Vulliamy, CE - Don Among the Dead Men

Not a mystery, in fact, and a real disappointment. The plot is simple: Dr Bowes-Ottery, a lecturer in Chemistry at a major University, accidentally develops a poison that causes prolonged euphoria followed by a painless death. Starting with the pure motive of removing public nuisances, he gradually comes to see the poison as a way of getting rid of his enemies and rivals. When a female student seduces him for her own purposes she too becomes a victim. At length Bowes-Ottery is arrested and tried for her murder, but acquitted for lack of evidence. Justice is served, however, by his immediate re-arrest and conviction for a murder he did not commit.

I got a shock on discovering this book was published in 1952. It is set in the late 1920s and could easily have been written then (perhaps it was, and kept back). Amazon describes it as a 'satirical thriller' but it is neither satirical nor thrilling: in fact the problem with the book is that it doesn't seem comfortable in any category. Any chance it had of being a mystery is lost when the plot is given away in the first thirty pages. There are a few mildly satirical passages, and some of the names - Mr Peter Paggle, Miss Lulu Busket - suggest a feeble attempt at farce, but there is nothing very much to laugh at. Being attacked by Vulliamy is, in Denis Healey's phrase, like being savaged by a dead sheep.

There are times when Vulliamy seems to be attempting a psychological study of a murderer a la Francis Iles, but the excerpts he gives from Bowes-Otterys' diary are neither interesting nor revealing. There is a long courtroom scene, but no particular forensic surprises. The Drug Unknown To Science ultimately disappears from the picture with no repercussions or the slightest interest in its future fate. And Vuillamy's attempt at an ironic conclusion is highly forced and simply pathetic.

On reading this I had Vulliamy pegged as part of the Milne generation, with considerable writing talent but nothing particular to say. On discovering the date I had to make a few chronological adjustments, but my verdict still stands.

In 1964 the book was made into a film called A Jolly Bad Fellow aka They All Died Laughing, with Leo McKern as the Doctor.

Jon.