The Tessa Crichton Mysteries Series

'You'll be the death of me one of these days. I'm telling you.' 'I'll be the death of myself first,' I replied. The soignée young actress Tessa Crichton is in dazzling form when Robin, her husband and Scotland Yard detective, suggests sleuthing in the Sussex village of Burleigh. The area has recently seen a number o

'Stabbed?' she repeated, in horror. 'Was he really?' 'I'm afraid so. From behind. He was sitting at his desk.' The soignée actress Tessa Crichton would rather be shopping and generally luxuriating in the pleasure of being newly married. However, she is soon embroiled in a plot involving an old acquaintance (murdered

'For God's sake don't get the idea that you're Miss Marple. It could quite conceivably lead to your being whacked on the head.' The narrator of this classic mystery is fashionable young actress, Tessa Crichton-obliged to turn private detective when murder strikes in the rural stronghold of Roakes Common. Leading hate-figures in th

When she turned round I saw that she had a carving knife in her hand. Why has Pelham Hargrave returned to his childhood home after twenty-five successful years in Canada and the United States, and is his beautiful and neurotic young American wife quite what she claims to be? Why has a celebrated Hollywood director chosen to retire to a rem

With no sound at all, she pitched forward head first into the punch bowl, scattering canapés and glasses in all directions. By all accounts, Mike Parsons is a paragon: considerate, loyal and devoted to his awkward wife - rumoured to be an alcoholic. But now he has done a vanishing act. Was he killed - and who would murder such a k

'What if he'd done it in reverse? Supposing the murder had already been committed by the time you saw him?' The elegant actress Tessa Crichton is starring in a film to be made in Paris. Her husband Robin (otherwise Detective Inspector Price of Scotland Yard) and her cousin Ellen travel with her but the trip is off to a peculiar st

'Going somewhere nice for lunch?' he enquired. 'No,' I said. 'As a matter of fact, I'm going straight back to the country. Something tells me there isn't a minute to lose.' The scene of the crime is a large Victorian Rectory. An aged and famous opera singer dies; she has been ill for some time and initially her deat

Dangerous secrets score high at an exclusive girl's school . . . but top marks belong to murder. Actress Tessa Crichton has mixed reactions to being on the panel of judges at the annual inter-house competition of the Waterside Drama and Ballet School, her alma mater. When she arrives on campus, the headmistress is having an affair

'Poor woman, how she must wish she had never come!' Prophetic words, if ever I heard any. The actress Tessa Crichton's cousin Ellen is engaged - but to someone she has known only a fortnight. The man appears rich, presentable and mad about Ellen, but Tessa is worried about the reaction of his former amoureuse, and i

"I am absolutely certain that someone is trying to kill me," she announced, which was pretty run of the mill compared to most of her ghastly secrets over the years. Tessa Crichton is appearing in a West End play when her old school friend Anne reappears in her life. Anne and her baby daughter are living in her lover's family manor

'So what tips do you need of a criminal nature?' 'Oh, nothing complicated. Just the basic rules for committing the perfect murder will do to be going on with.' The Rotunda in Dearehaven has a reputation as one of the most distinguished theatres in the country. Its success is due to its owner, Elfrieda Henshaw, a str

I had detected no sound or movement, but her eyes were open and, as I approached, she fixed them on me with an agonised stare. Tessa Crichton, actress wife of Scotland Yard Inspector Robin Price, comes to Storhampton to star in the local drama festival . . . and finds her most challenging role in a masquerade ending in murder. It

'He wants to see you, personally. He's Detective Meek, he's from Homicide, and chances are he's come to report a killing.' Tessa Crichton, actress and unwitting private detective, joins the cast of Host of Pleasures-a hit West End play opening its American run in Washington D.C. All is not well backstage. Artistic t

'I'm assuming that you want to see a murderer caught and getting what he deserves?' 'You bet I do. In fact, I hope he gets worse than he deserves.' When a young American girl disappears from her flat and usual London haunts, her friends and family aren't frantically worried. She is over twenty-one, of independent sp

'Not complaining, are you? Right up your street, I should have thought. Solving the odd murder between professional engagements is your forte.' When the rare chance occurs for Tessa Crichton and her policeman husband, Robin, to have a three week holiday together it is with some misgivings that Tessa agrees to spend the time at a l

"I should warn you that it is not a pretty story." "Stories about murder rarely are." Nobody knows who started the rumour that James McGrath murdered his wife Rosamund. Certainly no one had seen her in a while, and she had gone off to visit a sick cousin without mentioning a trip to the neighbours. Still, everyone w

He was confronted by the sight of his wife sagging full length on the sofa, where she had been since approximately half past six, when she was strangled to death with one of her own silk scarves. Death isn't in the script of the comedy slated to open in London's West End. But bloody bad luck during rehearsals has convinced actress

Some fast thinking would be required, if I were not to get my head chopped off on the coming Friday. When Mrs Trelawney, a much-married Australian of considerable fortune, bought the big house at Sowerley, the locals hoped her money would help enrich the locality and the community. Instead they found themselves in a cold war. <

'How was she killed?' 'Strangled, I gather, with her own silk scarf.' A murder involving a group of Americans on an English 'Mystery Tour' has actress Tessa Crichton investigating members of the group, including a young lady recently released from a psychiatric hospital who claims she is seeing ghosts.

'Ever heard of the Alibi Club?,' Robin asked when he was driving me home after one of the most disastrous first nights in theatrical history. When Tessa's Scotland Yard husband Robin is invited to speak at the renowned and respectable Alibi Club, she is excited to be surrounded by the members - all mystery writers of the first ran

'Rotten news, isn't it?' 'Rotten,' I agreed, taking it that he referred to the state of the national economy, 'but I daresay it will come all right in the end.' He stared at me as though I were either raving mad or drunk, which was excusable, since it turned out that he had been talking about the untimely death

'I don't give much for Baba's chances. Her days as an authoress must be numbered.' It is well known that the celebrated playwright, Sheridan Seymour, had three children by his mistress. The copyright to his plays was left to his legitimate daughters, but over the years Baba, the youngest, has gained sole control. Now Sherida