4.50 From Paddington (1957) – Agatha Christie

When Mrs McGillicuddy witnesses a murder through her train window, who else could she turn to for help but her friend Jane Marple? Even Miss Marple might find it difficult to locate the body, though. But after some clever reasoning, Miss Marple sends for housekeeper extraordinaire, Lucy Eyelesbarrow, who proves more than up to the task of investigating. She charms her way into the hearts of the isolated and unhappy Crackenthorpe family, but finding the corpse is only the first obstacle, as uncovering its…

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Tokyo Express – Seichō Matsumoto (1958 trans. Jesse Kirkwood 2022)

Two bodies are found lying together on a windswept beach in southern Japan. Toki was a waitress at a Tokyo restaurant, and Sayama worked in a government department under investigation for corruption. The police believe the two must have committed suicide together. All except local inspector Jūtarō Torigai, who begins to have doubts. When dynamic Inspector Mihara of Tokyo's anti-corruption police hears about this, he picks up the investigation with a vengeance. He becomes suspicious of a successful businessman with friends in high places…

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Crossed Skis (1952) – Carol Carnac

Stifled by grey post-WW2 London, Bridget Manners and a group of her friends (and friends of friends) escape to the beautiful ski slopes of Lech in Austria. Their bliss is only slightly disrupted by a few odd incidents.Meanwhile, back in London, Mrs Stein's house has burned down - and sadly, one of her tenants seems to have perished from the blaze. A chance observation - the print of a ski pole - links the case to a daring bank robbery from a few months…

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Death on the Riviera – John Bude (1952)

Detective-Inspector Meredith and Sergeant Strang are heading to the French Riviera to assist in breaking up a currency counterfeiting ring, and bring at least one of its members back to England with them. Along with their French colleagues Blampignon and Gibaud, they quickly pick up a trail that leads to the Villa Paloma, where rich widow Nesta Hedderwick lives with her niece Dilys, her companion Miss Pillgrew, the gigolo-esque Tony, his friend Kitty, and the artist Paul Latour. They're soon joined by Bill Dillon,…

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Untimely Death (1958) – Cyril Hare

In last week's The Turquoise Shop, the first body had been found shortly before the book begins. In Untimely Death (first published as He Should Have Died Hereafter), you could say the first corpse turned up decades before. The first half of the book takes place entirely in the Exmoor area, where the Francis and Eleanor Pettigrew have decided to stay for their holiday. For Francis, the location holds many vivid memories of time spent there in childhood. We are allowed time to get…

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The Red Locked Room – Tetsuya Ayukawa (2020, trans. Ho-Ling Wong)

Tesuya Ayukawa was, as the introduction to this collection says, the foremost proponent in his time of the honkaku, or "orthodox" mystery story. These puzzle-centric mysteries were the inspiration for the later stories by Yukito Ayastuji and Taku Ashibe (who wrote the introduction). In fact Ayukawa lived to see the shin honkaku ("new orthodox") movement begin, and also helped many younger writers make their start. This selection of short stories - his best ones, apparently - features two very different detectives. First is the…

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