Series: British Library Crime Classics

Over a long career in the courts, Justice Horace Ireton has garnered a reputation for merciless rulings and his dedication to meting out strict, impartial justice. Taking a break from his duty after a session of assizes, Ireton retreats to his seaside bungalow in Devon and turns his attention to family, specifically in attempting to bribe his daughter's lover, Morrell,...

Samuel Whitehead, landlord of the Rose and Crown, is a stranger in the lonely East Anglian village of High Eldersham. When the newcomer is stabbed to death in his pub, and Scotland Yard are called to the scene, it seems that the veil dividing High Eldersham from the outside world is about to be lifted. Detective-Inspector Young forms a theory...

Should detectives go to parties? Was it consistent with the dignity of the Yard? The inspector tossed for it—and went. Chief Inspector Macdonald has been invited to a treasure hunt party at the house of Graham Coombe, the celebrated publisher of Murder by Mesmerism. Despite a handful of misgivings, the inspector joins a guestlist of novelists and thriller writers disguised...

Staffordshire in the 1950s. Within the clay tanks at the pottery company Shentall's, a body has been found. Amid cries of industrial espionage and sabotage of this leader of the pottery industry, there is a case of bitter murder to solve for Inspector Hedley Nicholson. The Spoilt Kill by Mary Kelly won the CWA Gold Dagger Award in 1961 for...

Already it looked as if the police were up against a carefully planned and cleverly executed murder, and, what was more, a murder without a corpse! Two brothers, John and William Rother, live together at Chalklands Farm in the beautiful Sussex Downs. Their peaceful rural life is shattered when John Rother disappears and his abandoned car is found. Has he...

E.C.R. Lorac must be seriously considered for the position of leading writer of classic detective stories. – Birmingham Post While hot on the heels of serial coupon-racketeer Gordon Ginner, Chief Inspector MacDonald of Scotland Yard receives word of a peculiar incident up in Lancashire. The fishing cottage of a local farmer has been broken into, with an assortment of seemingly...

Then the rhythm of the train changed, and she seemed to be sliding backwards down a long slope. Click-click-click-click. The wheels rattled over the rails, with a sound of castanets. Travelling home from a European holiday, Iris Carr ends up alone at the station after a quarrel with her friends. Struck by a mysterious assailant and waking up just in...

'There are a dozen clever deceptions in the book, twice as many as most writers would have given us.' Julian Symons in Bloody Murder Hugh Everton was intent on nothing more than quietly drinking in the second-rate hotel he found himself in on England's south coast. Then in walked his old flame Lucy and her new husband and ex-Judge, Gregory...

Jefferson Farjeon is quite unsurpassed for creepy skill in mysterious adventures.- Dorothy L. Sayers Richard Temperley arrives at Euston station early on a fogbound London morning. He takes refuge in a nearby hotel, along with a disagreeable fellow passenger, who had snored his way through the train journey. But within minutes the other man has snored for the last time—he...

No observer, ignorant of the situation, would have guessed that death lurked nearby, and that only a little distance from the glitter of silver and glass and the hum of voices, two victims lay silent on a studio floor. On a fine autumn weekend, Lord Aveling hosts a hunting party at his country house, Bragley Court. Among the guests are...

Crime author Dick Markham is in love again; his fiancée is the mysterious newcomer to the village, Lesley Grant. When Grant accidentally shoots the fortune teller through the side of his tent at the local fair, following a very strange reaction to his predictions, Markham is reluctantly brought into a scheme to expose his betrothed as a suspected serial husband-poisoner....

Tour de Force is "written with much ingenuity, gaiety of colour and bright, joyful malice," according to Julian Symons in the Times Literary Supplement, 1955. Inspector Cockrill has finally booked a holiday, destined for a Mediterranean tour with a motley crew of fellow vacationers. By the time they have reached the island of San Juan el Pirata off the Italian...

It is past the half-hour. My time is coming nearer with every tick of the clock. Horace Manning, scientist, recluse, and 'closed book' even to his friends, is found dead in his study at 4am, following a dinner in honour of his daughter's engagement. An ivory-handled carving knife rests between his shoulder blades as the houseguests gather round to witness...

A woman is on trial for her life, accused of murder. The twelve members of the jury each carry their own secret burden of guilt and prejudice which could affect the outcome. In this extraordinary crime novel, we follow the trial through the eyes of the jurors as they hear the evidence and try to reach a unanimous verdict. Will...

I'm taking a revolver to Thrackley. You never know with blokes like Carson. I hate these harmless, potty people - they're always up to something. Jim Henderson is one of six guests summoned by the mysterious Edwin Carson, a collector of precious stones, to a weekend party at his country house, Thrackley. The house is gloomy and forbidding, but the...

In the village of Brimberley, the worst thing on the horizon seems to be the chance of being outshone by the rival village choir of Bramshott. But that is until Brimberley's lead tenor is blown up in his home by an explosion that rocks the whole community. As an amateur coalition of the motorcycling choir leader Liz, her ex-commando son...

Impossible crime stories have delighted readers since the invention of detective fiction as puzzle-lovers sought more cerebral entertainment. Following on from Miraculous Mysteries, CWA Diamond Dagger Award-winning crime writer Martin Edwards brings together a whole new casebook of mystifying locked room mysteries and impossible crimes. Featuring more great stories by John Dickson Carr, Julian Symons, and Margery Allingham alongside newly...

Christianna Brand is not merely a purveyor of thrills or a maker of puzzles. She is a novelist. - The Daily Telegraph While the Blitz bombards London, the boisterous grandchildren of Sir Richard March have descended upon Swanswater Manor in Kent for a family gathering and the finalising of the patriarch's will. Disgruntled by the behaviour and life choices of...

The White Priory Murders presents an 'impossible situation' regarded as the best Mr Dickson has given us, according to Torquemada in The Observer, 1935. "Sir Henry is at his best in this baffling yarn, and so is Carter Dickson," praised The New York Times in 1934. James Bennett has been invited to stay at White Priory for Christmas among the...

A lost novel from the golden age of crime, published for the very first time. It happened on a dark and misty night; the night of the ball at The Prince's Hall, Fordings. Abuzz with rumours surrounding the disappearance of Rosemary Reeve on the eve of last year's ball, the date proves ill-fated again when two homebound partygoers, Nick and...

In a tranquil Kentish village, Dr Sandys and his wife are preparing for Christmas with their guest, Liane 'Lee' Crauford. Festivities start badly when their party is spoiled by an enigmatic widow new to the village, and the atmosphere hits rock bottom when the pompous local nobleman and ceramic-collector Sir Henry Metcalfe unexpectedly dies. Sensing potential villains among Metcalfe's circle,...

She could imagine the headlines all too well... DEATH ON POSSETT ISLAND Well-known Playwright Found Dead on Christmas Tree. Dimpson McCabe — Dimpsie — has invited all of his closest friends of the theatre world to join him for Christmas at his castle on a private island some hours' drive from Edinburgh. The festivities have barely had a chance to...

She said once she heard some people told to get an airing in a closed carriage and that her life had been like that, trying to get fresh air, but always closed up, in a box. As warm sunshine bathes the streets of Paris in the late 1800s, the lively young debutante May meets the cotton-broker John Tyler. Far from...

If Carolus Deene catches so much as a whiff of murder he will be on the scent with all the persistence and gusto of a dachshund in search of truffles. While Senior History Master of Queen's School, Newminster, Carolus Deene has a troubling hobby as a criminologist and sometime sleuth. Even more troublingly, he has jaundice. But with the papers...

'All his stories are amusing, intriguing, and he is a master of the final twist' - Agatha Christie 'One of the most stunning trick stories in the history of detective fiction' - Julian Symons Graham and Joan Bendix have apparently succeeded in making that eighth wonder of the modern world, a happy marriage. And into the middle of it, there...

An honest policeman, Sergeant Wigan, escorts a drunk man home one night to keep him out of trouble and, seeing his fine book collection, slowly falls into the gentle art of book collecting. Just as the friendship is blossoming, the policeman's book-collecting friend is murdered. To solve the mystery of why the victim was killed, and which of his rare...

A man is forbidden to uncover the secret of the tower in a fairy-tale castle by the Rhine. A headless corpse is found in a secret garden in Paris — belonging to the city's chief of police. And a drowned man is fished from the sea off the Italian Riviera, leaving the carabinieri to wonder why his socialite friends at...

The characters are quite extraordinarily living... A most original and grimly farcical situation. - Dorothy L. Sayers Robert Arthur Kewdingham is an eccentric failure of a man. In middle age, he retreats into a private world, hunting for Roman artefacts and devoting himself to bizarre mystical beliefs. Robert's wife, Bertha, feels that there are few things more dreadful than a...

If much of the action is set in a bookshop or a library, it is a bibliomystery, just as it is if a major character is a bookseller or a librarian. - Otto Penzler A bookish puzzle threatens an eagerly awaited inheritance; a submission to a publisher recounts a murder that seems increasingly to be a work of non-fiction; an...

"Cara!" Mr. Wilkinson stood on the jetty looking out at the long, low shadow of the island, dark against the setting sun. "A beautiful place, and a beautiful name." "It's the Gaelic word for a corpse." From the dramatic Highlands to bustling cities and remote islands in wild seas, the unique landscapes and locales of Scotland have enthralled and shaped...

For Miss Cordell, principal of Persephone College, there are two great evils to be feared: unladylike behaviour among her students, and bad publicity for the college. So her prim and cosy world is turned upside down when a secret society of undergraduates meets by the river on a gloomy January afternoon, only to find the drowned body of the college...

Mystery in the Channel is a classic crime novel with a strikingly modern sub-text. The story begins with a shocking discovery. The captain of the Newhaven to Dieppe steamer spots a small pleasure yacht lying motionless in the water, and on closer inspection, sees a body lying on the deck. When members of his crew go aboard the yacht, they...

Crofts constructs his alibi with immense elaboration... The story is highly successful, and Mr Crofts is to be congratulated upon his experiment - Dorothy L. Sayers We begin with a body. Andrew Crowther, a wealthy retired manufacturer, is found dead in his seat on the 12.30 flight from Croydon to Paris. Rather less orthodox is the ensuing flashback in which...

Prince's College, Cambridge, is a peaceful and scholarly community, enlivened by Prudence Pinsent, the Master's daughter. Spirited, beautiful, and thoroughly unconventional, Prudence is a remarkable young woman. One fine morning she sets out for Suffolk to join her cousin, Lord Wellende, for a few days' hunting. On the way, Prudence encounters Captain Studde of the coastguard, who is pursuing a...

Holidays offer us the luxury of getting away from it all. So, in a different way, do detective stories. This collection of vintage mysteries combines both those pleasures. From a golf course at the English seaside to a pension in Paris, and from a Swiss mountain resort to the cliffs of Normandy, this new selection shows the enjoyable and unexpected...

Horniman, Birley and Craine is a highly respected legal firm with clients reaching to the highest in the land. When a deed box in the office is opened to reveal a corpse, the threat of scandal promises to wreak havoc on the firm's reputation—especially as the murder looks like an inside job. The partners and staff of the firm keep...

When a counterfeit currency racket comes to light on the French Riviera, Detective Inspector Meredith is sent speeding southwards—out of the London murk to the warmth and glitter of the Mediterranean. Along with Inspector Blampignon—an amiable policeman from Nice—Meredith must trace the whereabouts of Chalky Cobbett, crook and forger. Soon their interest centres on the Villa Paloma, the residence of...

Never had I been given a tougher problem to solve, and never had I been so utterly at my wits' end for a solution. A signalman is found dead by a railway tunnel. A man identifies his wife as a victim of murder on the underground. Two passengers mysteriously disappear between stations, leaving behind a dead body. Trains have been...

In the seeming tranquillity of Regency Square in Cheltenham live the diverse inhabitants of its ten houses. One summer's evening, the square's rivalries and allegiances are disrupted by a sudden and unusual death—an arrow to the head, shot through an open window at No. 6. Unfortunately for the murderer, an invitation to visit had just been sent by the crime...

The red robe concealed the blood until it made my hand sticky. Father Christmas had been stabbed in the back, and he was certainly dead. The murder of Father Christmas at one of London's great toy shops is just one of many yuletide disasters in this new collection of stories from the Golden Age of crime writing and beyond. Masters...

Locked-room mysteries and other impossible crime stories have been relished by puzzle-lovers ever since the invention of detective fiction. Fiendishly intricate cases were particularly well suited to the cerebral type of detective story that became so popular during the 'golden age of murder' between the two world wars. But the tradition goes back to the days of Wilkie Collins, and...

Christmas is a mysterious, as well as magical, time of year. Strange things can happen, and this helps to explain the hallowed tradition of telling ghost stories around the fireside as the year draws to a close. Christmas tales of crime and detection have a similar appeal. When television becomes tiresome, and party games pall, the prospect of curling up...

Cyanide in the Sun, curated by Martin Edwards, offers a jam-packed travel case of short mysteries bristling with murder and chicanery, just right for a summer getaway. This anthology is another instalment in the popular series celebrating forgotten classics and stories not printed since their original publication. It's the perfect bite-sized holiday reading for both the Classic Crime enthusiast and...

A Christmas party is punctuated by a gunshot under a policeman's watchful eye. A jewel heist is planned admist the glitz and glamour of Oxford Street's Christmas shopping. Lost in a snowstorm, a man finds a motive for murder. This collection of mysteries explores the darker side of the festive season - from unexplained disturbances in the fresh snow, to...