Word Monkey

'A delight . . . a glorious, witty and life-affirming ragbag of autobiography, cultural commentary and hard-won wisdom.' ANDREW TAYLOR, author of The Shadows of London 
 
'Perceptive, wise and illuminating . . . an unmissable farewell.' Barry Forshaw, FINANCIAL TIMES 
 
'The most hilarious, life-affirming book you&rsquo;ll read this year.' SAGA magazine 
 
'Wit and wisdom that make every page turn . . . what a fine talent the world has lost.' STARBURST 
 
This is the memoir Christopher Fowler always wanted to write about 'writing'. 
 
It's the story of how a young bookworm growing up in a house where there was nothing to read but knitting pamphlets and motorcycle manuals became a writer - a 'word monkey' - and pursued a sort of career in popular fiction. And it's a book full of brilliant insights into the pleasures and pitfalls of his profession, dos and don'ts for would-be writers, and astute observations on favourite (and not-so-favourite) novelists. 
 
But woven into this hugely entertaining and inspiring reflection on a literary life is an altogether darker thread. In Spring 2020, just as the world went into lockdown, Chris was diagnosed with terminal cancer. And yet there is nothing of the misery memoir about Word Monkey. Past and present intermingle as, in prose as light as air, he relates with wry humour and remarkable honesty what he knows will be the final chapter in his story. 
 
Deeply moving, insightful and surprisingly funny, this is Christopher Fowler's life-affirming account of coming to terms with his own mortality. 
 
'A remarkable book by a remarkable writer: amazingly entertaining and informative and also, for obvious reasons, one of the most moving.' SIMON MASON, author of the DI Wilkins Mysteries 
 
'Wonderful . . . there is no bitterness here, but a hearty celebration of how art defines a life, with dark humour on the right occasions and the deliberate aim to leave a positive message . . . his enthusiasm is infectious and sobering when you are aware that he was dying as he wrote these pages.' Maxim Jacubowski, CRIME TIME

Clever, wise, heartbreaking and yet also life-affirmingly funny: his literary comic lightness of touch is on a par with Wodehouse.

JOANNE HARRIS, bestselling author of Broken Light and Chocolat

A delight to read - a glorious, witty and life-affirming ragbag of autobiography, cultural commentary and hard-won wisdom about the strange and miraculous craft of writing. It's the sort of book that makes you want to underline every other sentence. Beautifully written, of course - one would expect no less from Chris - and characterised by its complete lack of self-pity. I hope it sells by the truckload.

ANDREW TAYLOR, bestselling author of The Shadows of London

A delight: perceptive, wise and illuminating on the act of reading (no genre held terrors for him) and, equally, the act of writing. All of this in a book full of disarmingly sardonic gallows humour about his own impending death. An unmissable farewell from the much missed author.

A remarkable book by a remarkable writer: amazingly entertaining and informative and also, for obvious reasons, one of the most moving.

SIMON MASON, author of the DI Wilkins Mysteries

Not a hint of Pollyanna here, just the most hilarious, life-affirming book you’ll read this year.

Wonderful . . . there is no bitterness here, but a hearty celebration of how art defines a life, with dark humour on the right occasions and the deliberate aim to leave a positive message, from the adoration of Dickens to the guilty pleasures of terrible horror movies . . . he was a man with a deeply-felt love (and I don’t use the word lightly) for the arts, both minor and major, and his enthusiasm is infectious and sobering when you are aware that he was dying as he wrote these pages.

Peppered throughout with a wit and wisdom that makes every page turn . . . seek him out and discover what a fine talent the world has lost.

Funny and poignant, Word Monkey is full of fascinating insights and is more than just a first-rate memoir . . . a fitting memorial to a terrific writer.

GUARDIAN, Best Crime and Thrillers of 2023

Christopher Fowler was the multiple award-winning author of almost fifty novels and short story collections, including the celebrated Bryant &amp; May mysteries. His other novels include Roofworld, Spanky, The Sand Men and Hot Water. He has also written two acclaimed memoirs, Paperboy (winner of the Green Carnation Prize) and Film Freak, plus The Book of Forgotten Authors and Peculiar London, Bryant and May's singular and eccentric guide to the city. In 2015 Chris was awarded the Crime Writers Association's coveted 'Dagger in the Library' for his body of work. He lived in London and Barcelona. Diagnosed with cancer just as the UK went into lockdown in 2020, Chris died on 2nd March 2023.

Bryant & May’s Peculiar London

One of the glories of the modern crime fiction field? The deliriously eccentric books by Christopher Fowler.

Devilishly clever . . . mordantly funny . . . sometimes heartbreakingly moving.

If you have never entered the curious world of Bryant and May, you're in for a treat.

As the nation's oldest serving detectives, we know more about London than almost anyone. After all, we've been walking its streets and impulsively arresting its citizens for decades. Who better to take you through its less savoury side? 
 We'll be chatting about odd buildings, odder characters, lost venues, forgotten disasters, confusing routes, dubious gossip, illicit pleasures and hidden pubs. We'll be making all sorts of odd connections and showing you why it's almost impossible to separate fact from fiction in London. 
 With the help of some of our more disreputable friends, each an argumentative and unreliable expert in his or her own dodgy field, we'll explain why some streets have genders, why only two Londoners got to meet Dracula, how a department store and a prison played tricks on your mind, when a theatre got stranded in the past, how a building vanished in plain sight, what excited Charlotte Brontë about the city and where the devils hide in London. 
 We hope to capture something of the city's restless spirit by wilfully wandering off course, and it goes without saying that we'll bluff and bamboozle you along the way but that's all part of the fun. History is what you remember. London is what you forget (and we've forgotten a lot). So please do join us on this magical mystery tour of our city. Who knows where we'll end up?

Bryant & May - London Bridge is Falling Down

'If you have never entered the curious world of Bryant and May, you're in for a treat.' THE TIMES 
 
It was the kind of story that barely made the news. 
 
When 91-year-old Amelia Hoffman died in her top-floor flat on a busy London road, it's considered an example of what has gone wrong with modern society: she slipped through the cracks in a failing system. 
 
But detectives Arthur Bryant and John May of the Peculiar Crimes Unit have their doubts. Mrs Hoffman was once a government security expert, even though no one can quite remember her. When a link emerges between the old lady and a diplomat trying to flee the country, it seems that an impossible murder has been committed. 
 
Mrs Hoffman wasn't the only one at risk. Bryant is convinced that other forgotten women with hidden talents are also in danger. And, curiously, they all own models of London Bridge. 
 
With the help of some of their more certifiable informants, the detectives follow the strangest of clues in an investigation that will lead them through forgotten alleyways to the city's oldest bridge in search of a desperate killer. 
 
But just when the case appears to be solved, they discover that Mrs Hoffman was smarter than anyone imagined. There's a bigger game afoot that could have terrible consequences. 
 
It's time to celebrate Bryant and May's twentieth anniversary as their most lunatic case yet brings death and rebirth to London's most peculiar crimes unit.

One of the glories of the modern crime fiction field? The deliriously eccentric books by Christopher Fowler . . . this exuberantly written entry is as entertaining as any of its predecessors

As always, Fowler does a masterly job of balancing humour with an ingeniously crafted plot. Devoted fans will be more than satisfied.

Christopher Fowler's writing is exquisite. His deep reverence for - and knowledge of - the dark and lonely pathways trodden by centuries of Londoners is compelling . . . the dialogue sparkles and the jokes are laugh-out-loud.'

There is always room for comic crime capers on the bookshelves of discerning readers, with Christopher Fowler's books having long been on the forefront of the subgenre. Here's to many more tales of our intrepid heroes as they solve seemingly impossible crimes in the most entertaining fashion.

A heady mixture combining a fast-paced plot with an agglomeration of oddballs that could have been taken from a Monty Python sketch . . . quirky, witty, wonderfully atmospheric and entertaining . . . absolutely brilliant.'

'If you have never entered the curious world of Bryant and May, you're in for a treat.' THE TIMES 
 
It was the kind of story that barely made the news. 
 
 When 91-year-old Amelia Hoffman died in her top-floor flat on a busy London road, it's considered an example of what has gone wrong with modern society: she slipped through the cracks in a failing system. 
 
 But detectives Arthur Bryant and John May of the Peculiar Crimes Unit have their doubts. Mrs Hoffman was once a government security expert, even though no one can quite remember her. When a link emerges between the old lady and a diplomat trying to flee the country, it seems that an impossible murder has been committed. 
 
 Mrs Hoffman wasn't the only one at risk. Bryant is convinced that other forgotten women with hidden talents are also in danger. And, curiously, they all own models of London Bridge. 
 
 With the help of some of their more certifiable informants, the detectives follow the strangest of clues in an investigation that will lead them through forgotten alleyways to the city's oldest bridge in search of a desperate killer. 
 
 But just when the case appears to be solved, they discover that Mrs Hoffman was smarter than anyone imagined. There's a bigger game afoot that could have terrible consequences. 
 
It's time to celebrate Bryant and May's twentieth anniversary as their most lunatic case yet brings death and rebirth to London's most peculiar crimes unit.

Bryant & May - Oranges and Lemons

Detectives Arthur Bryant and John May, assisted by the oddballs and eccentrics of the Peculiar Crimes Unit, return to break rules, infuriate officialdom and maybe, just maybe, catch the criminal in their 19th hugely entertaining and unorthodox new investigation.

'The most consistently brilliant, entertaining and educational voice in contemporary British crime fiction, the utterly fabulous Christopher Fowler.' Cathi Unsworth, CRIMESQUAD 
 
It's a Sunday morning, and the outspoken Speaker of the House of Commons has just been crushed under a mountain of citrus fruit . . . 
 
Bizarre accident or something more sinister? The government needs to know because here's a man who knows a thing or two that could compromise its future. 
 
Bryant and May and the Peculiar Crimes Unit should be on the case, however it seems the PCU is no more with one detective is in hospital, the other gone AWOL with the rest of the team having been dismissed. 
 
But events escalate, and soon a series of brutal yet undeniably clever killings linked to an old English nursery rhyme threaten society's very foundations and out-of-the-blue the PCU is (temporarily) back in business. 
 
And if the two detectives - 'old men in a woke world' - can set aside their differences and discover why some of London's most influential figures are being threatened, they might not only save the unit but also prevent the city from descending into chaos . . .

(Short Stories)

Bryant & May – England’s Finest

The second collection of original and never-before-published stories drawn from the casebooks of Arthur Bryant and John May and the Peculiar Crimes Unit.

'Winningly eccentric . . . London, in all its non-homogenous, sprawling splendour, is as much a character as Fowler's sleuthing duo' Barry Forshaw, Financial Times 
 
The Peculiar Crimes Unit has solved many extraordinary cases over the years, but some were hushed up and hidden away. Until now. 
Arthur Bryant remembers these lost cases as if they were yesterday. Unfortunately, he doesn't remember yesterday, so the newly revealed facts could come as a surprise to everyone, including his exasperated partner John May. 
 
Here, then, is the truth about the Covent Garden opera diva and the seventh reindeer, the body that falls from the Tate Gallery, the ordinary London street corner where strange accidents keep occurring, the consul's son discovered buried in the unit's basement, the corpse pulled from a swamp of Chinese dinners, a Hallowe'en crime in the Post Office Tower, and the impossible death that's the fault of a forgotten London legend. All of the unit's oddest characters are here, plus the detectives' long-suffering sergeant Janice Longbright gets to reveal her own forgotten mystery. 
 
These twelve crimes must be solved without the help of modern technology, mainly because nobody knows how to use it. Expect misunderstood clues, lost evidence, arguments about Dickens, churches, pubs and disorderly conduct from the investigative officers they laughingly call 'England's Finest'! 
 
_______________________ 
 
 
What readers are saying: 
***** 'Another gem from Christopher Fowler' 
 
***** 'I've loved Bryant &amp; May since I first discovered them' 
***** 'A perfect collection of implausibly, improbably impossible mysteries for readers of Bryant and May both old and new'

'Winningly eccentric . . . London, in all its non-homogenous, sprawling splendour, is as much a character as Fowler's sleuthing duo' Barry Forshaw, Financial Times 
 
 The Peculiar Crimes Unit has solved many extraordinary cases over the years, but some were hushed up and hidden away. Until now. 
Arthur Bryant remembers these lost cases as if they were yesterday. Unfortunately, he doesn't remember yesterday, so the newly revealed facts could come as a surprise to everyone, including his exasperated partner John May. 
 
Here, then, is the truth about the Covent Garden opera diva and the seventh reindeer, the body that falls from the Tate Gallery, the ordinary London street corner where strange accidents keep occurring, the consul's son discovered buried in the unit's basement, the corpse pulled from a swamp of Chinese dinners, a Hallowe'en crime in the Post Office Tower, and the impossible death that's the fault of a forgotten London legend. All of the unit's oddest characters are here, plus the detectives' long-suffering sergeant Janice Longbright gets to reveal her own forgotten mystery. 
 
These twelve crimes must be solved without the help of modern technology, mainly because nobody knows how to use it. Expect misunderstood clues, lost evidence, arguments about Dickens, churches, pubs and disorderly conduct from the investigative officers they laughingly call 'England's Finest'! 
 
_______________________ 
 
 
What readers are saying: 
***** 'Another gem from Christopher Fowler' 
 
***** 'I've loved Bryant &amp; May since I first discovered them' 
***** 'A perfect collection of implausibly, improbably impossible mysteries for readers of Bryant and May both old and new'

(Bryant & May Book 17)

Bryant & May - The Lonely Hour

In London a cunning killer goes about his grim work - a killer who always strikes at 'the lonely hour' - 4am. It falls to detectives Arthur Bryant and John May and the Peculiar Crimes Unit to find the method in his madness . . .

In Which Mr May Makes A Mistake And Mr Bryant Goes Into The Dark 
On a rainy winter night outside a run-down nightclub in the wrong part of London, four strangers meet for the first time at 4:00am. 
A few weeks later the body of an Indian textile worker is found hanging upside down inside a willow tree on Hampstead Heath. The Peculiar Crimes Unit is called in to investigate. The victim was found surrounded by the paraphernalia of black magic, and so Arthur Bryant and John May set off to question experts in the field. 
But the case is not what it appears. When another victim seemingly commits suicide, it becomes clear that in the London night is a killer who knows what people fear most. And he always strikes at 4:00am. 
In order to catch him, the PCU must switch to night shifts, but still the team draws a blank. John May takes a technological approach, Arthur Bryant goes in search of academics and misfits for help, for this is becoming a case that reveals impossibilities at every turn, not least that there's no indication of what the victims might have done to attract the attentions of a murderer that doesn’t seem to exist. But impossibilities are what the Peculiar Crimes Unit does best. 
As they explore a night city where all the normal rules are upended, they’re drawn deeper into a case that involves murder, arson, kidnap, blackmail, bats and the psychological effects of loneliness on Londoners. It's a trail that takes them from the poorest part of the East End to the wealthiest homes in North London - an investigation that can only end in tragedy…

The Lonely Hour ends on the most shocking cliffhanger yet – but if anyone can pull off the impossible, it's the most consistently brilliant, entertaining and educational voice in contemporary British crime fiction, the utterly fabulous Christopher Fowler.

In Which Mr May Makes A Mistake And Mr Bryant Goes Into The Dark 
 
Three deaths, seemingly unconnected but for one thing: each happened at precisely four a.m. - the lonely hour . . . 
 
At four in the morning outside a run-down nightclub in the wrong part of London, four strangers meet for the first time. A few weeks later a body is found on Hampstead Heath, hanging upside down and surrounded by the paraphernalia of black magic. Then a young man is killed on a London bridge and a woman is attacked in her modern (and secure) luxury apartment. 
 
To catch this killer, Bryant and May and the Peculiar Crimes Unit switch to working nights. While John May takes a technological approach, Arthur Bryant calls upon sundry eccentrics and misfits for help solving what seems an impossible case. 
 
But impossible is what the PCU does best. As they draw back the curtain on a city at night, Bryant and May follow a trail of murder, arson, blackmail, kidnap, loneliness and . . . bats. 
 
‘The most consistently brilliant, entertaining and educational voice in contemporary British crime fiction’ 
CATHI UNSWORTH 
 
‘One of our most unorthodox and entertaining writers’ SUNDAY TELEGRAPH 
 
‘I love the wit and playfulness of the Bryant &amp; May books’ ANNE CLEEVES

Christopher Fowler

A twist on Mervyn Peake's gothic masterpiece, Gormenghast . . .there is huge narrative energy in the plotting and a vast tapestry of characters . . . The Foot on the Crown caps a dazzling career.

While the fantasy genre may rule the roost at present, it’s clear from just a few pages . . . that The Foot on the Crown might have shaped the current genre had it appeared earlier. Exhilarating, panoramic, sporting the kind of eccentricity of characterisation that was always the writer’s stock in trade, this might almost be called a final peroration to a spectacular career.

Wit and wisdom that make every page turn.

Quirky, touching, profound and utterly original...a gripping page-turner.

It is said a legend is just a beautiful lie... 
 
In the second half of the first millennium, the legends say that London disappeared for over four hundred years. We know almost nothing about what happened during that time. But if we could shine a light on the city's ruined walls, we would be in for a shock. 
 
The Romans are long forgotten. It is now King Scarabold who rules what little remains of the city, together with his over-entitled daughter Giniva, her effete brother Leperdandy and their wayward, lunatic relatives - all squabbling and fighting amongst themselves for the future of their corrupted dynasty while trying to hide their most terrible secret. 
 
And ranged against Scarabold is a horde of bitter enemies from both without and within his dysfunctional household - the eerie Sheathwing, Lord Carapace Earl of Beetles, the warlike nuns of Étranges Cadeaux, a primate called M'Lin, Orobus the serpent, the terrifying Mater Moribund and the sinister child-spies Spackle and Peut - united in their desire to bring king's troubled reign to a bloody end. 
 
But the arrival of a mysterious outsider into the midst of the beleaguered Scarabold's snake-pit of a court that seems to offer a semblance of hope. The stranger's name is Watborn and he is a birdcatcher - strong, silent, he will infiltrate the royal family for a purpose that is all of his own . . . 
 
As fiendishly-armed warriors gather beneath the walls, the battle for London, its body and its soul as much as its bricks and mortar, is about to begin - and who will be left unscathed at the field's end?

The Foot on the Crown

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Arthur Bryant and John May are Golden Age detectives living in the modern world. Together they head up the Peculiar Crimes Unit, ready to solve any of the weird and wonderful crimes that fall across their desks.

Christopher Fowler

Praise for The Foot on the Crown

A twist on Mervyn Peake's gothic masterpiece, Gormenghast . . .there is huge narrative energy in the plotting and a vast tapestry of characters . . . The Foot on the Crown caps a dazzl ...

While the fantasy genre may rule the roost at present, it’s clear from just a few pages . . . that The Foot on the Crown might have shaped the current genre had it appeared earlier. Exhilarating, panoramic ...

Praise for Christopher Fowler

A twist on Mervyn Peake's gothic masterpiece, Gormenghast . . .there is huge narrative energy in the plotting and a vast tapestry of characters . . . The Foot on the Crown caps a dazzl ...

While the fantasy genre may rule the roost at present, it’s clear from just a few pages . . . that The Foot on the Crown might have shaped the current genre had it appeared earlier. Exhilarating, panoramic ...

Praise for Christopher Fowler

A twist on Mervyn Peake's gothic masterpiece, Gormenghast . . .there is huge narrative energy in the plotting and a vast tapestry of characters . . . The Foot on the Crown caps a dazzl ...

While the fantasy genre may rule the roost at present, it’s clear from just a few pages . . . that The Foot on the Crown might have shaped the current genre had it appeared earlier. Exhilarating, panoramic ...

Praise for Christopher Fowler

Books by Christopher Fowler

Series by Christopher Fowler

Bryant & May

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