P. D James

Throughout her illustrious career as the Queen of Crime, P. D. James was frequently commissioned by newspapers and magazines to write a special short story for Christmas. Four of the best are collected here. 

“Mystery lovers are in for a very merry time. . . . Will entertain and delight.” —USA Today
Each of these stories is as playful as it is ingeniously plotted, the author's sly humor as evident...

An anthology of six previously uncollected stories explores the memories, emotional machinations, rationalizations, dreams, and desires of people who get away with the perfect murder or who help keep information about a killing secret.

Two bodies, their throats cut with brutal precision, lie in a waste of blood in the dingy vestry of St Matthew's Church, Paddington. One is an alcoholic tramp; the other, Sir Paul Berowne, a recently resigned Minister of the Crown. Dalgliesh arrives to begin his investigations.

The museum is dedicated to the years 1919-1939 and one of the galleries, the Murder Room, displays exhibits from the most notorious cases of those inter-war-years. And now a modern killer is at work, the crimes uncannily echoing the cases on display. All the small group of people, the trustees, staff and volunteers, who work in the Dupayne, have the means and the opportunity for murder. One of them the ruthlessness to kill and kill again.

The untimely death of a young priest in training draws Commander Adam Dalgliesh back to East Anglia to investigate at the request of the young man's father, as Dalgliesh finds himself drawn into a complex and violent mystery.

A subtle and powerful work of contemporary fiction. Combe Island off the Cornish coast has a bloodstained history of piracy and cruelty but now, privately owned, it offers respite to over-stressed men and women in positions of high authority who require privacy and guaranteed security. But the peace of Combe is violated when one of the distinguished visitors is bizarrely murdered. Commander Adam Dalgliesh and his team are called on to solve a sensitive...

Presents an analysis of detective fiction and the works of some of its most noteworthy authors.

An evil-tempered forensic scientist is put to death, putting many of his colleagues out of misery. Commander Adam Dalgliesh must exhume the secrets of Dr. Lorrimer's laboratory in order to lay bare the murderous motive hidden in one human heart.

The mysterious and tragic deaths of two student nurses send Adam Dalgliesh, Chief Superintendent of Scotland Yard, to hunt the vicious killer seeking refuge in the Nightingale House.