Historical Women Detectives

After losing her copywriting job, young Gwynne Dacres seeks a place to live when she stumbles upon Mrs. Garr's old boarding house. Despite the gruff landlady and an assortment of shifty tenants, Gwynne rents a room for herself. She spends her first few nights at 593 Trent Street tensely awake, the house creaking and groaning as if listening to everything that happens behind its closed doors. A chain of chilling events leads to the gruesome discovery of a mutilated body in the basement kitchen, dead of unknown circumstances. Was it an accident or murder?

Mystery People of the UK The use of modern forensic methods on this long-forgotten case is fascinating as is the incorporation of real figures from 1902 New York. 5-Stars on Goodreads In 1902, nineteen-year-old Ruby was charged with murdering her family and sent away to a women’s asylum. Fast forward to 2016 to another family murder. Are they connected? This book was wonderfully written, and I love the history of old mental institutions and a murder mystery on top. . . what an excellent read! Hart Island is a small island located in the Long Island Sound, off the coast of the Bronx, in ...

It's no rest for the wicked when Kate Shackleton picks up her second professional sleuthing case. But exposing the culprit of a pawn-shop robbery turns sinister when her investigation takes her to the wealthy neighborhoods of Harrogate - and murder is only one step behind. A night at the theater should have been just what the doctor ordered, until Kate stumbles across a body in the doorway. The knife sticking out of its chest definitely suggests a killer in the theater's midst. Kate likes nothing better than a mystery - except solving it.

Nothing ever happens in August, so Kate goes off on a long-overdue holiday to Whitby to visit her friend Alma who works there as a fortune teller. She's been looking forward to a relaxing seaside sojourn, but, upon arrival, she discovers that Alma's daughter, Felicity, has disappeared, leaving her mother a note and the pawn ticket for their only asset: a watch-guard. What makes this more intriguing is that the jeweler who advanced Felicity the 30 shillings is Jack Phillips, Alma's current gentleman friend.

Smitten with spring fever, Elizabeth Tudor escapes London for fantastical Nonsuch Palace in the sweet Surrey countryside. There she hopes to relax and pose for the official royal portrait for which she is holding a competition. But one of her artists is burned to death, and portraits of the queen are going up in flames. When she hears that her rival, the dangerous Mary, Queen of Scots, has been peering in mirrors and announcing, "I see the next queen of England!" Elizabeth summons her Privy Plot Council.

When Sidney Grice journeys to Yorkshire to solve a mysterious death, March Middleton, his ward, is left to her own devices in a London swarming with danger and vice. Curiosity, as we know, has a dark edge. So when an intriguing letter leads March to the gates of the palatial Saturn Villa and into the nightmarish world of her long-lost uncle, it could be the beginning of an end for all.

“An ingenious marriage of comedy and crime” (Olga Tokarczuk, Nobel Laureate): When amateur sleuth and cunning socialite Zofia Turbotyńska’s beloved maid goes missing, she dives deep into Cracow’s web of crime, with only her trusted cook for company.

This summer, Queen Elizabeth I is in no mood for games. She and her court were expecting to spend the warmer months lounging in great manor houses, feasting in the fields, tempting forbidden romance, and perhaps engaging in sport. But someone in the Queen's entourage isn't playing by the rules…and soon Elizabeth is dodging crossbows, longbows, and - worst of all - the threats of her greatest rival, Mary Queen of Scots. As bodies and clues pile up, the mystery and dangers deepen like the surrounding forests.

In 1566, Elizabeth Tudor faces tremendous opposition from Parliament for ruling England without the help of a husband. Instead, she turns to her Privy Plot Council for help, only to discover from her royal herbalist that a woman has drowned in a tub of starch. Soon another garment worker meets the same rigid fate. Elizabeth becomes unbending in her attempts to solve the murders, as well as iron out the problems of her kingdom.

1957 - A young woman is found dead in a mews house a mile from Buckingham Palace, wearing only silk underwear and a a diamond tiara. An older man is discovered nearby, garrotted and pierced through the eye with a long, sharp implement. According to the police, a high society card game was going on downstairs that night. One of the players surely committed the murders, but each of them can give the others an alibi.

It's the summer of 1894, and an infidelity case has brought PI Mary Handley to a far corner of Brooklyn: Coney Island. In the midst of her investigation, Mary is contacted by a convicted man's brother to reopen a murder case. A prostitute was killed by a Jack the Ripper copycat years ago in her New York hotel room, but her true killer was never found. Once again it's up to Mary to make right the city's wrongs. New York City's untouchable head of detectives, Thomas Byrnes, swears he put the right man behind bars, but as Mary digs deeper, she finds corruption.

Highlands Lake is a small town…but even there where the most reliable news can be found in the local bakery and friendships last a lifetime…there are those who choose to live outside the rules…Jonathan Delamarck takes his job seriously. As such, murder investigations typically slide to the top of his priority list whether they took place in the last twenty-four hours or sometime in the last two hundred years. He believed that justice began with identifying the individual who was responsible. And that was exactly what he planned to do. Have you ever said something you really wish you ...

In the summer of 1932, Maisie Dobbs’s career takes an exciting new turn when she accepts an undercover assignment directed by Scotland Yard's Special Branch. Posing as a junior lecturer, she is sent to a private college in Cambridge to monitor any activities "not in the interests of His Majesty’s Government." When the college's controversial pacifist founder and principal, Greville Liddicote, is murdered, Maisie is directed to stand back from the investigation. But she soon discovers something suspicious....

January 1922, and the Bangalore constabulary is on high alert. Edward, Prince of Wales, is scheduled to visit the city, seeking to redeem his reputation after disastrous visits to Bombay and Calcutta which were marked by violent anti-British riots. Kaveri has none of these concerns on her mind; she's excited as she and her husband Ramu have been given VIP tickets to the famous Bangalore circus. But when a celebrity magician disappears into thin air and his son pleads with Kaveri to find his vanished father, she is stunned to discover Inspector Ismail telling her to leave the case well alone.

Maud West ran her detective agency in London for more than 30 years, having started sleuthing on behalf of society’s finest in 1905. Her exploits grabbed headlines throughout the world, but beneath the public persona, she was forced to hide vital aspects of her own identity in order to thrive in a class-obsessed and male-dominated world. And - as Susannah Stapleton reveals - she was a most unreliable witness to her own life. Who was Maud? And what was the reality of being a female private detective in the Golden Age of Crime?

Young Harriet and her brother Austin have always been scared of the quarry where their stonemason father works. So when they find him dead on the cold ground, they scarper quick smart and look for help. When help arrives, the quarry is deserted and there is no sign of the body. Were the children mistaken? Is their father not dead? Did he simply get up and run away? It seems like another unusual case requiring the expertise of Kate Shackleton. But for Kate this is one case where surprising family ties makes it her most dangerous and delicate yet.

New York, 1958. Even though Evelyn Murphy has made progress conquering her agoraphobia by leaving the Pinnacle, she still feels most comfortable in her father's hotel. With Malcolm Cooper, her new boyfriend and fellow employee at the hotel, Evelyn feels prepared for whatever happens next. In this case, it’s throwing a big fundraiser with the who’s who of New York City. The night is a success, and Evelyn finally takes up Malcolm’s offer to visit his apartment in Yonkers. As the party ends, they sneak away to the garage to get Evelyn's car. But Evelyn's always been good at finding things.

Penrose and Pyke’s wedding dream turns to ashes when the local women’s refuge goes up in flames. Grace Penrose is used to protesters at Lavender House, but she never expected them to set the refuge on fire, especially not on her wedding day. And her mother’s carefully orchestrated wedding plan definitely did not include Charlie Pyke disappearing into an inferno. The discovery of a woman’s body in the smouldering ruins rouses Grace and Charlie’s detective instincts. With marital bliss on their minds, an investigation is the last thing they need. But how can they ignore a murder, ...

It is the crowning day of twenty-five-year-old Bess Tudor's life as she returns from exile to become England's queen. But even as her magnificent procession wends its way to Westminster Palace, a shot rings out, muffled by the jostling crowd. Within moments of becoming England's ruler, Elizabeth learns of the brutal murder of a highborn lady of the court, the sister of one of her dearest friends.

Now showing at the Palace: classic movies, ghostly mayhem, and murder! When Nora Paige agrees to use the Palace movie theater for the launch of a new online game, she has no way of knowing that the event will end in murder. But when one of the theater’s owners is accused of the crime, the future of the Palace could be in danger. With help from Trixie, the lively ghost of a 1930s usherette, Nora sets out to solve the crime, all while dealing with the latest manipulations from her lying ex, the meddling of a Hollywood mogul with revenge on his mind, and the mysterious delivery box of ...