Granger, Ann 1939-

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Granger, Ann 1939-
(Patricia Ann Granger, Ann Hulme)

PERSONAL:

Born July 12, 1939, in Portsmouth, England; daughter of Eugene (a Royal Navy officer) and Norah (a homemaker) Granger; married John Hulme (a civil servant), 1966; children: Timothy, Christopher. Education: Royal Holloway College, London, B.A. (with honors), 1962. Religion: Anglican.

ADDRESSES:

Home—34 Longfields, Bicester, Oxfordshire OX26 6QL, England.

CAREER:

Writer. Worked as an English teacher in France, 1960-61; worked in visa section of British embassies in Europe, including Zagreb, Belgrade, Prague, and Vienna, 1962-66.

MEMBER

Society of Authors, Crime Writers Association, Mystery Writers of America, Writers in Oxford.

WRITINGS:

A Rare Interest in Corpses, Headline (London, England), 2006.

"MITCHELL AND MARKBY" SERIES; MYSTERY NOVELS

Say It with Poison, St. Martin's Press (New York, NY), 1991.

A Season for Murder, Headline (London, England), 1991, St. Martin's Press (New York, NY), 1992.

Cold in the Earth, Headline (London, England), 1992, St. Martin's Press (New York, NY), 1993.

Murder among Us, Headline (London, England), 1992, St. Martin's Press (New York, NY), 1993.

Where Old Bones Lie, Headline (London, England), 1993, St. Martin's Press (New York, NY), 1994.

A Fine Place for Death, Headline (London, England), 1994.

Flowers for His Funeral, St. Martin's Press (New York, NY), 1995.

Candle for a Corpse, St. Martin's Press (New York, NY), 1996.

A Word after Dying, St. Martin's Press (New York, NY), 1996.

A Touch of Mortality, St. Martin's Press (New York, NY), 1997.

Call the Dead Again, St. Martin's Press (New York, NY), 1998.

Beneath These Stones, St. Martin's Press (New York, NY), 2000.

Shades of Murder, Headline (London, England), 2000, St. Martin's Press (New York, NY), 2001.

A Restless Evil: A Mitchell and Markby Mystery, St. Martin's Minotaur (New York, NY), 2002.

That Way Murder Lies: A Mitchell and Markby Mystery, St. Martin's Minotaur (New York, NY), 2005.

"FRAN VARADY" SERIES

Asking for Trouble, Thorndike (Thorndike, ME), 1997.

Keeping Bad Company, Thorndike (Thorndike, ME), 1997.

Running Scared, Thorndike (Thorndike, ME), 1999.

Also author of Risking It All, Watching Out, and Mixing with Murder, "Fran Varady" books published by Headline.

HISTORICAL ROMANCE NOVELS; UNDER PSEUDONYM ANN HULME

A Poor Relation, Worldwide (New York, NY), 1979.

Summer Heiress, Mills & Boon (London, England), 1981.

The Gamester, Mills & Boon (London, England), 1982.

The Emperor's Dragoon, Mills & Boon (London, England), 1983.

Daughter of Spain, Mills & Boon (London, England), 1984.

A Woman of the Regiment, Mills & Boon (London, England), 1985.

The Hungarian Adventures, Mills & Boon (London, England), 1985.

The Garden of the Azure Dragon, Mills & Boon (London, England), 1986.

The Unexpected American, Mills & Boon (London, England), 1988.

The Flying Man, Worldwide (Toronto, Ontario, Canada), 1988.

A Scandalous Bargain, Mills & Boon (London, England), 1988.

Captain Harland's Marriage, Mills & Boon (London, England), 1989.

False Fortune, Mills & Boon (London, England), 1989.

Whisper in the Wind, Worldwide (Toronto, Ontario, Canada), 1989.

Also author, as Ann Hulme, of Interlaken Intrigue, 1986, and No Place for a Lady, 1988. Works have been translated into French, Swedish, Finnish, and German.

SIDELIGHTS:

Ann Granger is perhaps best known as the author of a series of mystery novels featuring heroine Meredith Mitchell (a British Foreign Office employee) and her crime-solving partner, chief inspector Alan Markby. Granger has published more than a dozen titles in the "Mitchell and Markby" series, beginning in 1991 with Say It with Poison. In the early part of her career, Granger, using the pseudonym Ann Hulme, published a dozen romance novels. In addition, in the late 1990s she began a second series of novels revolving around a character named Fran Varady. Still, Granger has received most critical attention for the "Mitchell and Markby" series. Several reviewers have noted Granger's compelling characters and her sensitive portrayal of human relationships. In a Publishers Weekly review of Say It with Poison, Sybil Steinberg determined that Mitchell and Markby must solve a murder which can only be done through "an understanding of the inner lives of those connected with the events," and noted that this book will "be savored by connoisseurs of characterization." Likewise, Granger's well-drawn settings are noted for heightening the suspense of the narrative. Steinberg wrote in Publishers Weekly that, in Granger's Cold in the Earth, both the characterization as well as "the atmospheric Cotswolds setting give this tale uncommon depth."

Granger has continued the "Mitchell and Markby" series into the twenty-first century with Beneath These Stones and Shades of Murder, both published in 2000. The books have also continued to delight critics and Anglophiles alike. A Kirkus Reviews contributor wrote that in Granger's Shades of Murder her characters continue to be "interesting [and] persuasive." Rex E. Klett of Library Journal called the novel "engagingly cozy." After reviewing Shades of Murder, a Publishers Weekly contributor called the book an "engrossing novel … sure to delight established Granger fans as well as … send new readers in search of her earlier works." GraceAnne A. DeCandido, writing in Booklist, referred to Shades of Murder as "excellent reading for those addicted to the British cozy."

In A Restless Evil: A Mitchell and Markby Mystery, the romantically involved sleuths try to determine whether or not there is a relationship between the recently found skeletal remains in the woods, a churchwarden murdered in church, and a serial killer known as the Potato Man from years ago who escaped apprehension by Markby. Library Journal contributor Rex Klett called this installment in the "Mitchell and Markby" series "a rock-solid British village procedural." A Publishers Weekly contributor noted the author's "skill at updating" the British cozy mystery genre. In a review in Booklist, Carrie Bissey commented: "An excellent cozy with a full complement of eccentric characters."

Meredith Mitchell recruits a reluctant Alan Markby, whom she is soon set to marry, to help solve a twenty-five year old case in That Way Murder Lies: A Mitchell and Markby Mystery. The case comes to the forefront once again when her old friend Toby Smythe asks her to find out who is sending blackmailing letters to his cousin's wife, Alison, insinuating that she killed her Aunt Freda, even though she was acquitted of the crime years earlier. Suspicion first falls upon Alison's stepdaughter, but she soon turns up dead, leading Meredith and Alan to turn their attention to any number of suspects living in small English village. GraceAnne A. DeCandido, writing in Booklist, noted the author's "winning way with color and structure" and added that the story is "an absorbing and well-paced village mystery." A Kirkus Reviews contributor commented that the author "wisely keeps the Markby-Mitchell romance in the background as she highlights the submerged creepiness of the classic village murder."

Granger once told CA: "It's always difficult to explain just why a writer writes. I was a bookish child. When I was young my mother would read aloud to me until her voice gave out. Later, I had an inspired English teacher who encouraged me to read a wide variety of literature. So I read Fyodor Dostoyevsky, for example, when I was in my early teens. I've retained a great love of long nineteenth-century novels ever since. Crime writers whose works I admire include Ngaio Marsh, Agatha Christie, Nicolas Freeling, Erle Stanley Gardner, Emma Lathen, and Barbara Paul, among many others.

"My crime novels have country settings. But the settings are modern villages reflecting rural life as it is today, and not at the time of the Golden Age of writers. The characters face modern problems as well as timeless situations. I always try to include an element of humor in my writing as I believe it is integral to the human experience."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

BOOKS

Detecting Women 2, Purple Moon (Dearborn, MI), 1996.

PERIODICALS

Armchair Detective, summer, 1994, review of Cold in the Earth, p. 273, and review of Murder among Us, p. 367.

Book, April, 1997, review of A Word after Dying, p. 22.

Booklist, July, 2001, GraceAnne A. DeCandido, review of Shades of Murder, p. 2029; December 1, 2002, Carrie Bissey, review of A Restless Evil: A Mitchell and Markby Mystery, p. 649; January 1, 2005, GraceAnne A. DeCandido, review of That Way Murder Lies: A Mitchell and Markby Mystery, p. 826.

Bookwatch, January, 1996, review of Where Old Bones Lie, p. 10; May, 1996, review of A Fine Place for Death, p.7.

Kirkus Reviews, June 1, 1994, review of Where Old Bones Lie, p. 737; November 15, 1994, review of A Fine Place for Death, p. 1496; May 1, 1996, review of A Candle for a Corpse, p. 643; January 15, 1997, review of A Touch of Mortality, p. 97; May 15, 1998, review of A Word after Dying, p. 697; May 1, 1999, review of Call the Dead Again, p. 676; September 1, 2001, review of Shades of Murder, p. 1248; December 15, 2004, review of That Way Murder Lies, p. 1167.

Library Journal, January, 1994, Rex E. Klett, review of Murder among Us, p. 170; December, 1994, Rex E. Klett, review of A Fine Place for Death, p. 138; May 1, 1999, Rex E. Klett, review of Call the Dead Again, p. 117; October 1, 2001, Rex E. Klett, review of Shades of Murder, p. 146; December, 2002, Rex Klett, review of Restless Evil, p. 183; February 1, 2005, Rex E. Klett, review of That Way Murder Lies, p. 57.

New York Times Book Review, December 24, 1995, Marilyn Stasio, review of Flowers for His Funeral, p. 18.

Publishers Weekly, February 22, 1991, Sybil Steinberg, review of Say It with Poison, p. 214; January 27, 1992, review of A Season for Murder, p. 90; February 22, 1993, Sybil Steinberg, review of Cold in the Earth, p. 84; July 4, 1994, review of Where Old Bones Lie, p. 55; November 8, 1994, review of A Fine Place for Death, p. 45; May 15, 1995, review of Murder among Us, p. 70; May 25, 1998, review of A Word after Dying, p. 68; April 19, 1999, review of Call the Dead Again, p. 64; February 7, 2000, review of Beneath These Stones, p. 68; September 24, 2001, Shades of Murder, p. 72; November 25, 2002, review of A Restless Evil, p. 47.