A new award-winning author joins the Crime Classics series with one of her best novels. This is a mystery of international intrigue set in London at Christmas time, mixing the best parts of traditional mystery with thriller elements such as a climactic chase involving a helicopter! ‘The Easter egg. I told ‘im. All white an’ glittering, lovely, like ice an’ frost an’ stars … An’ I lost it, I lost it. I lost all of it.’ In a gloomy flat off Islington High Street, Chief Inspector Brett Nightingale and Sergeant Beddoes find an old woman dead.

The Princess Olga Karukhin, who fled from Russia at the time of the Revolution, has lived in terror of being discovered ever since. Olga’s grandson, Ivan, appears to have run from the scene, but is later seen returning to the flat as though oblivious to the terrible crime. Taking place between 22nd and 24th December, Nightingale’s enquiry takes him across London, culminating in the wrapping of the mystery on Christmas Eve.

This never-before-republished novel from 1958 has a noticeably different feel to the neat puzzles and country house mysteries of crime fiction’s golden age, revealing the darker side of police detection in an evocative urban setting. 

Author: Mary Kelly, with an introduction by Martin Edwards

Brand: British Library Publishing

Number of pages: 224 pages

Binding: Paperback

Dimensions: 190 x 130 mm