FRANCIS DURBRIDGE
Dead to the World
PLUS
The Ventriloquist’s Doll
WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY MELVYN BARNES
COLLINS CRIME CLUB
an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd
1 London Bridge Street
London SE1 9GF
First published in Great Britain by Hodder & Stoughton 1965
‘The Ventriloquist’s Doll’ first published by Associated Newspapers
in the Daily Mail Annual for Boys and Girls 1952
Copyright © Francis Durbridge 1965
Introduction © Melvyn Barnes 2018
Cover layout design © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2018
Francis Durbridge asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
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Source ISBN: 9780008276355
Ebook Edition © June 2018 ISBN: 9780008276362
Version: 2018-06-01
Table of Contents
Wealthy American Robert Scranton asks Philip Holt to investigate the murder of his son at an English university, with the only leads being a postcard signed ‘Christopher’ and a missing signet ring …
When Dead to the World was published in March 1967, regular listeners to Francis Durbridge’s radio serials featuring Paul Temple could hardly have failed to be reminded of the plot of Paul Temple and the Jonathan Mystery, particularly as a new production had been broadcast less than four years earlier. Dead to the World was indeed the novelisation of that radio serial, but with Paul and Steve Temple replaced by photographer Philip Holt, his secretary Ruth Sanders and Detective Inspector Hyde. It was Durbridge’s second novel to feature these characters, their having debuted in his previous book The Desperate People, the novelisation of his 1963 television serial of the same name.
At that time, Francis Durbridge (1912–1998) was a long-standing, popular and distinctive writer of mystery thrillers for BBC radio and television who was soon to dominate the professional and amateur