Bruce Montgomery/Edmund Crispin: A Life in Music and Books

Under his real name, Bruce Montgomery (1921-1978) wrote concert music and the scores for almost 50 feature films, including some of the most enduring British comedies of the twentieth century, amongst them a number in the series started by "Doctor in the House" and the first six "Carry On" films. Under the pseudonym of Edmund Crispin he enjoyed equal success as an author, writing nine highly acclaimed detective novels, a number of short crime stories as well as compiling anthologies of science fiction which helped to increase the profile of the genre. A close friend of both Philip Larkin and Kingsley Amis, Montgomery did much to encourage their work. In this first biography of Montgomery, David Whittle draws on interviews with people who knew the writer and composer, some of whom are sadly no longer with us. These interviews, together with the in-depth research that Whittle has carried out, provide great insight into the development of Montgomery as a crime fiction writer and as a composer in the ever-demanding world of films. During the late 50s and early 60s these demands were to prove too much for Montgomery. Alcoholism combined with the onset of osteoporosis and a retreat into a semi-reclusive lifestyle resulted in him writing and composing virtually nothing during the last 15 years of his life. Whittle examines the reasons for Montgomery's early and rapid decline in this thoroughly researched and engagingly written biography.