Profile of H.R.F. Keating on Famous Like Me

H. R. F. Keating (born 1926) is an English crime fiction writer most notable for his series of novels featuring Inspector Ghote.

Life

Henry Raymond Fitzwalter Keating, known as Harry to his family and friends, typed out his first story at the age of eight. In 1956 he moved to London to work as a journalist on the Daily Telegraph newspaper. He was the crime books reviewer for The Times newspaper for fifteen years. He was Chairman of the Crime Writers' Association (CWA) (1970-71), Chairman of the Society of Authors (1983-84) and President of the Detection Club (1985). He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. He received the George N. Dove Award in 1995. In 1996 the CWA awarded him the Cartier Diamond Dagger for outstanding services to crime literature.

He lives in London with his wife, the actress Sheila Mitchell.

Works

Early novels

Keating's first four novels were published by Gollancz.

With his fifth novel, Death of a Fat God (1963), he moved to Collins Crime Club, with whom he stayed for the next twenty years.

Inspector Ghote

For further details of these novels see the main article Inspector Ghote.

Inspector Ganesh Ghote is an inspector in the Mumbai Police who appeared in twenty-four novels. The first was The Perfect Murder (1964), which won a Crime Writers' Association Gold Dagger Award and an Edgar Award, and was made into a film by Merchant Ivory. Ghote's final appearance was in the novel Breaking and Entering (2000).

Evelyn Hervey

In the mid-eighties Keating published three novels with Weidenefeld under the pseudonym Evelyn Hervey.

=DCI Harriet Martens

Harriet Martens is the protagonist of series of novels comprising The Hard Detective (2000), A Detective in Love (2001), A Detective Under Fire (2002), The Dreaming Detective (2003), Detective at Death's Door (2004), and One Man and His Bomb (due February 2006). She is a Detective Chief Inspector who earns the nickname "The Hard Detective" because of the tough image that she adopts to survive in the masculine world of UK policing. This toughness inspired her to start a "Stop the Rot" campaign that successfully reduced local crime but angered some violent criminals to the extent that they start murdering her officers. In the second book she falls in love with a fellow officer while investigating the murder of the UK's top tennis player. With her job under threat she fights to prove her worth in the third book.

Other novels

In the 1990s Keating wrote several novels about UK police detectives whose human weaknesses adversely affect their work. The first of these was The Rich Detective (1993) in which Detective Inspector Bill Sylvester of South Mercia Police investigates an anonymous allegation that a local antiques dealer is murder old ladies after persuading them to change their wills in his favour. In A Bad Detective (1996) Detective Sergeant Jack Stallworthy is a corrupt police officer who is planning his retirement to Devon when a businessman offers him an entire tropical island in return for stealing an incriminating file from the Fraud Investigations Office at police headquarters.

In September 1999 Flambard Press published his verse novel Jack, the Lady Killer.

Non-fiction

His guide to Writing Crime Fiction (1986) was based on his analysis of the development of the genre from the 1920s to the 1990s. It includes guidance on fictional structure, the plot and its characters, and on submitting a script to publishers.

Bibliography

• Death and the Visiting Fireman (1959)
• Zen there was Murder (1960) a country house mystery at a Buddhist retreat
• A Rush on the Ultimate (1961)
• The Dog it was that Died (1962)
• Death of a Fat God (1963)
• The Perfect Murder (1964) Inspector Ghote
• Is Skin Deep Fatal (1965)
• Inspector Ghote's Good Crusade (1966) Inspector Ghote
• Inspector Ghote Caught in Meshes (1968) Inspector Ghote
• Inspector Ghote Hunts the Peacock (1968) Inspector Ghote
• Inspector Ghote Plays a Joker (1969) Inspector Ghote
• Inspector Ghote Breaks an Egg (1970) Inspector Ghote
• Inspector Ghote Goes by Train (1971) Inspector Ghote
• Inspector Ghote Trusts the Heart (1972) Inspector Ghote
• Bats Fly up for Inspector Ghote (1974) Inspector Ghote
• A Remarkable Case of Burglary (1975) set in Victorian England
• Murder by Death (1976)
• Filmi Filmi Inspector Ghote (1976) Inspector Ghote
• Inspector Ghote Draws a Line (1979) Inspector Ghote
• Sherlock Holmes, The Man and His World (1979) non-fiction
• The Murder of a Maharajah (1980) Inspector Ghote
• Go West Inspector Ghote (1981) Inspector Ghote
• The Sheriff of Bombay (1984) Inspector Ghote
• The Governess (1984) writing as Evelyn Hervey
• Mrs Craggs Crimes Cleaned Up (1985) Emma Craggs
• The Man of Gold (1985) writing as Evelyn Hervey
• Writing Crime Fiction (1986) non-fiction
• Under a Monsoon Cloud (1986)
• Into the Valley of Death (1986) writing as Evelyn Hervey
• The Body in the Billiard Room (1987)
• Murder Must Appetize (1987) non-fiction
• Crime and Mystery: The 100 Best Books (1987) non-fiction
• Dead on Time (1988)
• The Bedside Companion to Crime (1989) non-fiction
• Inspector Ghote His Life and Crimes (1989) Inspector Ghote
• The Iciest Sin (1990)
• Inspector Ghote and Some Others (1991) Inspector Ghote
• Cheating Death (1992)
• The Rich Detective (1993)
• Doing Wrong (1994)
• The Good Detective
• The Bad Detective (1996)
• Asking Questions
• The Soft Detective
• In Kensington Gardens Once… (1997)
• Bribery, Corruption Also (1999) Inspector Ghote
• Jack, The Lady Killer (1999) a verse novel
• The Hard Detective
• Breaking and Entering (2000) Inspector Ghote
• A Detective in Love (2001)

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