Anthony Gilbert (author)
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Anthony Gilbert, the pen name of Lucy Beatrice Malleson (1899 – 9 December 1973), was an English crime writer. She also wrote non-genre fiction as Anne Meredith. She also published one crime novel under the Meredith name.
She published 69 crime novels, 51 of which featured her best known character, Arthur Crook. Crook is a vulgar London lawyer totally (and deliberately) unlike the aristocratic detectives who dominated the mystery field when Gilbert introduced him, such as Lord Peter Wimsey. Instead of dispassionately analyzing a case, he usually enters it after seemingly damning evidence has built up against his client, then conducts a no-holds-barred investigation of doubtful ethicality to clear him or her. The first Crook novel was published in 1936 and was immediately popular. The last Crook novel was published in 1974.
Her novel The Woman in Red, not featuring Crook, was adapted into the 1945 film My Name is Julia Ross.
