Ngaio Marsh
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English
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The acclaimed author brings us crime at a country-house Christmas party in "one of her best and most baffling mysteries" (Daily Express).
It's the Christmas season in 1972, and Agatha Troy is at a house party, enjoying the local holiday pageant and also painting the host's portrait. The painting's coming along fine, but the pageant goes a little pear-shaped when one of the players disappears. Could one of the eccentric guests have been involved?...
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Sybil Foster lives the sort of little English village that is home mostly to the very rich and the servants who make their lives delightful. But Sybil Foster's life is not delightful, even if she does have an extremely talented gardener. Exhausted from her various family stresses-a daughter, for instance, who wants to marry a man without a title!-Sybil takes herself off to a local hotel that specializes in soothing shattered nerves. When she's killed,...
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"A model is murdered in this "first-rate" detective story by the Mystery Writers of America Grand Master ( Kirkus Reviews ). On a ship traveling back to England, Miss Agatha Troy finds Inspector Roderick Alleyn tedious and dull; he thinks she's a bohemian cliché. They may be destined for romance, but there's a murder in the way: No sooner has Alleyn settled in to his mother's house, eager for a relaxing end to his vacation, than he gets a call...
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Roderick Alleyn volume 19
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English
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Description
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...
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"A local busybody is silenced for good in this tale by "a peerless practitioner of the slightly surreal, English-village comedy-mystery" ( Kirkus Reviews ). In their Dorset village, neither Miss Campanula nor her friend Miss Prentice are known as lovable little old ladies. They're waspish, gossiping snobby little old ladies, passionate only about their amateur theatrical productions, their narrowly defined opinions about how everyone else should behave...
7) Last Ditch
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English
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"Detection becomes a father-and-son activity in the Channel Islands: "A mystery novelist of world renown." -- The New York Times Ricky Alleyn, son of the renowned police detective Roderick Alleyn, has taken himself to a secluded island to write a novel. Or think about writing a novel. Or look for distractions so he can avoid writing a novel. The distractions abound, mostly in the form of colorful local characters, so all is beer and skittles until...
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English
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"A British police detective looks into sinister doings in the South of France in a crime thriller with "more than a little excitement" ( Kirkus Reviews ). Inspector Roderick Alleyn has decamped for the South of France on a family vacation-though for him, the vacation will involve some official poking around. Unfortunately, the object of his poking-the cultish denizens of a sinister and luxurious chateau-are not fond of being poked, and they have...
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"A visiting dignitary in London asks for security -- and gets extra help from a clever feline -- in a novel starring "the nonpareil among criminal investigators" ( The New York Times ). Superintendent Alleyn's old school chum, nicknamed the "Boomer," has become the president of the newly emerged African nation of Ng'ombwana, newly emerged in the wake of colonialism. Old school ties being what they are, his friend -- making an official visit to London...
10) Final Curtain
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English
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"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...
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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, Inspector Alleyn makes his way through the snow to put things right, in this classic whodunit by the Mystery Writers...
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The upper-crust Lamprey family exemplifies charm, wit, and a chronic lack of funds. Their only source of hope is the wealthy but unpleasant Lord Wutherwood, and the Lampreys may perhaps be forgiven for doing a little jig when his Lordship is killed and the resulting inheritance saves their bacon. Inspector Roderick Alleyn wouldn't dream of judging the Lampreys' joy. But he would like to figure out whether they murdered their benefactor ...
13) Death in Ecstasy
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Series
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Felony & Mayhem Press
Pub. Date
[2012]
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English
Description
"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...
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Murder strikes a sour note at a jazz concert in this classic detective novel from the Mystery Writers of America Grand Master.
Lord Pastern and Bagott is given to passionate, peculiar enthusiasms, the latest of which is drumming in a jazz band. His wife is not amused, and she is even less so when her daughter falls for Carlos Rivera, the band's sleazy accordion player. Nobody likes Rivera very much, so there's a wealth of suspects when he is shot...
15) Hand in glove
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Roderick Alleyn volume 22
Publisher
Felony & Mayhem Press
Pub. Date
2015.
Language
English
Description
A deadly dull man is now just plain dead in this novel by "a peerless practitioner of the slightly surreal, English-village comedy-mystery." -- Kirkus Reviews One has to admit that the timing was peculiar. No one could doubt that Mr. Percival Pyke Period was genuinely distraught to hear that his neighbor, Harry Cartell, had turned up dead in a ditch. But how is it that Mr. Percival Pyke came to write the letter of condolence before the body was found?...
16) False scent
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Publisher
Felony & Mayhem Press
Pub. Date
2015.
Language
English
Description
This tale of an actress's dramatic demise, and a police detective trying to sniff out a killer, is "one of Ngaio Marsh's best yarns" ( Kirkus Reviews ). Mary Bellamy is the sweetheart of the London stage--everyone simply adores darling Mary. So her fans and friends are heartbroken when somehow Mary manages to spritz herself not with her favorite perfume but with a deadly insecticide meant to be sprayed on the azaleas. What Inspector Alleyn smells...
17) Photo Finish
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Series
Publisher
Felony & Mayhem Press
Pub. Date
[2016]
Language
English
Description
"A diva is dead in New Zealand... "A neat little puzzle, sparkling writing...a book that should make all readers happy." -- The New York Times The soprano Isabella Sommita was widely loathed, so much so that the problem with solving her murder is less a lack of plausible suspects than an embarrassment of options. On a lavish island estate, cut off from the mainland by a sudden storm, Roderick Alleyn is among the guests, and fortunately can take charge...
Author
Publisher
Felony & Mayhem Press
Pub. Date
[2014]
Language
English
Description
"It's foul play on a freighter: "Enthralling...keeps the reader on tenterhooks until the dramatic finale." - Kirkus Reviews (starred review) The good ship Cape Farewell is steaming out to sea, with a passenger-list and crew fairly littered with the shifty, the twitchy, the peculiar, and the up-to-no-good. Arguably the up-to-no-goodest is a strangler with a romantic streak: He likes to leave his ladies with a flower and a charming little song. The...
Author
Publisher
Felony & Mayhem Press
Pub. Date
[2014]
Language
English
Description
"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...
Author
Series
Roderick Alleyn volume 7
Publisher
Felony & Mayhem Press
Pub. Date
[2012]
Language
English
Description
"A high-society homicide is the talk of the London season..."Marsh's writing is a pleasure." -- The Seattle Times It'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"...