The Heirs of Anthony Boucher Marvin Lachman

23 Bouchercon:
1990s
Bouchercon: 1 0s
1990: London
Bouchercon’s London site, King’s College in The Strand, was not a hotel. Some
attendees stayed at nearby hotels, most of which were expensive, while others stayed
in college dormitories for under £30 a night and made a daily round-trip to the convention
via the underground. Due to excellent publicity, about 1,000 people signed
up. Many were from the United States, but people also came from France, Finland,
West Germany, Canada, Iceland, Greece, Japan, and Belgium. There were twentyfour
booksellers, eight from the US.
There were complaints about the college as a convention site due to unavailability
of water and coffee, a scarcity of bathrooms, and the need to climb stairs from one
meeting room to another. There was a hospitality suite a block away at the Waldorf
Hotel, but it was poorly publicized and many didn’t know it existed.
Controversy, an increasing part of Bouchercons, began before the convention officially
opened on Friday, September 21st. Booksellers Marion and Robin Richmond,
who were chairing Bouchercon, scheduled a pre-convention dinner at the Sherlock
Holmes Pub in Northumberland Street. The Richmonds were upset that Maxim
Jakubowski, owner of Mystery One bookstore, scheduled an open house at his store
at the same time. They claimed he discouraged people from attending their dinner
and talked of possible legal action. Jakubowski’s lawyers answered the allegations,
also claiming that the Richmonds had reserved the best location in the dealers’ room
for themselves and took the hospitality room for their own use, though Pocket Books
paid for it.
If there were problems with the site of Bouchercon 21, there was general agreement
that the three-track programming arranged by British fan and scholar Barry
Pike was excellent. Panels included one on legal mysteries; another called “Scotland
Yard—Past and Present;” a centenary tribute to Agatha Christie, who was born in
1890; “The Detection Club: Then and Now;” and a talk on Sherlock Holmes’s foil,
Inspector Lestrade. The convention program book, edited by novelist Robert Richardson,
was highly praised.
Guest of Honor was bestselling British author P. D. James. Bob Adey, British expert
on “impossible” crimes, was Fan Guest of Honor. A Lifetime Achievement Anthony
was given to Michael Gilbert. American Sue Grafton was Toastmaster. The
sold-out awards banquet at the Waldorf started one hour and forty-five minutes late,
with no announcement to those waiting. It was later reported that the delay was
caused by security checking due to rumors of an IRA bombing.
In his report on Bouchercon in TAD, Ric Meyers used Dickensian language to
assess it, saying, “It was the best of Bouchercons; it was the worst of Bouchercons.”
He praised the varied program and opportunity to meet authors new to him. However,
he wrote of the college site’s shortcomings and the absence of a central location
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