Monday, November 28, 2016

In with the New: Five Years of Blogging and A Plenitude of Punshons, A Lone Lingo and Murder in the Closet

It's been just over five years since my premier blog post on November 22, 2011, on the mystery genre's "passing tramp" and the once out-of-print mystery writer Jefferson Farjeon, creator of the series character Ben the Tramp.  I followed with another post on Farjeon on the 26th and then made this one on December 26, on a certain Farjeon novel called Mystery in White, which you may have heard of since.  There were other posts as well in those first few weeks, and there have been many since.  Indeed, this post will be the 700th post at The Passing Tramp.

Lately I haven't been posting here as much as I would have liked, but I have been busy working on proofs for the essay collection Murder in the Closet, which will be out the last day of this year, a long introduction to Ada E. Lingo's regional detective novel Murder in Texas (1935) and the last ten novels in E. R. Punshon's Bobby Owen mystery series, beginning with So Many Doors, which Dean Street Press will Release on January 2.

opening in January
For this last set of Punshon Bobby Owen mystery reissues there is bonus material: with the first four novels, selections from Punshon's crime fiction reviews; with the next five novels, a Bobby Owen short story apiece (there are five known Bobby Owen short stories); and with the last novel, a Punshon Bobby Owen radio play, rediscovered by the indefatigable Tony Medawar.  This brings to 41 Bobby's total cases.

For this last set of Punshons I wrote a 3300-word introduction, "Detective Stories, the Detection Club and Death: The Final Years of E. R. Punshon" and short pieces on the reviews, short stories and radio play.  There also a note by Tony Medawar on the radio play, "Death on the Up-Lift," giving more detail about Punshon's work in radio.

I've now written over 30,000 words, when all the Dean Street Press Punshon pieces are taken together, about Punshon, making him the seventh the pre-WW2 Detection Club member about whom I have written at such length, after Cecil John Charles Street, Freeman Wills Crofts, JJ Connington--see Masters of the "Humdrum" Mystery-- and Douglas and Margaret Cole and Henry Wade (See The Spectrum of English Murder).  I also got the chance to write about Ianthe Jerrold, another early DC member, for DSP's reissues of her crime novels.

Coming soon, some more on Ada Lingo and her Murder in Texas and on Murder in the Closet, my major book project for 2016, to which a lot of great people have contributed.  There will also be some more news on additional projects and, I hope, just some regular book reviews!  Thanks for sticking with the blog all these years, I appreciate the readership.
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16 comments:

  1. noirencyclopediaNovember 28, 2016 at 8:04 PM

    It's been just over five years since my premier blog post on November 22, 2011

    Congrats on all the milestones, and in particular on having commemorated my 2011 birthday in such a way. Archaeologists of the future will regard this as more than a coincidence, you know.

    Or maybe not.

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    1. The Passing TrampNovember 30, 2016 at 4:23 AM

      A lot of great developments since 2011! 2010 even! I was finally propelled to blog by the examples of John Norris, Tomcat and Patrick Ohl, in fact, fine blogs all, among many others.

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  2. julia jonesNovember 29, 2016 at 12:14 AM

    Congratulations - that's really impressive and such an important contriubtion to our knowledge. I am in awe!

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    1. The Passing TrampNovember 30, 2016 at 4:24 AM

      Thanks, Julia, I'll keep pegging away. You set a great example. for the rest of us.

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  3. XavierNovember 29, 2016 at 1:58 AM

    Can't believe it's already five years and 700 posts - how time flies! Congratulations and here's to many more!

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    1. The Passing TrampNovember 30, 2016 at 4:27 AM

      I know, I wish I personally had those five years back, but I have at least managed to get a book out every year since 2012, plus all those intros and articles. A lot of words! And I think a lot of progress on numerous fronts in this field by many people. There's so much more interest now, compared to when we had our group at GAD.

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  4. JonathanNovember 29, 2016 at 5:45 AM

    Hey Curtis, just wondering if you have recommendations as to which of the newest reprints of Punshon would offer the strongest mysteries/ puzzles?

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    1. The Passing TrampNovember 30, 2016 at 4:29 AM

      I liked The Attending Truth a lot on that front, but I'm going back over all the books and will be blogging in greater detail here on them. The radio play was a fun discovery too, it's very much a vintage mystery.

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  5. AnonymousNovember 30, 2016 at 12:44 AM

    Congrats on the anniversary chum - and as always, thanks for doing so much for promoting the Golden Age!

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    1. The Passing TrampNovember 30, 2016 at 4:29 AM

      Thanks and thank you for your blog, it sets a standard.

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  6. dgbNovember 30, 2016 at 8:45 AM

    I am a silent reader but a major enjoyer. It's a rare day I don't begin by checking to see if you've gifted us with a new blog entry. Thanks for the pleasure and for all the introductions to previously unread writers.

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    1. The Passing TrampNovember 30, 2016 at 11:34 PM

      Thank you for commenting. It's nice to hear these things matter to people. There does seem to have been quite a lot of progress in the vintage mystery world over the last five years, which is encouraging to those of us who love it. I hope to do some more blog posts this month, but the writign projects do take a lot of free time.

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  7. BVLawsonNovember 30, 2016 at 10:23 AM

    Happy Anniversary! I don't always get to stop by and comment, but it doesn't mean I don't do a "hit and run" reading of the blog, which I thoroughly enjoy. Thanks for your hard work and for entertaining us these past five years, and best wishes with your upcoming endeavors - they all sound terrific.

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    1. The Passing TrampNovember 30, 2016 at 11:32 PM

      Thanks so much! I don't get as many comments on my blog as I would like, but I know the readership has gone up a lot in the last five years, for which I'm grateful.

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  8. dgbDecember 1, 2016 at 9:17 AM

    Curtis, you probably already take a look at Roy Glashan's Library, an Australian site that provides texts of vintage genre fiction of all sorts. Glashan has recently begun publishing Sexton Blake, Valentine Williams and Peter Cheney stories and novels. Your readers may be interested. Doug

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  9. Clothes In BooksDecember 6, 2016 at 1:59 PM

    Congratulations on all that history and all those achievements! You add so much to the blogging and GA fiction worlds...

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