Historical Mystery Women Sleuth

Cantankerous and vinegar-tongued Grandmama, from Anne Perry's Charlotte and Thomas Pitt series, is the leading character in this Christmas novel, which unfolds in the chilly, windswept Romney Marshes off the English Channel. Grandmama arrives on a holiday visit to the home of Charlotte's parents, where a fellow guest--an outcast from her own family--is subsequently murdered. Like the heroes before her in Anne Perry's Christmas novels, Grandmama is called upon to play the role of amateur detective.

In this Gaslight Mystery from the national best-selling author of Murder in Murray Hill, midwife Sarah Brandt and Detective Sergeant Frank Malloy investigate foul play in the secretive high-society world of 19th-century New York City....

Hannah Cameron was not well-liked, but who stabbed her in the back? To almost everyone, the answer was clear: she was killed by a burglar. This case is given to Inspector Nivens, so Mrs. Jeffries and the rest of the household must tiptoe around this case to find the real killer.

Caterina Pellegrini is a native Venetian, and like so many of them, she’s had to leave home to pursue her career elsewhere, mostly abroad. With a doctorate in baroque opera from Vienna, she lands in Birmingham, England, as a research fellow and assistant professor. Birmingham, however, is no Venice, so when she gets word of a position back home, Caterina jumps at the opportunity. The job is an unusual one.

1920s London isn’t the ideal place for a brilliant woman with lofty ambitions, but research assistant Saffron Everleigh is determined to beat the odds in a male-dominated field at the University College of London. She embarks on her first research study alongside the insufferably charming Dr. Michael Lee, traveling the countryside with him in response to reports of poisonings. But when Detective Inspector Green is given a case with a set of unusual clues, he asks for her assistance.

Miranda Brand is visiting Germany for what is supposed to be a month's vacation. But from the moment that Brigadier Brindley relates the story about a fortune in lost diamonds - a story in which Miranda herself figures in an unusual way - the vacation atmosphere becomes transformed into something more ominous. And when murder strikes on the night train to Berlin, Miranda finds herself unwillingly involved in a complex chain of events that will soon throw her own life into peril.

Orlando Edison is a stockbroker using London's infatuation with foreign mining ventures to make a fortune. He has curried favor with the nation's most respected aristocrats, even inviting three influential investors - known as the Merry Gentlemen - to be part of his latest enterprise. Edison is welcomed in the highest circles and moves with ease among the rich and powerful. But a few days before Christmas, he is found murdered.

Singapore, 1910 - Harriet Gordon has found fulfillment at last. Her young ward, Will, has settled into his new home with Harriet and her brother, Julian. And Harriet’s employment as a typist at the Straits Settlements Police Force has given her an intriguing way to occupy her time and some much-needed financial independence. But when her friend and employer, Inspector Robert Curran, is called to the scene of a brutal murder and Harriet is asked to comfort the victim’s family, her newfound sense of contentment is abruptly shattered.

December 1935. Director Monty Harrison's production of A Christmas Carol has had a troubled run on its tour of regional theatres. With tensions amongst the cast running high, the company reach their final stop—London's Theatre Royale. Catastrophe, however, strikes on opening night: Scrooge dies on stage, the result (it is presumed) of a heart attack. But the show must go on. Until, that is, a leading theatre critic—and old rival of Monty's—is killed backstage.

Upon returning to the city of Khelathra-Ven after five years fighting a war in another universe, Captain John Wyndham finds himself looking for somewhere to live, and expediency forces him to take lodgings at 221b Martyrs Walk. His new housemate is Miss Shaharazad Haas, a consulting sorceress of mercurial temperament and dark reputation.

Melbourne, Australia, 1929. The year starts off for glamorous private investigator Phryne Fisher with a rather trying heat wave and more mysteries than you could prod a parasol at. Simultaneously investigating the apparent suicide death of a man on St Kilda beach and trying to find a lost, illegimate child who could be heir to a wealthy old woman's fortune, Phryne needs all her wits about her, particularly when she has to tangle with a group of thoroughly unpleasant Bright Young Things.

22 janvier 1905. Paris se presse à la suite du cortège funéraire de Louise Michel, icône légendaire de la Commune. Parmi les ouvriers, la jeune Jeanne Desroselles, travestie en femme du peuple, se mêle à la foule. Idéaliste et militante, cette jeune héritière fréquente depuis quelques mois les rassemblements publics, vibrant des revendications de ceux qui luttent pour la justice et la liberté. Mais ce matin d'hiver sera pour Jeanne le dernier.

Prohibition is a dangerous time to be a working-class woman in New York City, but Vivian Kelly has finally found some measure of stability and freedom. By day, she’s a respectable shop assistant, delivering luxurious dresses to the city’s wealthy and elite. At night, she joins the madcap revelry of New York’s underworld, serving illegal drinks and dancing into the morning at a secretive, back-alley speakeasy known as the Nightingale. She's found, if not love, then something like it with her bootlegger sweetheart, Leo.

Inspector Nigel Nivens is not a nice man or a good investigator. In fact, he's terrible at his job and has always done everything he can to make life difficult for Inspector Witherspoon. But even his powerful family can't help him after he maliciously tried to hobble Witherspoon's last homicide investigation. He's been sent to a particularly difficult precinct in the East End of London as penance. When a paid informant is found shot in an alley, Nivens thinks that if he can crack the case, he'll redeem himself and have a much-needed chance at impressing his superiors.

1792, England: Lord Francis and Lady Ottilia Fanshawe are on their way home when their coach comes to a sudden stop. A woman is standing in the middle of the road - covered in blood. The woman refuses to speak but on further investigation they find the body of a man hidden in the woods. Ottilia insists on bringing the woman home to find out what occurred. But the more she finds out the more complicated the case becomes....

She keeps house for Inspector Witherspoon...and keeps him on his toes. Everyone's awed by his Scotland Yard successes - but they don't know about his secret weapon. No matter how messy the murder or how dirty the deed, Mrs. Jeffries' polished detection skills are up to the task...proving that behind every great man there's a woman - and that a crime solver's work is never done.

It was a most peculiar murder. A man's body was found in the canal - but the evidence showed that he had drowned in a bathtub. A theater critic known for his savage reviews, the victim had had a full cast of enemies. While Inspector Witherspoon scoured the theater, his housekeeper and unofficial sleuthing partner Mrs. Jeffries uncovered the critic's secret past: a real-life drama more compelling than any stage play.

Eleanor Murray will always remember her childhood on Edisto Island, where her late father, a local shrimper, shared her passion for music. Now her memories of him are all that tempers the guilt she feels over the accident that put her sister in a wheelchair and the feelings she harbors for her sister's husband. To help support her sister, Eleanor works at a Charleston investment firm during the day, but she escapes into her music, playing piano at a neighborhood bar. Until the night her enigmatic boss walks in and offers her a part-time job caring for his elderly aunt, Helena, back on Edisto.

Caren Gray manages Belle Vie, a sprawling antebellum plantation that sits between Baton Rouge and New Orleans, where the past and the present coexist uneasily. The estate's owners have turned the place into an eerie tourist attraction, complete with full-dress re-enactments and carefully restored slave quarters. Outside the gates, a corporation with ambitious plans has been busy snapping up land from struggling families who have been growing sugar cane for generations, and now replacing local employees with illegal laborers. Tensions mount when the body of a female migrant worker is found in a shallow grave on the edge of the property.

Eccentric Annabeth Gentry pretty much keeps to herself. Besides her recent inheritance - and the attention her bloodhound gets for digging up the body of a murdered thief - her life is in fact, rather dull. So why does she think that someone is trying to kill her? That's what Mrs. Jeffries and her staff has to find out. What they discover is a dead body next door, and three attempts on Annabeth's life. It sounds like there's a jealous dog in their midst. Mrs. Jeffries will have to sniff out some clues before the plot thickens....