Eleanor Boylan Libri

A Little Arsenic Goes A Long Way. In fact, a single arsenic-sprinkled hors d'oeuvre, eaten at her friend Sal's bookstore opening, almost sends Clara Gamadge to her grave a week before Christmas. Luckily she makes it to the hospital instead, thoroughly baffled by the attempt to kill her. The troops rally 'round her bed -- son Henry, daughter Paula, faithful cousin Sadd -- but are hardly a match for the recklessly bold villain they know is the poisoner...and who almost certainly will strike again. In this deadly game of cat and mouse, Santa himself seems to have abandoned the good guys, until Clara's tough sleuthing draws reinforcements from a most surprising source.

"An intricate, multifaceted puzzle...There's wit and warmth here, and even some wisdom. It's a little as if Jane Austen had turned to detection." THE PHILADELPHIA ENQUIRER Anna Pitman's death looks like a tragic accident. A May rainstorm slicks New York City's streets, and she slips to her death beneath a moving car. But to Clara Gamadge, helplessly watching her friend's terrible end, it's murder. In this Clara Gamadge Mystery, is Clara's best friend jealous enough to kill . . . or be killed?

Clara Gamadge puts down the phone with a tremor of excitement. Only a year ago that call would have come to her husband, gifted sleuth Henry Gamadge. Now Henry is dead, and Clara is summoned to deal with the latest convulsion in an old family tragedy. Haunted by the never-explained disappearance fifty years ago of her lovely daughter, Ellen, Clara's Aunt May ignores a kindly anonymous letter advising her to let Ellen rest, or live, in peace -- and suddenly dies. And so begins Clara's first solo case, a tragic, twisting tale that winds far into the past -- back to Prohibition, bitter family feuds, secret love affairs, and a cherished, laughing girl. In this lively puzzle, author Eleanor Boylan, whose own aunt Elizabeth Daly, wrote eight Henry Gamadge mysteries, does her aunt -- and her readers -- proud. "[A] charming contemporary mystery in the classic mode." -- The Washington Post Book World

"Clara Gamadge is a detective in the honorable tradition of Hercule Poirot....Boylan's writing is crisp and intelligent, her heroine endearing."PUBLISHERS WEEKLYWhen Clara Gamadge's friend Armand Evers predicts his own death, he's right on target. But Clara wonders if the body is Armand's or his evil look-alike cousin, Boyd. Disturbed and baffled, Clara becomes worried about Armand's sister Rachel, and goes to Dublin to warn her. Her dicey transatlantic adventure entangles her in further confusing identities, remembrances of things past, and a killer as stealthy as the Celtic twilight....