The Megstone Plot (Bello)

The disappearance of Commander Clive Easton, a naval hero with access to his Government's secrets, makes him look like a traitor. Just what he wants.

Easton is actually hiding on Megstone, a barren rock in the ocean. He thinks he's just hiding for a fortnight but when rescue doesn't come, suspects he might be marooned there.

What started as an affair with his friend's sultry and avaricious wife, Isobel, and a money-making plot that would net him and his lover a fortune, looks like it might cost him his life.

This is the story of a fraud to catch a fortune, from the master of plot, Andrew Garve. First published in 1956, this is classic crime fiction from a master of the genre and a founding member of the Crime Writers' Association. Reading classic crime, brought back into ebook by Bello, is like watching a classic film: if you enjoy watching The Third Man or North by Northwest, you'll love this book.

Andrew Garve is the pen name of Paul Winterton (1908-2001). He was born in Leicester and educated at the Hulme Grammar School, Manchester and Purley County School, Surrey, after which he took a degree in Economics at London University. He was on the staff of The Economist for four years, and then worked for fourteen years for the London News Chronicle as reporter, leader writer and foreign correspondent. He was assigned to Moscow 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 forty-five books. His work was serialized, televised, broadcast, filmed and translated into some twenty languages. He is noted for his varied and unusual backgrounds - which have included Russia, newspaper offices, the West Indies, ocean sailing, the Australian outback, politics, mountaineering and forestry - and for never repeating a plot.

Andrew Garve was a founder member and first joint secretary of the Crime Writers' Association.