This book gave new meaning to the phrase "freely adapted." I knew it'd be different from the episode in the UK TV series, but really....Book version: Old man Peachment is killed for a cache of ancient and medieval coins hidden in his house.TV version: Old man Peachment is murdered because of his ...
If you were to guess how a womanising, middle-aged brewer was murdered, you might say he was shot by a jealous husband or drowned in his own beer - not savaged by a horse. The strange death of Charles Berney, savaged and trampled to death by a horse on a windswept stretch of moorland, came as he ...
Johnny Lister ran out of road and got killed. In Latchford, where road is all there is. Five miles of road--a hot, straight strip with a dead tree at the westerly end of it. The wreckage of Lister's cycle was found a hundred yards from his body...Into the world of jazz and death-happy delinquents...
Madsen had gone, stumbling over the threshold in his eagerness. Gently stood staring at the greasy bottle. Felling, scowling, eased from foot to foot. They could hear Madsen cross the yard and go up his stairs: the slam of his door. Then only the noises of the sparrows scratching down through the...
Robertson was waiting at the hotel and I intended to waste no time in comparing notes with him. The evening chill was no myth, so I fetched an anorak from my room; I set out briskly up the narrow road in the soft gloom of the northern twilight. The village seemed deserted and nothing stirred at t...
Shelton’s thoughts are some part with the contractor, some part with Gently, some part with Sally. The contractor, because he was uncivil: Gently, because he has overwhelmed Shelton. As for Sally, the heat in the office had caused her to take off her tunic, and so to expose, with greater definiti...
These included a visit to the dustbins, a step which Stephens regarded as de rigueur: Gently, with a better appreciation of Hansom, expected small profit from this piece of routine. He had, moreover, used the car park in the past, and so was familiar with the general layou...
The market square, its gutters rushing with water, was as empty as a hosed-out fish barrel. In the streets one met only a few housewives hastening between the shops, their brightly coloured plastic macs glistening under advanced umbrellas. It was dark, too. The shops had o...
The Welshman began sniffing as soon as he stepped into the room, and after a sharp look round he glanced suspiciously at Gently. ‘That’s not Gold Block, man, I do know,’ he said. ‘Chanel.’ Gently pretended to leer. ‘There’s still some glamour left i...
You could almost feel the waves of refrigerating hate coming from the angry woman in the rear. Upright she sat, like a tiny princess. Her dark, flashing eyes tried to drill holes in Gently’s unexpressive back. ‘I still don’t understand, inspector!’ ‘I regret the necessity,...
The notice was pinned to the police station notice board, next to a red and yellow poster setting out the Festival programme. Hozeley’s Quintet was billed No. 1, on Saturday at eight at the George V Hall: The Shinglebourne Chamber Music Quartet with soloist Terence Virtue (clarinet). Gently grunt...
One hadn’t to go far to see the whole of Hiverton. It was huddled together like a misplaced hill village. On one side was the sea, on the other stony fields. From a little distance it had the appearance of a watchful, red-brick citadel. He had plodded along the terraces wh...
‘Did they get anything fresh from him?’ enquired Gently perfunctorily. ‘Oh yes, sir,’ replied his constable informant. ‘He admitted that he was in the wartime Special – knew all about the handling of truncheons, he did. The chief constable wants to give him one to see how ...
Reynolds had not yet come in, but Buttifant sat heavy-eyed in the C.I.D. room. He had a cigarette stuck to his lip and a piled ashtray at his elbow. He ducked his head and rose wearily. Gently motioned him to sit again. On the table in front of him was a scribbling pad and some pencilled-over she...
IT still rained, a cold sweat out of the darkness. Street-light reflections aimed daggers along the narrow Brickfields streets. Mostly the streets were deserted, but here and there loped a black figure, long-limbed, padded-shouldered, dripping trilby slanted forward. Paradise Street wore a new as...
On the other hand, I knew he wasn’t Dainty’s squeaker the first time he opened his mouth. He spoke with a Norchester street-accent, a debased form of the more vigorous Northshire; no Met officer would have missed it, though Rampant had talked through a dozen scarves. In fact, Dainty had made no m...
‘Willie loupit o’er a linn’, Lady Coupar WHEN GENTLY WOKE in the morning a grey twilight was pervading his room and a low susurrous buzzing sounded continuously in his ears. He stirred uneasily. Could the Bonnie Strathtudlem’s whisky really be so potent? But no, he’d only had time for a single to...
It was still the best hotel in Latchford, though now enlarged and shyly in-trend. Its pale, aloof, but agreeable face had once met the coaches arriving from London; as they crossed the bridge, after the perils of the heath, they saw first this haven, waiting to welcome them. Well, the bypass had ...