Perry, Anne (1938-2023), was an English author of detective fiction. She was best known for her detective stories set in England during the Victorian period of the late 1800’s. Perry wrote one series that features police inspector Thomas Pitt and his aristocratic wife, Charlotte. Another Victorian series featured private investigator William Monk and nurse Hester Latterly. Both series have been praised for their brilliant re-creations of life in Victorian England and their strong female characters. Most of the novels explore social problems of the period.
Perry inaugurated the Pitt novels with The Cater Street Hangman (1979). She introduced William Monk and Hester Latterly in The Face of a Stranger (1990). Perry wrote a series of five historical novels set during World War I (1914-1918). The series consists of No Graves As Yet (2003), Shoulder the Sky (2004), Angels in the Gloom (2005), and At Some Disputed Barricade and We Shall Not Sleep (both 2007). In 2019, Perry’s book Death in Focus launched a new mystery series featuring Elena Standish, a young photographer caught in a web of international intrigue in the 1930’s. Perry also wrote an annual series of Christmas detective novels set in Victorian England, beginning with A Christmas Journey (2003).
Perry was born in London on Oct. 28, 1938. Her real name was Juliet Marion Hulme. She worked as a flight attendant, buyer for a department store, and property underwriter until turning full-time to writing in 1972.
In 1954, when Perry was 15, she and her friend Pauline Parker murdered Parker’s mother. Both were convicted and served five years in prison. The case became the basis of a motion picture, Heavenly Creatures (1994), by the New Zealand filmmaker Peter Jackson, in which Perry was portrayed by the English actress Kate Winslet. Perry died on April 10, 2023.
See also Detective story.
