Laurel A. Young - P.D. James: A Companion to the Mystery Fiction

MCFARLAND COMPANIONS TO MYSTERY FICTION

BY KATE MACDONALD
1. John Buchan (2009)

BY GINA MACDONALD with ELIZABETH SANDERS
2. E.X. Ferrars (2011)

BY ERIN E. MACDONALD
3. Ed McBain/Evan Hunter (2012)

BY ANNE-MARIE BELLER
4. Mary Elizabeth Braddon (2012)

BY LUCIA RINALDI
5. Andrea Camilleri (2012)

BY JIM MANCALL
6. James Ellroy (2014)

BY MARGARET KINSMAN
7. Sara Paretsky (2016)

BY LAUREL A. YOUNG
8. P.D. James (2017)

MCFARLAND COMPANIONS TO MYSTERY FICTION, 8
Series Editor Elizabeth Foxwell

McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers
Jefferson, North Carolina

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGUING DATA ARE AVAILABLE

BRITISH LIBRARY CATALOGUING DATA ARE AVAILABLE

e-ISBN: 978-1-4766-2890-5

2017 Laurel A. Young. All rights reserved

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying or recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

Front cover: (inset) Phyllis Dorothy James (photograph by Gareth Iwan Jones); clock tower (photograph by Duncan Walker)

McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers
Box 611, Jefferson, North Carolina 28640
www.mcfarlandpub.com

For my HerdMom, Bruce and Alison
for their boundless love and support

P.D. Jamess narrative style is reminiscent of many excellent authors of the past while remaining uniquely her own. Her attention to careful mystery plotting follows in the tradition of the Golden Age of British detective fiction written between the two World Wars by the likes of Agatha Christie and Dorothy L. Sayers. However, Jamess novels are far more lengthy and complex than most Golden Age works, closer to nineteenth-century literature by George Eliot or Wilkie Collins in terms of the psychological complexity of the characters and the carefully drawn portraits of social dynamics. At the same time, Jamess work is thoroughly modern both in terms of the realistic descriptions of police procedures (drawn from her work history and thorough research) and the echoing aftereffects of crime. As fellow crime writer Val McDermid notes, This appropriation of the conventions of the past sometimes misleads people into thinking of James as a cosy writer. The reality is that she is anything but, and she took on those conventions only to subvert them in an often witty way (Val McDermid on P.D. James). Jamess detectives are essentially good people with a strong moral core, but they may experience disillusionment at the evil they confront, and the reader is left with the sense that, while the crime may be solved in the end, the larger concerns of contemporary society remain. Many of the novels feature closed settings, although the locations vary enormously. As the matron in Shroud for a Nightingale, which takes place in a nursing school, says, Its rather frightening how much people get to know about each others habits in a small closed community like this (142). This intimate knowledge often holds the key to the mystery. Through Jamess exploration of universal human weaknesses and struggles, her crime fiction ultimately achieves a timeless quality, as evidenced by her continued popularity and cultural relevance today. The majority of Jamess twenty books have been filmed for televised broadcasts, and her sole foray into dystopian fiction, The Children of Men (1992), was adapted as a well-regarded feature film directed by Alfonso Cuarn in 2006. Her last novel, Death Comes to Pemberley (2011) (a sequel to Pride and Prejudice; James often called Jane Austen her favorite author), was filmed and broadcast as a three-part BBC miniseries in 2013. Baroness James of Holland Park, as she became in 1991, died at home in Oxford on 27 November 2014, aged 94. She had hinted in interviews at the possibility of writing one more novel, but its contents will have to remain an unsolved mystery.

This encyclopedic guide contains more than 700 entries on Jamess works, references, and major themes. Each novel, short story, book, play, and film or television adaptation has an entry; however, omnibus editions that bundle multiple novels together without adding new content have not been included. There are entries on all characters mentioned by name, however briefly; the text in which each appears is noted. Characters who do not have a first name are given their titles (Mr., Sergeant, etc.). Entries are alphabetical by title or characters surname; for example: Dalgliesh, Adam. Articles such as A, An, or The are not considered in alphabetizing, so that A Taste for Death appears under T rather than A. Last names with prefixes are alphabetized by the main name, so Catherine de Bourgh appears under B rather than D. Major and minor repeated thematic elements such as feminism, religion, etc., have separate entries that discuss their representation across multiple texts. Real institutions mentioned in Jamess work, such as Scotland Yard and the National Health Service, are given an entry with a brief nonfictional definition as well as discussion of their use in Jamess fiction. Page numbers cited in the entries refer to the editions included in the annotated bibliography.

Cover Her Face (1962)

A Mind to Murder (1963)

Unnatural Causes (1967)

Moment of Power (1969)

Shroud for a Nightingale (1971)

An Unsuitable Job for a Woman (1972)

The Black Tower (1975)

Murder, 1986 (1975)

Handbook for Homicide (1976)

Death of an Expert Witness (1977)

A Fictional Prognosis (1977)

Murder as Social History (1977)

Ought Adam to Marry Cordelia? (1977)

A Very Desirable Residence (1977)

Dorothy L. Sayers: From Puzzle to Novel (1978)

Great-Aunt Allies Fly-papers (1978)

Agatha Christies Deceptive Artistry (1980)

Elegance, Eros and Terror (1980)

Innocent Blood (1980)

The Law in Liverpool (1980)

Dublins Timeless Trinity: Externals Change but Not Its Spirit (1981)

Eric Ambler and the Arts of Intrigue (1981)

Unsuitable Job for a Woman (1981)

The Skull Beneath the Skin (1982)

The Victim (1982)

In Mystery Fiction, Rooms Furnished One Clue at a Time (1983)

The Girl Who Loved Graveyards (1984)

House Calls: The Doctor Detective Round-Up (1984)

The Murder of Santa Claus (1984)

A Salem Sampler (1985)

A Taste for Death (1986)

The Art of the Detective Novel (1989)

The Church Should Mind Its Language (1989)

Devices and Desires (1989)

Diary (1989, 1991, 1994)

Introduction to The Eustace Diamonds (1990)

The Mistletoe Murder (199192)

The Children of Men (1992)

A Good Word for the Mother Tongue (1992)

The Man Who Got Away (1992)

The Man Who Was Eighty (1992)

Obituary: Sir Richard Francis (1992)

English Must Be Saved (1993)

Foreword to 800 Years of Womens Letters (1993)

Original Sin (1994)

On Ngaio Marsh (1995)