Dutch Crime Novelist A. C. Baantjer Dies

Several news organizations (see, for example, this one here) are reporting that bestselling Dutch crime writer A. C. Baantjer has died. He was 86.

Baantjer, an ex-police officer, is probably best known for his series of mysteries featuring Amsterdam Inspector Jurriaan De Cock (which was Anglicized to be DeKok in the English translations of his novels). In the 1990s a television series based on the books was produced, and titled not for the series character but for the author himself. Baantjer ran for 12 years on Dutch TV.

Speck Press has recently been publishing new editions of the DeKok mysteries, two of which we had the pleasure of reviewing: DeKok and the Dead Harlequin and DeKok and the Mask of Death.