Benn's Day: Historical figures in crime novels
Death's Door, the follow-up book, includes several such cameo appearances, including one by a Hollywood actor who, for purposes of his military service, went by the name John Hamilton. Other bit players include Monsignor Giovanni Battista Montini, a Vatican diplomat who later became Pope Paul VI, and Monsignor Hugh O'Flaherty (and his butler, John May), whom I had not heard of before reading the author's note Benn appends to the novel, but who is very much worth hearing about.
And that's where you come in: What are your favorite cameo appearances by historical figures in crime fiction? (Here's a link to one of mine.)
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James R. Benn will be part of my "World War II and Sons" panel at Bouchercon 2013 in Albany, N.Y., on Thursday, Sept. 19, at 4:00 p.m.
© Peter Rozovsky 2013
Labels: Bouchercon, Bouchercon 2013, conventions, historical crime fiction, historical fiction, historical mysteries, history, James R. Benn, World War II
posted by Peter Rozovsky at 10:11 PM
4 Comments:
Peter, I'm glad you are an aficionado of the cameo appearance. I'm putting the finishing touches on next year's Billy Boyle, and both Yogi Berra and Agatha Christie have their moments. They both were actually within a few miles of each other in pre D-Day England. Hmmm...could they have met? Would they understand each other?
Did Agatha Christie ever wear a lorgnette? If she did, would she ever looked down it at Yogi Berra? Christie had her famous disappearance in the 1920s. She could have another one with Berra, joining him on a quest for spaghetti and Chianti in wartime England.
Cameo appearances can be fun, and I learned something from these.
I'm questioning my memory. Does Howard Hughes actually appear briefly in THE BIG NOWHERE?
I don't know. I've read L.A. Confidential and White Jazz, but not The Big Nowhere.
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