The detective fiction genre is built around the essential structure of a crime, an investigation of that crime, and the revelation of the guilty party who committed the crime, and good heavens didn’t the Golden Age map out a lot of different ways to walk that path. And there are few people better placed to discuss this than President of the Detection Club and recent recipient of the CWA Diamond Dagger Martin Edwards, who celebrates three decades as a published author this year.
Continue readingChristianna Brand
#790: On the Morals of Golden Age Detective Fiction, via Crime and Detection [ss] (1926) ed. E.M. Wrong
That title is doing a lot of work, isn’t it? Fair warning: this goes on a bit.
At the online Bodies from the Library conference last weekend, I gave a talk inspired in part by E.M. Wrong’s introduction to the 1926 anthology Crime and Detection. And, in addition to coining the term “Wellington of detection” that inspired the thinking I laid out last weekend, there is plenty of material in that piece of prose to get the cogs turning.
Continue readingIn GAD We Trust – Episode 19: Reissue! Repackage! Repackage! [w’ Various People]
On the back of the Reprint of the Year Award run by Kate at CrossExaminingCrime, I thought it might be interesting to see what those of us who submit titles for that undertaking would choose to bring back from the exile of being OOP.
Continue readingIn GAD We Trust – Episode 14: The Island of Coffins (2021) by John Dickson Carr + The 9.50 Up Express (2021) by Freeman Wills Crofts [w’ Tony Medawar]
We’re all prone to speculate at times about how wonderful it would be to discover a previously-unpublished work by a beloved Golden Age author, and for today’s podcast episode Tony Medawar rejoins me to tempt you with two forthcoming collections of hard-to-find material from two of the genre’s titans — John Dickson Carr and Freeman Wills Crofts.
Continue readingIn GAD We Trust – Episode 12: Appeal and Deception in Golden Age Detective Fiction [w’ Scott K. Ratner]
You thought this podcast was nerdy before? You ain’t seen nothin’ yet. Today we welcome the GADisphere’s own Scott K. Ratner, and things get taxonomical…
Continue reading#702: Shedunnit x The Invisible Event – Locked Room Mysteries

You’re doubtless aware of the superbly wide-ranging Golden Age-focussed Shedunnit podcast run by Caroline Crampton, and I was delighted to be asked to contribute to an episode about locked room mysteries and impossible crimes. The results are now online for your listening pleasure.
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In GAD We Trust – Episode 8: Uncovering Long-Forgotten Short Stories + Bodies from the Library 3 (2020) ed. Tony Medawar [w’ Tony Medawar]

Today was due to have been the sixth (sixth!) Bodies from the Library conference at the British Library but, for obvious reasons, it’s not. I can’t, alas, give you a whole day of GAD-based discussion, but I can at least fill an hour with someone from that line-up of exceptionally knowledgable people, Tony Medawar.
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In GAD We Trust – Episode 6: Detective Fiction is Comedy [w’ Alasdair Beckett-King]




