The Piccadilly Murder is a 1929 mystery detective novel by the British writer Anthony Berkeley. Ambrose Chitterwick is a witness to the death of a lady in the lounge at the Piccadilly Palace Hotel, shortly after her companion dropped something into her coffee. Chief Inspector Moresby is convinced she was murdered by him her nephew and sole heir, Major Sinclair, using prussic acid. He arrests Sinclair and plans to use Chitterwick as starwitness for the prosecution. However, nagging doubts in Chitterwick's mind lead him to turn amateur detective and find the real truth.

Chief Inspector Macdonald has been invited to a treasure hunt party at the house of the Graham Coombe, the celebrated publisher of Murder by Mesmerism. The clues of the hunt have been devised by Coombe's thriller-writer friends, disguised on the night under literary pseudonyms. The fun comes to an abrupt end, however, when 'Samuel Pepys' is found murdered in the telephone room in bizarre circumstances.

The First Collection of Twelve Stories is a captivating collection featuring the brilliant detective Lord Peter Wimsey in a series of thrilling, often witty mysteries. This illustrated volume includes such unforgettable tales as The Fantastic Horror of the Cat in the Bag, where Wimsey faces a bizarre crime involving a mysterious cat, and The Unprincipled Affair of the Practical Joker, which pits the detective against a cunning adversary with a penchant for dark humor.

England, 1926. Just days before Lord Darriby-Jones is scheduled to enlighten the world at the Annual Limacology Symposium, his secretary unceremoniously bids adieu to her employment. It's now up to Lady Darriby-Jones to find a replacement. In a twist of fate, she stumbles upon a commoner from a neighboring town willing to accept the role, despite the slug-dismantling duties that await him. He's positively thrilled at the chance to rub elbows with true aristocrats, even if his job involves less glamorous endeavors.

The newly formed Ministry of Fine Arts has a staffing problem - one minister dead within six months of its inception, his successor snuffed out shortly before the General Election. When a third victim, Permanent Secretary Edwin Pompfret is fatally crushed by the fall of a giant bust, Inspector Julian Rivers is drawn into a case of murder of artistic devilment.

When the San Angelo drifts into port in the Thames Estuary, telephones begin to ring across the capital and an intricate series of events is set in motion. Beset by dreadful storms in the Bay of Biscay, the ship, along with the 'mixed cargo' it carries, is late. Unaware of the machinations of avaricious importers, wayward captains and unscrupulous traders, Harry Reed and June Harvey are thrust together by a riverside accident, before being swept into the current of a dark plot developing on the dockside.

While hot on the heels of serial coupon-racketeer Gordon Ginner, Chief Inspector MacDonald of Scotland Yard receives word of an intriguing incident up in Lancashire – the summer cottage of local farmer Giles Hoggett has been broken into, with an assortment of seemingly random items missing which include a complete reel of salmon line, a large sack, and two iron dogs from his fireplace. What first appears as a simple break-in quickly spirals into a mystery of contested land grabs for fishing between farmers, made all the more enticing to MacDonald when a body is then found in the river.

A man is found dead in an escape tunnel in an Italian prisoner of war camp. Did he die in an accidental collapse - or was this murder? Captain Henry 'Cuckoo' Goyles, master tunneller and amateur detective, takes up the case. This classic locked room mystery with a closed circle of suspects is woven together with a thrilling story of escape from the camp, as the Second World War nears its endgame and the British prisoners prepare to flee into the Italian countryside.

It is a dark and misty night, and bachelors Nicholas and Ian are driving to the ball at Fordings, a beautiful concert hall in the countryside. There waits the charming Dilys Maine, and a party buzzing with rumours of one Rosemary Reeve who disappeared on the eve of this event the previous year. With thoughts of this mysterious case ringing in their ears, Dilys and Nicholas strike a stranger on the drive back home, launching a new investigation and unwittingly reviving the search for what really became of Rosemary Reeve.

The Undignified Melodrama of the Bone of Contention is a short story from Dorothy Sayers' book, Lord Peter Views the Body. In The Undignified Melodrama of the Bone of Contention, Lord Peter Wimsey dives into a heated village dispute over an old will and a mysterious bone. When a bitter inheritance battle turns deadly, Lord Peter steps in to uncover the truth. With his wit and deductive skill, he navigates the underlying tensions, local rivalries, and hidden motives. Dorothy L.

A short story from British Library Crime Classic The Christmas Card Crime and Other Stories. A brutal murder and a shocking deathbed confession - the love triangle of Karen Garborg, Thord Jensen and Olaf Kinck proves deadly on the Norwegian ski slopes.

In the comfortable English Dorsetshire village of Anneypenny in the 1930s, fruit farmer Douglas Sewell–narrator of the story–sees his friend John die in agony. The death certificate states gastric ulcers but the post mortem’s revealing of poison punctures Anneypenny’s idyllic backdrop. Soon every friend and neighbour seems to harbour something suspicious. Douglas challenges his readers, or listeners, to answer the key questions before throwing out several scenarios and turning them upside-down in a tantalising path to the truth.

A novelist ambles down the lanes of a cosy country village, replete with Tudor houses and quaint cottages. In her writer's mind she pictures the sordid truth beyond the veneer, a seemingly laughable proposition - until the coming of the letters. Anonymous letters from a poisoned pen, sowing discord and defaming everybody from the Rector to the 'queen of the village' Miss Decima Asprey. Naturally, where there is venom in the air and dark secrets are threatening to come to light, the shadow of death is not far behind.

"The horror on the train, great though it may turn out to be, will not compare with the horror that exists here, in this house." On Christmas Eve, heavy snowfall brings a train to a halt near the village of Hemmersby. Several passengers take shelter in a deserted country house, where the fire has been lit and the table laid for tea - but no one is at home. Trapped together for Christmas, the passengers are seeking to unravel the secrets of the empty house when a murderer strikes in their midst.

England, 1925. After years shut away from the world, former detective Lord Edgington of Cranley Hall plans a grand ball to celebrate his seventy-fifth birthday. But when someone starts bumping off members of his scheming family, the old man enlists his teenage grandson to help find the killer, before one of them is next.