E.X. Ferrars was one of the most popular and prolific British crime writers of the twentieth century. This literary companion is designed to introduce readers to the full range of possibilities inherent in E.X. Ferrars’s canon, connecting novels and short stories that share themes and strategies, and providing biographical data that yield insights into Ferrars’s interests and concerns. A brief biography is included, as well as explanations of relevant genre terminology. This work is a pathway to better understanding this popular writer, whose work spanned 63 years and who, when she died at age 88, was at work on another mystery for her broad readership.

Gina Macdonald was the author of eight books and several other book-length publications. She wrote hundreds of articles and encyclopedia pieces on a variety of literary topics, but mainly on detective/ crime fiction. At the time of her death she had been promoted to full professor at Nicholls State University in Thibodaux, Louisiana.

Elizabeth Sanders obtained her B.A. in English from Nicholls State University in 2008. She was a teaching assistant at the University of Arkansas and will soon pursue a master’s degree in library science at Louisiana State University.

Series Editor Elizabeth Foxwell, an Agatha Award winner, is managing editor of Clues: A Journal of Detection.

Gina Macdonald and Elizabeth Sanders

Series Editor Elizabeth Foxwell

Format: softcover (7 x 10)
Pages: 206
Bibliographic Info: 4 photos, chronology, bibliography, index
Copyright Date: 2011
pISBN: 978-0-7864-4435-9
eISBN: 978-0-7864-8913-8
Imprint: McFarland
Series: McFarland Companions to Mystery Fiction

Acknowledgments      viii
Preface      1
Organization of the Companion      3
Ferrars’s Works in Chronological Order      5
Ferrars’s Works in Alphabetical Order      9
A Brief Biography      15
A Career Chronology      21
The Companion     23
Bibliography      173
Index      195

• Reviews of the Series: “The McFarland Companion series…has been consistently excellent, both in its choice of subjects and its quality of scholarship and writing”—Mystery Scene
• “E.X. Ferrars: A Companion to the Mystery Fiction is a very full and fair, much needed survey of the more than one hundred fine pieces of crime fiction produced in a writing career that ran from 1932 to 1995. A well thought-out account of all you would want to know about this finely entertaining crime novelist.”—Diamond Dagger recipient H.R.F. Keating, creator of Inspector Ghote.