floor window, bundled up in the back of truck, and taken away. A local thug has admitted to participating under the direction of the developer’s son. And the developer calls upon Charles to defend them both.

 

The case is more complicated than it looks. The developer is a survivor of Auschwitz, as is his wife. The son is borderline autistic (although this is earlier than autism becoming an official diagnosis). A crooked policeman is involved. And neither of Charles’s clients are telling him the complete truth, as if they’re protecting someone else. Did they really do what they’re accused of? Or are they being framed?

 

Simon Michael

Death, Adjourned is the 9^th Charles Holborne legal suspense novel by British author Simon Michael, and it’s a welcome addition to the series as well as something of a departure. For once, the specter of the Kray twins doesn’t overhang the story. There’s a hint they may play a role in the future, but for now, the murderous Krays are safely behind bars, their criminal empire being divided up and fought over.

 

Michael studied law at Kings College, London University and was called to the Bar in 1978. He worked primarily in the field of criminal law until the late 1990s, when he focused his practice on clinical negligence. He began writing in the 1980s and resumed it when he retired from legal practice.

 

Death, Adjourned is a riveting story. Michael knows exactly how to build suspense to fever pitch and throw in significant courtroom drama along the way. And here’s hoping for No. 10!

 

Related:

 

My review of The Brief by Simon Michael.

 

My review of An Honest Man by Simon Michael. 

 

My review of The Lighterman by Simon Michael.

 

My review of Corrupted by Simon Michael.

 

My review of The Waxwork Corpse by Simon Michael.

 

My review of Force of Evil by Simon Michel.

 

My review of The Final Shot by Simon Michael.

 

My review of Nothing But the Truth by Simon Michael. 

 

Some Monday Readings

 

E.O. Hoppe’s Londoners – Spitalfields Life.

 

481 – artwork by Sonja Benskin Mesher. 

 

An Enduring Song: Remembering A Canticle for Leibowitz – Bethel McGrew at Miller’s Book Review.

 

This Fiction Business: Revisiting the wisdom of the king of the pulps – Frank Theodat at Ink & Grit: Masters of Pulp Fiction. 

 

Winners and Losers – Brian Miller at A South Roane Agrarian.

“The Family Tree Mystery” by Peter Bartram

Colin Crampton, reporter (and usually crime reporter) for the Brighton Evening Chronicle accompanies his girlfriend, Shirley Goldsmith, on a visit to a nearby town. Shirley has discovered she has a relative living in England, with connections back to Shirley’s Australia. The man has told her he wants to give her something and needs her help. When they arrive at the man’s home, they discover his body. He’s been murdered. 

Colin Crampton is on the case. Not only does he get to scoop the rival newspapers, of which there were many in the 1960s, he may also be able to help solve two murders in Australia. A number of people have died, and they all seem to be connected – they’re part of the same extended family. Just like Colin’s girlfriend, Shirley. 

 

And Colin had a second mystery with which to contend, this one inside the newspaper. Someone has purloined his editor’s draft memoirs, right from the filing cabinet in the editor’s office. The memoirs may not seem particularly valuable, but they are potentially embarrassing – and career-threatening, not only to the editor but to Colin himself.

 

Peter Bartram

The Family Tree Mystery is the latest installment in the Colin Crampton mystery series by British author Peter Bartram. They read like what you imagine reporters and newspapers used to be like (and, I can testify, not terribly unlike the newspaper I worked for a long time ago). The stories are intriguing, doused with a healthy measure of fun (and bad jokes). Crampton is nothing if not irreverent, and I suspect Bartram has pulled considerably from his own journalism experience.

 

Bartram has published several Colin Crampton mystery novels and story collections. He had a long career in journalism, including being a reporter on a weekly newspaper, an editor for newspapers and magazines in London, and freelance journalism – all of which have been utilized in creating the character of Colin Crampton. Bartram is also a member of the Society of Authors and the Crime Writers’ Association.

 

Related:

 

My review of The Poker Game Mystery by Peter Bartram.

 

My review of The Comedy Club Mystery by Peter Bartram.

 

My review of The Tango School Mystery by Peter Bartram.

 

My review of Murder in the Morning Edition by Peter Bartram.

 

A Journalist and Crime – Stories and a Novella by Peter Bartram.

 

My review of Front-Page Murder by Peter Bartram.

 

My review of The Mother’s Day Mystery by Peter Bartram.

 

My review of The Beach Party Mystery.

 

My review of The World Cup Mystery by Peter Bartram.

"Nothing But the Truth" by Simon Michael

For more than a decade, the Kray Twins ruled London’s underworld. From the late 1950s to the late 1960s, identical twins Ronnie and Reggie Kray ran what they called “The firm,” involved in just about every criminal activity there was – drugs, prostitution, gambling, protection rackets, and more. The Krays are the subject of numerous books and five films. including “Legend” in 2015, starring Tom Hardy as both the twins. 

The Krays also have a somewhat starring role in the Charles Holborne legal thrillers by British author Simon Michael. And in the recently published eighth book in the series, Nothing But the Truth, the Krays finally meet justice – with a little help from Holborne.

 

Scotland Yard has had enough of the Krays – and Detective Superintendent Leonard Read has a highly secretive operation underway to nab them. It’s based away from Yard headquarters – the Krays have a lot of the police force on the payroll. When they’re arrested for involvement in a murder, they turn to defense attorney Charles Holborne. Like the Krays, he’s East End born and raised. His birth name is actually Horowitz; he changed it in an effort to escape his Jewish and East End roots. But those roots have a habit of ensnarling his feet. The simple fact is that the Krays have a file on Holborne – enough to get him disbarred and sent to prison.

 

Simon Michael

A Kray cousin is set up to take the fall for the murder rap, and it’s Holborne’s assignment to get him to plead guilty or defend him in such a way that he’s convicted. But there are some things Holborne simply cannot do, even if it means disobeying the Krays. What follows is one of the best literary sleights-of-hand that I’ve read in a very long time. 

 

Michael studied law at Kings College, London University and was called to the Bar in 1978. He worked primarily in the field of criminal law until the late 1990s, when he focused his practice on clinical negligence. He began writing in the 1980s and resumed it when he retired from legal practice.

 

Nothing But the Truth has the feel of a final volume in the Charles Holborne series, as it’s difficult to imagine Holborne without the Krays breathing down his neck at every turn. But if Simon can write a story with such a delightfully unexpected turn as this one, I’m confident he can figure out how to keep Holborne moving ahead.

 

Related:

 

My review of The Brief by Simon Michael.

 

My review of An Honest Man by Simon Michael. 

 

My review of The Lighterman by Simon Michael.

 

My review of Corrupted by Simon Michael.

 

My review of The Waxwork Corpse by Simon Michael.

 

My review of Force of Evil by Simon Michel.

 

My review of The Final Shot by Simon Michael.

"A Fatal End" by Faith Martin

Down an alleyway just off the High Street, The Bootleggers Club is a place in Oxford that’s a bit on the seamy side. Drug transactions, a bit of prostitution, underage drinking – and yes, all the teens and 20-somethings want to be there. It’s also a place where new bands can get some exposure, like the Rainbirds and its lead singer Ray Reason. 

But one night in that September of 1963, Ray is found dead on the club’s back circular stairs. It looks like he slipped or missed his footing – an accidental death. Dr. Clement Ryder, Oxford’s coroner, isn’t satisfied. But the inquest jury isn’t into nuances, and a verdict of accidental death is returned. Ryder quietly begins his own investigation, and he convinces the police to – once again – allow Woman’s Police Constable (WPC) Trudy Loveday to help him. And soon Loveday and Ryder, with the help of Ryder’s son, are knee-deep in the questionable side of the music business, everyone with a secret to hide, and what clearly becomes a case of murder.

 

Faith Martin

And time is short. Ryder’s Parkinson’s Disease is advancing, and he can no longer hide its side-effects and symptoms from Loveday. He’s going to have to tell her, with the inevitable end of their joint investigations. For a woman police officer in 1963, the opportunity to be involved in important police work has been a godsend – and now it looks to be coming to an end.

 

A Fatal End is the eighth mystery novel in the Ryder and Loveday series by British author Faith Martin, and it’s just as good as the first. Martin has managed to keep all eight books in the series at the same high level of quality. This reader hopes that she will invent a way to keep the detecting duo together, in spite of Ryder’s progressing disease. 

 

In addition to the Ryder and Loveday novels, Martin (a pen name for Jacquie Walton) has also published the series she’s best known for – the DI Hilary Greene novels, as well as the Jenny Sterling mysteries. Under the name Joyce Cato, she has published several non-series detective stories. Both Cato and Martin are also pen names for Walton. (Walton has another pen name as well – Maxine Barry, under which she wrote 14 romance novels.) A native of Oxford, she lives in a village in Oxfordshire.

 

Related:

 

A Fatal Obsession by Faith Martin.

 

A Fatal Mistake by Faith Martin.

 

A Fatal Flaw by Faith Martin.

 

A Fatal Secret by Faith Martin.

 

A Fatal Truth by Faith Martin.

 

A Fatal Affair by Faith Martin.

 

A Fatal Night by Faith Martin.

"The Final Shot" by Simon Michael

Attorney Charles Holborne briefly has a case that even he knows is hopeless. A rather notorious criminal found religion in prison and became a Church of England minister upon release. He’s been working diligently in his chosen mission field in London, and he’d been trying to get a boy’s club set up to help steer teenagers in the right direction. But a man was killed, the minister charged on both evidence and a supposed confession and convicted. Charles looks at the case and agrees there’s no room for an appeal. 

But he buys a car from the minister’s son, who operates a dealership, and that sets in motion a train of events that will lead to violence, murder, and the doors to the Kray Twins, legendary crime czars in London in the 1950s and 1960s (the Krays happen to be historical figures). And in 1966, all of this is happening while England is heading to the final game of the World Cup.

 

His personal life is vastly improving. His former girlfriend sally is now his full-fledged girlfriend again; the two are living together and remodeling an old home not far from Charles’s chambers in the Temple. But his mother is increasingly in the grip of dementia, and his father is having trouble trying to care for her, even though he refuses to hear any talk of a care home. 

 

Simon Michael

What the reader of The Final Shot, the seventh Charles Holborne mystery by Simon Michael, knows is what Charles does not but only suspects: the murder victim for which the minister was sent to prison is very much alive. And the Kray Twins are behind it all, which may make it very problematic for Charles, who has his own problems, and entanglements, with the Krays.

 

Michael studied law at Kings College, London University and was called to the Bar in 1978. He worked primarily in the field of criminal law until the late 1990s, when he focused his practice on clinical negligence. He began writing in the 1980s and resumed it when he retired from legal practice.

 

The Final Shot is another solid entry in the Charles Holborne series, full of detail about the period when the Beatles were changing popular culture, Allen Ginsburg was reading his poetry, and LSD was a new entrant on the drug scene. 

 

Related:

 

My review of The Brief by Simon Michael.

 

My review of An Honest Man by Simon Michael. 

 

My review of The Lighterman by Simon Michael.

 

My review of Corrupted by Simon Michael.

 

My review of The Waxwork Corpse by Simon Michael.

 

My review of Force of Evil by Simon Michel.

"Error of Judgment" by Roy Lewis

The body of a young woman is found in the elevator of a polytechnical institute. Inspector John Crow is called in to investigate. The victim was the secretary for the institute’s principal. But no one can offer a motive. 

Ac Crow ad his team investigate, they learn that not everyone who might be a suspect has a solid alibi. And the investigation is complicated by ongoing student demonstrations against the administration (it’s the 1960s; student demonstrations were part of the university experience). In fact, Crow and his colleagues find their hands full of protesting students while they try to find the killer. 

 

Side stories begin to play into the investigation. A sociology instructor starts an affair with a student protester. A manager from the Ministry of Education begins to look into the murder himself. One suspect has suffered a heart attack. The stories and events are swirling, but Crow is finding almost every promising avenue a dead end. 

 

Roy Lewis

Error of Judgment by British author Roy Lewis is the second in the Inspector Crow mystery series. The policeman plays an expectedly large role in this story, unlike the first, A Lover Too Many, in which he seemed almost a minor character. Lewis is developing his chief protagonist, and we’re learning more about his background and his relationships with his team, and what it is that makes him successful (dogged determination).

 

Lewis is the author of some 60 other mysteries, novels, and short story collections. His Inspector Crow series includes A Lover Too Many, Murder in the Mine, The Woods Murder, Error of Judgment, and Murder for Money, among others. The Eric Ward series, of which The Sedleigh Hall Murder is the first (and originally published as A Certain Blindness in 1981), includes 17 novels. The Arnold Landon series is comprised of 22 novels. Lewis lives in northern England.  

 

Error of Judgment is a tale of human frailty, misplaced passions, and being in the wrong place at the wrong time, all the while telling a story of student unrest in the 1960s.

 

Related:

 

A Lover Too Many by Roy Lewis.

A Cotswolds Murder by Roy Lewis.

 

The Sedleigh Hall Murder by Roy Lewis.

 

The Farming Murder by Roy Lewis.

 

The Quayside Murder by Roy Lewis.

 

The Diamond Murder by Roy Lewis.

 

The Geordie Murder by Roy Lewis.

 

The Shipping Murder by Roy Lewis.

 

The City of London Murder by Roy Lewis.

 

The Apartment Murder by Roy Lewis.

 

The Spanish Villa Murder by Roy Lewis.

 

The Marriage Murder by Roy Lewis. 

 

The Wasteful Murder by Roy Lewis.

 

The Phantom Murder by Roy Lewis.

 

The Slaughterhouse Murder by Roy Lewis.

 

The Tattoo Murder by Roy Lewis.

 

The Football Murder by Roy Lewis.

 

The Tutankhamen Murder by Roy Lewis.

 

The Zodiac Murder by Roy Lewis.

"The Beach Party Mystery" by Peter Bartram

It’s the mid-1960s. Crime reporter Colon Crampton of the Brighton Chronicle has a reputation for upending the local police and his journalism competitors. What’s more, he clearly enjoys that reputation, and he isn’t above a little skullduggery to keep competitors from getting a story first. 

A man has been found bludgeoned to death in his Brighton flat. From what the police can tell, the victim was running several scam activities, bilking people out of their savings. Potential suspects abound, but the most likely perpetrator is Crampton’s own landlady, Mrs. Figgis. In fact, she finds herself arrested for the murder.

 

His connection to the suspect gets Crampton splashed across the pages of the Chronicle’s competitors’ newspapers, offending the paper’s owner enough to have the reporter yanked off the crime beat. But crime news sticks to Crampton like flypaper, and he quietly continues looking into what’s going on, with a lead to a boat moored just outside Britain’s three-mile territory, one that broadcasts rock music and is shortly to be sponsoring a big beach party featuring The Rolling Stones. 

 

Peter Bartram

The Beach Party Mystery by Peter Bartram is the latest “Crampton of the Chronicle” mystery series, all set in the city of Brighton in the 1960s. Like its predecessors, the story is told in a breezy, comedic style, with jokes (including some off-color ones) abounding. Crampton is nothing if not sarcastic, and Bartram displays the reporter’s character and mindset with what can only be personal experience. 

 

Bartram has published several Colin Crampton mystery novels and story collections. He had a long career in journalism, including being a reporter on a weekly newspaper, an editor for newspapers and magazines in London, and freelance journalism – all of which have been utilized in creating the character of Colin Crampton. Bartram is also a member of the Society of Authors and the Crime Writers’ Association.

 

The Beach Party Mystery is fast-paced and easy reading, building toward a rather spectacular end that will leave the reader thankful for the skill of pickpockets, of all people. 

 

Related:

 

My review of The Poker Game Mystery by Peter Bartram.

 

My review of The Comedy Club Mystery by Peter Bartram.

 

My review of The Tango School Mystery by Peter Bartram.

 

My review of Murder in the Morning Edition by Peter Bartram.

 

A Journalist and Crime – Stories and a Novella by Peter Bartram.

 

My review of Front-Page Murder by Peter Bartram.

 

My review of The Mother’s Day Mystery by Peter Bartram.

"The Lighterman" by Simon Michael

The Kray twins, a pair of vicious London gangsters, are after attorney Charles Holborne, and they don’t seem to be able to quit.

Holborne, whose original named was Horowitz, from a kosher Jewish family in London’s East End, made a bad mistake. He was able to get the Krays’ attorney acquitted. The Krays wanted him found guilty and sent away for a good long time. And now Holborne is on the Kray’s “list,”

Which means they want him eliminated. 

It’s 1964. The corruption in the London underworld is matched only by the corruption in the police force. The police see what’s happening and decide they’re not interested in investigating. Charles manages to evade several attempts on his life, although one costs him about 30 stitches. The one he’s not expecting happens when he gets assigned to handle a murder brief, and the suspect is Izzy Conway. Izzy’s going to get the death penalty anyway, so the Krays tell him they’ll take care of his mother if he offs Charles. They even arrange for a weapon, smuggled in by a prison guard.

Simon Michael

What the Krays don’t know is that Izzy is Charles’s first cousin. They’ve known each other since 1940, when Charles left his kosher family and went to work with Izzy’s on barges running the Thames. Being a lighterman – working on flat-bottomed barges – was the most dangerous work imaginable at the time, the favorite target of German bombers during the Blitz. Charles was only 15 but big for his age, and it was the best time of his life. Two years later, he was reclaimed by his parents and eventually joined the RAF. After the war, he went to Cambridge, changed his name, married the daughter of a title, and became an attorney in London’s Temple. But the wife is now dead, he has a reputation with the profession and the police, and the Krays are after him.

The Lighterman is the third in the Charles Holborne mysteries by Simon Michael, and it’s a stunning story of corruption, criminal gangs, the legal profession, and one man’s belief in the law – and how he’s forced to compromise with that belief. It’s also a story of social change, of old family traditions breaking down, and how the past continues to shape the present.

Michael is the author of five novels in the Charles Holborne series. He studied law at Kings College, London University and was called to the Bar in 1978. He worked primarily in the field of criminal law until the late 1990s, when he focused his practice on clinical negligence. He began writing in the 1980s and resumed it when he retired from legal practice.

The Charles Holborne series is getting better with each successive novel, and it began with an excellent one. The Lighterman reaches into recent history and tells a story that is simply riveting.

Related:

My review of The Brief by Simon Michael.

My review of An Honest Man by Simon Michael. 

A journalist and crime – stories and a novella by Peter Bartram

It’s the early 1960s. Colin Crampton is the crime correspondent for the Brighton Evening Chronicle. He’s relatively new to the job, and he has the twin pressures of constant daily deadlines and a competitor who’s been doing the job for decades and is wired into every police and criminal source in the region. So Colin does what he does best – he keeps stumbling into crimes, and when he does, he’s sharp enough to figure out what’s going on, and what to do next (after he phones in his story).

Crampton is the fictional journalist of author Peter Bartram. In addition to several novels, he’s the star of a novella and a collection of short stories that are fun to read.

In Murder in Capital Letters, Crampton agrees to help a friend (a pub owner; Crampton knows a lot of pubs) get his money back. The pub owner bought what he thought was an early 19^th-century love letter from the Prince Regent to his mistress. Crampton spots the numerous errors of the forgery, and then says he’ll go visit the forger himself, an antiques dealer named Frederick Hollingsbourne-Smith. Perhaps there’s a story here; at the least it will be a few free pints.

What he walks in on is the body of Mr. Hollingbourne-Smith, with two bullet holes in it. And Crampton does what any self-respecting reporter would do – and it’s not calling the police. He spends a few minutes investigating the crime scene (for “local color” for the story). And he spots several metal letters used in linotype printing on the dead man’s desk. Then he calls the police.

The problem for the police is there are a multitude of possible suspects – a former wife, a mistress, a former partner, not to mention all the various people the man has cheated and defrauded over the years. But Crampton is on the job – and he desperately needs a follow-up story.

Equally great fun are the seven short stories that comprise Murder from the Newsdesk. In “The Mystery of the African Charity,” a recent widow is being bothered by her nephew, who’s storing used clothes at her house for an African charity. The nephew is not the type to be involved in philanthropy, and a friend of the widow asks Crampton to look into it. “The Mystery of the Two Suitcases” involves suitcases being left and exchanged at the local railway station. And there’s a mink coat inside one of them.

“The Mystery of the Single Red Sock” begins with Crampton buying gin at the off-license when a would-be robber arrives, wielding a baseball bat. Crampton thwarts the robber, but is drawn into a larger story. In “The Mystery at the Beauregard Hotel,” Crampton receives a tip (from his landlady) that there’s been a double murder at establishment, and he looks into it only to find something else entirely. “The Mystery of the Precious Princess” involves a greyhound, and who may be fixing races at the local dog racing track.

“The Mystery of the Note on the Beach” is about an apparent suicide, except Crampton sees something being staged instead of an actual suicide. And in “The Mystery of the Phantom Santa,” a little boy happens to mention to Crampton that he’s been seeing Santa Claus arriving each night at the garage attached to the boy’s house.

Peter Bartram

Bartram has even more fun with his characters’ names. And the Evening Chronicle’s editor, Frank Figgis, is a character drawn straight from life (I knew people just like him when I worked for a newspaper in Texas).

Author Peter Bartram has had a long career in journalism, including being a reporter on a weekly newspaper, an editor for newspapers and magazines in London, and freelance journalism – all of which have been utilized in creating the character of Colin Crampton. Bartram is also a member of the Society of Authors and the Crime Writers’ Association.

Both Murder in Capital Letters and Murder from the Newsdesk are light, easy-to-read, and entertaining mysteries.

Related:

My review of Murder in the Morning Edition by Peter Bartram.

Top photograph by Darren Coleshill via Unsplash. Used with permission.