The first book featuring Ben, the lovable, humorous ex-sailor and down-at-heels rascal who can’t help running into trouble.The first book featuring Ben, the lovable, humorous ex-sailor and down-at-heels rascal who can’t help running into trouble.Ben is back home from the Merchant Navy, penniless as usual and looking for digs in fog-bound London. Taking shelter in an abandoned old house, he stumbles across a dead body – and scarpers. Running into a detective, Gilbert Fordyce, the reluctant Ben is persuaded to return to the house and investigate the mystery of the corpse – which promptly disappears! The vacant No.17 is the rendezvous for a gang of villains, and the cowardly Ben finds himself in the thick of thieves with no way of escape.Ben’s first adventure, No.17, began life in the 1920s as an internationally successful stage play and was immortalised on film by the legendary Alfred Hitchcock. Its author, J. Jefferson Farjeon, wrote more than 60 crime thrillers, eight featuring Ben the tramp, his most popular character.‘There may be contemporary story writers who are equals of Mr Farjeon in the ability to put the reader swiftly and wholly under the spell of the eerie and uncanny, but they have not come within our reading.’ NEW YORK WORLD‘Jefferson Farjeon writes thrills enhanced by good writing, good humour, and good character sketches.’ SUNDAY TIMESJ. Jefferson Farjeon (1883-1955) was the author of more than 60 crime and thriller novels. His work was highly acclaimed in his day. He is now best known as the author of the bestselling “Mystery in White”, and also “No.17”, a play that was brought to the big screen by Alfred Hitchcock and led to the series of popular ‘Ben’ detective novels.• By the author of Mystery in White, the runaway classic crime bestseller in 2015.• One of eight ‘Ben the Tramp’ titles, a forgotten series of detective novels published between the 1930s and 1950s, all now reissued in Crime Club paperback.• This is the first book, also turned into a b/w film by Alfred Hitchcock.• A rare example of an entertaining comedy detective character, hugely popular when first published• Also available in ePub and on Audio for the first time.
Publicat de: HarperCollins Publishers