Dr. Richard Austin Freeman MRCS LSA (11 April 1862 - 28 September 1943) was a British writer of detective stories, mostly featuring the medico-legal forensic investigator Dr. Thorndyke. He invented the inverted detective story (a crime fiction in which the commission of the crime is described at the beginning, usually including the identity of the perpetrator, with the story then describing the detective's attempt to solve the mystery). Roberts said that this invention was Freeman's most noticeable contribution to detective fiction. Freeman used some of his early experiences as a colonial surgeon in his novels. Many of the Dr. Thorndyke stories involve genuine, but sometimes arcane, points of scientific knowledge, from areas such as tropical medicine, metallurgy and toxicology.

Freeman was a significant author of detective fiction in his day. He was most famous for his creation of Dr. Thorndyke, and many of the obituaries recording his death refer to this in the obituary headline. Thus the Birmingham Daily Gazette announced "Dr. Thorndyke" Creator Dead, the Belfast News-Letter announced Obituary Dr. R. A. Freeman, Creator of "Dr. Thorndyke", and the Evening Star (Dunedin) announced Obituary: Creator of Dr. Thorndyke.

Critical comment has tended to concentrate on four aspects of Thorndyke: Freeman's quality as a writer; the close attention to logic, scientific accuracy and methods in his stories; the invention of the inverted detective story, and comparisons with Sherlock Holmes. The Times considered that the second and third of these were what singled Freeman out from the ruck. (wikipedia.org)