Death in a White Tie

Description

A body in the back of a taxi begins an elegantly constructed mystery, perhaps the finest of Marsh's 1930s novels. The season had begun. Debutantes and chaperones were planning their luncheons, teas, dinners, balls. And the blackmailer was planning his strategies, stalking his next victim. But Chief Detective Inspector Roderick Alleyn knew that something was up. He had already planted his friend Lord Robert Gospell at the scene. But someone else got there first...

Dame Ngaio Marsh was born in New Zealand in 1895 and died in February 1982. She wrote over 30 detective novels and many of her stories have theatrical settings, for Ngaio Marsh's real passion was the theatre. She was both actress and producer and almost single-handedly revived the New Zealand public's interest in the theatre. It was for this work that the received what she called her 'damery' in 1966.

'The brilliant Ngaio Marsh ranks with Agatha Christie and Dorothy Sayers' Times Literary Supplement 'Ngaio Marsh's Death in a White Tie is the best detective story I have ever read...' Dashiell Hammett '[This book has] a distinction that puts the author in the front rank of crime story writers' Times Literary Supplement 'A brilliant, vivacious teller of detective novels.' News Chronicle 'The finest writer in the English language of the pure, classical puzzle whodunnit. Among the crime queens, Ngaio Marsh stands out as an Empress.' The Sun