Leslie Purnell Davies (20 October 1914 – 6 January 1988) was a British novelist whose works typically combine elements of horror, science fiction and mystery. He also wrote many short stories under several pseudonyms.
Davies' books deal with the defects, evolution or manipulation of human consciousness, and in some ways are comparable to the works of Philip K. Dick. (The premise of The Artificial Man certainly bears some resemblance to that of Dick's Time Out of Joint.) His protagonists frequently suffer from amnesia or other loss of identity, and their quest to find out who they really are drives the plot.
Davies' novel The Alien (1968) was very freely adapted into the 1972 film The Groundstar Conspiracy, starring George Peppard and Michael Sarrazin.
Davies worked as a pharmacist, postmaster, optometrist and gift shop owner, and served in the British Army Medical Corps in France, Italy and North Africa.
A critical essay on Davies' novels can be found in S. T. Joshi's The Evolution of the Weird Tale (2004).
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