Episode 117: The Moving Toyshop by Edmund Crispin

SPEAKERS
Sarah Harrison, Carolyn Daughters, David Whittle

Sarah Harrison  00:12

Welcome to Tea, Tonic and Toxin, the only book club and podcast dedicated to exploring mysteries chronologically from Edgar Allan Poe to the present, we’re discussing the best mysteries and thrillers ever written, as well as interviewing some of the world’s most talented contemporary mystery and thriller writers. I’m your host, Sarah Harrison.

Carolyn Daughters  00:33

And I’m your host, Carolyn Daughters. We aim to educate, entertain, and reignite interest in exceptional and often overlooked authors who shaped the genre. Check us out at teatonicandtoxin.com and on our socials to find tons of great content and take part in the conversation. We love hearing from listeners, and we’re excited you’re joining us on our journey through the history of mystery.

Carolyn Daughters 00:57

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Carolyn Daughters  01:24

Sarah, how are you doing today?

Sarah Harrison  01:25

I’m having some technology issues today, Carolyn. But we’ll get through it.

Carolyn Daughters  01:33

Sarah, it has happened before. Once or twice over the years.

Sarah Harrison  01:39

Once or twice, and today’s the twice.

Carolyn Daughters  01:42

Yes.

Sarah Harrison  01:43

But before we jump into our episode, I’m really excited about and move away from the technology issues I’m not excited about. I want to give a shout out. We have a new Raven member to our Patreon platform, and his name is David Fiore. He is truly a mystery buff. Had so many thoughts about so many classic mysteries, and he’s going to be receiving our flat swag package that we send out beyond just a sticker. Every piece of flat swag I can fit in an envelope David is going to be receiving to thank him for his Raven membership.

Carolyn Daughters  02:30

That’s very cool. I’m glad to hear that.

Sarah Harrison  02:31

We do have two memberships. The first is the Raven, and it gets the flat swag. They get all our episodes early. They get extra bonus episodes like on movie adaptations or any other experimental thing we’re trying. And then we have another tier. It’s called the Sherlock, and that’s actually a physical book club where we curate for those members the books and send them out quarterly. If anyone wants a flat swag packet themselves, we do have those added memberships.

Carolyn Daughters  03:08

I want a Sherlock.

Sarah Harrison  03:10

You can sign up, Carolyn.

Carolyn Daughters  03:12

All I have to do is sign up, and then I can get all the books.

Sarah Harrison  03:18

Get them all.

Carolyn Daughters  03:19

I have them all.

Sarah Harrison  03:22

You’re going to read them all.

Carolyn Daughters  03:23

Definitely. Well, today we’re talking about a really interesting book. It’s a little bit different than a lot of the books we’ve been reading, but I feel like we’ve been saying that every episode. We recently read Death Comes as the End by Agatha Christie, which is really different. I think 2026 is the year of really interesting books that diverge from what we would call our norm of this period. Today’s book is The Moving Toyshop by Edmund Crispin. Richard Cadogan in the book is a poet and would-be bon vivant. He arrives for what he thinks will be a relaxing holiday in the city of dreaming spires, folks. That’s Oxford. Late one night, however, he discovers the dead body of an elderly woman lying in a toyshop. When the police arrive, the toyshop has disappeared, and the police are understandably skeptical about Richard’s tale. However, his former schoolmate, Oxford professor and amateur detective Gervase Fen, knows that truth can be stranger than fiction. Soon, the bookish duo are careering around town in a hot pursuit of clues. But just when they think they understand what happened, the mystery of the disappearing toyshop takes a sharp turn. P.D. James calls The Moving Toyshop a spirited frolic of a detective story that retains its place as one of the most engaging and ingenious mysteries of its age.

Carolyn Daughters  04:49

Robert Bruce Montgomery is the author. He was born in Buckinghamshire in 1921. After graduating. St John’s College, Oxford, in 1943, he was a member of a famous literary circle that included Kingsley Amis and Philip Larkin. Under the pseudonym Edmund Crispin, he wrote 42 short stories and nine detective novels, including The Moving Toyshop. In addition to his reputation as a leader in the field of the mystery genre, Bruce Montgomery was a successful concert pianist and composer, most notably penning the musical score for the well-known Carry On series. Robert Bruce Montgomery became a regular crime fiction reviewer for The Sunday Times from 1967, contributing to many periodicals, newspapers, and science fiction anthologies. After the golden years of the 1950s, he retired from the limelight to live in Devonshire until his death in 1978.

Sarah Harrison  05:51

I have the pleasure of introducing our guest today. David Whittle is a music scholar, educator, and author whose research has helped illuminate the remarkable life and legacy of Bruce Montgomery, better known to detective fiction readers as Edmund Crispin. David studied music at the University of Nottingham, where he completed his Ph.D. on Montgomery, examining the intertwined careers of the acclaimed composer and Golden Age mystery writer. David’s book, Bruce Montgomery/Edmund Crispin: A Life in Music and Books, is the definitive biography of Bruce Montgomery, drawing on extensive archival research and interviews with those who knew him. The biography explores Montgomery’s extraordinary dual career as the creator of the beloved Gervase Fen mysteries and as the composer of concert works and the scores for nearly 50 feature films, including the Doctor series and the first six Carry On films. Welcome, David. We’re so excited to have you.

David Whittle  06:52

Thank you very much. I’m very pleased to be here. I’m not sure how many people in the U.S. know the Carry On films and the Doctor films, but they’re very well-known over here.

Sarah Harrison  07:04

Are they still very? Because I don’t think they are that well-known here.

David Whittle  07:09

They’re shown now and then on the telly, but they were of course all done in the 50s or very early 60s, so they’re getting on a bit.

Sarah Harrison  07:20

Oh, that’s great that they’re still popular there.

Carolyn Daughters  07:24

Well, Sarah, how did you find David?

Sarah Harrison  07:29

Googling. I was googling everything. Yes, as we do, looking for Edmund Crispin experts and experts on The Moving Toyshop, and David was the top of the list. Honestly, as you remember. you were very excited.

Carolyn Daughters  07:43

I remember. You emailed me and said, “Oh my gosh, we have a great potential guest.

Sarah Harrison  07:51

Then it became a stalking enterprise, David, trying to get you. I could not find any contact method except by reaching out. I don’t know if you are trying to hide from the limelight? But I had to reach out to Crime Writers Association, and they forwarded an email to you.

David Whittle  08:13

Two different people there forwarded it.

Sarah Harrison  08:15

Yes,  that was kind of them, and they did not collaborate on forwarding the email. Never mind. They made it.

Carolyn Daughters  08:24

Yes, they’re good people. The people at the Crime Writers Association.

Sarah Harrison  08:28

They will forward your emails, absolutely.

Carolyn Daughters  08:34

Our podcast is focused on the history of mystery. We’re moving chronologically through many of the best mysteries and thrillers ever written. We were not super familiar with Edmund Crispin, and I’m really glad we have an Edmund Crispin book in our reading list for 2026, and I really enjoyed reading it, and so I just wanted to get kind of overall thoughts about The Moving Toyshop because David, as you could imagine, okay, we could choose a number of different books by Edmund Crispin, by Bruce Montgomery, and we chose this one, like what are your thoughts about this book and our selection?

David Whittle  09:25

Most people, the real expert critics will say it’s his best book. I agree and disagree with that, but no, it is. It’s clearly one of his better ones, and but it is the one that usually gets brought out when everybody’s talking about it, as because it’s recommended by various people. I’ve had one or two arguments over the years about which one is the best, but friendly.

Carolyn Daughters  09:56

Well, is it The Case of The Gilded Fly?

David Whittle  10:01

I’m very fond of the next one, the one he wrote next, the Swan Song, because it’s set in a probably because being a musician, principally, if I’m anything, it’s set in an opera company. I mean, he’s often criticized about plots and things, but of course I don’t think that was his first point of interest, really. He was much more interested in the characters, and but Swan Song, I think, has got quite a nice symmetrical plot. I won’t say any more than that. And so I like that. But I also like the one he wrote right at the end of his life when he hadn’t written a novel for 23 years, was it? The glimpses of the moon, but I mean that’s absolutely riotous. I mean the detection’s even worse than normal in it. But it’s just enormous. It’s enormous fun. The characters in it are just completely ridiculous. But it’s great fun.

Carolyn Daughters  10:59

Is the detection worse than normal, or is it just more madcap than normal?

David Whittle  11:05

Think things appear that you haven’t really been warned about. Going back to Ronald Knox and his rules about detective fiction. Yes, I don’t think it will last her on that. But I don’t think I think I seem to remember one the reviewer says. But who cares, you know? Because it’s just such fun, and it’s far more about the characters than the plot and everything. Because I actually finished. Did I finish the bar break? I remember with a quote from Agatha Christie because she lived fairly near him in Devon, and one day, I don’t know year he was, but he picked her up to give her a lift somewhere. And on the way, she said, “Well, Edmund, she said, “we haven’t had we haven’t had a book from you sometimes. She said, “Is there a problem? And he said, “Well, I can’t think of a plot. And she said, “Well, I didn’t think that would have worried you.

Carolyn Daughters  12:04

I think that that’s fair. Sarah, what was your impression? The plot is not the strongest part, and yet I found The Moving Toyshop really enjoyable. What was your response?

Sarah Harrison  12:21

Actually, I want to. I want to check a little bit on this conversation. Did Agatha Christie call him Edmund? Did she call him by his pseudonym, or did she call him Robert Bruce? What do people call him?

David Whittle  12:33

Well, nobody ever called him Robert. Okay, Robert. That’s what he did. Yes, baptized. But he was always Bruce in the family, and obviously on the music side he’s Bruce Montgomery. But as far as crimes concerned, the author of The Moving Toyshop was Edmund, and it is very difficult because I give talks on him. And it depends on what I’m talking about with him. I’m likely to call him either of them at any particular time. No, I got that story. He wrote some notes for a talk he was going to give, and I think in those as far as I can remember now. She called him Edmund, but yes, I can’t say more than that.

Sarah Harrison  13:11

No, that’s hilarious. On the topic of plot, it was. I would say  stands out as being like the only book whose plot hinges on like an absurdist poem. I was reading through. I was like, really? Is it? It’s all going to be the poem. Okay, that’s new. That’s different.

David Whittle  13:36

Well, he was particularly keen on Edward Lear’s limericks, which of course is part of the plot, isn’t it? And so, and he was always defending the fact. He tends Leo tends to repeat the first line in the last one. Other people were very critical about this, but he said, “No, no, no, it’s perfectly all right. But, but I mean, that’s not the only literary thing in, is there? Because he’s always throwing in references and whatever.

Sarah Harrison  14:02

Oh, the whole book is references. I wanted to ask you about that because some references I get, many references are beyond me. I’m the kind of person who will want to look up the reference. I read a whole novel once just to just to get a Simpsons joke. They were making a reference I didn’t get. What was the novel? It was Norman Mailer’s biography, actually.

David Whittle  14:30

When Edmund Crispin’s first book came out, a chap called Charles Monteith was one of the major editors at Faber. Who later on Montgomery edited, or Crispin rather, whatever we’re calling him, edited anthologies of science fiction for them because he was very keen on science fiction, even though he never wrote it. And Charles Monte said, when the first Edmund Crispin came out, he thought it was yet another pseudonym for Michael Innes, of course, was a pseudonym off of the J. I. M. Stewart, and because of all the erudition in it, quotes and literary things, he thought it was more books by J. I. M. Stewart, not Michael Innes ones, but Edmund Crispin. He does in all of them. There are references flying around.

Sarah Harrison  15:20

Did readers at the time get the references in The Moving Toyshop? Were they common to the day, or were even readers like, “This is over my head. What’s what are you referring to?

David Whittle  15:30

I’ve no idea.

Sarah Harrison  15:32

Oh, really? I’m like, how literate was culture at this point that they would get all of these references?

David Whittle  15:38

Well, I’ve never asked anybody who read them in 1946 or whenever it came. Wow! All right, fair enough,

Sarah Harrison  15:44

I guess.

David Whittle  15:45

Well, I suppose the people who want to read the Michael Innes type books would probably get a lot of them. There was various I have to look at because he read modern languages at Oxford. So of course, that’s why you get in things like The Gilded Fly, a parrot that can recite Heine, but has to be quoted a line by Mallowe to get him going, and things like this, bizarre things.

Carolyn Daughters  16:13

I remember when I studied Eliot and I was studying The Waste Land, and I have this annotated large version of The Wasteland, and part of the effort was reading everything that was referenced in The Waste Land, and it’s a really, it’s tough, but what it’s like once you’re in it, you’re in it. You’re like I’m going to make you. You have these lists of texts to read and poems to read and books, and it’s incredible. And this is a lengthy poem, but I mean, in a book like these two guys, Richard Cadogan and Gervase Fen, they like throw references back and forth, and they play literary games. And who’s the worst author, and who’s the, and they’re just throwing stuff back and forth. And you can tell that Edmund Crispin is having fun with this. He has stuff he wants to share, and he’s sharing it.

David Whittle  17:22

I mean, your saying about T. S. Eliot and The Waste Land. I had to do that for A level over here. The exam we do when we don’t. A long time. Oh God, it’s 50 years ago. But, of course, in the glimpses of the moon, Crispin’s last book, the vicar dresses up as Madame Sazostris to go and fortune tell at the vicarage fete or the village fete, whatever it is.

Sarah Harrison  17:48

Oh, another fete!

David Whittle  17:49

Yes, he’s at it. Yes, even then. But of course, the thing is, as you have seen, Philip Larkin is the dedicatee of The Moving Toyshop, and it was him. Yes, and that how I don’t know the story of how Edmund Crispin got the idea for it, but no. Well, during the war, when they both finished at Oxford, both neither of them could fight because Larkin. His eyes were very bad, and Montgomery had been born with deformity of feet, so they pointed inwards, and he’d had these operations in his teens to pull them out. So of course he wasn’t fit for active service, and neither of them were. And Larkin got a job in Wellington in Shropshire, in the library. Bruce Montgomery was teaching at Shrewsbury School, which is about I think 12 miles away. Of course, Philip Larkin used to go over on the train to see him, and he said one night he noticed that there was a shop that every time he went past it at night the awning was still up, and he mentioned this to Montgomery Crispin, and that’s that was how The Moving Toyshop started.

Sarah Harrison  18:58

Exactly.

David Whittle  18:59

So it’s not surprising that there’s a poet, Cad-o-gan or Ca-do-gan, however we pronounce in the Irish and English.

Sarah Harrison  19:05

How do you say? I say Cadogan. You say Cadogan?

David Whittle  19:09

In England, we say Cadogan.

Sarah Harrison  19:12

Well, that’s probably right then.

David Whittle  19:14

They could be called Cader Gorn. Anyway, but oh man. Well, yes, the Irish RM, those books by Somerville and Ross are set now as a very fussy housekeeper who insists on being Misses Caida Gordon and not being Richard Cadogan. But no, so of course that’s not surprisingly, presumably one as a poet in the novel because of the Larkin influence, and of course there’s that great bit towards that great bit towards the end, when Cadogan goes on about the character of poets, and that was allegedly from a distillation of a lot of conversations that Bruce Montgomery had had with Philip Larkin over the years.

Carolyn Daughters  19:54

Okay, what did you both make of okay Cadogan? Which I’m going to have to change.

Sarah Harrison  20:02

I’m going to have to work on that now.

Carolyn Daughters  20:05

When you hear it in your head in a certain way, and you’re like, it’s locked in, and then suddenly it’s like, no, that’s not. It’s always wrong. Smith, it’s Smith, and you’re like, whoops. We start The Moving Toyshop. He’s bored. He’s uninspired. He’s feeling middle aged and like he needs a change in his life. And so, okay, the American in me is thinking, great, he’s going to go on safari in Africa, or he’s going to. Oh no, in The Moving Toyshop  Richard Cadogan wants to seek adventure in Oxford. And I thought that was the most charming thing in the world. What did you think?

Sarah Harrison  20:45

Is Oxford the mecca for like British academics? I remember. It remind me of Gaudy Night by Dorothy L. Sayers. We read that too, where Dorothy L. Sayers writes about going back to Oxford, and it’s just like very, I don’t know. It’s sticking with. I would never think to go back to my alma mater for my vacation.

Carolyn Daughters  21:07

Or for your adventure.

David Whittle  21:09

I think we do over there a bit more, but and of course they always say, don’t they, about novelists write about what, and of course he knew Oxford very well. But he always picks up. Sorry, Gervase Fen always picks up some. He doesn’t have a standard sidekick. That’s become common in. Well, it was back in then, wasn’t it, with Dorothy L. Sayers and people? But he always seems to pick somebody up in the course of his investigation. So he never has a standard person in them. You get most peculiar people appearing and acting as his foil in the novels.

Carolyn Daughters  21:47

So there’s no Watson to his Holmes. It’s not like they have a steady recurring character.

David Whittle  21:52

No, none whatsoever. I don’t think. Well, there’s a couple of books where Inspector Humbleby from Scotland Yard appears, and he appears more in the short stories, but he’s still not really a fight, not in the same way. But no, he just picks somebody up.

Sarah Harrison  22:12

What about Mr. Anthony Hoskins? Does he show up in any other books? He was my favorite, I have to say. I like that guy. Really, he seems so helpful. He’s great with salt and all.

David Whittle  22:24

And very good with the ladies, of course. Always feed us.

Sarah Harrison  22:29

Making them feel safe and giving them candy. That’s what it is.

David Whittle  22:32

Of course, that’s one of the other. I mean, because in this one. There’s a spoof of Evelyn Waugh with Brideshead Revisited, when that part is it Barnaby the chap’s name? I’m trying to remember Adrian Barn. Yes, Mr. Barnaby, who’s a bit like Anthony Blanche in Brideshead Revisited. And of course, there’s various quotation, and then there’s a hypochondriac Welshman who speaks just like Wall’s character does in Decline and Fall. Things like this, so he’s always up. He’s always ready for a spoof of things as well. No, but I’m afraid Oscar reappear anywhere else.

Carolyn Daughters  23:14

He should be the sidekick in a lot of these books. I think, like, if there were a sidekick, he would be a good one.

Sarah Harrison  23:21

Really comes in handy. Like you got to keep him in your back pocket anytime you need to like put a lady at ease to explain the plot line to you.

Carolyn Daughters  23:30

Or put a guy at ease. Like he was really good in almost any situation. He could slide right in, and he was really useful.

Sarah Harrison  23:38

Like find a really skinny doctor, and he’s like, I’m on it. I got your man. I’m chasing him down. We have a whole like gang.

Carolyn Daughters  23:47

We should all have that person.

David Whittle  23:49

Well, I know I was going to say since we’re talking about the ladies and the men, I mean, it’s unusual because in most of Crispin’s novels, a man’s only got to see a woman and they fall straight in love. When I first read The Moving Toyshop, I assume that Richard Cadogan and Sally Carstairs would be an item before you turn the next page, and then I assumed Hoskins would carry her off at the end. But no, not a bit of. It’s very unusual.

Sarah Harrison  24:23

That’s interesting.

Carolyn Daughters  24:24

I liked her as a character a lot. She wasn’t on the page a ton, but when she was, I felt like she made an impact. I want to get a sense as to why is The Moving Toyshop is so enduring. David, from your perspective, and I want to hear from both of you. Like, okay, they’re in this. He’s in this toyshop, and then the next day he brings the police back, and there’s no toyshop. Like, what, what, what were you thinking, Sarah? I know it was your first read. It was my first read, David. What are you thinking is happening here? Like, is this protagonist crazy, or were you thinking, okay, there’s something more creative happening? Like, why is this book enduring to start?

David Whittle  25:13

As I said to you earlier on, I have enough trouble remembering what goes on in them anyway, let alone my reaction when first reading. But I suppose I just I just assumed that Richard Cadogan was telling the truth. It never occurred to me, wouldn’t they? So you think, well, why somebody switching what was a toyshop overnight has become a general store, which of course is what it was before, apparently, as we know subsequently, and you think what something’s going on? What is going on?

Carolyn Daughters  25:47

Sarah, what were you thinking when you were reading? Like what came to mind?

Sarah Harrison  25:52

Like David, I was just taking it at face value. I loved as well that Edmund Crispin had put a map in there, which I referenced for the whole first half of The Moving Toyshop, because they were referring to everything. I’m like, “Where’s that on the map? Where’s that? So, I mean, it was on the map, the first location and the second location of the toyshop. So it was just fearing out, and in the end, I didn’t feel like there was a great reason behind it. It was even. I think Gervase Fen was like, “That’s a stupid plan. Yes, and Rossiter was like, “That was a dumb plan. What? That was the plan.

Carolyn Daughters  26:32

I love a map in a book, and we’ve talked about this. Like a couple Agatha Christie books have a map. Like some of the books we’ve read have, and I even think like some of the sci-fi fantasy books, like Lord of the Rings, has maps, and I just study those maps. I’m so into them, and so I love that aspect of it where you can take a step back and look at the scene as it is, and when in particular in The Moving Toyshop they are in this crazy car, Gervase Fen is driving, and wow! Like, I mean, would you ever get in a car with him? I have that question.

Sarah Harrison  27:08

Lily Christine the Third. Lily Christine the Third. The name of the car.

Carolyn Daughters  27:13

I mean, you take your life in your hands.

David Whittle  27:15

If you read these later novels, I think it’s the first one Lily Christine appears in, but she appears in more or less every other one, and is okay.

Sarah Harrison  27:24

I was going to.

David Whittle  27:25

And I don’t think he’s driving, or the car is any better in the later one.

Carolyn Daughters  27:30

I possibly worse. I mean, he is. I mean, it’s terrifying. I was very scared for everybody who got in this guy’s car, and I was like, well, okay, that. So this is an adventure, right? Like, to me, it’s really interesting that okay, this very like weary guy. He’s just like, oh, I just I’m trying to meet with my editor or publisher. I’m trying to figure out my next steps. I’m going to take this adventure in Oxford, and then he gets way more than what he bargained for. He realizes he finds a dead body. He’s knocked over the head. He brings the police back, and he says, “This was a toyshop. Wait a minute, it’s a grocery store. It’s so interesting as a mystery premise, I just found it fascinating trying to figure out like what was going on here. So at first I was not sold on the Oxford as scene of adventure, and yet wow, like Edmund Crispin really sold me on this this college university. This famous university town, as being the place where a lot of craziness happens, which I loved.

David Whittle  28:53

And of course, doesn’t even is it in this book where he first walks as being the home of lost corpses, rather than the true Matthew Arnold thing, lost causes, or what is it? Lost causes. He’s a composer, Matthew Arnold. But I’m not sure it is actually, but it’s somebody anyway. I spend a lot of time in Oxford because all most, well, all of his papers essentially are in the Bodleian Library there. So of course, when he’s going on about the lanes down near St John’s, with one of the inevitable chases that goes on, because most of his novels end up with a chase of some sort. Do you know that the circus fairground scene at the end, towards the end, that Alfred Hitchcock paid to use that in Strangers on a Train.

Carolyn Daughters  29:51

Ah, okay.

David Whittle  29:52

And after he’d done that, he then asked, “Oh, Crispin’s publisher, to send him all these books in case he could find anything else to use, but he didn’t. He paid, I forget what it was, 25 guineas or something, to use that slightly altered, but the basic premise of the fairground ride that starts getting out of control.

Carolyn Daughters  30:15

They’re at this Botley fair in The Moving Toyshop, and it he mentions it’s like a scene in a Graham Greene novel, and we read that novel just a couple months ago. The Ministry of Fear. So there’s this fete that starts the entire book. Our protagonist wanders in, and we want don’t want to spoil it, and we want everyone to read it and everyone to listen to her to the episodes, but he gets a cake, and boy, that cake is a tricky cake. But I thought that was so cool, like that that reference, which would have been a fairly recent reference and important enough from a literary standpoint for Edmund Crispin to make, which I loved also.

David Whittle  31:02

Well, Edmund Crispin was always very up to date with things. So you get, for instance, in this the references to Brideshead Revisited or the Black Spoon that was only published I think the year before this, and you also not in this one I think but in Swan Song, you get the references to Benjamin Britten’s opera Peter Grimes Swan Song I think was published 47 well Peter Grimes was only first performed in 45 so on music and literary things he was right smack on it in terms of being up to date.

David Whittle  31:42

Of the things, although it’s possibly not directly relevant to The Moving Toyshop, but certainly to the case of the gilded fly, that there was a this thing in England, well in Britain called the movement, which was authors like Kingsley Amis and John Wain, that’s W A I N author, obviously not the actor, and people like that, this anti-pretension business of don’t like phonies and all this, and usually, because Bruce Montgomery in his music and Edmund Crispin in his detective novels is very much a nostalgia person, so we call him Golden Age. Of course, strictly speaking, he wasn’t between the wars, which is the usual definition of a golden age. But his tastes in most things were going backwards. But actually, particularly in The Case of the Gilded Fly or the “gelded fly,” as Philip Larkin called it, he’s actually ahead of the game in terms of some of the characters and the other novelists 10 years later suddenly started making a career out of. Say Kingsley Games being one of them. He’s interesting from that side because and Blake Morrison, who wrote a book about this, the movement as it’s known. I think it was the one of the writers on the New Statesman gave it this title, or the editor of the New Statesman, and he mentions this about Edmund Crispin’s detective novels, and actually they were ahead of the game in terms of this literary movement, which is quite interesting, given as I say that most of his interests were nostalgic really in his styles of writing and composing.

Carolyn Daughters  33:30

It’s interesting you say that because there’s a couple times he stops, and then Gervase Fen, I think it is, stops and turns to the audience to the reader and speaks gives us a meta level like outside The Moving Toyshop take on something that’s happening. Hey reader and I thought that was really interesting that he did that and for me it was part and parcel with the playful nature of this book, like it, it felt really not. At one point, I thought to myself, “Okay, this book is silly. And then I thought, “Silly” is a derogatory term, and but I meant it in a positive way. But I thought it could be taken wrong. So then I thought, “Okay, he just he throws a bunch of people into a scene near the end of this book, and the crowd grows, and it’s runners and people on bicycles and people are knocking each other over, and it it’s this it’s this male really, and it just felt mad cap. I guess, is better than silly. But there was almost a Monty Python element to it, where it’s extremely smart and also slightly silly at the same time. I don’t know. So Monty Python’s the best. I love Monty Python, so it’s like the best praise I could give almost any. But to me, that’s how it felt. Is like you have the brightest guys in the world, the bright guy writing it, and bright characters in the book, all doing things that are slightly silly and just make you laugh a little bit.

David Whittle  35:16

Well, yes. You just remind, just gone scuttling to The Moving Toyshop as you’ve reminded me of a bit when the Cadogan says if there’s anything I hate, it’s the book in which characters don’t go to the police when they’ve no earthly reason for not doing so, and then Fen says you’ve got an earthly reason for not doing so immediately, and Cadogan says what’s that? And he says, and Fen says the pubs are open, as one who said Fen as one who, after a long night, sees dawn on the hills. So, and he says, doesn’t at one point we better turn left because Gallant is publishing this book, and of course Gallant was well-known for publishing left wing.

Sarah Harrison  35:57

I didn’t get that joke.

David Whittle  35:58

No, well, I suppose you wouldn’t. Yes, you possibly would. So yes, Victor Gallant, who was the founder of Gallant, was a well-known socialist and very much from the left wing. So they, I think, they even had something like the Left Wing book club or something. But anyway, so of course Montgomery or Crispin was actually somewhat robustly conservative. There are those sorts of comments. But then Dorothy L. Sayers does that, doesn’t she?

David Whittle  36:28

Or in the detective story. So of course you can’t say that. And John Dickson Carr does it, who of course became a very boozing pal of Edmund Crispin because we’ll probably talk that later on. I’m afraid Crispin hit the bottle in later life, and then John Dickson Carr hit it rather earlier, I think. But they a lot of them will come out with these things when we’re in the detective story. Oh yes, I think Henry is it Henry Merrivale, one of John Dickson Carr’s detectives, says that. I think Henry Merrivale says something like, “Well, of course we’re going to be like a detective story because we’re in one,” or something like that.

Sarah Harrison  37:10

You remind me of my favorite part where Gervase Fen broke the fourth wall. There, they’d just been attacked by the two thugs, and Cadogan is waking up, and he hears Fen talking, and Fen saying, “Murder stalks the university, the blood on the mortar board. Fen strikes back, and I’m reading this, and he’s, “What’s that you’re saying? Cadogan asks in a faint, rather gurgling voice, “I was making up titles for Crispin. I was reading. I was like, “What? Wait, what? Oh, okay. And I, what was even funnier to me was he was making up titles like Fen Strikes Back, and I thought, “Oh, Fen must have rescued him while Cadogan was knocked out. No, they’re both tied up. He’s just tied up making titles up for a Crispin.

Carolyn Daughters  38:02

Edmund Crispin becomes then a literary reference by Edmund Crispin.

Sarah Harrison  38:07

That was one of my favorite parts in The Moving Toyshop, where he’s just sitting there making up titles for the book while he was tied up.

David Whittle  38:16

Yes, and they play those silly games and detestable characters in fiction.

Sarah Harrison  38:23

Yeah, unreadable books. I love that one.

Carolyn Daughters  38:27

Unreadable books. That’s right.

Sarah Harrison  38:28

You’re in the same section.

David Whittle  38:31

Yes. No, he always manages to get those things in somehow. And of course, he uses. Sorry. Go on.

Sarah Harrison  38:41

Well, I was just saying, are those actual digs? Is he really digging on Ulysses and Jane Austen, or is it just all part of the story?

David Whittle  38:50

I don’t know. I don’t think I ever came across his views specifically on. Well, you did get to know some because I’m a great fan of P. G. Waters, and I’d always rather assume that Crispin Montgomery would be, and then I found a letter from him saying, “Why do people find Woodhouse funny? And I was rather disappointed by this. Oh, how interesting! And of course, you never know people’s taste, do you? Though I was going to say, what? Of course, there’s a lot of names he uses. Of so Rossiter, for instance, his one of his sisters married a Rossiter, admittedly spoke with an I in the middle rather than an E, who ran a department store in Devon. So he uses names quite often. In fact, well, he references Philip Larkin, doesn’t he? Some way, and made a reference.

Carolyn Daughters  39:38

He did. He did.

David Whittle  39:41

Can I find you? Oh, yes. I’ve got a seminar. Where is it? He said, “Oh, if somebody comes in the influence of Sir Gawain on Arnold’s, or can he says, ‘Good heavens, that must be Philip Larkin, the most indefatigable searcher out of pointless correspondence.'” The world has ever known. So he’s often doing that sort of thing.

Sarah Harrison  40:05

That was a good one. I’ve just actually been reading about Sir Gawain to my son.

Carolyn Daughters  40:11

Oh, okay.

Sarah Harrison  40:12

I liked that one.

Carolyn Daughters  40:14

I really liked the idea behind the list of unreadable books in The Moving Toyshop. I have to say in my on my list of unreadable books, Tristam Shandy and Clarissa, which I’ve read both, but I would still add to a list of unreadable books. I agree with both of those.

David Whittle  40:26

Well, yes, we could all probably make similar list, can’t we? Of course, he gets onto detestable characters in fiction, doesn’t he? As well, yes. Awful lines from Shakespeare, just towards the end, I think.

Sarah Harrison  40:44

Which is funny because he was he was reading a Shakespeare seminar right before they go on this chase, right?

David Whittle  40:51

Yes.

Sarah Harrison  40:52

He’s quoting Shakes. He’s going out. He’s using Shakespeare as his reason to not teach the class and to run out there.

David Whittle  41:01

Well, he needs them to join in the chase, doesn’t he?

Sarah Harrison  41:04

Yes, exactly. It’s very convincing.

David Whittle  41:08

But of course, and we talked about the wasteland. He does masquerade as T. S. Eliot at one point, doesn’t he? Somebody rings him up, Fen, and he says, “Oh, that’s for me. And so it is, and he manages to get music in when they go and bust into the rehearsal of Brahms’s Requiem. He normally manages to get music into a book somewhere. And also, that’s when they’re in the cinema as well, when they’re chasing somebody. He makes a reference to the film music, doesn’t he? The score.

Sarah Harrison  41:42

Okay.

David Whittle  41:42

Although he hadn’t actually started writing film music at the time, he wrote this book. So that was a bit different, I suppose. And of course, another thing he has in The Moving Toyshop is he usually has somebody who drops his H’s. Because he’s got the lorry driver who reads D. H. Lawrence.

Sarah Harrison  42:03

Yes, I like that. Yes, I love that.

David Whittle  42:06

And waves Lady Chatterley’s Lover at it when they’re on something, doesn’t he?

Carolyn Daughters  42:13

Also a challenging book, possibly now added to my list.

David Whittle  42:18

Coming from not far from where I’m speaking to you from, so yes, no, it is yes, it’s what it is. But yes, all these things just add up to the rather bizarre things that he gets up to, I suppose. And you also have the switch round between the chief constable, so Richard Freeman, who’s always trying to get Fen to agree with his views on literature, and of course there’s Fen always.

Sarah Harrison  42:52

Yes, they keep referencing measure for measure. They keep they’re in the middle of this. It’s almost like a chess game. They’re like my next argument about measure for measure, every time they see each other.

David Whittle  43:04

Yes, and that that that I’m thinking later books. So Richard does not appear, but he does in the earlier ones with this this role reversal. And of course, you do get Gervase Fen with his oh my fur and whiskers, always quoting Alice in Wonderland Lewis Carroll.

Sarah Harrison  43:23

Another book full of references.

David Whittle  43:26

He’s always doing that in other books as well.

Carolyn Daughters  43:31

What characters, if any, are being carried from book to book? Because he’s in this university setting with various people that we meet in The Moving Toyshop. Do we meet any of these people ever?

David Whittle  43:49

Well, there’s the elderly Don Wilkes, who just generally gets in the water.

Sarah Harrison  43:56

He’s so mean to Wilkes. He’s so rude. I couldn’t believe it, and Wilkes has just given it right back to him. The first thing he calls him is babyish, and I was like, “Oh, that’s good.

David Whittle  44:08

He’s certainly in the first one. I’m not. Oh, but he drifts out of them. Eventually, as I say, Sir Richard Freeman drifts out of them. Humbleby, the Scotland Yard chap I mentioned earlier on, he drifts in, but only for a couple of them. So, the answer is actually no, really. There aren’t characters that reappear. I think the more modern idea of these series, crime series things where characters develop and families things come out. Didn’t clearly appeal to him at all. I don’t think was going on so long then, but it’s more of a more recent development, isn’t it? But no, as I say, he picks up different sidekicks. For a week, really, there’s no, there’s no continuation.

Sarah Harrison  45:08

Carolyn, we are unbelievably coming up on time, even though there’s so much to talk about. I want to give fair warning, like, oh, what I would say in the next episode, we’ll still discuss The Moving Toyshop, but we want to broaden up a little bit more into Edmund Crispin, Bruce Montgomery, David’s work and research around them. But what final lingering questions do you want to be sure to ask? What do we want to talk about The Moving Toyshop before we wrap this episode?

Carolyn Daughters  45:41

Okay, well let’s. I mean, let’s do the thing that we do. Let’s talk about the ending really quick. We do spoil. We also love David. We have other episodes that are called “Stay Mysterious, where we just talk about the book, but we don’t spoil them, but in these conversations we are a book club and we talk about it. So, did the final explanation work for you? Like, what was your thought as we wrapped up The Moving Toyshop? Like, Sarah and I, it was our first Edmund Crispin. David, not your first rodeo, but I want to hear like what did you think about the ending?

David Whittle  46:26

Well, I’m about to not be the ideal person because crime stuff. I don’t tend to worry too. Perhaps how I like Edmund Crispin, I don’t worry too much about the plot. I do a bit of reviewing of crime fiction, and I perhaps I’m more interested in the characters and how it goes. I don’t. I very rarely think. Does that hold together? Every now and then I do, but I suppose I could probably say I’m very easily pleased by the ending. So you say about you like the maps, and of course there’s that plan, isn’t there, of the shop where each character was when the murder took place.

Carolyn Daughters  47:04

Exactly.

David Whittle  47:05

I don’t really bother looking at that. I just think, oh well, they were there somewhere. So, and I just think, well, does it sound plausible when you get to the end? And I assume because he gets a bit carried away, doesn’t he? Well, there’s only one person. It’s a locked room thing, isn’t it? But there’s only one person who could have done what it was, and then of course there’s a little bit of not jiggery pokery exactly when the how it was done, but for me it seems plausible as it were, and you just think I’m sure it works together, and of course, it’s got to be one of a limited number of people, unless there really is something pulled out of a hat, like perhaps like he does in his last novel. But in this case, you think, well, it’s got to be one of them. So of course, I’m not one of these person who suddenly bans the tape and says, “Oh, I never thought it was him or her or whatever? Oh well, yes, probably is then. So I don’t know what you thought, but perhaps you take more notice of plots and plans and like.

Carolyn Daughters  48:13

It depends. But Sarah, how did you feel as you wrapped up The Moving Toyshop?

Sarah Harrison  48:18

I had a couple of feelings. It was the obvious guy that you’re left with. Well, it must be that guy. They did spend some time. Edmund Crispin spent some time building up Sally. There was a moment where you thought maybe Sally’s about to kill Richard Cadogan, like maybe she’s about to do that. She is who she seems, so she did not do that. The fact, okay, the fact this is what came up. It’s all an inheritance scheme. I don’t think we’ve talked about that aspect yet. So she based all of her inheritance of her extremely wealthy money on finding people that fit the types of people in this limerick. Finding a skinny doctor, any skinny doctor will do. Finding somebody that’s really cold all the time. Finding all these people, and then splitting up her inheritance between them, and they were, except for Sally, they were all terrible. So she couldn’t have picked a worse group of people who would still figure out how to plot murder amongst them, which was what she was trying to avoid with this crazy scheme. And it actually, Carolyn reminded me of our previous book, dyed in the wool, where Flossie, if anything, is known as an excellent judge of character. This oh, her name just suddenly flew Snaith, Miss Snaith to be the worst judge of character. All time and comes up with this kooky plot of terrible people inheriting millions based on.

Carolyn Daughters  50:07

She’s also a terrible person. Maybe she was a good/bad judge of character. Who knows? But she herself was not like a stand. She’s not great.

Sarah Harrison  50:18

She was just a crotchety old lady. I mean, I didn’t necessarily think it held together or it didn’t hold together, but I was like, “Well, that’s nuts as a premise. And what is she doing? But it’s not unbelievable, I would say. What about you, Carolyn?

Carolyn Daughters  50:42

I felt less invested in the whodunit than I did in the journey. So for me, it was just a fun journey from beginning to end, and I wasn’t on the edge of my seat. Is it this person or that person? And I wasn’t invoking the rules of fair play and saying, “Well, I have figured it out. It’s this. I wasn’t even there. I was just following along, and there was a point in The Moving Toyshop where I was trying to figure out. Okay, there’s this big conglomeration of people all charging up the street, which happens a couple times in The Moving Toyshop, and I’m losing track of who’s in this group, and who’s at the front of the group in the back, and who’s joining. And I was like, I don’t think it matters that much. And then we got to a place where they get on these boats, and I thought, okay, I should probably know who’s on the boats. But I was really just trying to almost attach and detach, in ways where I can just follow the madcap journey, and I felt, and so it is a mystery novel for sure. There is a murder committed, and all the stuff, but I felt like this is a book where you just have fun. Like you have to like go in knowing I’m going to have fun along the way.

David Whittle  52:08

Quite. Mm-hmm.

Sarah Harrison

Thank you so much for joining us, David. This discussion on The Moving Toyshop by Edmund Crispin has been delightful. And listeners, please come back for the next episode, where we get to discuss Edmund Crispin in even more detail. Please help other mystery lovers find our show by subscribing or with a like, a share, or a rating. It’s totally free, and it means the world to us.

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Carolyn Daughters

Thanks for joining us on our journey through the history of mystery. Until next time, Stay Mysterious.