Book picks similar to
The Abbey Court Murder by Annie Haynes
mystery
20th-century
fiction
crime-fiction
Murder at the Brightwell
Ashley Weaver - 2014
Looking for a change, she accepts a request for help from her former fiancé, Gil Trent, not knowing that she’ll soon become embroiled in a murder investigation that will test not only her friendship with Gil, but will upset the status quo with her husband.Amory accompanies Gil to the Brightwell Hotel in an attempt to circumvent the marriage of his sister, Emmeline, to Rupert Howe, a disreputable ladies’ man. Amory sees in the situation a grim reflection of her own floundering marriage. There is more than her happiness at stake, however, when Rupert is murdered and Gil is arrested for the crime. Amory is determined to prove his innocence and find the real killer, despite attempted dissuasion from the disapproving police inspector on the case. Matters are further complicated by Milo’s unexpected arrival, and the two form an uneasy alliance as Amory enlists his reluctant aid in clearing Gil’s name. As the stakes grow higher and the line between friend and foe becomes less clear, Amory must decide where her heart lies and catch the killer before she, too, becomes a victim. Murder at the Brightwell is a delicious mystery in which murder invades polite society and romance springs in unexpected places. Weaver has penned a debut in the tradition of Jacqueline Winspear.
Murder Most Malicious
Alyssa Maxwell - 2015
. .December 1918: As a difficult year draws to a close, there is much to celebrate for nineteen-year-old Phoebe Renshaw and her three siblings at their beloved family estate of Foxwood Hall. The dreadful war is finally over; eldest daughter Julia's engagement to their houseguest, the Marquis of Allerton, appears imminent; and all have gathered to enjoy peace on earth, good will toward men. But the peace of Foxwood Hall is shattered on the morning of Boxing Day, when the Marquis goes missing. Not entirely missing, however, as macabre evidence of foul play turns up in gift boxes given to lady's maid Eva Huntford and a handful of others. Having overheard her sister and the Marquis in a heated exchange the night before, Lady Phoebe takes a personal interest in solving the mystery. As the local constable suspects a footman at Foxwood Hall, Phoebe and Eva follow the clues to a different conclusion. But both young women will need to think outside the box to wrap up this case--before a cornered killer lashes out with ill will toward them. . .
The Viaduct Murder
Ronald Knox - 1925
It was selected by Howard Haycraft to be included in the ultimate mystery list: The Haycraft-Queen Definitive Library of Detective-Crime-Mystery Fiction, Two Centuries of Cornerstones 1748-1948.Marryatt (the clergyman), Carmichael (the retired don), Reeves (the former member of the military intelligence), and Gordon (the vacationing golfer) are playing golf in Paston Oatvile when Reeves slices his drive from the third tee. In searching for the ball they come upon the dead body of Mr. Brotherhood below the railroad viaduct. When they find his hat 15 yards away from the body they suspect 'there's been dirty work.' The foursome set out to solve his murder.Father Knox has provided us with a witty, clever, and thoroughly delightful, classic British mystery story.
Trent's Last Case
E.C. Bentley - 1913
Feared but not loved, Manderson has no one to mourn him when the gardener at his British country estate finds him facedown in the dirt, a bullet buried in his brain. There are bruises on his wrist and blood on his clothes, but no clue that will lead the police to the murderer. It will take an amateur to—inadvertently—show them the way. Cheerful, charming, and always eager for a mystery, portrait artist and gentleman sleuth Philip Trent leaps into the Manderson affair with all the passion of the autodidact. Simply by reading the newspapers, he discovers overlooked details of the crime. Not all of his reasoning is sound, and his romantic interests are suspect, to say the least, but Trent’s dedication to the art of detection soon uncovers what no one expected him to find: the truth. Delightfully irreverent yet ingeniously plotted, Trent’s Last Case is widely regarded as a masterwork of the mystery genre.
The Man in Lower Ten
Mary Roberts Rinehart - 1909
Meanwhile, his bag containing the valuable documents has been stolen, along with his clothes, and he's being accused of the killing when the train is wrecked. Blakely and a mysterious young woman may be the car's only survivors.
A Man of Some Repute
Elizabeth Edmondson - 2015
Or so it seems to intelligence officer Hugo Hawksworth, wounded on a secret mission and now reluctantly assuming an altogether less perilous role at Selchester. The Castle’s faded grandeur hides a web of secrets and scandals—the Earl has been missing for seven years, lost without a trace since the night he left his guests and walked out into a blizzard. When a skeleton is uncovered beneath the flagstones of the Old Chapel, the police produce a suspect and declare the case closed.Hugo is not convinced. With the help of the spirited Freya Wryton, the Earl’s niece, he is drawn back into active service, and the ancient town of Selchester is dragged into the intrigues and conspiracies of the Cold War era. With a touch of Downton Abbey, a whisper of Agatha Christie and a nod to Le Carré, A Man of Some Repute is the first book in this delightfully classic and witty murder mystery series.
Murder at Hartigan House
Lee Strauss - 2017
Ginger's Boston terrier, Boss, noses out a missing phalange from under the cot.It's a mystery that once again puts Ginger alongside the handsome Chief Inspector Basil Reed. Who is the victim? And how did she end up in Ginger's home?Clues lead Ginger and her good friend Haley Higgins to a soirée hosted in 1913 by Ginger's late father, George Hartigan. A shadow of suspicion is cast on her father's legacy, and Ginger isn't so sure she wants to know the truth about the man she dearly loved.Ginger decides to host another soirée, inviting the guest list from ten years previous. Before the night is over, another person is dead.
The Plumley Inheritance
Christopher Bush - 1926
What is it?”
“Plumley’s dead, sir. Henry Plumley. We just got the news over the ’phone. Suicide they say it was. Anything else you want, sir?”
Out-of-print for over nine decades and one of the rarest classic crime novels from the Golden Age of detective fiction, The Plumley Inheritance, first of the Ludovic Travers mysteries, is now available in a new edition by Dean Street Press.When the eccentric magnate Henry Plumley shockingly collapses and dies, a great adventure begins for Ludovic Travers, the dead man’s secretary, and his comrade Geoffrey Wrentham – a romp with not only mystery and mischief in the offing but murder too.The Plumley Inheritance was originally published in 1926. This new edition features an introduction by crime fiction historian Curtis Evans.
The Daughter of Sherlock Holmes
Leonard Goldberg - 2017
Joanna Blalock’s keen mind and incredible insight lead her to become a highly-skilled nurse, one of the few professions that allow her to use her finely-tuned brain. But when she and her ten-year-old son witness a man fall to his death, apparently by suicide, they are visited by the elderly Dr. John Watson and his charming, handsome son, Dr. John Watson Jr. Impressed by her forensic skills, they invite her to become the third member of their investigative team.Caught up in a Holmesian mystery that spans from hidden treasure to the Second Afghan War of 1878-1880, Joanna and her companions must devise an ingenious plan to catch a murderer in the act while dodging familiar culprits, Scotland Yard, and members of the British aristocracy. Unbeknownst to her, Joanna harbors a mystery of her own. The product of a one-time assignation between the now dead Sherlock Holmes and Irene Adler, the only woman to ever outwit the famous detective, Joanna has unwittingly inherited her parents’ deductive genius.
Nobody's Perfect
Douglas Clark - 1969
Called to investigate Huth’s sudden death, Detective Chief Inspector Masters and Inspector Green of Scotland Yard, find Huth slumped in his chair. Initial observations conclude that one of the company’s employees murdered Huth. Faced with the prospect of eight hundred suspects, Masters and Green have their work cut out. When all signs suggest the cause of death was an overdose of drugs, not self-administered the investigation’s complexity increases. In a company that has unlimited access to drugs, and with drug experts working within the company, Masters and Green find themselves searching for a needle in a haystack. Adam Huth was a popular man. Anyone who knew him hardly had a bad word to say about him. This just made the case even harder … what motive could the murderer have had? Mr Torr, the Personnel Manager, has something to hide. Masters and Green can sense it. Arousing their interest, Masters and Green start to dig into Mr Torr further. The matter of missing Metathiazanone tablets puts Mr Torr high on the list of suspects. Huth knew about the missing tranquilizers, and Masters and Green are almost certain Mr Torr murdered Huth out of fear of being sacked … Mrs Huth had a lot to gain from Mr Huth’s death. His life insurance would have kept her going for a while … another suspect to add to Master and Green’s list. Mr Huth was suffering from a kidney infection … according to Dr Mouncer, who prescribed the drugs that killed him. Yet another one to add to the list … As the investigation takes them deeper into the profile of certain employees, the discovery of the missing drugs and its uses, surfaces. And the murderer’s motive behind the killing shocks everyone … Nobody's Perfect is book 1 in the Masters and Green Mystery series. Praise for Douglas Clark: “With perfect moments of dry wit, this is a classic whodunit” – Matt Lynn About the author: Douglas Clark was born in Lincolnshire, 1919. He wrote over 20 crime novels and under other names, including James Ditton and Peter Hosier.
The Plague Court Murders
Carter Dickson - 1934
The door had been bolted from within and locked from without, and there was no other means of getting in or out. Yet there lay Darworth - and besides him the dagger that had belonged to Plague Court's most evil and persistent ghost. It was a question that was not to be answered that night either by Masters, or by any of that strangely assorted group which had congregated at Plague Court. They began to ask themselves if the ghost of Louis Playge, one time assistant to the hangman, had not really come back to haunt the slime and decay of the court that bore his name.
Last Bus to Woodstock
Colin Dexter - 1975
Morse is sure the other hitchhiker can tell him much of what he needs to know. But his confidence is shaken by the cool inscrutability of the girl he's certain was Sylvia's companion on that ill-fated September evening. Shrewd as Morse is, he's also distracted by the complex scenarios that the murder set in motion among Sylvia's girlfriends and their Oxford playmates. To grasp the painful truth, and act upon it, requires from Morse the last atom of his professional discipline.
Death of a Gossip
M.C. Beaton - 1985
Much is from the viewpoint of a naive secretary seduced by a blue-blood playboy. Icy blond beauty, aristocratic Priscilla Halburton-Smythe, lends a hand.
A Meditation on Murder
Robert Thorogood - 2015
Until he's murdered, that is. The case seems open and shut: when Aslan was killed he was inside a locked room with only five other people, one of whom has already confessed to the murder. Detective Inspector Richard Poole is hot, bothered, and fed up with talking to witnesses who'd rather discuss his 'aura' than their whereabouts at the time of the murder. But he also knows that the facts of the case don't quite stack up. In fact, he's convinced that the person who's just confessed to the murder is the one person who couldn’t have done it. Determined to track down the real killer, DI Poole is soon on the trail, and no stone will be left unturned.