The Corpse Danced at Midnight by J B Fletcher
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Thanks to Eileen O’Shea: youluckygirl on Instagram |
Title: The Corpse Danced at Midnight
Author: J B Fletcher
Publisher: Sutton Place Publishing
Also Coventry House Publishing (according to murdershewrote.fandom.com), her Irish publisher seems to be Hartley Publishing (Nan’s Ghost)
Source: TV series Murder She Wrote
In the pilot episode of Murder She Wrote, The Murder of Sherlock Holmes, Jessica Fletcher has accidentally become a published author after her nephew Grady showed the manuscript of her first mystery novel to a firm of publishers. She only wrote the book to amuse herself and initially isn’t very pleased.
The Corpse Danced at Midnight becomes very successful and Jessica is forced to embark on a series of chat shows and radio interviews. In New York City, she meets her publisher who first snubs her, and is then so extremely taken with her he invites her to his lavish estate for the weekend. The weekend includes a fancy dress party (my least favourite kind of party), and a murder. One murder rapidly escalates into a second and, guess what, Jessica finds herself investigating. This sets the trend for the entire 12 series (plus TV movies) of Murder She Wrote, every single episode of which is simply littered with dead bodies.
Although, of course, Jessica Fletcher carries on writing, and we frequently see her tapping away at her typewriter and later her word processor, or on the promotion circuit for subsequent books, not many of her titles feature quite so prominently as The Corpse Danced at Midnight. In a later episode it nearly gets turned into a film. Luckily a murder (surprise!) interrupts filming. A lucky escape for Jessica, but not, of course, the murder victim.
We don’t learn much about the plot of The Corpse Danced at Midnight. But thanks to a careless interviewer we do discover that the murderer is the pregnant ballerina.
Other books by J B Fletcher include A Faded Rose Beside Her, The Venomous Valentine (possibly her 23rd novel), and Yours Truly, Damian Sinclair.
Despite not watching most episodes of Murder She Wrote with a view to spotting fictional books, I have recently noticed Runway to Murder, which we learn has been translated into French (Piste vers la Muetre) in the episode Murder a la Mode (S11 E17). Somewhat improbably both the English and the French titles are shown on the front cover.
Also translated into French is Poison in my Heart, or [Le] Poison dans mon Cœur, which features in The Monte Carlo Murders (S8 E14).
And I think I heard a character mention The Belgrade Murders in When Thieves Fall Out (S4 E2).
In Witness for the Defense (S4 E3) we learn that Jessica researched Sanitarium of Death by checking herself into a sanitarium, thus allowing annoying lawyer Oliver Quayle to insinuate that she suffers from mental instability.
I have also written myself a note about a book called A Case and a Half of Murder, apparently in What You Don’t Know Can Kill You (S12 E22) although I don’t recognise the episode at all.
And in S12 E21 we learn that Jessica’s detective is called Inspector Dyson. But we don’t know if he appears in all her books, just a few or only one. And I think that’s quite enough of that for now.
In fact, when you start paying attention, you will see that a high percentage of Murder She Wrote episodes feature authors and playwrights and poets. And fictional books. It’s amazing how often I must have watched the show in the past without noticing.
You may already know that you can buy “actual” Jessica Fletcher books in real life if you fancy. They seem to be co-written, mostly, by Donald Blain.
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Thanks to mikaelhallstroem.com on Instagram |
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