Mrs. Bradley Books
If anything roused the rancour of guests at Chayning Court, it was that someone should be late for dinner. But the intrepid explorer Everard Mountjoy was dead in the bath. Beatrice Adela Lestrange Bradley takes it upon herself to investigate, unaware that she, along with all the other houseguests and staff, will be one of the suspects.
When Rupert Sethleigh's body is found one morning, minus its head, laid out in the village butcher shop, the inhabitants of Wandles Parva aren't particularly upset. Sethleigh was a blackmailing money lender and when the unconventional detective Mrs Bradley begins her investigation she finds no shortage of suspects. It soon transpires that most of the village seem to have been wandering about Manor Woods, home of the mysterious druidic stone on which Sethleigh's blood is found splashed, on the night he was murdered but can she eliminate the red herrings and catch the real killer?
An athletics competition to win an inheritance highlights this most eccentric British mystery featuring the most eccentric sleuth. The third of Gladys Mitchell's Mrs. Bradley mysteries, first published in 1930, its an example of how the author frequently bent the rules of the fair-play detective novel to her own absurdist ends. You will never guess the killer's motives, but you'll have fun watching Mrs. Bradley unravel this mystery.
When the vicar’s wife discovers that her unmarried housemaid is pregnant, sometime detective and full-time Freudian, Mrs. Bradley, undertakes an unnervingly unorthodox investigation into the mysterious pregnancy.
Hillmaston School has chosen The Mikado for their next school performance and, in recognition of her generous offer to finance the production, their meek and self-effacing arithmetic mistress is offered a key role. But when she disappears mid-way through the opening night performance and is later found dead, unconventional psychoanalyst Mrs Bradley is called in to investigate. To her surprise she soon discovers that the hapless teacher had quite a number of enemies - all with a motive for murder...
The quaint, cozy village of Saxon Wall is hiding a dark, sinister reality. When fiction author Hannibal Jones retires to Saxon Wall in hopes of reinvigorating his writing career, he instead finds himself in the midst of an increasingly puzzling and dangerous situation. Eccentric villagers and stories of curses, demons, and blood sacrifices abound. A devastating drought and imposing vicar escalate the pervasive fear until Hannibal Jones feels compelled to call in his good friend and detective, Mrs. Beatrice Lestrange Bradley. An alarming tale of a missing baby and suspicious deaths comes to light. And soon Bradley and Jones are at the center of a mystery wrought with conspiracy, murder…and witchcraft. This classic caper promises to entertain, frighten, and intrigue as you revel in the antics of the gloriously unorthodox sleuth Mrs. Bradley.
A hunt for a ghost turns to murder in this Mrs. Bradley mystery set in an Oxforshire village during the Christmas season.
Sir Rudri Hopkinson, an eccentric amateur archaeologist, is determined to recreate ancient rituals at the temple of Eleusis in Greece in the hope of summoning the goddess Demeter. He gathers together a motley collection of people to assist in the experiment, including a rival scholar, a handsome but cruel photographer and a trio of mischievous children. But when one of the group disappears, and a severed head turns up in a box of snakes, Mrs Bradley is called upon to investigate…
Dame Beatrice Lestrange Bradley becomes involved in investigating an apparent mystery at a convent school
The imminent publication in a limited edition of a scandalously anti-Semitic book— The Open Bellied Mountain —by the printing house of Saxant and Senss, finds the author of the inflammatory work—Fortinbras Carn—and his closest relatives receiving disturbing threatening letters; threats that soon have to be taken deadly seriously when the author’s wife is killed in mysterious circumstances. Mrs. Beatrice Adela Lestrange Bradley is soon drawn into a mystery as bizarre and as baffling as any that she has ever encountered during her long and illustrious career. Ably assisted by her resolute and energetic nephew Carey, and by the young and enterprising solicitor to the author’s family, she finds herself battling Nazis, nudists and gun-toting motorcyclists in equal numbers; unmasking the reason behind a sudden craze for wearing false beards; and the origin of several dismembered human body parts, which begin to appear in a variety of increasingly peculiar locations. All before eventually arriving at the case’s unexpected and surreal climax.
It is the early months of the Second World War and the inhabitants of the provincial town of Willington are just coming to terms with the idea of petrol shortages, rationing, and the occasional air-raid warning. The last thing they expect is for three mysterious corpses to appear More... in their midst on the same, rainy autumn night. The mystery is compounded by the apparent motiveless nature of the crimes and the absence of any obvious link between the victims: one, a notable town councilor: the second, a young A.R.P. volunteer; and the third, an unidentified drowning case. The youthful Inspector Stailard is baffled and it requires the saurian intervention of Mrs. Bradley to unravel the complex web of deceit and to uncover a particularly peculiar motive behind the murders. The humour and energy of Brazen Tongue, which are a hallmark of every Gladys Mitchell novel, will delight her established body of enthusiasts, and will introduce a lesser-known work from a masterly Golden Age writer to a new generation of crime fiction fans.
A VINTAGE MURDER MYSTERYRediscover Gladys Mitchell one of the 'Big Three' female crime fiction writers alongside Agatha Christie and Dorothy L. Sayers.A friend staying with distinguished psychoanalyst and sometime detective Mrs Bradley is alarmed by a chance meeting with a pale young man who claims his uncle is being poisoned - is there a detective who could help discover the culprit Mrs Bradley is soon on the case, but upon investigation it seems the uncle is in the best of health. But then the old man does indeed die suddenly, followed by his nephew, and Mrs Bradley finds herself in the murderer's firing line.Opinionated, unconventional, unafraid... If you like Poirot and Miss Marple, youll love Mrs Bradley.
This is a crime writing gem featuring vanished children, haunted mansions and family secrets from one of the masters of the crime-writing genre.
When Miss Murchan disappears from a dance at the Cartaret Traiing College for women teachers, Mrs. Beatrice Adela Lestrang Bradley, amateur sleuth, steps in to find out who did what to whom?
Touring Scotland’s western Highlands is meant to be a romantic holiday for Ian and Catherine Menzies. But the winds shift when the limping, haunted figure of Hector Loudoun appears. The man begs for an audience and then regales them with a marvelous tale: after Hector refused another man’s offer to purchase his property, he was cursed by a terrible fall and tormented by a ghostly voice calling out for justice. The story seems unfounded, until Hector’s housekeeper suddenly goes missing...and the body of a stranger—stabbed in the back—is discovered by Ian’s sister and her traveling companion Mrs. Beatrice Lestrange Bradley. The psychoanalyst detective Mrs. Bradley is no stranger to murder. She sets out to interview Hector, but instead unearths a whole new set of mysteries...and motives. In this peculiar tale of clan lore and buried secrets, the indomitable Mrs. Bradley unravels a multifaceted mystery—piece by satisfying piece.
Could there be a Jack-the-Ripper copycat in the sleepy village of Brentford? Two women have been found brutally murdered, each under the light of a full moon. When a third mutilated body is identified, brothers Simon and Keith Innes discover that their brother Jack was mysteriously absent from their home on that last moonlit night. After Jack’s snob’s knife goes missing from his tool box, Simon and Keith have no choice but to investigate and clear his name. With the help of the peculiar amateur detective Mrs. Bradley, the brothers race to find answers…before the rising of another full moon. The belovedly eccentric Mrs. Bradley and her ingenious sleuthing are sure to impress in this cleverly woven classic. You’ll never guess who lurks in the shadows―and why.
A VINTAGE MURDER MYSTERY Rediscover Gladys Mitchell – one of the 'Big Three' female crime fiction writers alongside Agatha Christie and Dorothy L. Sayers. When a pair of ramblers, lost in the English countryside, stop at a country house to ask for directions, they are most astonished to be ushered in to dinner. It seems they've been invited as a necessity by the superstitious lady of the house, to avoid thirteen guests sitting down to dinner. But the thirteenth guest never arrives, and his headless body is discovered in a wood the next day. Fortunately, numbered among the original dinner guests is a rather extraordinary psychoanalyst, and sometime detective, by the name of Mrs Bradley...
Miss Prissie Carmody has a full house. She was living quietly and happily with her ward, nineteen-year old Connie, in her South-west London flat when Prissie's second cousin appeared, his young wife in tow. Edris Tidson spent the war years as a banana grower on the Canary Islands, but now he and wife Crete are staying--perhaps permanently--with their frustrated but polite aunt. Connie, however, is quick to show her dislike of the invasion. One day, Edris reads in the newspaper a letter proclaiming the sighting of a naiad, or water-nymph, in the River Itchen. Excited by this whimsical account, Edris organizes a family excursion to Winchester (which Miss Carmody is to sponsor) in search of the nymph, even though no one shares his enthusiasm on this subject.
When an unpopular teacher at a private boy’s school is found murdered, only Mrs. Bradley can solve the mystery in this classic crime caper from the redoubtable Gladys Mitchell.
A VINTAGE MURDER MYSTERY Rediscover Gladys Mitchell – one of the 'Big Three' female crime fiction writers alongside Agatha Christie and Dorothy L. Sayers. George Jeffries is attempting to guide a coach party of eccentrics around Scotland via the treacheous mountain known as The Devil's Elbow. But when one of the touring party is found dead, suspicion falls on the hapless Jeffries. His fiancee goes in tears to her employer, who happens to be the remarkable psychoanalyst and private investigator Mrs Bradley. Fortunately for all concerned Mrs Bradley takes the case, and employs all her singular talents in the task of finding the true murderer. Opinionated, unconventional, unafraid... If you like Poirot and Miss Marple, you’ll love Mrs Bradley.
Most people overlooked the sullen deaf-mute teenager Francis Caux…until he led police to the scene of a murder. It was psychoanalyst and detective Mrs. Beatrice Lestrange Bradley who found a clever way to communicate with Francis, thus learning that his recent fear of water stemmed from a body chained to the underside of a boathouse dinghy. But how did Francis know the location of the body? Even more puzzling is the discovery of a second murder linked to another Caux teen, Derek, in a nearby village. Mrs. Bradley suspects that the teenage Caux boys are somehow related, and soon must consider the possibility that they are coconspirators…in murder. The beloved eccentric detective Mrs. Bradley pieces together details from a tragic past and a troubling present in this delightfully deceptive classic mystery.
Merlin's Castle, Merlin's Furlong -- it's no wonder the three undergraduates off on a lark end up in the wrong place when they set out to retrieve the valuable diptych which old Professor Havers, a dabbler in witchcraft, believes was stolen from him by rival collector, the odious Mr. Aumbrey. When they eventually find the right place, they discover Aumbrey's dead body instead of the icon, and have a lot of explaining to do to the police. Meanwhile, Aumbrey had recently revised his will in favor of his impoverished poet nephew Richmond, making him a prime suspect in the murder, although his other three nephews insist no one knew of the change. It's a knotty problem indeed for Mrs. Bradley, and right up her alley, with her fondness for unruly students and all things macabre.
Beatrice Lestrange Bradley, psychiatrist and consultant for Britain's Home Office, is vacationing with her assistant Laura when the latter, out on a hike with a young boy, discovers the body of Miss Faintley, one of his teachers, tucked under a bush. From the police Mrs. Bradley learns that the woman was involved in an odd, slightly illegal transfer of packages containing different specimens of fern. Following her instincts to such settings as the caves of Lascaux in France and the Isle of Wight, Mrs. B. uncovers a complex currency-smuggling scheme.
In this glorious Golden Age crime caper, Mrs Bradley investigates the murder of a young woman following a Sherlock Holmes themed party. One of Sir Bohun Chantrey's great passions in life are the stories of Sherlock Holmes. To celebrate the great man's anniversary, he throws a party at which the guests are instructed to come as characters from the detective stories. But several of the guests are more interested in Sir Bohun's money, and when he announces that he is to marry a poor governess, things take a turn for the worse, not least when the Hound of the Baskervilles turns up. Fortunately Mrs Bradley, and her secretary Laura, are amongst the guests and ready to investigate the deepening mystery.
Renowned criminologist, psychoanalyst and sardonic widow Mrs Bradley is enjoying a relaxing holiday on the beautiful island of Hombres Muertos. Then a cave high up in the mountains, containing the mummified bodies of twenty three dead kings, acquires an extra corpse overnight and Mrs Bradley is delighted to be called into action. As her investigations begin it quickly becomes clear that almost everyone on the island has a motive for murder, and a dark secret they are desperate to conceal. But who is the real killer?
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Mr. Hugh Camber, claiming the family estate as his own following an inheritance, does not receive quite the warm welcome that he has expected. Housestaff members give their notice, the chauffeur is released following a wave of insubordination, and the villagers seem reluctant to account for the tension that accompanies the house. Slowly, Hugh gathers up enough information to draw some conclusions. It appears that upon Paul Camber’s death, the household fears the inevitable arrival of a widowed aunt, Mrs. Hal Camber, to claim the estate for herself and her rather insufferable young son. There are rumours of unpleasantness between a dismissed Camber tutor and a local farm girl. Added to that, much speculation is given to the demise of Paul he was found drowned in a Scotland stream. Paul’s son, master Stephen, had also drowned in a local river a few months earlier, and an eyewitness noted that the boy appeared to be drunk as he made his way along the bank. As prophesied by the Camber housemaids, Mrs. Hal arrives at the estate with her son in tow, and with the intention of settling in. Sympathetic but resolute, Hugh locks horns with this domineering relation and eventually sends her back to her home. Shortly thereafter, villagers start receiving anonymous letters which accuse Hugh of the murder of his relatives. When Hugh and his fiancée, the vicar’s sister, are sent similar notes, Hugh asks Dame Beatrice to travel to the Norfolk estate and venture an opinion as to the writer’s identity. Hugh already suspects the exiled aunt, but, as Dame Beatrice points out, it is curious that the letters specifically refer to murder when accusations of other ill behaviours would blacken a name equally well. After all, both Paul and Stephen Camber were accorded rulings of accidental death. And then there are the tomatoes. Parlourmaid Ethel lifted three from Paul Camber’s dining room table and became quite sick after eating them. Master Stephen’s final lunch was said to contain tomatoes. But from where did these intoxicating fruits originate? And how did they find their way into the Camber house? Dame Beatrice uses her knowledge of poisons, salmon fishing, agriculture, pig farming, and the deviousness of human nature to solve this agreeable countryside mystery.
Two leading characters in this detective novel are Phlox and Marigold Carmichael, a pair of dilettante Bohemians who wish to find a Romano-British treasure trove. While digging in Hampshire, they unearth a skeleton which they show as a Romano-British exhibit. However, Dame Beatrice Lestrange Bradley is so doubtful of its origin that she has tests made and discovers the bones to be those of a person killed within the present decade. And so Miss Mitchell’s famous woman detective takes on a new and exciting case.
A VINTAGE MURDER MYSTERYRediscover Gladys Mitchell one of the 'Big Three' female crime fiction writers alongside Agatha Christie and Dorothy L. Sayers.The famous psychoanalyst and detective Dame Beatrice Bradley and her feisty secretary, Laura, travel to Scotland for a conference. But when a series of mishaps lead Laura to the island of Tannasgan, she finds herself at the mercy of some menacing Scottish hospitality. Her strange adventure piques the interest of her employer, and local legends surrounding a cruel Laird lead the pair into a peculiar mystery.Opinionated, unconventional, unafraid... If you like Poirot and Miss Marple, youll love Mrs Bradley.
Dame Beatrice Lestrange Bradley investigates when after reporting a body in his tent, Tom Richardson is charged with two murders
Under pressure from a small boy who wants to spend his summer holiday there, Dame Beatrice Lestrange Bradley is persuaded to rent the estate, only to find that an unexplained violent death occurred there some two years previously and that the murderer has never been found. The police have a suspicion that they know his identity, but there is no proof. The dead man was Thomas Dysey, a previous owner of the estate, but it is so impoverished that there seems no reason for supposing that the murder was committed by one of his relatives for gain, although, in the absence of all other conceivable motives, there seems no other cause for his death. It turns out that he has an illegitimate son named Henry and a legitimate son, Bonamy. The former is debarred by his illegitimacy from inheriting, and the latter who got into disgrace in England, is said to have died abroad. This leaves Thomas Dysey’s wife and his twin brothers, one of whom has adopted the illegitimate son, and these have become the main suspects. During the early part of Dame Beatrice’s tenancy, the castle appears to be haunted by a singing ghost, but his spectral nature is soon in doubt, as, twice a week, on Wednesday nights and Sundays, he steals food from the manor house pantry. The situation is further complicated by the fact that on Wednesdays and Saturdays the house and castle are thrown open to the customary half-crown visitors, one of whom may be the murderer. The singing ghost appears to be exorcised when one of the dead man’s twin brothers is also murdered, and in precisely the same way. This presupposes that the murders are dynastic and that possession of the almost worthless property is the murderer’s ultimate aim. This is the police theory. There is also a strong local rumour that the manor house once sheltered Jesuit priests during the time when the Catholic faith was proscribed, and that these left behind a treasure known as the Dysey Hoard. Nobody seems to know whether the treasure is still in existence or, if so, what form it takes, and Dame Beatrice tries to trace its history in the hope that this will shed some light on the two murders. Two other possible suspects exist in the form of a woman whom one of the brothers has married, and her sister, who is Henry’s mother, but although these women could have murdered Thomas as an act of revenge for begetting Henry, there seems no reason why they should have killed the second brother. All appears to turn upon whether the legitimate son, Bonamy, is alive or dead. When he turns up, not only alive but married with a son of his own, the mystery of the two murders seems insoluble until Dame Beatrice tracks down the truth.
Dame Beatrice Lestrange Bradley is typically consulted for her astute detective skills, but her most recent invitation is anything but typical. She has been summoned to the home of an unknown relative, Romilly Lestrange, who asks not for her assistance in solving a crime, but for her psychiatric opinion of his wife. The young woman, according to Romilly, has developed a troubling habit of tossing items and pets off a cliff top! But Romilly’s wife, Rosamund, tells a different story―one of repression and deceit at the hands of her captor. As Dame Beatrice attempts to discern the eccentric from the criminally insane, the news of a family inheritance arises, followed by the discovery of another relative’s dead body floating in the sea. Dame Beatrice must use skills both psychoanalytic and sleuthing to uncover the truth…for never has a case been closer to home, and never has her life been in such peril. Legendary crime fiction author Gladys Mitchell sends her most notorious detective into her most perplexing case: the mystery of the Lestrange family itself.
In this story, Dame Beatrice Lestrange Bradley finds herself in the unusual position of being involved with a shady professional boxing establishment run by a gang whose activities are a cover for something which Damon Runyon would call, “by no means a high-class business, and even considered somewhat illegal.” Toby Sparowe, the nephew of one of the Dame’s friends, has bought a derelict railway station opposite the public house where the gang have established their training quarters, and where a callow youth is being coached for a non-existent fight. In fact, the boy is being used as a cloak for the gang’s profitable but nefarious enterprises. Toby befriends him and offers to help with his training but this does not suit the gang's plans and they rudely brush off Toby’s offer. When a murder is committed and the youth charged, Toby's suspicions are aroused. He invokes the help of Dame Beatrice who uses her formidable wits to bring about a happy but not a highly ethical ending.
In this detective story, Mrs Lestrange, the detective joins an archaeological expedition to Greece visiting sites connected with the god Apollo. A difficult lady novelist, also part of the group falls, from a cliff called Sappho's Leap. What looks like an accident turns out to be murder.
A Mrs. Bradley mystery in which a small English town is in need of skeletons. First published in 1972.
Marius Lovelaine has decided to extend the olive-branch and visit his estranged sister at her island-set hotel. He rallies his family together, but wife Clothilde wants nothing to do with sister or island, and opts to visit her cousin instead. Reluctantly, Marius travels to the island of Great Skua with only his grown children in tow: son Sebastian and daughter Margaret are determined to make the most of their holiday. Eliza Lovelaine (now Dashleigh) has invited them to her hotel, though rather dubiously mentioning the guest fees as she did so. Marius and family disembark from the boat, having arrived with a reptilian older lady and her Amazon-sized companion, only to be told that sister Lizzie has not returned from a trip to the mainland. Frustrated, Marius waits for her arrival, but the days pass and the tiny boat never brings the missing woman to the island. Marius does make the acquaintance of Eliza's business partner, a dour woman named Miss Crimp, who promptly annoys her guest by situating Marius at the hotel while booking his offspring into a separate chalet. An infestation of ornithologists to the island proves the last straw, but before the Lovelaines can make an exit, a birdwatcher spots the body of a woman being tossed against the rocks by a turbulent sea. Identification shows that the unfortunate woman is Eliza Dashliegh. Marius, who had hoped to reconcile with his sister partly to bolster any potential inheritance she might leave, becomes a suspect in the suspicious death, as does the money-minded Miss Crimp and Lizzie's illegitimate son, an island farmer named Ransome Lovelaine. Sebastian and Margaret find that the family headstones in the churchyard have been defaced in a curious manner, and unsettling actions and signs point to the presence of witchcraft on Great Skua. Dame Beatrice keeps an eye on events, but she and Laura have come to the island on their own mission. Dead pigs, locked lighthouses, midnight rituals and pirates' caves provide enough intrigue for the elderly detective to postpone the writing of her memoirs and investigate the mysteries provided by this wind-swept, rocky Atlantic island.
Hamish Gavin has accepted a teaching position at a unique institution, Joynings, where almost all of the students--and most of the faculty--have dark deeds and secrets in their past that led them there. Equal parts safe house, college, and minimum confinement prison, Joynings warden Gascoigne "Gassie" Medlar places the emphasis on school sports programs, with academic classes arriving a distant second. Hamish soon meets the other teacher/coaches, including a disagreeable man named Jones, who is unpopular with students and staff, and for several good reasons. David Jones is a careless womanizer, targeting a number of female students and work staff; his actions and oversights have caused sports injuries to some promising athletes, including a stunt that sent a long distance jumper to the hospital; he's unreliable and drinks heavily; and complaints to Medlar about him don't produce a result, as Jones is the warden's brother-in-law. When Jones disappears from campus, no one is overly concerned, though Hamish finds the behavior of some of the students odd. Days later, Jones's body is discovered buried in the long jump pit, and Hamish contacts his mother and her employer, Dame Beatrice, who takes up the case. Dame B.'s investigations uncover several motives of people who would prefer to see the unlikeable Jonah out of the picture, including Medlar, who may have been his blackmail victim. A trophy javelin is found in a changing room, covered in red paint, but the real murder weapon is soon found among the practice javelins: one of them was fitted with a lethal steel dagger tip. As Dame Beatrice gathers more clues, a student's body is found in the woods, bludgeoned by a metal shot. An off-campus meeting of suspects at the village police station gives Dame Beatrice the opportunity to unmask the school's sports-minded killer.
For the second time in her career, Dame Beatrice Lestrange Bradley is called upon to solve the mystery of murder in a convent. After a series of anonymous letters have been received by the Sisters and also by members of the staff at a school run by the nuns, the supposed writer of the letters is found drowned in the school pond, together with her own Family Bible. At the inquest a verdict of accidental death is returned, but Dame Beatrice regards this as unsatisfactory for reasons which she passes on to the local Inspector of Police. With some help from him and some evidence supplied by two of the schoolchildren, she unmasks a heartless and cowardly murderer.
In the small Oxfordshire village where Ken and Meg Clifton spend their school holidays, the Fair is the most exciting thing that ever happens - that is, until a double murder is committed. The general opinion is that the village contains a homicidal maniac. Mrs. Bradley, called in by her friend Mrs. Kempson, thinks otherwise.