9 stories
Gaudy Night
The dons of Harriet Vane's alma mater, the all-female Shrewsbury College, Oxford, have invited her back to attend the annual Gaudy celebrations. However, the mood turns sour when someone begins a series of malicious acts including poison-pen messages, obscene graffiti, and wanton vandalism. Despite the dons' reluctance to share the secret with an outsider, Harriet convinces them to let her bring in Lord Peter Wimsey to assist the investigation—but his involvement is not without complications, both personal and professional.
Murder Must Advertise
When executive Victor Dean dies from a fall down the iron staircase at Pym's Publicity, a posh London advertising agency, Lord Peter Wimsey goes undercover to investigate.
Whose Body
Thipps, an architect, finds a dead body wearing nothing but a pair of pince-nez in the bath of his London flat. Lord Peter Wimsey—a nobleman who has recently developed an interest in criminal investigation as a hobby—resolves to investigate the matter privately.
Unnatural Death
The wealthy Agatha Dawson is dead--a trifle sooner than expected--but there are no apparent signs of foul play. Lord Peter Wimsey, however, senses that something is amiss and refuses to let the case rest--even without any clues or leads. Suddenly, he is faced with another murder: Agatha's maid. Can super-sleuth Wimsey find the murderer and solve the case before he becomes the killer's next victim?The intricate trail of horror and senseless murder leads from a beautiful Hampshire village to a fashionable London flat and a deliberate test of amour.
Have His Carcase
A young woman falls asleep on a deserted beach and wakes to discover the body of a man whose throat has been slashed from ear to ear . . . The young woman is the celebrated detective novelist Harriet Vane, once again drawn against her will into a murder investigation in which she herself could be a suspect.
The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club
On the afternoon of 10 November, ninety-year-old General Fentiman is called to the deathbed of his estranged sister, Lady Dormer, and learns that under the terms of her will he stands to inherit most of her substantial fortune – money sorely needed by his grandsons Robert and George Fentiman.
Send for Paul Temple
In the dead of night, a watchman is brutally attacked and with his dying breath cries out, "The Green Finger!" It is the latest in a series of robberies to take place that have left Scotland Yard mystified, and with no other choice but to call upon the expertise of novelist and criminologist Paul Temple.
Five Red Herrings
The majestic landscape of the Scottish coast has attracted artists and fishermen for centuries. In the idyllic village of Kirkcudbright, every resident and visitor has two things in common: They either fish or paint (or do both), and they all hate Sandy Campbell. Though a fair painter, he is a rotten human being, and cannot enter a pub without raising the blood pressure of everybody there. Campbell’s body is found at the bottom of a steep hill, and his easel stands at the top, suggesting that he took a tumble while painting. But something about the death doesn’t sit right with gentleman sleuth Lord Peter Wimsey. No one in Kirkcudbright liked Campbell, and six hated him enough to become suspects. Five are innocent, and the other is the perpetrator of one of the most ingenious murders Lord Peter has ever encountered.
Clouds of Witness
Rustic old Riddlesdale Lodge was a Wimsey family retreat filled with country pleasures and the thrill of the hunt -- until the game turned up human and quite dead. He lay among the chrysanthemums, wore slippers and a dinner jacket and was Lord Peter's brother-in-law-to-be. His accused murderer was Wimsey's own brother, and if murder set all in the family wasn't enough to boggle the unflappable Lord Wimsey, perhaps a few twists of fate would be -- a mysterious vanishing midnight letter from Egypt...a grieving fiancee with suitcase in hand...and a bullet destined for one very special Wimsey.
