The Pit-Prop Syndicate Explained

The Pit-Prop Syndicate is a 1922 thriller novel by Freeman Wills Crofts, one of the leading figures of the Golden Age of Detective Fiction.^[1] It was one of several stand-alone novels Crofts wrote following his successful debut The Cask, before creating the character of Inspector French who debuted in Inspector French's Greatest Case (1924).^[2]

Synopsis

A boat notionally carrying pit props from the Gironde to the Humber is in fact engaging in illegal smuggling. This leads on to a murder in a London taxi and an investigation by the slow but sure Inspector Willis of Scotland Yard.

Bibliography

• Evans, Curtis. Masters of the "Humdrum" Mystery: Cecil John Charles Street, Freeman Wills Crofts, Alfred Walter Stewart and the British Detective Novel, 1920-1961. McFarland, 2014.
• Reilly, John M. Twentieth Century Crime & Mystery Writers. Springer, 2015.

External links

• • https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/freeman-wills-crofts/the-pit-prop-syndicate

Notes and References

1. Reilly p.396
2. Evans p.153