First published in 1929, now public domain in the US and Canada, this was the first in a series of seven novels featuring the character of Chief Inspector Poole, published during the Golden Age of Detective Fiction. It is notable for its portrayal of a German Jewish character, a banker who seeks revenge and wants to murder someone for his mistreatment. It was well-received by critics and sold well. The Observer wrote "It would be difficult to overpraise it." After banker Sir Garth Fratten ...

Sir Robert D'Arcy, High Sheriff of Brackenshire, harbours a painful memory of what he considers his shameful surrender to the Germans in 1916. Gradually he realises nothing is known of the incident and his confidence returns, and he gains in honour and responsibility in the county. Then, out of the blue, a man appears who threatens to reveal the incident - or to keep it hidden, at a price. D'Arcy resists this new enemy, but is handicapped by his own view of his position, his past deed, his...

Colonel Jerrod has just six months to live, but he needs a year if he is to save Brackton, the family estate, from crippling death duties. Then his ambitious son, Grant, has an idea, one that develops into a complicated fraud that, he hopes, will safeguard Brackton for future generations. But there is a boating accident, in which Colonel Jerrod is believed drowned, and a visit at Brackton from the Inland Revenue to clear up some routine questions... Before long, Chief Inspector Poole finds...

A baker's dozen of stories -- 13 to be exact -- from the Golden Age master of the police procedural: seven from the casebook of Detective Inspector John Poole, whose brilliant work in the The Duke of York's Steps and No Friendly Drop will be remembered by readers of Wade novels; and six miscellaneous narratives of crime and detection, all of them displaying the scientific ingenuity which distinguishes Wade's work.

“No Friendly Drop” (1931) by Henry Wade. At first it seems that Lord Henry Grayle has taken an overdose of sleeping medicine, but the autopsy reveals a tiny amount of scopolamine along with the draught—harmless in itself, but fatal when mixed... A poisoner with apparently expert knowledge is at work in the great house at Tassart. But from what motive, and how? Before he can find an answer to these questions, Detective-Inspector John Poole is faced with a second, more horrible murder.

Two men in Hadestone Prison are approaching the end of their sentences for burglary and assault. James Carson is well educated but brutal; Toddy Shaw is a cheerful cockney who considers burglary a sport. Trouble flares in the chapel, and both Shaw and Carson are involved. Eventually both men are released, but old hatreds fester. Toddy gets work on leaving prison, wanting to do right by his wife and family. Carson, released later, soon comes looking for Toddy. Then a nightwatchman at a bank...

In “Gold Was Our Grave,” first published simultaneously in the US and UK in 1954, Hector Berrenton returns home from hospital after a serious car accident. Suspecting Berrenton's car has been tampered with, the North Sussex Police call in Scotland Yard. Chief Inspector John Poole, put in charge of the investigation, quickly discovers that three years earlier Berrenton and his partner, Jocelyn Fallon, had been on trial accused of fraud. The crime they were accused of was in connection with ...

The Duke of York’s Steps by Henry Wade is a classic British detective novel and one of the most acclaimed entries in the Inspector Poole series. First published in 1937, the book exemplifies the Golden Age of crime fiction, combining meticulous police procedure with psychological insight and a carefully constructed mystery. The novel opens with the discovery of a man’s body at the foot of the Duke of York’s Steps in London. What initially appears to be a straightforward death soon reveals ...

It's "great fun" when a baker's dozen of Golden Age authors collaborate on a whodunit—including Agatha Christie, Dorothy L. Sayers, and G. K. Chesterton ( The Guardian).Originally published in 1931, The Floating Admiral is a classic literary collaboration by members of the Detection Club, in which each chapter is written by a different mystery author, with G. K. Chesterton adding a prologue after the novel was completed. Each writer was tasked wit...

The Floating Admiral (The Detection Club). Illustrated Edition is a landmark of classic British detective fiction and a unique literary experiment created by the celebrated members of the Detection Club, a society of the genre’s finest writers. When the body of an unknown man is discovered drifting in a small boat along a quiet English river, what seems at first a simple mystery quickly unfolds into a web of secrets, false leads, and conflicting testimonies. Each chapter was written by a d...

In an oak-panelled room in a rural Oxford gastropub, ten young undergraduates with cut-glass vowels and deep pockets are meeting, intent on restoring their right to rule - and on getting totally "chatueaued". Members of The Riot Club, an elite student dining society, the fraternity starts to fray when they discover they're a guinea-fowl short and the prostitute they've hired is suddenly banished.An apparent spoof on Oxford's notorious Bullingdon Club, whose past members include Bor...

Travel to exciting and dangerous Dimensions with us...Get Me OutThe day after the Fourth of July, Shaya receives a panicked call from her father: "Come and get me out of here!" His voice trembles with terror. People are dying, and the police are nowhere to be found. Can Shaya uncover the truth behind the chaos before it's too late?Face Your FearSally is trapped in an unrelenting cycle of emotional and physical torment. To brea...