Margaret Beda Nicholson (née Larminie; 30 January 1924 – 17 November 2012), known professionally as Margaret Yorke, was an English crime fiction writer.
Margaret Larminie was born in Compton, Surrey, near Godalming, on 30 January 1924. She spent her childhood in Dublin, moving to England in 1937. During World War II she worked as a hospital librarian, then at eighteen she joined the WRNS as a driver.
She changed to the Yorke pen name to avoid readers' confusion with a similarly-named published family member. She published her first novel Summer Flight in 1957, and in Dead in the Morning invented an Oxford don sleuth, Patrick Grant, who shared her love of Shakespeare. Her last novels were A Case to Answer (2000) and Cause for Concern (2001). Her five Patrick Grant books were reissued as ebooks in 2018. She was chairman of the Crime Writers' Association in 1979–80.
She lived in Long Crendon in Buckinghamshire until her death at the age of 88 on 17 November 2012. She was survived by a son and a daughter.
Yorke was awarded the 1999 CWA Cartier Diamond Dagger, and the 1982 Martin Beck Award from the Swedish Academy of Detection for The Scent of Fear.
No Medals for the Major (1974)
The Small Hours of the Morning (1975)
The Point of Murder (American title The Come-On) (1978)
The Smooth Face of Evil (1984)
Margaret Yorke at fantastic fiction
Margaret Yorke at Bastulli Archived 9 May 2008 at the Wayback Machine
Works by Margaret Yorke at Open Library