TALES of mystery and imagination will be told by some of the country's finest authors when the first Torbay Festival of Crime Writers is held this year.

The four-day event, entitled Sleuths!, will include top novelists, an 80-year-old film of John 'Babbacombe' Lee, writing workshops, a forensics panel, quiz evening and trips to Agatha Christie's former River Dart home, Greenway.

Among the best-selling authors already lined up for April is Anne Perry, herself a convicted murderer, found guilty in 1954 of assisting in the killing of her friend Pauline Parker's mother.

The events formed the basis for the 1994 film Heavenly Creatures, in which Kate Winslet (pictured) played the teenage Anne, whose original name is Juliet Hulme.

Anne, who went on to publish more than 40 novels and collections of short stories, will be at the festival on April 4.

Other authors attending the festival include Carol Smith, Arthur Conan Doyle expert Paul Spiring and Anne Zouroudi.

Festival organisers are in talks with other writers, including Louis Ferrante, a former Mafia gang leader.

He became a writer after going to prison, where he read his first book. He later wrote an autobiography and a novel.

Paul Trainer, Sleuths! committee member, said: "Literary festivals are very popular all around the country, and this event will place us at the vanguard of that national pastime.

"We feel it will be a major event for Torbay. It will help to put Torbay at the forefront of literary destinations. British publishers are keen to work with us."

Another treat for crime fans will be a showing of The Man They Could Not Hang, a silent-era film charting the life of John 'Babbacombe' Lee (pictured).

In 1885, Lee was convicted of the brutal murder of his employer Emma Keyse at her home at Babbacombe Bay. At Exeter prison, three attempts were made to execute Lee, but each time the trap door of the scaffold failed to open. As a result, Home Secretary Sir William Harcourt commuted the sentence to life imprisonment. Lee was released in 1907.

The film is being loaned to the festival by the British Film Institute, and a pianist will be hired to provide live music when it is shown St Anne's Hall.

Matthew Clarke, Sleuths! committee chairman, said: "This film hasn't been seen publicly for decades. It's a real coup for us to get it, and how appropriate that it's being shown in Babbacombe.

"It's great to be at the birth of a new festival — one that will be an annual event. It comes after the success of the annual Agatha Christie Festival, which is a big draw for Torbay.

"It's good to see all these different people coming together to create such an exciting new development in Torbay's cultural calendar.

"One thing about the Bay is we're very lucky to have all the venues we have got. It's a natural location for a festival, one that reflects our very rich cultural heritage."