The Victoria Vanishes

Murder doesn’t get more peculiar than this. A lonely hearts killer is targeting middle-aged women at some of England’s most well-known pubs. What’s even more peculiar, Arthur Bryant happened to see the latest victim only moments before her death—at a pub torn down eighty years ago! It’s only the beginning of a case littered with clues that defy everything the veteran detectives know about the profiles of serial killers and the methodology of crime.

What do the Knights Templars, the secret history of English pubs, and the discovery of an astounding religious relic have to do with this recent crime spree? More important, do the Peculiar Crimes Unit’s two living legends have enough life left in them to stop a murderous conspiracy…and a deadly cupid targeting one of their own?

Chrisopher Fowler is the acclaimed author of fifteen previous novels, including the award-winning Full Dark House, and four other Peculiar Crimes Unit mysteries, White Corridor, The Water Room, Seventy-Seven Clocks, and Ten Second Staircase. He lives in London.


From the Hardcover edition.