Author: Richard Hull

Richard Hull was the pseudonym of British crime-writing accountant Robert Henry Sampson. Born in 1896, he was educated at Rugby School in Warwickshire and obtained a mathematical exhibition to Cambridge on leaving. He was, however, prevented from attending Cambridge by the onset of war, and following his service he became a chartered accountant, working for a firm in the 1920s before setting up his own practice. The author”s first novel, The Murder of My Aunt, was published in 1934 and remains his best-known work. After serving in WWII, he continued a career as both accountant and author. A bold experimenter, Hull often used the first person and peopled his books with unpleasant characters. Although dealing with murder, his novels are generally not of the ordinary detective nature; Hull instead specialized in unusual approaches to narrative. An intriguing and innovative crime novelist, he died in 1973.