Suspense Amateur Detective

Due to financial hardships at Tawcester Towers, the Dowager Duchess has decreed that the only way the family fortunes can be restored is to marry Blotto off...to an American! Reluctantly, Blotto, together with Twinks and his trusty chauffeur Corky Froggett set sail.

An trois de la République. Lyon, ville insoumise, endure la plus sanglante des répressions. Fuyant la soldatesque, une nonne accepte l'invitation...

es and Watson investigate spies and amateur beggars in this thrilling addition to the Sherlock Holmes mythos, based on one of the unpublished tales mentioned in the original series.

"Im Grunde bin ich ein Naturwissenschaftler, den es reizt, Abstecher in die trügerische Literaturwissenschaft zu unternehmen. Das erkennen Sie auch an meinem klaren und präzisen Verstand." England Ende der 40er Jahre. Oxford-Professor und Exzentriker Gervase Fen, wie er selbst betont, der einzige Literaturwissenschaftler der Kriminalliteratur, der je Detektiv wurde, hat es sich in den Kopf gesetzt, Lokalpolitiker zu werden. Das Dörfchen Sanford, in das es ihn für seinen Wahlkampf verschlägt, erscheint zunächst ruhig und friedlich. Doch der Schein trügt.

England in den 40er Jahren. Beim Oxforder Opernensemble steht die erste Aufführung von Wagners Meistersingern nach dem 2. Weltkrieg auf dem Plan. Eine der Hauptrollen übernimmt der überaus begabte, aber ebenso unbeliebte Sänger Edwin Shorthouse. Jedenfalls, bis man ihn nach einer Probe erhängt in seiner Garderobe findet. Selbstmord? Wohl kaum. Schon bald danach kommt es zu einem zweiten Mord. Der Tote war ein junger Chorsänger und aufstrebender Opernkomponist. Oxford Professor und Amateurdetektiv Gervase Fen ist ratlos und steht vor einem Rätsel.

Ein Spielzeugladen löst sich in Luft auf. England im Herbst 1938. Um seine Schreibblockade zu lösen, begibt sich der Lyriker Richard Cardogan nach Oxford. Kaum in der Universitätsstadt angekommen, ist ihm die exakte Adresse seiner Unterkunft entfallen. So stolpert er prompt in einen Spielzeugladen und darin über die Leiche einer Frau. Bevor er auch nur einen klaren Gedanken fassen kann, trifft ihn ein Schlag auf den Hinterkopf und er findet sich am folgenden Tag auf dem Boden des Lagerraums wieder.

Schottland - ein Golfturnier, eine Explosion, eine Leiche. Eigentlich wollte Pater Brown bei dieser elitären Benefizveranstaltung nur nach großzügigen Spendern suchen, jetzt ist er stattdessen auf der Suche nach den Verantwortlichen. Handelt es sich um einen Unfall oder Vorsatz? Schnell wird ein Schuldiger für die Tat gefunden. Aber ist er auch der wahre Täter? Mit viel Gespür fürs Detail geht Pater Brown einem ganz eigenen Ansatz nach und beweist wieder einmal, wie gut er das Spiel beherrscht.

When one of A.J.'s celebrity yoga students gets permanently bent out of shape, and another is accused of the crime, A.J. has no choice but to position herself as a sleuth to find the real killer.

Things are always odd and strange in Metamora, but when the proprietor of the curiosity shop, Odd and Strange Metamora, hosts a spring carnival showing off his collection of oddities, the day goes right in the garbage - or rather, out of the garbage when a raccoon overturns a trash can in the middle of town scattering human bones around the park. When it's discovered that the remains date back over a century, rumors start to run as rampant as the pack of furry bandits taking over the town at night.

Mayor Parish is determined Silverlake should win the prestigious Best Fall Getaway award for Witch Reader's Magazine—especially since the town is already a top contender. But when the journalist covering Silverlake writes a scathing review and is found dead, things go from fall festive to fatal misfortune. The Mystic Inn guest had his fair share of critics, but the killer couldn't possibly be someone living in Silverlake, could they? Angelica and her friends are racing to find out.

Who burglarised the train heading for Victoria Station, and whatever became of its conductor? Did the village idiot or Mrs Foley murder the mean-spirited Edgar Foley, or could the constable be responsible for the devious deed? Who on Earth will be able to untangle the affair of the disappearing car, the black necktie, and the abortive theft? Enter Gervase Fen, Oxford professor and sometime super-sleuth, an expert at solving cases that baffle even the most astute policemen. These sixteen short classics by a master of the modern detective story will test your crime solving abilities as well

Amateur sleuth Mordecai Tremaine is back in another classic mystery from the author of Murder for Christmas. Adrian Carthallow, enfant terrible of the art world, is no stranger to controversy. But this time it's not his paintings that have provoked a blaze of publicity - it's the fact that his career has been suddenly terminated by a bullet to the head. Not only that, but his wife has confessed to firing the fatal shot.

England in den 40er Jahren. Englischprofessor und Teilzeitdetektiv Gervase Fen verbringt gerade seine Ferien in dem kleinen Städtchen Tolnbridge, als es mit der Erholung schlagartig ein Ende hat. Auf den örtlichen Organisten wurde ein Mordanschlag verübt. Der Mann hat weder Feinde, noch kann seine völlig harmlose Musik der Auslöser gewesen sein. Als Ersatz für den Organisten beordert Fen einen befreundeten Musiker in die Provinz, den prompt ein Drohbrief erreicht. Eins ist klar, hinter der kleinstädtischen Idylle verbirgt Tolnbridge ein Geheimnis. Bald machen Gerüchte die Runde.

A note from bartender Brian McNulty, Raymond Ambler’s friend, confidant, and sometimes adviser, sets the librarian sleuth off on a murder investigation - one that he pursues reluctantly until a second murder upends the world as he knows it. The second victim is a lady friend of McNulty’s - and the prime suspect is McNulty himself.

Following a long but successful book tour, Joe Biden has one more stop before he can return home: Chicago. His old pal Barack Obama has invited him to meet a wealthy benefactor whose endorsement could turn the tide for Joe if he decides to run for president. The two friends barely have time to catch up before another mystery lands in their laps: Obama’s prized Blackberry is stolen. When their number one suspect winds up full of lead on the South Side, the police are content to write it off as just another gangland shooting. But Joe and Obama smell a rat....

The first story featuring Ben, the lovable, humorous ex-sailor and down-at-heels rascal who can't help running into trouble. Ben is back home from the Merchant Navy, penniless as usual and looking for digs in fog-bound London. Taking shelter in an abandoned old house, he stumbles across a dead body - and scarpers. Running into a detective, Gilbert Fordyce, the reluctant Ben is persuaded to return to the house and investigate the mystery of the corpse - which promptly disappears!

Ben knows that whenever his thumbs are itching, something 'orrible is about to happen. Sure enough, on one foggy afternoon of itchy thumbs, the hapless Ben is implicated in criminal activity by the police - the kind of mistake it isn't easy to explain. Doing a runner, Ben hides in the basement of a deserted house, where he discovers the body of a well-dressed man, shot through the head...and much more trouble than he bargained for.

It's 1943, the war is raging, and sleuthing scribe Ellery Queen wants to do his bit. After a tortuous cross-country drive, he takes a job writing scripts for a Hollywood propaganda house - twelve hours a day of hack work that quickly turns his mind to jelly. After a few weeks, he is so worn down that he can type nothing but gibberish, and he decides to drive home. The trouble starts as soon as he reaches the desert.

In Strawberry Yellow, he returns to the strawberry farms of his youth and encounters family intrigue, danger, and murder. The series' most compelling and evocative mystery yet is set in the strawberry fields of Watsonville, California, where young Mas first arrived as a Hiroshima survivor in the 1940s. He returns for the funeral of a cousin and quickly gets entangled in the murder of a young woman. Was his cousin murdered, too?

The girl is found beside the East River, strangled. She's in her late 20s - so why was she carrying a fake ID? The case should have nothing to do with Reuben Frost, retired Wall Street lawyer, but Frost has never been known to mind his own business. Not to mention, his wife, Cynthia, has been slowed down by arthritis, and his social calendar is barren for the first time in decades. It's the perfect time to find a murderer.