LIBRARY JOURNAL'S AWARD-WINNING SELF-e MYSTERY OF 2015!An unseemly lesson…in murder.The year is 1896, and college professor Concordia Wells has her hands full: teaching classes, acting as live-in chaperone to a cottage of lively female students, and directing the student play, Macbeth.But mystery and murder are not confined to the stage, especially when the death of Concordia's sister, Mary, appears to be foul play...

An old flame…an assassin's bullet…the event of the season….November 1885Although Penelope Hamilton Wynch doesn't especially miss her estranged husband, she does yearn for the excitement of the old days when they worked together on assignments from the Pinkerton Agency. Against her better judgment, she agrees to help him on a new case: to go undercover in the household of a wealthy industrial tycoon who's been the victim of factory sabotage and an assassinat...

When a killer crashes the honeymoon, three’s a crowd…It’s the summer of 1899, and Professor Concordia Wells—now Mrs. David Bradley—eagerly anticipates their honeymoon in the Hamptons. She has one errand along the way, to visit a former student seeking advice. About a love interest, no doubt.If only it were that benign. The young lady, now employed as a switchboard operator, inadvertently eavesdropped on a murder plot involving the high finance world of the ...

A stolen blueprint, a dead body, and wedding bells….Change is in the air at Hartford Women's College in the fall of 1898. Renowned inventor Peter Sanbourne—working on Project Blue Arrow for the Navy—heads the school's new engineering program, and literature professor Concordia Wells prepares to leave to marry David Bradley.The new routine soon goes awry when a bludgeoned body—clutching a torn scrap of the only blueprint for Blue Arrow—is discovered on the p...

A deadly secret that won’t stay buried…It is the fall of 1896, and Miss Concordia Wells is hip-deep in the usual tumult of a lady professor’s life: classes, clubs, student pranks, and the unending drama generated by the girls she lives with on campus. Complicating this normality is the new Lady Principal, whom the students have nicknamed “the Ogre.” The woman seems bent on making Concordia’s life miserable.And then there’s the exotic spirit medium, Madame Durand, who has be...

A murder…a missing boy…a secret society’s bold and deadly plot…It is 1898, and Professor Concordia Wells has come to expect the hectic routine of classes, clubs, teas, and the inevitable student pranks at the women’s college. If only she could avoid the cantankerous dean, Randolph Maynard, who has learned about her past experiences as a “lady sleuth.” To Concordia’s dismay, he scrutinizes her every move for evidence of unseemly conduct.The dean will certain...

A deadly secret that won't stay buried…It is the fall of 1896, and Miss Concordia Wells is hip-deep in the usual tumult of a lady professor's life: classes, clubs, student pranks, and the unending drama generated by the girls she lives with on campus. Complicating this normality is the new Lady Principal, whom the students have nicknamed "the Ogre." The woman seems bent on making Concordia's life miserable.Events take a grave turn, however, when an ancient ...

Beware of rich men bearing gifts…It's the fall of 1899 and the new Mrs. David Bradley—formerly Professor Concordia Wells of Hartford Women's College—is chafing against the hum-drum routine of domestic life.The routine is disrupted soon enough when the long-hated but wealthy patriarch of her husband's family, Isaiah Symond, returns to Hartford. His belated wedding gift is a rare catalogue by artist/poet William Blake, to be exhibited in the college's antiqui...

Missing jewels...a haunted inn...a long-held secret...Penelope Hamilton Wynch, one of the few female operatives employed at the Pinkerton Agency in 1886, is sent to the Adirondacks to investigate the mysterious happenings at Schroon Lake Inn, newly renovated to cater to New York City's upper crust on summer holiday.Rumors of ghosts are bad enough, but when expensive jewelry disappears, the owner's livelihood is at stake. A woman's touch is needed.Pe...

Lady detective Penelope Hamilton must navigate a labyrinth of 1880s politics, high society, and murder.On a January night in 1887, trouble comes knocking at Pinkerton detective Penelope Hamilton's door in the form of a sulky young runaway. The girl turns out to be the grandniece of an influential senator, who hires Pen to escort her and her friend from Chicago to his Washington, DC home.What seems a simple assignment takes an alarming turn when a hired thug...

Murder aboard the Overland Limited…It is the summer of 1898. Professor Concordia Wells is eager to accompany her friend, Pinkerton detective Penelope Hamilton, on a cross-country train trip to San Francisco. Breathless vistas and exciting locales will be a welcome change from a fiancé impatient to set a wedding date and the threat of revenge from the remaining Inner Circle members back in Hartford.But Concordia should know there is no such thing as...

Money, love, and murder in 1880s Newport high society…Pinkerton detective Penelope Hamilton is summoned to fashionable Newport to investigate the two-year-old death of a wealthy matron. Did she fall from the Cliff Walk's Forty Steps in the middle of the night, as was presumed, or was she pushed by her much-younger husband?The case is personal this time, since Pen's client is her own mother—breaking her near-decade of silence—and the man under scrutiny is to...