Ted Lewis - Crime Novelist

First off, apologies for being offline for so long, but now I am back, so to kick off, let us have a look at a novelist who wrote a genuine classic; Ted Lewis.  He wrote a novel in 1970 called "Jack`s Return Home" which was quickly snapped up to be turned into a film.  This was the best British crime film of them all; Get Carter.  Lewis was born in 1940 in Manchester, growing up being a fan of western and crime films.  His first novel was written in 1965, "All the way home and all the night through" but never wrote again for five years.  He attended Hull College and actually worked on the Beatles animation film "Yellow Submarine" then wrote "Jack`s Return Home" in 1970.   He later resurrected the character of Jack Carter in two novels "Jack Carter`s Law" & "Jack Carter and the Mafia Pigeon."

    Further British crime stories were "Plender" about a professional blackmailer. This was made into a Scandinavian film entitled "The Serpent."  This was centred around Humberside.  There was "Billy Rags," a story of a villain who escapes from prison - anybody who reads this and John McVicars autobiography will note some similarities.  "GBH" was a tale of a London porn baron who goes on the run to the Lincolnshire coast after committing some torture murders, then slowly goes mad and self destructs.  "The Rabbit" is a tale of a young lad experiencing sexual awakenings on Humberside.  He did write an American cop story called "Boldt" but then succumbed to booze in 1982.  A pity.