A classic British locked room mystery for fans of both thrillers and crime: The Clockmaker's Secret. Currently FREE for a limited time only! A buried clock holds the key to a decades-old mystery. On holiday to escape the nightmares of his last case, disgraced soldier turned private detective John “Slim” Hardy comes upon something buried in the peat on Bodmin Moor. Unfinished and water-damaged but still ticking, the old clock provides a vital clue to an unsolved missing-persons case. As Slim begins to ask questions of the tiny Cornish village of Penleven, he is drawn into a world of lies, rumours, and secrets, some of which the residents would prefer to stay buried. Twenty-three years ago, a reclusive clockmaker left his workshop and walked out onto Bodmin Moor, taking his last, unfinished clock with him. He disappeared. Slim is determined to find out why. The Clockmaker’s Secret is the stunning sequel to Jack Benton’s acclaimed debut, The Man by the Sea. #freeebook #freemystery #classicmystery #britishmystery #privateinvestigator #lockedroom #traditionalbritish #theclockmakerssecret #doomedlove #secretsandlies

A classic British locked room mystery for fans of both thrillers and crime: The Games Keeper Having fallen on hard times, disgraced soldier turned private investigator John “Slim” Hardy is hired by rich and enigmatic land owner Oliver Ozgood to uncover the identity of a mysterious blackmailer. The man is demanding a fortune in exchange for his silence. He claims to be Dennis Sharp, a former employee of Ozgood, and threatens to reveal secrets that will soil Ozgood’s family name and send the patriarch to prison. There’s only one problem. Dennis Sharp is dead, killed by Ozgood himself. In search of answers, Slim moves to the remote rural hamlet of Scuttleworth in the Devonshire countryside, where he will confront demons both from within and without in his most challenging case yet. The Games Keeper is the third book in the Slim Hardy Mystery series. While the stories follow a rough sequence, they can be read in any order. Other titles available: The Man by the Sea The Clockmaker’s Secret Slow Train The Angler's Tale

Impossible crime stories have been relished by puzzle-lovers ever since the invention of detective fiction. Fiendishly intricate cases were particularly well suited to the cerebral type of detective story that became so popular during the 'golden age of murder' between the two world wars. But the tradition goes back to the days of Edgar Allan Poe and Wilkie Collins, and impossible crime stories have been written by such luminaries as Arthur Conan Doyle, G.K. Chesterton, Dorothy L. Sayers and Margery Allingham. This anthology celebrates their work, alongside long-hidden gems by less familiar writers. Together these stories demonstrate the range and high accomplishment of the classic British impossible crime story over more than half a century.

Designed to appeal to the book lover, the Macmillan Collector's Library is a series of beautifully bound pocket-sized gift editions of much loved classic titles. Bound in real cloth, printed on high quality paper, and featuring ribbon markers and gilt edges, Macmillan Collector's Library are books to love and treasure. A fascinating collection of ingenious mysteries which all pose the question 'howdunnit?' - 'how was the crime done?' Featuring well-known sleuths from Sherlock Holmes to Father Brown, as well as the less familiar, including Jacques Futrelle's Professor Augustus S. F. X. Van Dusen, in each story the reader is invited to play detective and is presented with a challenge: can you solve the mystery before the solution is revealed? Such stories reached their height of popularity in the Victorian and Edwardian eras; this collection, edited and introduced by David Stuart Davies, brings together stories from such masters of the genre as Edgar Allan Poe, Wilkie Collins and G. K. Chesterton.

In this definitive collection, Edgar Award-winning editor Otto Penzler selects a multifarious mix from across the entire history of the locked room story, which should form the cornerstone of any crime reader's library. Virtually all of the great writers of detective fiction have produced masterpieces in this genre, including Agatha Christie, Edgar Allan Poe, Dorothy L. Sayers, Arthur Conan Doyle, Raymond Chandler, G.K. Chesterton, John Dickson Carr, Dashiell Hammett, Ngaio Marsh and Stephen King. The purest kind of detective story involves a crime solved by observation and deduction, rather than luck, coincidence or confession. The supreme form of detection involves the explanation of an impossible crime, whether the sort of vanishing act that would make Houdini proud, a murder that leaves no visible trace, or the most unlikely villain imaginable. 70 stories handpicked by Otto Penzle

A buried clock holds the key to a decades-old mystery. On holiday to escape the nightmares of his last case, disgraced soldier turned private detective John "Slim" Hardy comes upon something buried in the peat on Bodmin Moor. Unfinished and water-damaged but still ticking, the old clock provides a vital clue to an unsolved missing-persons case. As Slim begins to ask questions of the tiny Cornish village of Penleven, he is drawn into a world of lies, rumours, and secrets, some of which the residents would prefer to stay buried. Twenty-three years ago, a reclusive clockmaker left his workshop and walked out onto Bodmin Moor, taking his last, unfinished clock with him. He disappeared. Slim is determined to find out why. The Clockmaker's Secret is the stunning sequel to Jack Benton's acclaimed debut, The Man by the Sea.