The sleepy seaside town of Taviscombe has more than its share of gossips and schemers. It also has Mrs. Sheila Malory, a widow whose gift for judging character and unmasking murderers is as impressive as her knowledge of nineteenth-century literature. Mrs. Malorys sleuthing talents are tested once again when she comes upon the body of one of her friends, a sweet elderly lady. Miss Grahams death by poison is quite convenient for a local doctor of dubious reputation; the dead womans refusal to move thwarted Dr. Cowleys plans to build a nursing home. But Mrs. Malory knows that nothing is as...

While in Stratford, widow Sheila Malory always stays with her old friend, actor David Beaumont. On this visit she finds him in dire straits: his career is on the skids and his finances are in ruins. Unless he can convince his penny-pinching brother Francis to sell their jointly owned family home in the seaside village of Taviscombe, the bank will repossess his cottage. Francis, Dean of the Culminster Cathedral, does not believe that charity begins at home. He refuses to put the house on the market or provide a loan. Mrs. Malory offers David a place to stay in her own home in Taviscombe so...

A small university in Pennsylvania has engaged Mrs. Sheila Malory to teach a course on Nineteenth-Century Women writers, and so, with some reluctance, the widow leaves her home in the charming seaside village of Taviscombe to experience academic life in America. The semester will prove even more challenging than she thought, for no sooner does she arrive than a colleague is found with a bullet in his head. The victim is particularly nasty, a man many would like to see dead. Lieutenant Landis, the lead investigator, just happens to be divorced, available, and eager to discuss Shakespeare. When...