Surfeit of Lampreys

Wealthy Sir Hubert Handesley's original and lively weekend house parties are deservedly famous. To amuse his guests, he has devised a new form of the fashionable Murder Game, in which a guest is secretly selected to commit a 'murder' in the dark, and everyone assembles to solve the crime. But when the lights go up this time, there is a real corpse....

Rickie Alleyn, son of the famed detective Roderick Alleyn had taken to the peaceful Channel Island village of Deep Cove to write his book. However, soon enough the tedium of provincial life threatens to send him packing until, that is, he finds a dead stablehand and sleepy community's world is upturned. His father is called to take proceedings into hand, but as a darker side to island life emerges, one of illegal drugs and smuggling, Rickie goes missing. Will Ngaio Marsh's stalwart detective be able to find his son in time?

It started as a student exercise, the knife under the drape, the model's pose chalked in place. But before Agatha Troy, artist and instructor, returns to the class, the pose has been re-enacted in earnest: the model is dead, fixed for ever in one of the most dramatic poses Troy has ever seen. It's a difficult case for Chief Detective Inspector Alleyn. How can he believe that the woman he loves is a murderess? And yet no one can be above suspicion.

"Anyone who murdered Colonel Protheroe," declared the parson, "would be doing the world at large a service!" It was a careless remark for a man of the cloth. And one which was to come back and haunt the clergyman just a few hours later. From seven potential murderers, Miss Marple must seek out the suspect who has both motive and opportunity.

The superlatively analytical Inspector Hemingway is confronted by a murder that seems impossible – no one was near the murder weapon at the time the shot was fired. Everyone on the scene seems to have a motive, not to mention the wherewithal to commit murder, and alibis that simply don't hold up.

When George Abbershaw is invited to Black Dudley Manor for the weekend, he has only one thing on his mind - proposing to Meggie Oliphant. Unfortunately for George, things don't quite go according to plan. A harmless game turns decidedly deadly and suspicions of murder take precedence over matrimony. Trapped in a remote country house with a murderer, George can see no way out. But Albert Campion can.

Celebrated amateur detective Albert Campion awakes in hospital accused of attacking a police officer and suffering from acute amnesia. All he can remember is that he was on a mission of vital importance to His Majesty's government before his accident. On the run from the police and unable to recognise even his faithful servant Lugg or his own fiancee, Campion struggles desperately to put the pieces together while the very fate of England is at stake.

First, there is a skeleton in a dinner jacket. Then, a corpse in a golden aeroplane. After another body is found, Albert Campion nearly makes a fourth. Both the skeleton and the corpse have died with suspicious convenience for Georgia Wells, a monstrous but charming actress with a raffish entourage. Georgia's best friend just happens to be Valentine, a top couturier and Campion's sister. In order to protect Valentine, Campion must unravel a story of blackmail and ruthless murder.

Everyone fell under the spell of Jimmy Sutane, the charming and talented song-and-dance man. Everyone, that is, except the spiteful practical joker who put a pin in his stick of grease-paint and pasted 'Last Week' over the 'House Full' notices. Nothing too deadly. But as soon as Albert Campion is called in to investigate, people begin to die, and there's no shortage of suspects when the first victim's death is so convenient for so many.

The secrets of the respected publishing house of Barnabus Ltd. stretch back many years, but when one of the directors is found dead, locked in the company's strongroom, it's time for Albert Campion to set to work puzzling out the mysteries.