Thu 10 Jul 2014
Reviewed by William F. Deeck: PETER PIPER – The Corpse That Came Back.
Posted by Steve under Authors , Reviews[5] Comments
William F. Deeck
PETER PIPER [THEO LANG] – The Corpse That Came Back. Random House, US, hardcover, 1954. First published in the UK: Hodder & Stoughton, hardcover, 1952, as Death in the Canongate.
The fairly portly chess-playing Detective-Inspector O. (as in Oliver, though his name isn’t Oliver) Gray of Scotland Yard is in Edinburgh to attend as many concerts as possible at the International Festival. When the local police ask him to take a hand in the investigation of the appearance of the corpse of Bailie Andrew Maclachlan, who had planned his own funeral to the minutest detail and had been cremated, or so everyone thought, Gray disrupts, but only a little, his plans.
He manages to get in his sightseeing, giving readers a splendid rendering of the tourist’s Edinburgh, and the musical offerings of the Festival while discovering why the corpse has turned up most unexpectedly.
A police procedural both interesting and amusing, one of seemingly only two featuring Gray. This is a pity, for Gray is a delightful character.
According to Random House, Lang wrote under a pseudonym while he was in the British Army during World War II because he didn’t want to go through the red tape of getting permission to write. After writing several books on walking trips, Lang wrote a series of books about the antiquities of Scotland.
Bibliographic Notes: Bill was in error, or rather two, when he wrote up his notes on this book. There were three Inspector Gray books, the other two being Murder After the Blitz (Hurst, 1943) and Death Came in Straw (Hurst, 1945), neither of which had US editions and hence are as scarce as hen’s teeth today. And Piper’s real name was Theo Langbehn, although he did write one mystery as Theo Lang.
As Peter Piper, he wrote two other works of crime fiction, both in Hubin, with no series characters noted. What has always been a problem for me, is trying to keep from being confused between the author Peter Piper, and the character Katherine “Peter†Piper, who appeared in seven works of detection fiction by Amelia Reynolds Long, but I think I finally have them straight now.
July 10th, 2014 at 4:59 pm
At the moment there’s no cover image to go with this review — couldn’t find one online anywhere. But I did find an inexpensive copy of the book with a jacket, and prompted by Bill’s review, I snatched it up. I’ll add the cover image to the review as soon as the book arrives.
July 10th, 2014 at 5:59 pm
Granted, it sounds interesting. I recall seeing the listings for Peter Piper and wondering what the books were about or like. Now when I see them again I’ll have a reference point.
July 10th, 2014 at 8:10 pm
I find it easy to tell Piper the author from Piper-Long’s character. Piper (the character) appears in totally abysmal books. Any book by Piper has to be better than one with Piper as a character.
July 10th, 2014 at 8:41 pm
I think you have a point there, Jerry. In fact, I know you do!
July 11th, 2014 at 1:55 pm
I didn’t want to say, but Amelia Reynolds Long is just an awful writer. As Jerry says and Steve agreed, almost anything would be better.