A high-society homicide is the talk of the London season . . ."Marsh's writing is a pleasure." — The Seattle TimesIt's debutante season in London, and that means giggles and tea-dances, white dresses and inappropriate romances . . ..and much too much champagne. And, apparently, a blackmailer, which is where Inspector Roderick Alleyn comes in. The social whirl is decidedly not Alleyn's environment, so he brings in an assistant in the form of Lord "Bunchy" Go...

Commemorating 75 years since the Empress of Crime’s first book, the fourth volume in a set of omnibus editions presenting the complete run of 32 Inspector Alleyn mysteriesSURFEIT OF LAMPREYSThe Lampreys were a peculiar family. They entertained their guests with charades – like rich Uncle Gabriel, who was always such a bore. The Lampreys thought if they jollied him up he would bail them out of poverty again. But Uncle Gabriel meets a violent end, and Chief Inspector Alleyn ha...

A policeman in the audience sees an all-too-real death scene on a London stage: "Good enough to satisfy the most critical reader of detective stories." — The New York TimesInspector Roderick Alleyn has been invited to an opening night, a new play in which two characters quarrel and then struggle for a gun, with predictably sad results. Even sadder, the gun was not, in fact, loaded with blanks. And when it comes to interviewing witnesses, actors can be a dec...

A river cruise may be sunk by a ruthless criminal in this novel by "the doyenne of traditional mystery writers" ( The New York Times).Inspector Alleyn's wife, the artist Agatha Troy, has a special fondness for Constables—the paintings, that is, not the policemen. So she jumps at the chance to take a river cruise through "Constable Country" in the east of England, in honor of the nineteenth-century master of landscapes. Her enthusiasm dims a little, though, ...

The inspector digs into a cold case on a New Zealand sheep farm in this "well-sustained crime story" from the Mystery Writers of America Grand Master ( Kirkus Reviews).Flossie Rubrick, a highly opinionated and influential member of the New Zealand Parliament, was last seen heading off to one of the storage sheds on her sheep farm. Three weeks later, she turned up dead and packed in a bale of her own wool. What happened on the night of her long-ago disappear...

A Shakespearean actor shuffles off his mortal coil in this "skillfully wrought" country-house mystery ( The New York Times).Sir Henry Ancred, a celebrated Shakespearean actor, has arranged to have his portrait painted by Agatha Troy, wife of Inspector Roderick Alleyn. But when Ancred is killed at his own birthday party, leaving behind a family full of suspects, Troy's work ends and Inspector Alleyn's begins . . ."It's time to start comparing Christie...

Folkways turn fatal in a very old-fashioned English village, in this witty mystery filled with "ingenious" detective work ( Kirkus Reviews, starred review).The village of South Mardian likes the old ways. The very old ways. This may be 1957, but South Mardian still features a blacksmith, a village idiot, and an elaborate fertility ritual performed at the winter solstice. There's squabbling, of course, and worse—like when one of the ritual's main players is ...

This tale of murder at a snowed-in country house is a "constant puzzle to the end . . . alive with wit" ( The New York Times).The unspeakably wealthy (and generally unspeakable) Jonathan Royal has decided to throw a party and, just for fun, has studded the guest list with people who loathe one another. When a blizzard imprisons them all in Royal's country house, murder ensues, and there are nearly as many suspects as there are potential victims. Eventually,...

A mystery with "atmosphere, humor . . .and a group of characters, English, Maori, and New Zealander, who are fascinating and completely credible." — The New York TimesDuring World War II, Colonel Claire—a tremendously nice fellow and a disastrously bad businessman—runs a mud-baths resort in rural New Zealand. But the place is on the brink of being taken over by a local blowhard who may be a Nazi spy. Inspector Alleyn has been sent in to sort things out—and ...

Tainted wine sends a member of a religious sect to meet her maker in a witty mystery marked by "quiet, intelligent deduction" ( Kirkus Reviews).Did lovely Cara Quoyne get a whiff of the bitter almonds as she raised the goblet to her lips? We'll never know: With a single sip of prussic acid she transported herself to the Hereafter.Now Inspector Alleyn must investigate a murder at the House of the Sacred Flame, a rather quirky little religious sect in ...

An aristocrat dies under fishy circumstances in this tale by "the finest writer in the English language of the pure, classical puzzle whodunnit" ( The Sun).In an almost unspeakably charming little English village, one of the local aristocrats turns up dead next to the local trout-stream with, in fact, a trout at his side. Everyone is dreadfully upset, of course, but really, just a tad irritated as well—murder is so awfully messy. Inspector Alleyn doesn't qu...

Commemorating 75 years since the Empress of Crime’s first book, the second volume in a set of omnibus editions presenting the complete run of 32 Inspector Alleyn mysteries.DEATH IN ECSTASYWho slipped cyanide into the ceremonial wine of ecstasy at the House of the Sacred Flame? The other initiates and the High Priest claim to be above earthly passions. But Roderick Alleyn discovers that the victim had provoked lust and jealousy, and he suspects that more evil still lurks behi...