Nigel (Marlin) Balchin - Works

Novelist, born in West Lavington, Wiltshire, S England, UK. He studied at Cambridge, after which he combined writing with his work as an industrial psychologist. During World War 2 he was scientific adviser to the Army Council, from which experience he wrote two well-known novels: Darkness Falls from the Air (1942) and The Small Back Room (1943). Later novels explore the problems of psychologically and physically disabled men, as in A Sort of Traitors (1949) and The Fall of a Sparrow (1955).

He wrote for Punch magazine, published as Mark Spade, and turned to novels. Darkness Falls From the Air is set during the London Blitz and was written while the bombing was still in progress. The Small Back Room became a Powell-Pressburger film. A Way Through the Wood was adapted as a stage play Waiting for Gillian, and as the 2005 film Separate Lies.

Works

How to Run a Bassoon Factory (1934) as Mark Spade No Sky (1934) Simple Life (1935) Lightbody on Liberty (1936) Darkness Falls from the Air (1942) The Small Back Room (1943), made into a film in (1949) Mine Own Executioner (1945), made into a film in (1947) Lord, I Was Afraid (1947) The Borgia Testament (1948) A Sort of Traitors (1949), made into a film in (1960) A Way Through the Wood (1951) Sundry Creditors (1953) Last Recollections of My Uncle Charles (1954) stories The Fall of the Sparrow (1955) Seen Dimly Before Dawn (1962) In the Absence of Mrs. Petersen (1966) Kings of Infinite Space (1967)