An English Murder

By Cyril Hare

Book Overview

A country house murder mystery classic, as a party find themselves snowed-in on Christmas Eve with a murderer among them... The snow is thick, the phone line is down, and no one is getting in or out of Warbeck Hall. All is set for a lovely Christmas, with friends and family gathered round the fire, except as the bells chime midnight, a murder is committed. But who is responsible? The scorned young lover? The lord's passed-over cousin? The social climbing politician's wife? The Czech history professor? The obsequious butler? And perhaps the real question is: Can they survive long enough to find out?

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0571339018
• ISBN13: 9780571339013
• Release Date: November 2017
• Publisher: Faber & Faber
• Length: 240 Pages
• Weight: 0.40 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 5.0" x 7.7"

Customer Reviews

A SATISFYING ENGLISH MYSTERY

I purchased this book in a used book store because it looked like it might be a good mystery and I have been reading a lot of mystery writers of the 30s and 40s and earlier. The previous review pretty much says it all without giving away the mystery. I am in the process of reading all of his books. TENANT FOR DEATH is a good mystery with a somewhat surprising twist and DEATH IS NO SPORTSMAN is interesting also for a picture of the British "system" of stream fishing rights and of fly fishing.

Another Superb English Mystery by Cyril Hare - Engaging, Intelligent Plot

An English Mystery (1951) is one of those remarkably good English mysteries that remains as fascinating and enjoyable today as it was decades ago. Inexplicably, the author Cyril Hare (pseudonym for A. A. Gordon Clark, a distinguished English judge) is not well-known, and yet his stories are uniformly excellent. Fortunately, many of his mysteries have been reissued by Dover, Harper-Perennial, and most recently by House of Stratus. An English Mystery offers everything that might be expected in an English mystery. Relatives and guests gathered together for the Christmas holidays find themselves snowbound in a remote country manor. Their host is an aged peer, still aristocratic, although his family has suffered gradual decline, even impoverishment. And, of course, there is the faithful butler. In Cyril Hare's hands, these traditional elements are melded into an exceptionally good story, notable for its fascinating characterizations, it decidedly intelligent plot, and for its surprising, and satisfying, deductive solution. An English Mystery makes a great introduction to the literate, intelligent, and yet completely enjoyable stories by Cyril Hare. I also highly recommend three other mysteries by Cyril Hare: Untimely Death, The Wind Blows Death, and Suicide Excepted.