The Detection Club is rather like the House of Lords of British crime writing, though considerably more select. (I should declare an interest: I’m a member of the club, so it’s possible I may be biased.)
Founded in 1930 by Agatha Christie and Dorothy L. Sayers among others, the club chooses new members by secret ballot. Candidates undergo an initiation ritual involving black candles, a billowing red robe originally designed for G.K. Chesterton, a terrifying sacred oath and a skull called Eric. (Forensic examination has demonstrated that Eric belonged to a female.)
The story of the club’s early years has been well told in The Golden Age of Murder by Martin Edwards, the current president. The so-called ‘rules’ of detective fiction, Ronald Knox’s ‘Decalogue’, were never taken seriously by members. Then as now, the Detection Club had two aims: to promote the crime writing genre in general and its members’ books in particular; and to hold regular dinners to mitigate the solitary agonies that characterise the life of every author. In order to further both aims, members occasionally publish anthologies of short stories or collaborative novels. The most popular of these joint ventures was The Floating Admiral, a perfectly formed whodunit complete with map, published in 1931 and reissued 80 years later.
Fifteen of today’s members have collaborated on a new novel, edited by Simon Brett, a past president of the club. In one sense, as its title suggests, it’s a homage to The Floating Admiral. To emphasise the point, the characters take their surnames from pre-war members of the club. Once again, it’s an exercise in literary consequences with corpses.
In his introduction, however, Brett makes the point that, unlike its predecessor, The Sinking Admiral isn’t a 1930s-style detective story, part crossword puzzle, part railway timetable.
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