Better than Biggles: Michael Annesley’s ‘Lawrie Fenton’ spy thrillers.

Abstract

Captain F.A.M. Webster, the athlete, athletics coach and author who lived from 1886 to 1949, wrote a series of fifteen spy thrillers under the pseudonym of Michael Annesley. His hero, Lawrie Fenton, is a lively and laid-back secret agent for the fictional Intelligence Branch of the (British) Foreign Office. The books were published between 1935 and 1950, and the series is important because of its European settings, analyses of contemporary politics, insights into contemporary points of view, and snapshots of events and places. Fenton was a new and exciting hero for his times. The paper establishes Webster’s unrecognized but important influence on the development of the spy thriller. The photographs are from the Webster family collection.