I got into this late. I'm assuming you're talking about
Charles Williams the suspense novelist (as opposed to the
Brit lit novelist and an adventure writer from the
Thirties).
For a book edited by Jon Breen called Murder off The Rack,
seven or eight of us took our favorite pb writer and did a
piece on him. I took Williams. I had two or three long
discussions about Williams with his long-time agent Don
Congdon. Don told me that he was one of the best writers that
he'd ever represented but that Williams just never got the
break some of the others did. Even though he did some movie
work from time to time and even though he was reviewed widely
and well, he just never hit the big time the way John D or a
few other pb boys did.
There really isn't any mystery to how Williams died. One
Monday morning Condgon got a telegram (?) saying By the time
you read this, Don, I'll be dead.
Congdon said that he'd been begging Willims to come back to
the small town where he'd been living. Congdon, as I recall,
said that Williams hadn't been writing and was deeply
depressed folowing the death of his wife from cancer. He
stayed on his boat alone after his wife passed. So, after
sending the telegram to Congdon, he went over the side of the
boat and drowned.
I may have a few details wrong--our conversation were twelve
thirteen years ago--but that's essentially the story. No real
mystery that I'm aware of.
Ed Gorman
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
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