Death on the Riviera by John Bude
Detective Inspector Meredith is dispatched flying southward—out of the London gloom to the warmth and glitter of the Mediterranean—when a counterfeit cash racket is discovered on the French Riviera. Meredith must find Chalky Cobbett, a thief and forger, together with Inspector Blampignon, a kind police officer from Nice.
Death on the Riviera by John Bude
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Their attention soon turns to the eccentric Englishwoman Nesta Hedderwick’s villa in Paloma, where she lives with her bohemian housemates, including her niece, an artist, and a playboy. Soon, it becomes clear that more than one Villa Paloma resident has something to conceal, and the scene is prepared for murder.
This timeless crime book from 1952 captures the sun-drenched glitz of life on the Riviera while blending clever plotting with a splash of humour. This publication, which has been available for more than sixty years, was made possible by the British Library’s rediscovery of Bude’s formerly forgotten detective novels.
This was released a little bit later than the ‘Golden Age’ of detective fiction, which is the time frame I usually keep to—between the two World Wars. Even though this was written in the 1950s, John Bude began his career during that time and continued in that vein.
What I like about this book is that it is a holiday mystery in the sense that a large portion of it is set on the French Riviera, a well-liked vacation spot for wealthy people. It is also a sort of holiday for the detectives involved, as they have been sent by Scotland Yard to pick up a suspect connected to a case that is currently ongoing in London. They have a holiday spirit about them and are on a little vacation to the south of France.
The British Library book does a fantastic job of explaining the crime they are investigating, which is also very much of its day. Basically, it’s a currency racket: after the Second World War, Britain and Europe put all these currency protections in place to shield economies from significant market volatility. An international counterfeiting operation is very criminal on a number of fronts. They are there to look into just that.
