J. S. Fletcher

Joseph Smith Fletcher (7 February 1863 - 30 January 1935) was a British journalist and writer. He wrote more than 230 books on a wide variety of subjects, both fiction and non-fiction. He was one of the leading writers of detective fiction in the "Golden Age".

Fletcher was born in Halifax, West Yorkshire, the son of a clergyman. He was educated at Silcoates School in Wakefield. After some study of law, he became a journalist. His first books published were poetry. He then moved on to write numerous works of both historical fiction and history, many dealing with Yorkshire, which led to his selection as a fellow of the Royal Historical Society. In 1914 he wrote his first detective novel and went on to write over a hundred, many featuring the private investigator Ronald Camberwell.

He was married to the Irish writer Rosamond Langbridge, with whom he had one son.

Popular works

• The Borough Treasurer, 1921
• The Charing Cross Mystery, 1923
• The Chestermarke Instinct, 1921
• Dead Men's Money, 1920
• The Herapath Property, 1921
• In the Days of Drake, 1897
• In the Mayor's Parlour, 1922
• The Ivory God, 1907
• The Middle of Things, 1922
• The Middle Temple Murder, 1919
• The Orange-Yellow Diamond, 1921
• The Paradise Mystery, 1921
• Ravensdene Court, 1922
• The Rayner-Slade Amalgamation, 1922
• The Safety Pin, 1924
• Scarhaven Keep, 1922
• The Talleyrand Maxim, 1920

Source

• Hugh Greene, ed. Introduction to Further Rivals of Sherlock Holmes, Penguin Books, 1973. ISBN 0-14-003891-4.

External links

• Works by J. S. Fletcher at Project Gutenberg
• Yorkshire Post article on Fletcher, 8 May 2006