Sir Terence David John Pratchett was an English humorist, satirist, and author of fantasy novels, especially comical works. He is best known for his Discworld series of 41 novels.
Dame Edith Ngaio Marsh was a New Zealand mystery writer and theatre director. She was appointed a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 1966.
You Only Live Twice is the eleventh novel and twelfth book in Ian Fleming's James Bond series of stories. It was first published by Jonathan Cape in the United Kingdom on 26 March 1964 and sold out quickly. It was the last Fleming novel published in his lifetime. It is the concluding chapter in what is known as the "Blofeld Trilogy" after Thunderball and On Her Majesty's Secret Service.
The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club was the first novel by English author Charles Dickens. Because of his success with Sketches by Boz published in 1836, Dickens was asked by the publisher Chapman & Hall to supply descriptions to explain a series of comic "cockney sporting plates" by illustrator Robert Seymour, and to connect them into a novel. The book became a publishing phenomenon, with bootleg copies, theatrical performances, Sam Weller joke books, and other merchandise. On its cultural impact, Nicholas Dames in The Atlantic writes, "'Literature' is not a big enough category for Pickwick. It defined its own, a new one that we have learned to call "entertainment." Published in 19 issues over 20 months, the success of The Pickwick Papers popularised serialised fiction and cliffhanger endings.
Alexander "Sandy" McCall Smith, CBE, FRSE, is a British legal scholar and author of fiction. He was raised in Southern Rhodesia and was formerly Professor of Medical Law at the University of Edinburgh. He became an expert on medical law and bioethics and served on related British and international committees. He has since become known as a fiction writer, with sales in English exceeding 40 million by 2010 and translations into 46 languages. He is known as the creator of The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series. The "McCall" derives from his great-great-grandmother Bethea McCall, who married James Smith at Glencairn, Dumfries-shire, in 1833.
Book at Bedtime is a long-running radio programme that is broadcast on BBC Radio 4 each weekday evening between 22.45 and 23.00.
Colonel Sun is a novel by Kingsley Amis published by Jonathan Cape on 28 March 1968 under the pseudonym "Robert Markham". Colonel Sun is the first James Bond continuation novel published after Ian Fleming's 1964 death. Before writing the novel, Amis wrote two other Bond related works, the literary study The James Bond Dossier and the humorous The Book of Bond. Colonel Sun centres on the fictional British Secret Service operative James Bond and his mission to track down the kidnappers of M, his superior at the Secret Service. During the mission he discovers a communist Chinese plot to cause an international incident. Bond, assisted by a Greek spy working for the Russians, finds M on a small Aegean island, rescues him and kills the two main plotters: Colonel Sun Liang-tan and a former Nazi commander, Von Richter.
James Dover Grant, primarily known by his pen name Lee Child, is a British author who writes thriller novels, and is best known for his Jack Reacher novel series. The books follow the adventures of a former American military policeman, Jack Reacher, who wanders the United States. His first novel, Killing Floor (1997), won both the Anthony Award and the 1998 Barry Award for Best First Novel.
The Moving Finger is a detective novel by British writer Agatha Christie, first published in the USA by Dodd, Mead and Company in July 1942 and in the UK by the Collins Crime Club in June 1943. The US edition retailed at $2.00 and the UK edition at seven shillings and sixpence.
The Sunday Philosophy Club is a series of novels and novellas by Alexander McCall Smith. It is also the name of the first novel in the series, and an informal talking group founded by the main character Isabel Dalhousie. The series is set in Edinburgh.
Lee Yeongdo is a Korean novelist known for his work in fantasy and science fiction genre. He is best known for his Dragon Raja series of fantasy novels which is also his debut work, serialised on an online forum from 1997 and published on its completion in 1998.
James Clancy Phelan, known professionally as James Phelan, is an Australian writer of thrillers and young adult novels, including Fox Hunt, The Last 13 series for teens, and the Jed Walker and Lachlan Fox thrillers. He has also written short stories and the non-fiction book Literati.
In literature, a serial is a printing or publishing format by which a single larger work, often a work of narrative fiction, is published in smaller, sequential instalments. The instalments are also known as numbers, parts, fascicules or fascicles, and may be released either as separate publications or within sequential issues of a periodical publication, such as a magazine or newspaper.
Kate Williams is a British historian, author, and television presenter. She is a professor of public engagement with history at the University of Reading.
The Dog Who Came in from the Cold is the second online novel by Alexander McCall Smith, author of The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series. In the first series, the author wrote a chapter a day, starting on 15 Sep 2008, the series running for 20 weeks and totalling 100 episodes. The daily chapters, read by Andrew Sachs were also available as an audio download. The second and third series were published online, running from Monday 21 September 2009 and Monday 13 September 2010, respectively.
A Conspiracy of Friends is the third online novel by Alexander McCall Smith, author of The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series. In the first series, the author wrote a chapter a day, starting from 15 September 2008, and the series ran for 20 weeks, totalling 100 episodes. The daily chapters, read by Andrew Sachs, were also available as an audio download. The second and third series were published online, running from Monday 21 September 2009 and Monday 13 September 2010, respectively.
Virgil Reilly, was an Australian cartoonist, comic book artist and illustrator. In a long and varied career, he was one of Australia's most famous newspaper and magazine artists and a prolific comic-book illustrator. He was known as 'Virgil', the name he signed on his work. While working for Smith's Weekly during the inter-war years he became well-known for his cartoons of glamorous and seductive young women that became known as 'Virgil's girls'. During World War II he continued to draw cartoons featuring sensual and assertive young women for the Sunday Telegraph and contributed cover art, patriotic cartoons and paintings for the Australian Women's Weekly. In the late-1940s and 1950s Reilly was a prolific and successful comic-book artist, known for his fictional creations such as 'Silver Flash' and the 'Rocket Squadron', as well as his depictions of actual naval battles.
Con Chrisoulis is an Australian and Greek multidisciplinary artist, most famous for his graphic novels, Tales of The Smiths, Dryland, and Rebel Rebel.
Adèle and Co. is a 1931 comic novel by the English author Dornford Yates, featuring his recurring 'Berry' characters. This was Yates's first full-length Berry novel, following several earlier Berry short story collections. It was the first Berry book to be published in the UK by Hodder & Stoughton, and not to be serialised in The Windsor Magazine.
Safe Custody is a 1932 novel by the English author Dornford Yates. It was serialised weekly in five parts in The Saturday Evening Post in October and November 1931 as "Your Castle of Hohenems", illustrated by F. R. Gruger.
