A Bone and a Hank of Hair

This novel starring Carolus Deene, a gentleman detective in the Lord Peter Wimsey mold, has such a riveting premise that readers will easily overcome their annoyance at Deene's archaic, fussy demeanor and instead revel in the eerie goings-on. History master Deene spends his Christmas vacation investigating the disappearance of a woman believed to have been married to and murdered by a man named Brigham Rathbone. Deene stays in Rathbone's now-deserted home, Glose Cottage, near Canterbury, soaking up the creepy atmosphere. The detective painstakingly unravels a string of clues that show Rathbone may have a string of dead wives. An old-fashioned but still engaging mystery. —Booklist   (Dec 15, 1985)

Mild-mannered, middle-aged widower Carolus Deene sometimes manages to do a bit of sleuthing while engaged in his principal labors as senior history master at Queen's School, Newminster. In this mystery, Deene is advised by the formidable Mrs. Chalk that her heiress cousin has vanished and that the lady's idle, fortune-hunting husband Rathbone has surely murdered her and buried the corpse in the back garden. Deene's pursuit of the truth leads him from London to Hastings, from a remote cottage in the Kent countryside to a Cornwall colony swarming with artists and writers. Along the way he encounters some familiar types: the bluff, hearty, old-school-tie landlord, the tippling charlady; the reformed prostitute; assorted village snoops and gossips; the loathsome Rathbone (whose experience in theatricals has made him adept at disguise); and the inevitable bumbling local constabulary. The tale moves vigorously enough, and the suspense, though bearable, sustains interest in this pleasant confection. —Publishers Weekly (December 1985)

Leo Bruce was the pen name of Rupert Croft-Cooke, who wrote more than twenty highly praised mysteries featuring Carolus Deene. He also wrote eight mysteries featuring Sergeant William Beef, a cockney police detective who invariably knows who done it.