`No one constructs a whodunnit with more fiendish skill than Colin Dexter' Guardian

Service of All the Dead is the fourth novel in Colin Dexter's Inspector Morse series. The sweet countenance of Reason greeted Morse serenely when he woke, and told him that it would be no bad idea to have a quiet look at the problem itself before galloping off to a solution. In the quiet parish of St Frideswide's, most people could still remember the murder of the churchwarden. A few could still recall the murderer's suicide. Even the police closed the case. But Chief Inspector Morse was alone among the congregation in suspecting that not everything might be so tidily put to rest. And a...

The Silent World of Nicholas Quinn is the third novel in Colin Dexter's Oxford-set detective series. Morse had never ceased to wonder why, with the staggering advances in medical science, all pronouncements concerning times of death seemed so disconcertingly vague. When the newly-appointed and gifted member of the Oxford Examinations Syndicate is murdered in his north Oxford home, so starts a formidably complicated homicide case for Chief Inspector Morse. For tracking down the killer will involve navigating the insular and labyrinthine world of Oxford colleges . . . The Silent World of...

The first intriguing case that began Colin Dexter’s phenomenally successful Inspector Morse series. ‘Do you think I'm wasting your time, Lewis?’ Lewis was nobody’s fool and was a man of some honesty and integrity. ‘Yes, sir.’ An engaging smile crept across Morse’s mouth. He thought they could get on well together . . . The death of Sylvia Kaye figured dramatically in Thursday afternoon’s edition of the Oxford Mail. By Friday evening, Inspector Morse had informed the nation that the police were looking for a dangerous man. But as the obvious leads fade into twilight and...

Last Seen Wearing is the second Inspector Morse novel in Colin Dexter's Oxford-set detective series. Why now? Why Friday 12th September – two years, three months and two days after Valerie Taylor had left home to return to afternoon school? He frowned. ‘Something’s turned up, I suppose.’ Strange nodded. ‘Yes.’ After leaving her home in Oxford to return to school in London, seventeen-year-old Valerie Taylor completely vanished. Despite the efforts of the police and Chief Inspector Ainley, the trail went cold and she was never found. Two years on, Ainley is dead, and Inspector...

The Jewel That Was Ours is the ninth novel in the Oxford-set detective series from Colin Dexter, the winner of the CWA Silver Dagger Award. He looked overweight around the midriff, though nowhere else, and she wondered whether perhaps he drank too much. He looked weary, as if he had been up most of the night conducting his investigations . . . For Oxford, the arrival of twenty-seven American tourists is nothing out of the ordinary . . . until one of their number is found dead in Room 310 at the Randolph Hotel. It looks like a sudden – and tragic – accident. Only Chief Inspector Morse...