Love Lies Bleeding

By Edmund Crispin

As inventive as Agatha Christie, as hilarious as P.G. Wodehouse – discover the delightful detective stories of Edmund Crispin. Crime fiction at its quirkiest and best.

Castrevenford school is preparing for Speech Day and English professor and amateur sleuth Gervase Fen is called upon to present the prizes. However, the night before the big day, strange events take place that leave two members of staff dead. The Headmaster turns to Professor Fen to investigate the murders.

While disentangling the facts of the case, Mr Fen is forced to deal with student love affairs, a kidnapping and a lost Shakespearean manuscript. By turns hilarious and chilling, Love Lies Bleeding is a classic of the detective genre.

• Language: English
• Publisher: HarperCollins UK
• Release date: Jun 4, 2015
• ISBN: 9780008124168

Edmund Crispin

Robert Bruce Montgomery was born in Buckinghamshire in 1921, and was a golden age crime writer as well as a successful concert pianist and composer. Under the pseudonym Edmund Crispin, he wrote 9 detective novels and 42 short stories. In addition to his reputation as a leader in the field of mystery genre, he contributed to many periodicals and newspapers and edited sci–fi anthologies. After the golden years of the 1950s he retired from the limelight to Devonshire until his death in 1978.

Reviews for Love Lies Bleeding

[leslie398 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Very enjoyable entry in the Gervase Fen series. I like books in school settings, and this one doesn't disappoint! Fen (and Crispin) are in fine form, the humor is present and the solution, while clear once Fen expostulates, was a surprise to me.

[abbottthomas · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

It's a long time since I read any of Crispin's books and I had forgotten his donnish detective, Gervase Fen. I enjoyed reading my yellow-wrapped Cheap Edition with a gentle whiff of damp and crisp browning paper - much better than a paperback, even a green Penguin.The story is set in a boarding school not too far from Stratford-upon-Avon. Fen has arrived to present the prizes at the school's speech day. An opportune choice, as, soon after his arrival, two of the teaching staff are found shot to death. The urbane headmaster seems amazingly unfussed about the events, worrying mainly about keeping the story from the visiting parents, and having to contact Gabbitas for two replacements. There is another problem in the disappearance of a girl from the neighbouring girls' school which may seem irrelevant but we, and Fen, know better. The plot moves along quite briskly with another murder to come as well as a major role for the demented bloodhound who we inexplicably met at the start of the book.I found the style somehat irritating: Fen is making comments that suggest he has worked everything out about a third of the way through the book, certainly before a motive has been found. We get some helpful hints along the way but the full denouement has to wait until Fen gets round to telling his headmaster friend the details in the last couple of chapters, after the murderer is dead. I don't consider that a 'spoiler' because, in the days of capital punishment, the murderer in middle-class who-dun-its was usually allowed a less grim end than the noose.An interesting feature was the relationships between Fen and a couple of nubile 16-year-old schoolgirls who play important parts in the story. For a married, middle-aged professor he has an inappropriate interest in their physical development and goes as far as kissing one on the tip of her nose, not to mention offering them cigarettes and whisky. Those were the days!

[catym_14 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Professor of English Literature Gervase Fen helps out an old friend by agreeing at short notice to present the prizes at a school speech day - little expecting also to be called upon to investigate several murders and a kidnapping, and possibly - just possibly - to discover a lost Shakespearean manuscript.A nicely-plotted mystery with excellent character sketches and a lot of depth. The insane bloodhound is a nice touch, and the scene with the headmaster interrogating the sixteen-year-old boy caught making illicit assignations with a girl is really very amusing. Fen is his usual self (but less annoying than he often is) and the whodunnit is satisfyingly complex. Well paced, well written, rich and full-bodied. In more than one sense. The kind of book with which to snuggle down before a roaring fire (should you be so fortunate as to have access to one) on a really cold night, with either a large glass of wine or a large mug of cocoa depending on your preferences.

[jonrob_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

When Gervase Fen is asked to give the prizes at a minor public school he becomes embroiled in a mystery involving the murder of two of the staff, the abduction of a pupil from a nearby girls' school and the finding of an old manuscript in a nearby cottage, whose inhabitant becomes yet another victim. As usual Fen is able to solve the mystery using precise logical deduction. All the characters are well-drawn in one of my favourites from Crispin's small body of work.