With a Bare Bodkin

(Paperback, Main)

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A Francis Pettigrew mystery, originally published in 1946. England is in the grip of the Second World War and the Blitz has forced the evacuation of various government offices from London. Francis Pettigrew, an unsuccessful barrister and amateur detective, accompanies his ministry to the distant seaside resort of Marsett Bay where the civil servants must make the best of their temporary home. In this strange atmosphere, Pettigrew begins to fall in love with his secretary, Miss Brown, who is also being courted by a widowed man who is much older than her. Bored and restless, the ministers start playing a light-hearted game of plan the perfect murder to pass the time. Pettigrew, caught up in his love for Miss Brown, remains detached from the silliness - until a real murder happens, and he is drawn into solving the mystery. One of the best detective stories published for a long time. Spectator

Author Bio

Cyril Hare was the pseudonym for the distinguished lawyer Alfred Alexander Gordon Clark. He was born in Surrey, in 1900, and was educated at Rugby and Oxford. A member of the Inner Temple, he was called to the Bar in 1924 and joined the chambers of Roland Oliver, who handled many of the great crime cases of the 1920s. He practised as a barrister until the Second World War, after which he served in various legal and judicial capacities including a time as a county court judge in Surrey. Hare's crime novels, many of which draw on his legal experience, have been praised by Elizabeth Bowen and P.D. James among others. He died in 1958 at the peak of his career as a judge, and at the height of his powers as a master of the whodunit.