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And Other Stories
by P. D. James
Four previously uncollected stories from one of the great mystery writers of our time - swift, cunning murder mysteries (two of which feature the young Adam Dalgliesh) that together, to borrow the author's own word, add up to a delightful "entertainment."
The newly appointed Sgt. Dalgliesh is drawn into a case that is "pure Agatha Christie." ... A "pedantic, respectable, censorious" clerk's secret taste for pornography is only the first reason he finds for not coming forward as a witness to a murder ... A best-selling crime novelist describes the crime she herself was involved in fifty years earlier ... Dalgliesh's godfather implores him to reinvestigate a notorious murder that might ease the godfather's mind about an inheritance, but which will reveal a truth that even the supremely upstanding Adam Dalgliesh will keep to himself.
Each of these stories is as playful as it is ingeniously plotted, the author's sly humor as evident as her hallmark narrative elegance and shrewd understanding of some of the most complex - not to say the most damning - aspects of human nature. A treat for P. D. James's legions of fans and anyone who enjoys the pleasures of a masterfully wrought whodunit.
"Starred Review. {The] puzzles are sure to please Christie fans, while offering enough psychological depth to satisfy those who want to emotionally invest in the characters, even if they appear for just a few dozen pages." - Publishers Weekly
"[N]o one would take exception to the concluding sentiment in McDermid's introduction: 'These stories are a delicious gift to us at a time when we thought we would read no more of P.D. James's work.' James' fans can only hope for several more such gifts." - Kirkus
"Four previously uncollected stories appear as a kind of after-dinner chocolate left on the pillows of the late mystery master's fans. As Val McDermid notes in her insightful foreword, James often employed the conventions of the cozy, but she was 'anything but cozy,' wittily subverting those conventions to tell much darker tales." - Booklist
This information about The Mistletoe Murder was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Photo © Ulla Montan
Phyllis Dorothy James, Baroness James of Holland Park OBE, better known as P. D. James, was born on August 3 1920 in Oxford, the eldest daughter of an Inland Revenue Official. The family moved first to Wales and then, when she was
11, to Cambridge where she attended the Cambridge High School for Girls. Due to financial pressures at home she left school when she was 16, first following her father into the tax office, then working in a theatre where she met her husband, Ernest Connor Bantry White, who was training to be a doctor.
They married in 1941 and had two daughters during the war years - she named her second daughter after her favorite author, Jane Austen. Connor was sent to
India during World War II with the Royal Army Medical Corps and returned
mentally disabled. He was...
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