Robert Bruce Montgomery was born in Buckinghamshire in 1921. After graduating from St John’s College, Oxford, in 1943, he became a member of a famous literary circle that included Kingsley Amis and Philip Larkin. Under the pseudonym Edmund Crispin, he wrote nine detective novels and forty-five short stories, and was invited by John Dickson Carr to join the esteemed Detection Club. In addition to his reputation as a leading crime writer, Montgomery was also a successful concert pianist and composer, most notably penning the scores for the well-known Carry On film series.
As Edmund Crispin, Montgomery also edited science-fiction anthologies, contributed to periodicals and newspapers, and became a regular crime-fiction reviewer for the Sunday Times from 1967. He retired from the limelight to live in Totnes in Devonshire until his death in 1978.