17 SEPTEMBER 1954, Page 6

Promotion In last week's issue of the Bookseller Henry Puffmorc

(ono of the Worcestershire Puffmores I imagine) wrote: Edward Crankshaw's excursion into noveldont with The Creedy Case (Michael Joseph) has drawn a fair measure of congratulation all round. There have been several suggestions, however, that the main character is just a shade too Strixian in his hobnobbing terms with the military elite.' I am flattered by the discovery that I have, however parthenogenetically. given birth to an epithet; and if, as appears to be the case, it is a mildly, pejorative one, that can be nobody's fault but mine.