Mon 22 Apr 2013
Author Audrey Boyers is included in the Revised Crime Fiction IV, by Allen J. Hubin, for one book under this name, Murder by Proxy (Doubleday Crime Club, 1945), which was actually a collaboration with Bettina Boyers. Some information about the latter has recently come to light: included in Part 37 of the online Addenda to the Revised CFIV, Bettina Boyers was the “pseudonym of Betti Rosa Tagger, 1891-1960. She was also known as Bettina Bruckner, and died the widow of Theodor Tagger, whose pseudonym was Ferdinand Bruckner. Born in Rosnow, Poland; died in New York City.”
Bettina Boyers has one other entry of her own in CFIV, a solo novel entitled The White Mazurka (Doubleday, 1946), also a Crime Club novel.
Not much information seems to be known about Audrey Boyers, however. One might have guessed that she and Bettina were sisters, and yet apparently they were not. What has caught Al’s eye in recent days, along with that of fellow mystery researcher John Herrington, is the entry for Audrey Boyers Walz (1906-1983) who between 1931 and 1951 wrote eight mystery novels under the pen name of Francis Bonnamy, all of which featured a series character named Peter Shane, a criminologist by trade.
For more information about the series, check out the author’s GADetection page here: http://gadetection.pbworks.com/w/page/7930094/Bonnamy,%20Francis
The question posed by Al and John is this: Is Audrey Boyers also Audrey Boyers Walz? It would be a whopper of a coincidence if they are not, but no evidence has so far arisen to say that they are. (And where does “Bettina Boyers” fit in?)
July 24th, 2013 at 6:30 pm
Audrey Boyers Walz is my mother, and she collaborated with Bettina Bruckner on Murder by Proxy. Coincidentally I found some entries in her diaries about Bettina — somewhat to my surprise as Audrey had never much spoken much to me or my brother about this collaboration — and I only recently discovered the entries in her diaries.
She found working with Bettina “difficult.” In the entry for August 28, 1944, she wrote, “At work by 11 with Mrs. Bruckner and it is very difficult. She persists in trying to get her stuff back in and mine out, with the greatest zest.” Then n August 29, 1944, “More of sane. I can understabd her feeling of authority with her age and background but it doesn’t make her an ideal collaborator. By 5:30 ready to scream.” In entries in 1946 she mentions receiving a “fat” royalty check from the publisher for “Proxy.” I would gather that the collaboration had been encouraged by her editor at Duell Sloan and Pierce. By the way, my mother had a sister named Betty Boyers, and perhaps the name “Bettina and Audrey Boyers” emerged from that as a sort of joke.
July 24th, 2013 at 7:17 pm
Thanks for all of this information, Terry, as well as the anecdotes about the writing of MURDER BY PROXY, which I’ve forwarded on to John and Al. Most interesting indeed!
July 25th, 2013 at 12:42 pm
Between the two mystery writers, Audrey Boyers and Bettina Bruckner, who collaborated (?) on one book, it would seem that the former is the best known of the two. “Not much information seems to be known about Audrey Boyers†strikes me as a mystery in itself. Audrey Boyers and Audrey Boyers Walz is one and the same person; mystery solved. Between my brother, Terry, and I, you now have the evidence. She wrote many novels under the pen name of Francis Bonnamy; spelling the name Francis as a man would, to sell more copies. Although there are readers who follow Francis Bonnamy, she is best known for two historical novels, “The Bizarre Sisters†and “The Undiscovered Country,†who she successfully collaborated with her husband as Jay and Audrey Walz. Go ahead and Google the names. Both novels are very good reads, the first involves a famous trial in Cumberland, Virginia, about a scandalous affair, involving the Richard Randolph family, who had two pretty good lawyers, Patrick Henry and John Marshall. The novel was on the NYT and other best seller lists for weeks. Even the small Cumberland library has two copies of “The Bizarre Sisters,†after all their mysterious Randolph neighbors are in the book.The second novel was about Elisha Kent Kane, an Arctic explorer from Philadelphia who lead an expedition, 1850, to try finding the British explorer, Sir John Franklin. The novel is also a story about the Fox Sisters, known for spiritual mediums and those “spirit rappings.†Oh, and not wanting to lose her writing skills, she wrote a travel book, again collaborating with Jay Walz, about visiting Canada, entitled “Portrait of Canadaâ€, a New York Times Book. It was well accepted by Canadians even though the writers were from the United States.
July 25th, 2013 at 2:20 pm
Christopher
More interesting information. Thanks!
Steve
September 9th, 2013 at 6:23 pm
I found considerably more information about Bettina Bruckner in two letters my mother Audrey Boyers Walz wrote to her sister, Betty Boyers of New York City dated September 5 and September 21, 1944. This was after she had worked with Mrs. Bruckner, and clearly she was impressed by her as much as she was frustrated by her. During the time they worked together, she learned a great deal about Bettina’s life, including her marriage to Ferdinand Bruckner, an important writer and theater manager who had great success in Berlin working with Max Reinhardt. His plays were translated into many languages and “Elizabeth of England” was produced in London in 1931 where it starred Phyllis Neilson-Terry, of the Terry theatrical family. He became a prominent anti-Nazi in the early 1930s and forced to emigrate to the States where unfortunately he did not have much success. In Berlin she had run a private school and she and her husband lived in a “gem of an eighteenth century house” filled with beautiful things, all presumably lost during the war. Audrey wrote, “She has a forceful, intense and stubborn mind…. She has the conviction of the rightness of her ideas which makes the artist – and a difficult collaborator.”
Regarding this collaboration, Audrey said, “So in her talk it became clear she thought I had only straightened out the language, fixed some technicalities from the mystery novel angle, and fixed other incidents to conform to American mores. But the charm of it she is deeply convinced [it] is her doing. She hasn’t English enough to appreciate what I did. She said it was wonderful the way I read between the lines of her twisted language, but she believes sincerely that everything I did read in was there. You can see how that attitude would make me writhe, even though I understand it.”
I mentioned in an earlier communication that the name “Bettina and Audrey Boyers” may have been a kind of joke dreamed up by Audrey who had a sister named Bettina. In fact, Mrs. Bruckner wanted a name that she could use on her own if Audrey didn’t wish to collaborate in the future. Audrey’s agent, Max Lieber, who was also her agent, came up with “Bettina and Audrey Boyers” as the joint authors. My mother thought this was “hysterically” funny when she passed the information on to her sister in the letter dated September 21.
However, the tone of her letter shows quite clearly how much Audrey respected Bettina Bruckner’s fascinating background and experience.
September 9th, 2013 at 9:11 pm
Terry
Thanks for passing along all this interesting inside information!
— Steve