Death in White Pyjamas / Death Knows No Calendar

"Death in White Pajamas: At the country home of Sam Richardson, a group of actors have gathered along with their somewhat sinister producer Basil Barnes and a playwright whose star is rising in the theater scene. The drama isn't staying in the production, as competitive tension in the air begins to rise between the three actresses Clara, Angela and Deirdre. But nobody expects to find Deirdre's murdered body on the grounds wearing, for some unknown reason, white pyjamas... An inspector Meredith mystery of the kind John Bude does best; a well-drawn and authentic period setting, and a satisfying mystery following the traditional rules and style of the golden age of the genre. Death Knows No Calendar: The "locked-room" element of the mystery is simple: Lydia Arundel, a fairly wealthy painter, is found shot dead in her locked studio, with suicide seemingly impossible due to the position of the weapon. Many figures in the local village, Beckwood, have a motive for her murder: the Reverend, who seems to have had an affair with her; her husband, who inherits all her money; Hawkinge, who used to be in love with her but now wants to marry Honororia, and Honororia herself, who saw Hawkinge with Lydia. All suspects were in the area the night she was killed, and local bobby Major Boddy is left to untangle the curious web. Once again, Bude is on form playing with the pettiness and pocket intrigue of village politics, and the reader is treated to heaps of misunderstanding, double-crossing and subterfuge even on this small-scale case"--