Stay of Execution (short story collection)

{{Short description|1971 story collection by Michael Gilbert}}

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File:Stay of Execution (short stories).jpg

Stay of Execution is a collection of mystery stories by the British thriller writer Michael Gilbert, first published in 1971 by Hodder & Stoughton. Gilbert, who was appointed CBE in 1980, was a founder-member of the British Crime Writers' Association.{{cite book|last1=Gilbert|first1=Michael|title=Stay of Execution|date=2012|publisher=House of Stratus|isbn=978-0755132447|pages=194}} The Mystery Writers of America named him a Grand Master in 1988{{cite news|title=Michael Gilbert (obituary)|url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/1510088/Michael-Gilbert.html|accessdate=13 November 2012|newspaper=The Telegraph|date=10 February 2006}} and in 1990 he was presented Bouchercon's Lifetime Achievement Award.{{cite web |url=http://www.bouchercon.info/history.html |title=History of Guests of Honor |website=Bouchercon World Mystery Convention |accessdate=5 July 2014}} Unusually for a collection of stories, its reprint edition by House of Stratus in 2011 has no index detailing the stories in the book. The longest story, by far, is the last one in the book, Stay of Execution. At 54 pages, it is what is generally called a novella. Two of the stories feature Chief Superintendent Hazlerigg; three Henry Bohun; and one Detective Inspector Petrella, characters who have figured in other short stories and novels by Gilbert. The Independent said of the book in 2006:

Gilbert had a fondness for amusing but unscrupulous pirates... and an entirely practical, indeed sceptical, view of the workings of the law. It was typical of his humour that the two stories in his excellent collection Stay of Execution (1971) in which rascally solicitors "get away with it", "Back on the Shelf" and "Mr Portway's Practice", were written in the first person."Michael Gilbert", obituary in the Independent of 9 February 2006 at [https://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/michael-gilbert-6109485.html]