Hammond Innes

Ralph Hammond Innes

(15 July 1913 – 10 June 1998) was a British novelist who wrote over 30 novels, as well as works for children and travel books.

Biography

Innes was born in

.

Innes produced books in a regular sequence, with six months of travel to settings all over the world and research followed by six months of writing. Many of his works featured events at sea and of metallurgy. His output decreased in the 1960s, but was still substantial. He became interested in ecological themes, as in High Stand, his "tree" novel. He continued writing until just before his death. His last novel was Delta Connection (1996).

Unusually for the thriller genre, Innes' protagonists were often not "heroes" in the typical sense, but ordinary men suddenly thrust into extreme situations by circumstance. Often, this involved being placed in a hostile environment (the Arctic, the open sea, deserts), or unwittingly becoming involved in a larger conflict or conspiracy. The protagonist generally is forced to rely on his own wits and making best use of limited resources, rather than the weapons and gadgetry commonly used by thriller writers.

Four of his early novels were adapted into films: Snowbound (1948) from The Lonely Skier (1947), Hell Below Zero (1954) from The White South (1949), Campbell's Kingdom (1957) from the book of the same name (1952), and The Wreck of the Mary Deare (1959) also from the book of the same name (1956).^[2] His 1973 novel Golden Soak was adapted into a six-part television series in 1979. It was partly filmed in Nullagine, Western Australia. An audio adaptation of The Doomed Oasis was repeated on the UK digital radio station BBC Radio 7 (now called BBC Radio 4 Extra).

In 1937, he married actress Dorothy Mary Lang, who died in 1989.^[3] Innes's great love and experience of the sea as a yachtsman, was reflected in many of his novels. Hammond and his wife both travelled in and raced their yachts Triune of Troy and Mary Deare. They lived together in Suffolk for many years, in the village of Kersey. After their deaths, they left the bulk of their estate and all of their Public Lending Rights to the Association of Sea Training Organisations, to enable young people to gain training and experience in sailing the element they both loved.^[4]

In 1978, Hammond Innes was appointed a

(CBE) for his services to literature.

Bibliography

Novels

• The Doppelganger (1937)
• Air Disaster (1937)
• Sabotage Broadcast (1938)
• All Roads Lead to Friday (1939)
• The Trojan Horse (1940)
• Wreckers Must Breathe (also published in the U.S. as Trapped) (1940)
• Attack Alarm (1941)
• Dead and Alive (1946)
• Killer Mine (1947)
• The Lonely Skier (also published in the U.S. as Fire in the Snow) (1947)
• The Blue Ice (1948)
• Maddon's Rock (also published in the U.S. as Gale Warning) (1948)
• The White South (also published in the U.S. as The Survivors) (1949)
• The Angry Mountain (1950)
• Air Bridge (1951)
• Campbell's Kingdom (1952)
• The Strange Land (also published in the U.S. as The Naked Land) (1954)
• The Wreck of the Mary Deare (1956)
• The Land God Gave to Cain (1958)
• The Doomed Oasis (1960)
• Atlantic Fury (1962)
• The Strode Venturer (1965)
• Levkas Man (1971), adapted for television as Levkas Man
• Golden Soak (1973), adapted for television as Golden Soak
• North Star (1974)
• The Big Footprints (1977)
• The Last Voyage: Captain Cook's Lost Diary (fictionalised account of
  Captain Cook
  's third and last voyage) (1978)
• Solomon's Seal (1980)
• The Black Tide (1982)
• High Stand (1985)
• Medusa (1988)
• Isvik (1991)
• Target Antarctica (1993)
• Delta Connection (1996)

Books for children (as Ralph Hammond)

• Cocos Gold (1950)
• Isle of Strangers (1951)
• Saracen's Tower (1952)
• Black Gold on the Double Diamond (1953)

Nonfiction

• Harvest of Journeys.
  ISBN 978-0-00-612180-0
  .
• Scandinavia (1963)
• Sea and Islands (1967)
• The Conquistadors.
  ISBN 978-0-00-217531-9
  .
• Hammond Innes Introduces Australia. Andre Deutsch. 1971.
• East Anglia (1986)

See also

• Nevil Shute

References

External links

• Petri Liukkonen. "Hammond Innes". Books and Writers.
• Book covers from fantasticfiction