FFB: Death and the Sky Above

Paul Winterton (1908-2001), the son of a journalist and member of Parliament, was educated at the London School of Economics and London University, receiving his B.Sc. in political science and economics in 1928. He was on the staff of The Economist for four years and worked for fourteen years for the London News Chronicle as reporter and foreign correspondent. He served in the Moscow office from 1942 to 1945, where he was also the correspondent of the BBC's Overseas Service.

After the war, he turned to full-time writing of detective and adventure novels and produced more than fifty books and numerous short stories under the pen names of Roger Bax and Paul Somers, although the majority were published under his Andrew Garve pseudonym. His work, translated into over twenty languages and adapted for TV, included varied backgrounds from his many travels, such as Russia, newspaper offices, the West Indies, sailing, the Australian outback, politics, mountaineering and forestry. Dr. Robin Winks, Yale historian and an expert on detective fiction, once wrote ''Garve's sense of place is uncanny."

Garve was also known for never repeating a plot, and 1953's Death and the Sky Above follows the plight of Charles Hilary, the henpecked husband of the bitter, alcoholic and vindictive Louise who won't grant Charles the divorce he wants so he can be free of his marital prison. One fateful day, he leaves for a cricket match and makes plans to be with Kathryn Forrester, a successful news reporter who loves Charles so much she's willing to leave her career and move to France to be with him.

But when Louise is found murdered and Charles' many letters pleading for a divorce are discovered, he's arrested for her murder and scheduled to be executed by hanging. A prison fire enables him to escape with Kathryn, but in their attempt to cross the Channel, their boat capsizes and Charles is recaptured. Resourceful journalist Kathryn works feverishly to prove his innocence as the clock ticks away toward her lover's last day on Earth, but no one will listen...

Several of Garve's novels were adapted for the screen, including Megstone Plot, made into the 1959 movie A Touch of Larceny starring James Mason and George Sanders, and one of the author's pseudonymous Roger Bax books became the 1953 movie Never Let Me Go with Clark Gable and Gene Tierney. Death and the Sky Above was made into an installment of NBC's "Kraft Mystery Theater" in December 1961 starring Peter Williams, Petra Davies and Ursula Howells and directed by Robert Lynn.

Winterton/Garve also served the crime fiction community in another important role, as a founding member and first joint secretary of the Crime Writers' Association, along with Elizabeth Ferrars.