Ladies' Bane

Governess-turned-sleuth Miss Silver unravels a tangled web of marriage, mystery, and murder in the English countryside

No one has seen Allegra Trent since she got married. Her husband, Geoffrey, swept her off her feet and out of London to a faraway town called Bleake, consumed with the dream of owning a ramshackle medieval estate known as “Ladies’ Bane.” Why he’s so determined to live there no one knows, but Allegra postpones visits from family again and again, and then stops writing letters at all.

Her family has begun to worry when suddenly her sister, Ione, finds herself not merely invited but positively urged to come. At first, Ione is puzzled, but upon her arrival she suspects that ominous forces are at work in the house. Then an unexpected death occurs, and her worst suspicions are confirmed.

Miss Silver might appear harmless, but the former governess knows her way around a murder. As a private investigator, she’s solved many cases among London’s upper class and has earned “her place in detective fiction as surely as Lord Peter Wimsey or Hercule Poirot” (Manchester Evening News).

Patricia Wentworth (1878–1961) was one of the masters of classic English mystery writing. Born in India as Dora Amy Elles, she began writing after the death of her first husband, publishing her first novel in 1910. In the 1920s, she introduced the character who would make her famous: Miss Maud Silver, the former governess whose stout figure, fondness for Tennyson, and passion for knitting served to disguise a keen intellect. Along with Agatha Christie’s Miss Marple, Miss Silver is the definitive embodiment of the English style of cozy mysteries.