Patricia Highsmith Books

The Borrowers are tiny people who live under the floor of the Lender family's house. A nasty lawyer, Ocious P. Potter, wants to pull down the Lender's home, but young Peter Lender meets Arrietty Clock, a Borrower, and they join forces to try and stop him.

Sometimes, normality hides terrible things. This is what Patricia Highsmith seems to tell us in this collection of stories where no one is what they appear to be. A handful of men and women are enveloped in an aura of absolute normality, but sometimes, trapped by circumstances, they can behave in very strange ways, sometimes with irreversible consequences. This is the case of the retired Skipperton, who takes a neighborhood conflict too far, or Don, a man obsessed with his neighbor's correspondence, or even Dr. McCullough, who contemplates the idea of murdering an old friend he actually detests. We will also see how far Helen's anguish can go after losing her daughter, or what Ginnie feels when she kills someone for the first time, even if it is in self-defense. All of them were, apparently, ordinary people with whom any of us could identify. In these stories, Patricia Highsmith brings to light the darkest and most unsettling side of the human mind and shows how, many times, the boundary that separates good from evil can become imperceptible.

The diaries of Patricia Highsmith offer an intimate glimpse into the mind of one of the 20th century's most complex novelists. These writings reveal her struggles, thoughts, and creative processes, providing a unique perspective on her life and the literary world. As a significant literary event of 2021, this collection promises to engage readers with Highsmith's conflicts and insights, showcasing her profound impact on literature.

Exploring the universal nature of secrets, this book delves into the hidden aspects of human experience that everyone grapples with. Through candid reflections, it reveals personal truths and shared vulnerabilities, inviting readers to confront their own secrets. The narrative unfolds in a straightforward manner, emphasizing the importance of honesty and self-acceptance. It offers a unique perspective on the complexities of identity and the connections formed through our hidden lives.

Essential for understanding Patricia Highsmith’s transgressive life and prophetic work, this volume is also “one of the most observant and ecstatic accounts . . . about being young and alive in New York City” (Dwight Garner,― New York Times ). Before Alfred Hitchcock adapted her debut novel, Strangers on a Train , for the big screen; before her suave and sociopathic Thomas Ripley snaked his way into the canon of psychological suspense; and before The Price of Salt became a cult classic of romantic obsession, who was Patricia Highsmith?Focused on her formative years in Manhattan, this condensed edition of Highsmith’s monumental Diaries and Notebooks reveals “Pat” at her most passionate and florescent. Beginning in 1941 at Barnard College and encompassing the Texas native’s adventurous twenties,? The New York Years intertwines scenes from her dizzying social life―rife with sleepless nights barhopping in the queer underground Greenwich Village scene, always juggling too many lovers―with an intimate self-portrait of a young artist who by day dispassionately wrote comics for a paycheck. Amid all the hangovers and the breakups, she read voraciously and honed her craft with verve. Laid bare in this perennial reader’s edition are the bold, hilarious, romantic, tragic, and maddeningly contradictory observations of one of “our greatest modernist writers” (Gore Vidal).

NOW A MAJOR NEW NETFLIX SERIESTom Ripley wants money, success, and the good life - and he's willing to kill for it.Struggling to stay one step ahead of his creditors (and the law), Ripley leaps at the chance to start afresh on a free trip to Europe. But when his new-found happiness is threatened, his response is as swift as it is shocking.Now a[Bokinfo].

WITH NORTON'S PUBLICATION OF "Slowly, Slowly in the Wind and "The Black House, Patricia Highsmith's entire body of work is now back in print. First published in 1970 and 1981, respectively, these two volumes are among Highsmith's must nuanced and psychologically suspenseful works. "Slowly, Slowly in the Wind gathers stories that explore the hypocrisies or the Catholic Church, the writing life, Poe-like horror fantasies, and more. The stories in "The Black House mine classic Highsmith Terrain as they sketch the lives of suburban dwellers that appear quite normal at first but unravel to reveal their proximity to the macabre. Both collections are perfect examples of Highsmith's view of human nature and a fitting capstone to the reintroduction of one of the twentieth century's greatest writers.

Mit diesen handlichen Bänden kann sich jeder auf besonders unterhaltsame Weise in der englischen Sprache fortbilden. Weniger bekannte Vokabeln sind erläutert.

Published to celebrate the centenary of one of the twentieth century's most influential writers, this is the most comprehensive volume of Highsmith's short fiction. Includes two newly discovered stories.

Patricia Highsmith's story of sexual obsession may be one of the most important, but still largely unrecognized, novels of the twentieth century. First published in 1952 under the pseudonym Claire Morgan and touted as "the novel of a love society forbids," the book soon became a cult classic. Yet it was always relegated to a mystery subgenre and never before given the literary recognition that it is now receiving. Based on a true story plucked from Highsmith's own life, The Price of Salt tells the riveting story of Therese Belivet, a stage designer trapped in a department store day job, whose routine is forever shattered by an erotic epiphany - the appearance of Carol Aird, a customer who comes in to buy her daughter a Christmas toy. Therese begins to stalk the alluring suburban housewife, who is trapped in a marriage as stultifying as Therese's job. They fall in love and set out across the United States, pursued by a private investigator who eventually blackmails Carol in a choice between her daughter and her lover.

The legendary writer Patricia Highsmith is best remembered today for her chilling psychological thrillers The Talented Mr. Ripley and Strangers on a Train. A critically acclaimed best seller in Europe, Highsmith has for too long been underappreciated in the United States. Starting in 2011, Grove Press will begin to reissue nine of Highsmith's works. Eleven is Highsmith's first collection of short stories, an arresting group of dark masterpieces of obsession and foreboding, violence and instability. Here naturalists meet gruesome ends and unhinged heroes disturb our sympathies. This is a captivating, important collection from "one of the truly brilliant short-story writers of the twentieth century" (Otto Penzler). Includes an introduction by Graham Greene.

A gripping novel that explores the shifting sands of moral values - is murder still murder when committed in a lawless place?

Le plaisir de lire en V.O.Ce recueil de 10 nouvelles anglaises et américaines d'auteurs contemporains (R. Dahl, P. Highsmith, I. Asimov, etc.) et de genres très divers a pour but d'aider les élèves à lire de manière autonome en anglais.Les premières nouvelles sont accompagnées d'une aide à la lecture importante, qui va décroissant alors que les élèves gagnent en confiance.- Chaque nouvelle est suivie d'une fiche de lecture qui aide à la compréhension du texte et propose des activités et des exercices.- Les nouvelles choisies reposent toutes sur une intrigue qui incite l'élève à aller jusqu'au bout de l'histoire.

Tom Ripley detested murder. Unless it was absolutely necessary. Wherever possible, he preferred someone else to do the dirty work. In this case someone with no criminal record, who would commit 'two simple murders' for a very generous fee.

A major new reissue of the work of a classic noir novelist.

"Highsmith's writing is wicked . . . it puts a spell on you, after which you feel altered, even tainted."-Entertainment Weekly

Patricia Highsmith's "The Animal-Lover's Book of Beastly Murder" explores the dark side of animals, portraying them with human-like murderous thoughts. Stories feature a truffle-hunting pig and a disillusioned circus elephant, showcasing animals as powerful beings capable of chaos, transforming them from pets into agents of destruction.

Patricia Highsmith reveals her secrets for producing world-class crime and thrillers

As Edith Howland's life becomes harsh, her diary entries only become brighter and brighter. She invents a happy life. As she knits for imaginary grandchildren, the real world recedes. Her descent into madness is subtle, appalling, and entirely believable.

A young man sent to Europe on a job slowly assumes the life of the man he is sent to help.

Sechs spannende Stories der »mistress of suspense«: The Terrapin - The Button - A Shot from Nowhere - Broken Glass - Mrs Afton, Among Thy Green Braes - The Fully-Licensed Whore - The Wife. Texte in der Originalsprache, mit Übersetzungen schwieriger Wörter am Fuß jeder Seite, Nachwort und Literaturhinweisen.

Obsessed with his love for Annabelle Delaney, David Kelsey tries to break up her marriage and succeeds in accidentally killing her husband

In a small Pennsylvania town, Robert Forrester is recuperating from a nasty divorce and a bout of psychological trouble. One evening, while driving home, he sees a pretty young woman framed by her bright kitchen window. Soon, he can't keep himself away. But when Robert is inevitably discovered, obsession is turned on its head, and he finds himself unable to shake the young woman, nor entirely sure whether he should. Recently made into a major motion picture starring Julia Stiles and Paddy Considine, "The Cry of the Owl" is essential Highsmith, a modern classic ready to be reborn.

Remember Dickie Greenleaf? Tom Ripley killed him. The only thing is he keeps ringing Tom up. Enough to make even a cool cucumber like Ripley uneasy. This book immerses the reader in Tom's world at Belle Ombre with the lovely Heloise and the very shadowy world of art forgery and murder.

The Buckmaster Gallery is staging another Derwatt exhibition, but now an American collector claims that the expensive masterpiece he bought three years ago is a fake. Ripley needs the perfect solution to keep his role in the fraud a secret and his reputation clean but not everyone's nerves are as steady as his. Especially when it comes to murder.

Rife with overtones of Dostoyevsky, "The Glass Cell" combines a quintessential Highsmith mystery with a penetrating critique of the psychological devastation wrought by the prison system, offering a bleak and compelling portrait of daily prison life that is, sadly, as relevant today as it was when the book was first published in 1964.

En boheme-beværtning i det ellers så regelrette Zürich danner rammen om en cocktail af erotiske forviklinger og pardannelser

"The Blunderer, " first published in 1953, is hailed as Highsmith's finest novel, about the rise and fall of a faithful suburban husband who plots his wife's demise in fantasies gruesome and eerily serene.

We meet on a train, see, and nobody knows we know each other! The psychologists would call it folie a deux... Strangers on a Train was Patricia Highsmith's first novel, and adapted into a classic film by Alfred Hitchcock. 'A true original in crime fiction' The Times

When Elsie Taylor drifts to Greenwich Village from upstate New York, her vitality soon wins her a sophisticated circle of friends. But she also becomes the obsession of a failed inventor and nightwatchman, who would protect her from the corruption he sees everywhere around him.

To everyone around them, Melinda and Vic Van Allen are the perfect couple - young, wealthy and attractive. But when their love sours, their mind games reach a twisted, dangerous climax

A collection of stories, based on natural and unnatural catastrophes and exploring the macabre and its meaning.

When Richard Alderman becomes a born-again Christian, his conversion rips his once close-knit family apart. He and his youngest son, Robbie, embrace their newfound faith, while his eldest son, Arthur, rejects it. Caught in the middle of the ensuing web of lies is his wife, Lois, as she struggles to keep the peace. But when the church elders start to interfere in Arthur's love life, events spiral toward violence.

Fearing that he was directly responsible for the death of his father, an American multimillionaire food magnate, sixteen-year-old Frank Pierson learns of a plot to kidnap him and enlists the aid of Tom Ripley, an American expatriate in Paris

The great revival of interest in Patricia Highsmith continues with this work that reveals the chilling reality behind the idyllic facade of American suburban life.

There are women who destroy their men and women who destroy themselves; girls who notch up their conquests and girls who go too far. From 'Oona, the Jolly Cave Woman' to 'The Fully Licensed Whore, or, The Wife', seventeen ironical, bizarre and sophisticated stories. With an eerie simplicity of style, Highsmith turns our next-door neighbors into sadistic psychopaths, lying in wait among white picket fences and manicured lawns. In the darkly satiric, often mordantly hilarious sketches that make up Little Tales of Misogyny, Highsmith upsets our conventional notions of female character, revealing the devastating power of these once familiar creatures—"The Dancer," "The Female Novelist," "The Prude"—who destroy both themselves and the men around them. This work attesets to Highsmith's reputation as "the poet of apprehension" (Graham Greene).

Two men meet in the picturesque backstreets of Athens. Chester MacFarlane is a conman with multiple false identities, near the end of his rope and on the run with his young wife Colette. Rydal Keener is a young drifter looking for adventure. He finds it in one evening as the law catches up to Chester and Colette, and their fates become fatally entwined. Patricia Highsmith draws us deep into a cross-European game of cat and mouse in this masterpiece of suspense from the author of 'The talented Mr Ripley'. Now a major film starring Viggo Mortensen, Kirsten Dunst and Oscar Isaac. This special edition includes a foreword by director and screenwriter Hossein Amini.

When Ray Garrett's new wife kills herself on their honeymoon, he persuades the initially suspicious Rome police that he's innocent of any wrongdoing over the death. However, his father-in-law, the brutish Ed Coleman, is convinced Ray killed her and shoots Ray, leaving him for dead. He survives and, desperate to prove himself, follows Coleman to Venice, where a deadly game of cat-and-mouse ensues, with Coleman still seeking justice and Garrett a clear conscience

Highsmith blends a savage humor with brilliant social satire in this dark tale of a highminded criminal who hits a wealthy Manhattan couple where it hurts the most when he kidnaps their beloved poodle.

Gentle, generous Theo would tell you that he feels quite logically happy about sharing Lelia with his best friend Ramón. Although the word 'logical' troubles him sometimes. (Can love ever be logical?) It is he, at any rate, who eventually finds Lelia dead in her painter's studio in Mexico City. She has been raped, her handsome face bloodily mutilated. Theo's thoughts immediately turn to Ramón as the natural suspect: hot tempered, moody, a man whose Catholic soul has already been damned by passion - unable to marry Lelia, unable to give her up... A confession is made, but are we able to believe it? In A Game for the Living threads of sexual jealousy and guilt are shot through with all Patricia Highsmith's uncanny talent for the unexpected. Cover Photograph: Patrick Llewelynn-Davies

Contemporary / American English (Available April 2008) Guy Haines is travelling through Texas on a train when a stranger invites him to share a meal. But the stranger has a terrible plan. You murder my father, and I'll murder your wife,' he suggests. So begins Guy's journey into a world of madness, lies and death.

Verhalen waarin telkens een moord een grote rol speelt.

Collection of sixteen short stories featuring cats and crimes.

Over thirty chilling tales of gruesome evil—a man buried alive; a young girl dancing to her death; Jack the Ripper alive and well in modern Chicago and many more haunting terrors! --front flap

With carefully adapted text, new illustrations, language practise activities and additional online resources, the Penguin Readers series introduces language learners to bestselling authors and compelling content. Titles include popular classics, exciting contemporary fiction, and thought-provoking non-fiction. The Talented Mr Ripley, a Level 6 Reader, is B1+ in the CEFR framework. The longer text is made up of sentences with up to four clauses, introducing future continuous, reported questions, third conditional, was going to and ellipsis. A small number of illustrations support the text. In the 1950s, Tom Ripley travels from the United States of America to Italy, to find Dickie Greenleaf and bring him home to his father. But when Tom sees Dickie's money and relaxed way of life, he becomes jealous and begins to make other plans.

Fourteen spine-tingling stories of suspense include P. D. James's ""The Victim,"" in which a gorgeous celebrity uses her infatuated ex-husband as a murder weapon, and tales by Ruth Rendell, Patricia Highsmith, and other authors.CONTENTSA Man Around the House by Nancy PickardA Glowing Future by Ruth RendellCatalyst by Evan HunterDeath of a Romance Writer by Joan HessBy the Time You Read This by Larry S. HokeAll At Once, No Alice by Cornell WoolrichI Don’t Do Divorce Cases by David JusticeKilling Howard by Ralph McInernyThe Victim by P.D. JamesThe Brothers by Lawrence TreatBreakfast Television by Robert BarnardA Letter Too Late by Henry SlesarThe Betrayers by Stanley EllinThe Perfect Alibi by Patricia Highsmith

Stories included: Man Overboard (Sir Winston Churchill) Timber (John Galsworthy) The Angry Street (G. K. Chesterton) The Call of Wings (Agatha Christie) The Cherries (Lawrence Durrell) A Man From Glasgow (Somerset Maugham) Earth to Earth (Robert Graves) The Grey Ones (J. B. Priestley) The Man Who Didn't Ask Why (C. S. Forester) All But Empty (Graham Greene) Animals or Human Beings (Angus Wilson) Something Strange (Kingsley Amis) The Post-Mortem Murder (Sinclair Lewis) The Dance (F. Scott Fitzgerald) A Rose for Emily (William Faulkner) The Bronze Door (Raymond Chandler) A Man Who Had No Eyes (MacKinlay Kantor) The Affair at 7 Rue de M-- (John Steinback) The Snail Watcher (Patricia Highsmith) Inferiority Complex (Evan Hunter) The Terrible Answer (Paul Gallico) Miriam (Truman Capote) Exterminator (William Burroughs) During the Jurassic (John Updike)

Pearson English Readers bring language learning to life through the joy of reading. Well-written stories entertain us, make us think, and keep our interest page after page. Pearson English Readers offer teenage and adult learners a huge range of titles, all featuring carefully graded language to make them accessible to learners of all abilities. Through the imagination of some of the world’s greatest authors, the English language comes to life in pages of our Readers. Students have the pleasure and satisfaction of reading these stories in English, and at the same time develop a broader vocabulary, greater comprehension and reading fluency, improved grammar, and greater confidence and ability to express themselves. Find out more at english.com/readers

"Suave, agreeable, and completely amoral ... Tom Ripley stops at nothing--not even murder--to accomplish his goals."--Jacket

In a chilling literary hall of mirrors, Patricia Highsmith introduces Tom Ripley. Like a latter-day Henry James Hero, he is sent to Italy with the commission to coax Dickie Greenleaf back to his wealthy father. But Ripley finds himself very fond of this prodigal young American. He wants to be like him - exactly like him. Suave, agreeable, and utterly amoral, Ripley stops at nothing-certainly not only one murder-to accomplish his goal.

Barcelona. 21 cm. Encuadernación en tapa dura de editorial ilustrada. Colección 'Obras selectas de Patricia Highsmith) (Obras maestras del crimen y misterio', numero coleccion(5). Highsmith, Patricia 1921-1995. Ripley's game. Patricia Highsmith traducción, Jordi Beltrán. Traducción del inglés. Beltrán, Jordi. 1941-. Crímenes imaginarios. El juego del escondite .. Este libro es de segunda mano y tiene o puede tener marcas y señales de su anterior propietario.

Diese Auswahl umfasst fünf Short Stories der Psychologin Patricia Highsmith, die eindrucksvoll zeigt, dass es für die Erkundung seelischer Untiefen keinen Mord braucht. Mit unerwarteten Wendungen und tiefen Einsichten ins Allzumenschliche beleuchtet der Erzählband eine besondere Facette der Autorin.

City Crimes - Die besten Morde aus den Metropolen - bk1378; Scherz Verlag; Amanda Cross, Colin Dexter, Daphne du Maurier, u.v.a.; pocket_book; 2000

Composé de 20 nouvelles inédites représentant 50 années de création highsmithienne (1938-1982). Portrait incisif de l'Amérique et témoignage du cheminement de l'auteur, ce livre illustre ses thèmes de prédilection en mettant en scène des personnages à la psychologie fragile ou d'autres encore, plus proches de la caricature.

Patricia Highslith L'Empreinte du faux Lorsque le jeune romancier hA(c)ros du livre dA(c)barque en Tunisie, oA il doit tourner un film, sa vie lui paraA(R)t totalement rA(c)ussie. Sa carriA]re s'annonce brillante; il ne doute ni de lui-mAame ni de celle qu'il se dispose A A(c)pouser. A A A Or, voilA que tout se dA(c)rA]gle: l'ami qu'il attend n'arrive pas..: Sa fiancA(c)e le laisse sans nouvelles. Et les certitudes font place au doute. II en viendra A se demander sans angoisse, au terme de cette traversA(c)e de la solitude, s'il n'est pas devenu un assassin... A A A A Le meilleur roman de Patricia Highsmith est A mon avis L'Empreinte du faux, et quand on me demande A quoi tient cette prA(c)fA(c)rence, je rA(c)ponds: A l'angoisse qui y rA]gne. . Graham Greene.

Hrsg. Manson, Cynthia. U. a. von Rendell, Ruth ; Braun, Lilian Jackson ; Highsmith, Patricia 250 S.

Die hier unter dem Titel Die stille Mitte der Welt vorgelegten Texte aus dem Nachlass sind keine Suspense- und keine Tiergeschichten, sondern psychologische Erzählungen. 14 Stories über moderne Großstadtmenschen in Not, über wissende kleine Mädchen, traumversponnene Liebende und ältere, vom Leben gerupfte Frauen und Männer. Die Geschichten gehorchen keinem Muster und keiner einheitlichen Methode, sie verraten noch nicht einmal in allen Fällen dieselbe Hand als hätte die junge Patricia Highsmith mit jeder Geschichte einen eigenen Modus erfinden und das Verhältnis zur Welt neu festlegen müssen. Dabei sind die Verzauberung durch erhoffte Seelenverwandtschaften, die betäubten Schritte einer in die Trauer entlassenen Figur und das Zermürbende des Lebenskampfes mit viel Takt, enormer Anteilnahme und großem Sinn für die sprechenden Details eingefangen."

Ehe Patricia Highsmith durch ihre Romane ›Zwei Fremde im Zug‹, ›Tiefe Wasser‹ und ›Der talentierte Mr. Ripley‹ berühmt wurde, schrieb sie psychologische Stories. Über entwurzelte Einwanderer, tapfere Liebende, wissende Mädchen und Jungen und vom Leben gebeutelte Menschen. Damals erschienen ihre Stories nur verstreut in Schul- und Frauenmagazinen. Nun dürfen wir sie neu entdecken.

A l'égal du chat qui, dans la première de ces dix nouvelles, introduit d'une patte nonchalante le mystère et l'horreur au sein d'une paisible réunion amicale, Patricia Highsmith instille au coeur de chaque récit le venin discret qui porte le texte à son sommet de virulence. Qu'elle mette en scène, avec un humour féroce, l'adoption de deux vieillards par un couple sans enfants ou la destruction d'un homme par ses amis, qu'elle décrive impitoyablement les attaques quotidiennes dans les rues, qu'elle s'amuse d'une jolie oisive ou nous glace avec les visions d'une femme seule, la romancière américaine prouve, comme dans les précédents recueils, qu'elle excelle dans l'art difficile de la nouvelle.Née au Texas, Patricia Highsmith a écrit de nombreux romans dont plusieurs ont été portés à l'écran : Monsieur Ripley (qui devint Plein Soleil sous la direction de René Clément) , L'Inconnu du Nord-Express (film d'Alfred Hitchcock) , Ce mal étrange (Dites-lui que je l'aime dans la mise en scène de Claude Miller ) et Ripley s'amuse (L'Ami américain, film de Wim Wenders ). Le journal d'Edith, quant à lui, est considéré comme son chef-d'oeuvre . La Proie du chat est son quatrième recueil de nouvelles à paraître chez Calmann-Lévy.

" Un chat fait qu'une maison soit un foyer. Un écrivain n'est jamais seul avec un chat, tout en étant suffisamment seul pour pouvoir travailler. Qui plus est, qu'il déambule ou qu'il dorme, un chat est une œuvre d'art vivante, en perpétuelle métamorphose. " Ces mots de Patricia Highsmith disent bien la passion que ce grand écrivain a nourrie pour les chats tout au long de sa vie. Elle en a eu jusqu'à six en même temps - des siamois pour la plupart. Ils dormaient sur son lit, la regardaient travailler, assis sur son bureau, et parfois lui inspiraient une intrigue. Ce petit recueil célèbre le chat dans tous ses états : en personnage de fiction, en inspirateur de poème, en sujet d'étude, en modèle d'artiste. Trois nouvelles amusantes ou troublantes comme le sont les chats, qui laisseront au lecteur un arrière-goût étrange et pénétrant.

Contents:Intuición femenina / Isaac Asimov -- Traducción de Lorenzo CortinaProfesor Miseria / Truman Capote -- Traducción de Juan VilloroLa romántica / Patrica Highsmith -- Traducción de Jordi BeltránUna madre / James Joyce -- Traducción de Guillermo CabreraParece tan dulce / Rosa Montero --La ciociara / Alberto Moravia -- Traducción de Ma Esther BenítezSilba para llamar al viento / Rosamunde Pilcher -- Traducción de Margarita CavándoliPigmalión / Manuel Vázquez Montalbán --La imagen móvil / Edith Wharton -- Traducción de Rosa S. de NaveiraEl vestido nuevo / Virginia Woolf -- Traducción de Andrés Bosch

Muchos escritores y muchos asesinos han escrito y han matado en busca del crimen perfecto. Solo Highsmith podía elevar el listón y superarse a sí misma para dar con La coartada perfecta.

An anthology of 23 cat stories from classic authors, cats which are comic, heroic, spoiled, fat and even a desert island cat, embellished with specially commissioned line drawings by William Geldart.

In veel misdaadverhalen speelt de vrouw een belangrijke rol, maar er zijn uiteraard ook talloze vrouwen die als auteur van misdaadverhalen een bijdrage geleverd hebben aan deze rijke traditie, met name in de achterliggende eeuw. In dit boek presenteert Elizabeth George, de meest toonaangevende vrouwelijke misdaadauteur van dit moment, haar keuze uit de beste verhalen van die vrouwen. Haar overzicht begint in Groot-Brittannië en het Gemenebest, waar de periode van 1920 tot en met de jaren vijftig 'the Golden Age of Mystery' genoemd wordt.