Mrs. Pollifax

Mrs. Virgil (Emily) Pollifax of New Brunswick, New Jersey, was a widow with grown children. She was tired of attending her Garden Club meetings. She wanted to do something good for her country. This first in the series sends Emily on her first case after she successfully persuades a skeptical CIA recruitment officer that she is the best person for the job.

Emily Pollifax is one of a precious few gray-haired female sleuths who solve their cases through unflagging determination, moral courage and wisdom that comes with age. In "The Amazing Mrs. Pollifax", Emily answers the call of that “nice Mr. Carstairs” to go to Istanbul as a courier and search for a missing agent.

Mrs. Pollifax has a new hat, and only she and Mr. Carstairs know it conceals eight false passports which she must smuggle into Bulgaria.

Emily “vacations” at an opulent Swiss resort in the hope of locating nine pounds of hijacked plutonium intended for an atom bomb.

A safari expedition in Zambia is the disguise Emily employs in order to locate a professional assassin among her fellow explorers. Along the way, she meets an extraordinary man named Cyrus.

Posing as a tourist, Emily makes her way to China with the job of protecting a CIA treasure.

Emily’s tranquil domesticity with new husband Cyrus is interrupted when she is called to Hong Kong in pursuit of a vanished agent.

A relaxing holiday in Thailand turns into a nightmare when Emily loses Cyrus to kidnappers.

All Mrs. Pollifax has to do is help a bumbling CIA agent confirm the identities of seven undercover informants in Morocco. A simple assignment. But right away, things go wrong. The first informant is murdered just after Mrs. P. identifies him in Fez. Worse, she has the frightening sensation that her associate is not who or what he says he is.

A former CIA operative turned art dealer waits in Italy, wounded and in hiding, for the cavalry. According to his SOS, only Mrs. Pollifax will do....

Kadi Hopkirk has been hiding in Mrs. Pollifax's junk closet for two days. Kadi spills out an improbable story - that since a chance meeting with a childhood friend she has been followed by persons unknown in a sinister van. A little experiment on Mrs. P's part proves at least this part of the story correct. What began as a dash for safety and a call for help expands into an assignment that leads to hair-trigger violence in exotic places.

A missing salami leads Mrs. Pollifax to a shocking discovery: a woman is hiding in her house. Even more unsettling is the revelation that ever since the young woman had a chance encounter with the heir to the throne of Ubangiba, she has been followed by deadly hit men. What do these men want?

In response to a desperate SOS, Kadi Hopkirk flies to the African country of Ubangiba, where her childhood friend, Sammat, is soon to be crowned king. Mrs. Pollifax, reluctant to allow the girl to venture alone into what she fears may be grave danger, crashes the party.

Emily Pollifax accompanies her young friend Kadi back to Africa, where a mutual friend is to be crowned king of his small country. But when several people are slashed by murderous lion claws and Kadi disappears, Mrs. Pollifax must begin a perilous investigation. Fortunately for all, staunch determination and polished karate skills are on her side.

Mrs. Pollifax, Innocent Tourist whisks the gray-haired agent into a perilous web of intrigue that spreads across the drifting sands of the volatile Middle East. An old CIA friend, Farrell, must collect an inflammatory manuscript smuggled out of Iraq into Jordan. Farrell has a simple request for Emily—provide cover during his trip to Jordan by posing as his fun-loving elderly cousin. But before the plane even lands, danger begins stalking the sprightly Mrs. Pollifax.