Perfect blue skies, a soft summer breeze and a view to die for! Lord Edgington of Cranley Hall has some living to do. The next item to cross off on his list of grand ambitions is a serene balloon flight above his palatial estate. But, after a man falls to his death, the pleasant pursuit is interrupted, and the esteemed detective suspects foul play. With the help of his hapless grandson, their loyal golden retriever and a couple of parachutes, Lord Edgington must solve the murder before the meddlesome police arrive to take control of the case. But, when all of the suspects seem like such nice chaps, it's awfully difficult to spot a killer. An Agatha-Christie-style novella with a dash of Downton Abbey thrown in, "Death from High Places" is a standalone, 1920s whodunit which immediately follows "Murder at the Spring Ball", the first novel in the bestselling "Lord Edgington Investigates..." series of mysteries.

This is the fascinating life of femme fatale Alice de Janzé, a book that “may well have solved the mystery of Lord Erroll’s killing” (San Francisco Chronicle)—the story at the center of James Fox’s White Mischief. A glamorous American multimillionairess, Alice de Janzé scandalized 1920s Paris when she left her aristocratic French husband for an English lover—whom she later tried to kill in a failed murder-suicide. Abandoning Paris for the moneyed British colonial society known as Kenya’s Happy Valley, she became the lover of womanizer Joss Hay, Lord Erroll. In 1941, Erroll was shot in his car on an isolated road. The crime remained unsolved.Paul Spicer, whose mother was a confidante of Alice’s, uses personal letters and research to piece together what really happened that fateful evening. He brings to life an era of unimaginable wealth and indulgence, where jealousy and hidden passions brewed. At the heart of The Temptress is Alice, whose seductive charms no man could resist, and whose unfulfilled quest for love ended in her own suicide at age forty-two.From Publishers WeeklyPlease note: the ebook edition does not include photos that originally appeared in the printed book.The 1941 fatal shooting of British earl Joss Erroll in Kenya made headlines worldwide (and was the subject of the book and movie White Mischief). A cuckolded husband was acquitted, and now Kenyan-born former oil executive Spicer intriguingly fingers his late mother™s friend, Countess Alice de Janzé, Joss™s discarded mistress. Alice™s complicated and violent love life was possibly attributable to bipolar disorder and to abandonment by her father, a self-made American millionaire, when Alice was 13. Alice married a French count, Frédéric de Janzé, and to escape the stuffy confines of French society, the couple spent much of their time in Kenya. There Alice had two love affairs that, according to Spicer, goaded Alice to violence: she made a botched murder-suicide attempt in 1927 when English aristocrat Raymund de Trafford rejected her, yet they married in 1932 (Alice had already left her husband). Alice had also begun a two-decade-long liaison with Joss. Though Joss had many enemies, Spicer posits that Alice killed Joss, and months later, at age 42, committed suicide, hoping they would be reunited in the afterlife. The author™s depiction of the unstable heiress and her milieu of wealthy expatriates cavorting in the Kenyan highlands is engrossing. 8 pages of b&w photos. Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. From BooklistKenya's notorious “Happy Valley” set flourished during the twenties and thirties, providing enough scandalous fodder to fuel numerous books and movies. The Kenyan-born Spicer takes a leaf from Frances Osborne's The Bolter: Idina Sackville—the Woman Who Scandalized 1920s Society and Became White Mischief's Infamous Seductress (2009) by chronicling the checkered life of Alice de Janzé, another fascinating, if twisted, resident of Happy Valley. Focusing on the unsolved murder of the wickedly handsome Joss Hay, Lord Erroll in 1941, he alleges that Alice, a fading American glamour girl with a penchant for titled aristos, actually shot Erroll in a fit of insanely jealous pique. Basing his theory on the thinnest of evidence—gossip, hearsay, and a letter of confession from Alice that he has never actually seen—he nevertheless paints an intriguing portrait of a thoroughly debauched social circle. Recommend this speculative true-crime scenario to readers prepared to reconcile simultaneous feelings of intrigue and antipathy. --Margaret Flanagan

When Jack left the police force to join the Forensic Science Unit in Canberra, he thought his days of visiting crime scenes were over. But while he's on leave in Sydney, his old friend Bob asks him to help out with a series of grisly murders. Someone is horribly mutilating and murdering convicted paedophiles the moment they are released from jail.  Still grieving from the collapse of his marriage and the disappearance of Jacinta, his teenage daughter, four years earlier, Jack tries to make sense of what is happening. An anonymous caller seems to link his daughter with the murders, though pursuit of that line of questioning leads nowhere fast. Against his instincts and professional judgement, Jack allows himself to become enmeshed in an affair that threatens to jeopardise the entire investigation. And then suddenly, Jacinta rings Jack, a desperate voice on the line saying, 'Dad, I've just done something really stupid...' 

Book DescriptionThe 13th Lord Francis Powerscourt murder mystery. Product DescriptionLondon, 1912, and the famed Ballet Russes have come to London to perform. Anticipation is high, for Diaghilev’s troupe is renowned throughout Europe. At the end of their famed performance of Thamar at the Royal Opera House, the Georgian queen stabs her prince to death and throws him into the river. But life mirrors art when the prince is found truly dead, stabbed through the heart in the orchestra pit below stage. But the corpse is not the dancer in the programme. It is his understudy. Powerscourt is summoned to investigate. But who was the intended victim – the understudy, or the star of the Ballets Russes? And the Ballet Russes are not the only Russian visitors in London this season. Lenin, Europe’s most dangerous revolutionary, has sent some bank robbery money to be changed into pounds. There are stolen jewels from St Petersburg to be sold. And there are other darker forces abroad too and Powerscourt has to look death in the face before he can solve the mystery of Death at the Ballet Russes 

In A PRESUMPTION OF DEATH, Jill Paton Walsh tells how World War II changed the lives of Peter, Harriet and their growing family. The story opens in 1940. Harriet Vane - now Lady Peter Wimsey - has taken her children to safety in the country. But the war has followed them: glamorous RAF pilots and even more glamorous land-girls scandalise the villagers; the blackout makes the night-time lanes as sinister as the back alleys of London. Then the villagés first air raid practise ends with a very real body on the ground - not a war casualty but a case of plain, old-fashioned murder. And even before the second body is found, Lord Peter Wimsey and his brilliant wife are on their way to finding the killer.

A ‘vampire’ is stalking the streets, attacking beautiful young women; some are murdered days later, others aren’t touched again. Gemma Lincoln, PI, begins to see a pattern and predicts which woman will be targeted next. But can she convince the police to take action?Meanwhile, at the salubrious Sapphire Springs Spa, a cosmetic surgery clinic that boasts the latest breakthrough in the search for eternal youth, clients are experiencing sudden onset depression and worse. Is the exclusive clinic involved in a lethal cover-up? While dealing with this brutal case, Gemma finds that her ex, Steve Brannigan, the father of her son Rafi, desperately needs her help. He is facing career destruction from a woman who also wants Gemma dead. As she moves closer to discovering the appalling truth about the murders, Rafi and Steve disappear. Confronting a mother’s worst nightmare, Gemma realises what she is prepared to do to save her son…

Business isn't booming for antiques dealer Abigail Timberlake Washburn. A local rug store is luring away her customers with its rock-bottom prices. Eager to check out the competition, Abby is delighted to find a priceless Persian amid the cut-rate carpets—and shocked when Gwendolyn Spears, the store's beleaguered owner, begs her to take it home! Abby feels more than a little guilty about getting such a great deal...especially when Gwendolyn is found dead the next morning.Investigating the brutal murder, Abby soon discovers that the prized Orientals of Charleston's society dames are nothing more than cheap fakes...and that a dangerous thief will do anything to pull the rug out from under her.