Mystery Mile

by Margery Allingham

Overview

Albert Campion is sailing home when he saves the life of fellow passenger, Judge Crowdy Lobbett. Hunted by the notoriously deadly Simister gang, it seems as though the judge's troubles have followed him from America.

Determined to catch the infamous gang leader, Albert bundles the judge, along with his son Marlowe and beautiful daughter Isopel, to the manor at Mystery Mile, where he hopes to lure the villain out into the open. But the safe haven of Mystery Mile is soon invaded by danger, and when people start disappearing, the race to uncover the enigma of their enemy's true identity becomes ever more urgent.

Mystery Mile, first published in 1930, is the second Margery Allingham novel starring eccentric and well-loved amateur sleuth, Albert Campion.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781448216659
Publisher:	Bloomsbury USA
Publication date:	01/02/2018
Series:	Albert Campion
Pages:	256
Sales rank:	155,607
Product dimensions:	4.90(w) x 7.70(h) x 0.80(d)

About the Author

Margery Louise Allingham is ranked among the most distinguished and beloved detective fiction writers of the Golden Age alongside Agatha Christie, Dorothy L. Sayers, and Ngaio Marsh. Allingham is J.K. Rowling's favourite Golden Age author and Agatha Christie said of Allingham that out of all the detective stories she remembers, Margery Allingham 'stands out like a shining light'.

She was born in Ealing, London in 1904 to a very literary family; her parents were both writers, and her aunt ran a magazine, so it was natural that Margery too would begin writing at an early age. She wrote steadily through her school days, first in Colchester and later as a boarder at the Perse School for Girls in Cambridge, where she wrote, produced, and performed in a costume play. After her return to London in 1920 she enrolled at the Regent Street Polytechnic, where she studied drama and speech training in a successful attempt to overcome a childhood stammer. There she met Phillip Youngman Carter, who would become her husband and collaborator, designing the jackets for many of her future books.

The Allingham family retained a house on Mersea Island, a few miles from Layer Breton, and it was here that Margery found the material for her first novel, the adventure story Blackkerchief Dick (1923), which was published when she was just nineteen. She went on to pen multiple novels, some of which dealt with occult themes and some with mystery, as well as writing plays and stories – her first detective story, The White Cottage Mystery, was serialized in the Daily Express in 1927.

Allingham died at the age of 62, and her final novel, A Cargo of Eagles, was finished by her husband at her request and published posthumously in 1968.

Date of Birth:

May 20, 1904

Date of Death:

June 30, 1966

Place of Birth:

London

Place of Death:

Colchester, Essex, England

Education:

Endsleigh House School, Colchester; the Perse School, Cambridge; and the Regent Street Polytechnic, London

Editorial Reviews

To Albert Campion has fallen the honor of being the first detective to feature in a story which is also by any standard a distinguished novel.” —The Observer

“Margery Allingham is notable for the energy and inventiveness of her writing.” —P.D. James

“Margery Allingham stands out like a shining light.” —Agatha Christie

From the Publisher