The women of Hexton-on-Weir decide that Father Battersby, the new vicar, cannot remain professionally celibate, but their matchmaking plans run amok when the church gala planned to draw out the vicar is halted by murder. Reprint. IP. ...

Vernon Watts may have been beloved by the millions of faithful viewers of the long-running soap opera Jubilee Terrace but his fellow cast members knew him for what he was -- an egotistical former music-hall performer whose untimely death in a pedestrian accident was not something to be universally regretted.

Sadly, though, director Reggie Friedman soon fills the supposed void by asking Hamish Fawley, an equally unpleasant former member of the Jubilee Terrace troupe, to rejoin the soap. Hamish was never much liked. Now he's more obnoxious than ever.

The mood on the set is not exactly serene, a situation made worse when the police receive an anonymous letter suggesting that Vernon Watts's "accident" may in fact have been murder. Did one of his fellow actors push Vernon into the oncoming traffic?

Detective Inspector Charlie Peace faces tough challenges as he probes the make-believe world of skilled thespians to find a possible killer. With a cast of suspects who are trained to emote on cue, Charlie will need all of his policeman's instincts if he's to avert further tragedy.

Writing with his usual acerbic wit and penetrating insight into human foibles, acclaimed master of mystery Robert Barnard gives us another winning entry in his magnificent body of work....

The wife of a vicar, Rosemary Sheffield suddenly decides she no longer believes in God, leaves her marriage, and befriends a Bosnian named Stanko, who ends leading her back to the parish and embroiling her murder investigation. Reprint. PW. ...

Vernon Watts may have been beloved by the millions of faithful viewers of the long-running soap opera Jubilee Terrace but his fellow cast members knew him for what he was -- an egotistical former music-hall performer whose untimely death in a pedestrian accident was not something to be universally regretted.

Sadly, though, director Reggie Friedman soon fills the supposed void by asking Hamish Fawley, an equally unpleasant former member of the Jubilee Terrace troupe, to rejoin the soap. Hamish was never much liked. Now he's more obnoxious than ever.

The mood on the set is not exactly serene, a situation made worse when the police receive an anonymous letter suggesting that Vernon Watts's "accident" may in fact have been murder. Did one of his fellow actors push Vernon into the oncoming traffic?

Detective Inspector Charlie Peace faces tough challenges as he probes the make-believe world of skilled thespians to find a possible killer. With a cast of suspects who are trained to emote on cue, Charlie will need all of his policeman's instincts if he's to avert further tragedy.

Writing with his usual acerbic wit and penetrating insight into human foibles, acclaimed master of mystery Robert Barnard gives us another winning entry in his magnificent body of work....

A man's home is his castle, but for Percy Spender ("call me perce") that motto has been taken just a bit too literally. After the sudden death of first one distant relative and then another, the amiable Perce has become the 12th Earl of Ellesmere. And his home, no longer a cozy council flat, is now the drafty, imposing Chetton Hall, complete with more bedrooms than Perce can count and an army of servants. Frankly, all these fancy-pants trappings make Perce itch. He'd just as soon sell up, buy a comfy cottage, and put a bundle on the ponies. However, some of his mates and family members have other ideas. And the sad fact is that an Unfortunate Accident can happen to anyone, even a lord of the realm....

A small-town vicar's daughter, Sara Causseley could not be more delighted by her new job as governess to the aristocratic Hallam clan. The children are precociously adorable, the gardens at Hallam House are a dream, and the conversation -- at glittering dinners, at boisterous family picnics -- is as stimulating as she could possibly have wished. But ominous political clouds are gathering over Europe, and as England slips inexorably toward World War II, the Hallams' political views make the family increasingly unpopular. No one, though, suspects the extent of the malice that is percolating in the surrounding countryside until a human skeleton -- and then a human corpse -- are found on the Hallam grounds, sending some kind of ugly message. That message and the source of its hate will remain all but incomprehensible to Sara for some time, until war and its violations have left her with a very new view of those sunny picnics on the Hallam lawns....