Basil Copper

Basil Copper
Born	5 February 1924 London, UK
Died	3 April 2013
Occupation	novelist, short story writer
Nationality	UK
Genre	fantasy, horror, Detective fiction

Basil Frederick Albert Copper (5 February 1924 – 3 April 2013) was an English writer and former journalist and newspaper editor. He became a full-time writer in 1970. In addition to horror and detective fiction, Copper was perhaps best known for his series of Solar Pons stories continuing the character created as a tribute to Sherlock Holmes by August Derleth. Copper was a longtime resident of Sevenoaks in Kent, and at the time of his death was survived by his French-born wife Annie (née Guerin) to whom he had been married since 1960.

Copper's interests included swimming, gardening, travel, sailing and historic film material. One of England's leading film collectors, his private archive contained almost one thousand titles (at 1977). He founded the Tunbridge Wells Vintage Film Society and often gave talks at various film organisations in London. He has been a member of the British Film Society and the Vintage Film Circle of London.

Copper had his very first short story "The Curse" published when he was 14 years old; however his first professionally published short story was "The Spider" in the Fifth Pan Book of Horror Stories(1964). His first book was the Mike Faraday novel The Dark Mirror (1966).

The first of Copper's stories published by editor August Derleth was "The House by the Tarn" in Dark Things (1971). Copper went on to have a long-lived relationship with Derleth's Arkham House, which published his collections From Evil's Pillow (1973) and And Afterward, the Dark (1977) and his novels Necropolis (1980) and The House of the Wolf. His work drew praise from Donald Wandrei who said of him:"He beguiles the mind as he lures the imagination beyond the outposts of reality." Copper's work was also championed by editor Peter Haining.

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