Blotto Twinks
3 primary works • 13 total works
Book 1
Book 2
The extremely aristocratic but extremely thick Blotto and his extremely brainy sister Twinks are attending a weekend house party when the inevitable happens. Their hostess, the Dowager Duchess of Melmont, is murdered. An amateur detective, conveniently staying for the weekend, deduces that the Lyminster family chauffeur Corky Froggett must have done it. For Blotto and Twinks, the only way to prove Corky's innocence is by finding the real perpetrator.
So begins the second investigation for the daring duo... one which takes them via an opium den in Limehouse, a Scottish castle and a disused Cornish tin mine, to a thrilling final confrontation at the nerve-centre of the evil League of the Crimson Hand. Yes, Blotto and Twinks are back!
Praise for Simon Brett:
'A new Simon Brett is an event for mystery fans' P D James
'Murder most enjoyable' Colin Dexter
'Simon Brett writes stunning detective stories. I would recommend them to anyone.' Jilly Cooper
'Few crime writers are so enchantingly gifted' Sunday Times
'One of British crime's most assured craftsmen... Crime writing just like in the good old days, and perfect entertainment.' Guardian
Book 4
Due to financial hardships at Tawcester Towers, the Dowager Duchess has decreed that the only way the family fortunes can be restored is to marry Blotto off... to an American!
So begins the fourth adventure in the Blotto and Twinks series, and this time the aristocratic sleuthing siblings end up being transported across the Pond to the gangster-ridden hell-hole that is Prohibition Chicago.
Reluctantly, Blotto, together with Twinks and his trusty chauffeur Corky Froggett set sail on ocean liner S/S His Majesty. He feels like a condemned man as awaiting him in Illinois is fabulously wealthy heiress Mary Chapstick, the only daughter of meat-packing magnate Hiram P. Chapstick III. But it's Twinks who discovers early on that all is not as it seems and that Hiram P. Chapstick III is in fact up to his neck in a bootlegging operation run by the notorious Chicago mobster, Spagsy Chiaparelli.
So Blotto and Twinks set out to unmask the villainy of Hiram P. Chapstick III, where a final shootout takes place among the filthy stockyards, abattoirs and caning factories of Chicago's Meatpacking District - will Blotto and Twinks ever make it back to dear old Blighty?
Consternation at Tawcester Towers! While giving a guided tour of the house's Long Gallery Blotto is stunned to discover that two of the family portraits - a Gainsborough and a Reynolds - are missing.Tawcester Towers has been the victim of art thieves! Blotto is forced to summon his brilliantly intelligent sister Twinks who instantly deduces that the paintings have been stolen by a gang of international art thieves based in Paris. So Blotto and Twinks instantly set off in the former's Lagonda for France!
Their investigations in Paris bring them into contact with the absinthe-soaked art community of the Rive Gauche, but after an attempt on his life at the Folies Bergere, Blotto is persuaded by Twinks that it is to Nice they must travel, as the criminal mastermind La Puce runs his evil empire from there, funded by the proceeds of many European art collections - including those from Tawcester Towers.
The French Riviera is a gay old place, and following various lead, Twinks makes contacts with many expatriates and Americans all leading the good life, including the famous silent movie star Mimsy La Pim, who Blotto finds himself curiously drawn to. But after a particularly decadent party it is discovered that Mimsy has been kidnapped by La Puce - and so it is up to Blotto and Twinks to save the starlet from many fates worse than death and restore the fortunes of Tawcester Towers to boot!
Praise for Simon Brett:
'A new Simon Brett is an event for mystery fans' P D James
'Murder most enjoyable' Colin Dexter
'Simon Brett writes stunning detective stories. I would recommend them to anyone.' Jilly Cooper
'Few crime writers are so enchantingly gifted' Sunday Times
'One of British crime's most assured craftsmen... Crime writing just like in the good old days, and perfect entertainment.' Guardian
Tawcester Towers, the family seat of the Lyminster family, has suffered an unwelcome injection of distant cousins, so distant that they aren't even British! Count Igor and Count Lyudmilla Bashusky had to flee Russia after the Revolution and have spent the intervening years building up debts in the hotels of Europe's capitals and sponging off ever more exasperated (and distant) relatives.
The Bashusky's arrival at Tawcester Towers causes a stir, and it's up to Blotto and Twinks, that indefatigable duo, to provide a solution to get them back to Russia. Reversing the Russian Revolution and getting a Tsar back into St Petersburg's Winter Palace is just the sort of challenge the fiercely bright Twinks relishes, though her dim-witted brother Blotto shows less aptitude for the subtleties of international politics, despite his commendable bravery.
The siblings soon find themselves in Berlin to try and broker a meeting with the White Russian community, and swiftly become embroiled in a world of spies, counterspies, conspiracies and counter-conspiracies. Just when things seem to be looking up, little do Blotto and Twinks realise that their plans are being monitored by the spymaster Fyodor Vlachko, a former worker on the Bushusky's estate who has now risen to a senior post in the secret police of the newly-formed Soviet Union . . .
Another hair-raising adventure featuring the aristocratic brother and sister sleuthing duo!
The end of the cricket season spells gloom for Blotto, until he is invited to bat against the Hollywood cricket team out in sunny LA, where rain never stops play. And so begins the latest adventure for Blotto and his supremely gifted sister Twinks. Although their mother, the Dowager Duchess of Tawcester, keeps a strict rein on her two children, she knows America is full of wealthy young men, all of whom will fall in love with her daughter - and marriage to a Texan millionaire would solve the Tawcester financial problems once and for all.
So, accompanied by trusty chauffeur Corky Froggett, the intrepid siblings head out to California. On arrival in Hollywood they are invited to a glitzy party where they are introduced to a firmament of Hollywood stars, directors and gossip columnists, but the mood of the party suddenly curdles with the breaking news that beautiful starlet Mimsy La Pim - the (former) love of Blotto's life - has been kidnapped. And Blotto is determined to make it his personal mission to rescue her.
But in the world of old-fashioned cricket matches, gigantic Hollywood egos, film-making disasters and merciless crooks, it soon falls to Twinks to rescue her brother from the various messes he creates when attempting to rescue his damsel in distress. Will the siblings ever get back to Tawcester Towers - or will it be a case of death before wicket?
The curse of Pharaoh Sinus Nefertop is upon Blotto so it's up to Twinks to banish it!
Yet another financial crisis at Tawcester Towers! So this time the Dowager Duchess decides to sell off the less important family possessions, which have, for a long time, been consigned to the attics of the ancestral home.
Blotto and Twinks are dispatched to help the valuer as he carries out an inspection. Not much of any worth is found but then the valuer spies some Egyptian artifacts, collected by the tenth duke, Rupert the Egyptologist. In some excitement he rushes back to London to consult his reference books, leaving Blotto and Twinks alone in the attic, where they are drawn to a sarchophagus decorated with hieroglyphs. Twinks starts to translate: 'Anyone who desecrates this shrine will be visited by the Pharoah's curse...' - just as Blotto prises the lid off.
From that moment on a series of unpleasant incidents start happening at Tawcester Towers but it is only when the Dowager Duchess's precious pug is struck down with a stomach bug that she instructs her son to sort things out and stop the accelerating sequence of disasters.
It's the brainy Twinks who decide the only thing to be done is to put the genie back in the bottle and so she, together with Blotto and their trusty chauffeur Corky Froggett, undertake take the sarcophagus back to Egypt, to the Valley of the Kings as only when this is done will the effect of the Pharoah's curse be lifted...
'One of British crime's most assured craftsmen . . . perfect entertainment' Guardian
Once again, the plumbing at Tawcester Towers is causing consternation for the Dowager Duchess, so - unusually for her - she gives her blessing for Blotto to take part in the 'Great Road Race' in his beloved Lagonda ... so long as he wins. The first prize of 10,000 pre-War sovereigns will help towards repairing the leaky ancestral home.
Blotto elects to take chauffeur Corky Froggett as his spare mechanic, while Twinks is despatched by her mother to the Highlands, to paint water colours and bag herself a wealthy husband. But, on the morning of the race's start, enfeebled by food poisoning, Blotto and Corky are forced to employ an extra mechanic on their team - a slender, blonde and rather attractive young American... named Ronald.
So Blotto and his team are pitted against Europe's finest, in a race which takes them through France, across the Alps, to a finish line at the Colosseum in Rome. Among the competitors are Florian Carré-Dagneau, indulged son of the race sponsors, Count Daspoontz from Germany, and the Italian Enrico Parmigiano-Reggiano. All want to win the race, and all want the prize money and all - with the exception of Blotto and his team - will resort to dastardly deception and fiendish sabotage to ensure Blotto's Lagonda is not the first car over the finishing line...
The ninth hair-raising adventure featuring the aristocratic brother and sister sleuthing duo!
Praise for Simon Brett:
'A new Simon Brett is an event for mystery fans' P. D. James
'Murder most enjoyable' Colin Dexter
'Few crime writers are so enchantingly gifted' Sunday Times
'Simon Brett writes stunning detective stories. I would recommend them to anyone' Jilly Cooper
'A new Simon Brett is an event for mystery fans' P. D. James
'Murder most enjoyable' Colin Dexter
Anyone for cricket - and a spot of burglary?
An idle conversation on the merits of the glorious game with an old Etonian chum is just the excuse Blotto needs to put himself forward for a cricket tour to foreign climes... and so begins the next adventure for our intrepid duo, where the action takes them to India where, as everyone knows, the finest cricket players hail from - as well as the world's most skilled jewel thieves...
The Dowager Duchess has no problems in letting her two children go to the subcontinent as having her beautiful daughter Twinks married off to a massively rich Maharaja offers the Dowager Duchess the prospect of a permanent solution to the cash-draining maintenance of the Tawcester Towers plumbing.
So Twinks joins Blotto on a steamer bound for India, one that is full of young woman desperate to marry well there - only once having encountered the dashing Blotto, a lot of them fancy the idea of getting married before they reach their destination. And, unbeknownst to the siblings, also on the ship is the international jewel thief Archie Montmorency, passing himself off as one of Blotto's cricketing entourage. His real mission though is to steal the diamond which adorns the turban the Maharajah of Koorbleimee . . .
Praise for Simon Brett
'One of British crime's most assured craftsmen . . . Crime writing just like in the good old days, and perfect entertainment' Guardian
'Few crime writers are so enchantingly gifted' Sunday Times
'Simon Brett writes stunning detective stories. I would recommend them to anyone' Jilly Cooper
A quick trip to the capital goes horribly wrong when Blotto and Twinks get accidentally involved in London's criminal underworld . . .
It starts innocently enough at the intimate review 'absolutely everyone is talking about', Light and Frothy, where its glamorous star, Frou Frou Gavotte, has rather taken the fancy of Blotto's school friend Giles 'Whiffler' Trumpington. But while Blotto and Whiffler wait for the star outside the theatre to take her to dinner, Whiffler is seized and manhandled into the back of a cab which then drives off into the night . . . Leaving Blotto with the problem of how to rescue his kidnapped schoolmate.
Naturally, he enlists Twinks's help and the two of them encounter actors, singers, impresarios, revue writers, cockney showgirls and Scotland Yard's finest - and white slave traders, who succeed in abducting Twinks - leaving it up to Blotto and his trusty chauffeur, Corky Froggett, to rescue her before she's shipped off to foreign parts forever . . .
Praise for Simon Brett
'A new Simon Brett is an event for mystery fans' P. D. James
'Murder most enjoyable' Colin Dexter
'One of British crime's most assured craftsmen . . . Crime writing just like in the good old days, and perfect entertainment' Guardian
'Few crime writers are so enchantingly gifted' Sunday Times
'Simon Brett writes stunning detective stories. I would recommend them to anyone' Jilly Cooper
'A new Simon Brett is an event for mystery fans' P. D. James
'Murder most enjoyable' Colin Dexter
'What? You mean the earl does it for money? That's way beyond the barbed wire!' This explosion of disgust from Blotto is provoked when Twinks informs him of the activities of the Earl of Woking. The gentleman in question is owner of Clusters, a stately home not far from Tawcester Towers, and he has been renting out parts of Clusters for private functions - and charging his guests!
The discovery of this appalling lapse in aristocratic behaviour sets Blotto and Twinks off on their latest adventure. Determined to find out more about the Earl of Woking's activities, they discover the existence of a sinister group called Aristotours - brokers between impoverished owners of stately homes and the common people, offering 'a taste of the high life' to characters such as stockbrokers, surgeons and solicitors. And if this were not bad enough, the siblings discover Aristotours trying to infiltrate their evil practises into Tawcester Towers itself! So Blotto and Twinks set off on a quest to identify - and stop - the evil genius behind Aristotours.
Praise for Simon Brett
'One of British crime's most assured craftsmen . . . Crime writing just like in the good old days, and perfect entertainment' Guardian
'Few crime writers are so enchantingly gifted' Sunday Times
'Simon Brett writes stunning detective stories. I would recommend them to anyone' Jilly Cooper
'A new Simon Brett is an event for mystery fans' P. D. James
'Simon Brett writes stunning detective stories. I would recommend them to anyone' Jilly Cooper
'Murder most enjoyable' Colin Dexter
The two aristocratic siblings Blotto and Twinks are once again launched into another death-defying adventure, this time in the civil war-torn republic of Jalapeno, in Mexico. But how did they ever get to such a foreign and distant land in the first place?
For Twinks it was an easy decision - to escape her mother's match-making attempts she sets out to visit her old friend, Begonia Guiteras, who lives in Jalapeno, which is fortuitously on the doorstep of an Aztec dig Twinks wants to work on. Unfortunately, her visit coincides with the War for Jalapeno Independence, headed by Colonel Henriquez Guiteras, Begonia's father.
At the same time, Twinks's excavation of the Aztec site is revealing the exciting prospect of a hoard of Conquistadors' gold - but will taking it away from the burial ground unleash the dreaded Curse of Attatotalloss?
Into this confusion stumbles Blotto, who only comes to Mexico as he's missing his sister. On being reunited with Twinks they then discover Begonia has been kidnapped by Mexican government forces and both set out to rescue her. This leads to many chases and challenges across the Mexican countryside, resulting in the capture of the twins where death by firing squad seems inevitable... but will trusty chauffeur Corky Froggett, as so very often in past adventures, be able to save the day?
Praise for Simon Brett
'One of British crime's most assured craftsmen . . . Crime writing just like in the good old days, and perfect entertainment' Guardian
'Few crime writers are so enchantingly gifted' Sunday Times
'A new Simon Brett is an event for mystery fans' P. D. James
'Murder most enjoyable' Colin Dexter
Blotto and Twinks are off on another adventure - and this time they're bound for the Alpine village of Luzvimmen in Switzerland, where Blotto participates in racing the prestigious and very fast Croissant Run, though someone seems determined to sabotage his chances.
Twinks, on the other hand, is on a mission to rescue her friend's sister from the sinister finishing school she is trapped in - the Convent of the Sacred Icicle. Once inside, Twinks is threatened by an elderly nun who shows her a secret glacier in which the Phantom Skiers are entombed... awaiting resurrection so they can wreak vengeance on people who are too curious... like Blotto and Twinks.
Meanwhile, up at Schloss Luzvimmen, the crazed Count von Strapp is set on global domination via a deadly arsenal of Swiss cheese hardware he's planning to unleash on the world...
Yes, everything's much as usual in the world of Blotto and Twinks
Praise for Simon Brett
'One of British crime's most assured craftsmen . . . Crime writing just like in the good old days, and perfect entertainment' Guardian
'Few crime writers are so enchantingly gifted' Sunday Times
'Simon Brett writes stunning detective stories. I would recommend them to anyone' Jilly Cooper