To Love and Be Wise

The most interesting of the great female writers of the Golden Age. This disarmingly low-key tale of a mysterious disappearance is the perfect introduction to her world

The definition of a classic, a real cut above. It hasn't aged a day

Will leave you desperate to re-read

Worth reading for its ingenious denouement

One of the best mysteries of all time

As interesting and enjoyable a book as they will meet in a month of Sundays

Nobody can beat Miss Tey at characterisation or elegance of style: this novel's a beauty

First-rate mystery, ably plotted and beautifully written

Suspense is achieved by unexpected twists and extremely competent storytelling . . . credible and convincing

Tey's style and her knack for creating bizarre characters are among the best in the field

Josephine Tey is one of the best-known and best-loved of all crime writers. She began to write full-time after the successful publication of her first novel, The Man in the Queue (1929), which introduced Inspector Grant of Scotland Yard. In 1937 she returned to crime writing with A Shilling for Candles, but it wasn't until after the Second World War that the majority of her crime novels were published. Josephine Tey died in 1952, leaving her entire estate to the National Trust.

'The most interesting of the great female writers of the Golden Age. This disarmingly low-key tale of a mysterious disappearance is the perfect introduction to her world' VAL MCDERMID 
 
'The definition of a classic, a real cut above. It hasn't aged a day' JOSEPH KNOX 
 
When Hollywood-star photographer Leslie Searle disappears from a remote English village, gifted inspector Alan Grant is called in to investigate. But what would bring such a successful individual to the village? And was his vanishing his own doing, or did something eerie occur at the hands of an unsuspected culprit? 
 
'Will leave you desperate to re-read' SARAH HILARY 
 
'Worth reading for its ingenious denouement'TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT

A gripping historical mystery

The Daughter Of Time

A detective story with a very considerable difference. Ingenious, stimulating and very enjoyable

Really first class . . . a continual delight

Josephine Tey enjoys a category to herself, as a virtuoso in the spurious . . . the nature of the deception on this occasion is too good to give away

Most people will find The Daughter Of Time as interesting and enjoyable a book as they will meet in a month of Sundays

A detective story with a very considerable difference.  Ingenious, stimulating and very enjoyable

Josephine Tey has always been absolutely reliable in producing original and mysterious plots with interesting characters and unguessable endings

'A detective story with a very considerable difference. Ingenious, stimulating and very enjoyable' SUNDAY TIMES 
 
'As interesting and enjoyable a book as they will meet in a month of Sundays' OBSERVER 
 
Scotland Yard inspector Alan Grant, recovering from a broken leg, becomes fascinated with a contemporary portrait of Richard III, believed to have brutally killed his brother's children - the Princes in the Tower - to make his crown secure. But is the hunchback with such a sensitive, noble face really one of the world's most heinous villains? Or was he the victim of one of the most insidious plots in history? 
 
'One of the best mysteries of all time' NEW YORK TIMES 
 
'Suspense is achieved by unexpected twists and extremely competent storytelling . . . credible and convincing' SPECTATOR

A Shilling For Candles

A classic mystery from the Golden Age of detective fiction.

Beneath the sea cliffs of the south coast, suicides are a sad but common fact. Yet even the hardened coastguard knows something is wrong when a beautiful young film actress is found lying dead on the beach one morning. 
 
Inspector Grant has to take a more professional attitude: death by suicide, however common, has to have a motive - just like murder...

Miss Pym Disposes

Tey's style and her knack for creating bizarre characters are among the best in her field

Elegantly written, leisurely, amusing, penetrating ... with a thumping terminal surprise!

A classic murder mystery from the Golden Age of detective fiction, written by genre legend Josephine Tey. 
 
Leys Physical Training College is famous for its excellent discipline and its spectacularly athletic students. Miss Lucy Pym, expert psychologist, is pleased and flattered to be invited to lecture there - even if the Olympian splendour of the students leaves her feeling just a little inadequate. 
 
But a nasty accident spoils the occasion, and suddenly Miss Pym must turn her intellect to the unpleasant suspicion that, among all these healthy young students, there lurks an incurably sick mind...

The Man In The Queue

The Man In The Queue is as fresh and original as ever, 85 years on. Never one to tie herself to genre conventions, Tey builds on character and circumstances to create an enthralling cat-and-mouse hunt.

Inspector Alan Grant, my favourite detective of all time, painstakingly, fascinatingly identifies the body then chases suspects up to the Highlands of Scotland and all around the town.

Outside a London theatre a throng of people wait expectantly for the last performance of a popular musical. But as the doors open at last, something spoils all thought of entertainment: a man in the queue is found murdered by the deadly thrust of a stiletto...

The Singing Sands

Beautifully written and insistently readable.

Josephine Tey has always been absoluteely reliable in producing original and mysterious plots with interesting characters and unguessable endings

Really first class... a continual delight

On his train back to Scotland for a well-earned rest, Inspector Grant learns that a fellow passenger, one Charles Martin, has been found dead. It looks like a case of misadventure - but Grant is not so sure. Teased by some enigmatic lines of verse that the deceased had apparently scrawled on a newspaper, he follows a trail to the remote Outer Hebrides. 
 
And though it is the end of his holiday, it is also the beginning of an intriguing investigation into the bizarre circumstances shrouding Charles Martin's death...

Brat Farrar

Suspense is achieved by unexpected twists and extremely competent story-telling . . . credible and convincing

Josephine Tey enjoys a category to herself, as a virtuoso in the spurious ... the nature of the deception on this occasion is too good to give away

Really first class . . . a continual delight

Ingenious, stimulating and very enjoyable

A stranger enters the inner sanctum of the Ashby family posing as Patrick Ashby, the heir to the family's sizeable fortune. The stranger, Brat Farrar, has been carefully coached on Patrick's mannerisms, appearance and every significant detail of Patrick's early life, up to his thirteenth year when he disappeared and was thought to have drowned himself. 
 
It seems as if Brat is going to pull off this most incredible deception until old secrets emerge that threaten to jeopardise the imposter's plan and his very life...

Josephine Tey

The Franchise Affair is an ingenious book ... The essential mystery is wonderfully established; the claustrophobic building-up of the apparently seamless case against the Sharpes is impeccably done

Permanent classics in the detective field . . . no superlatives are adequate

Really first class . . . a continual delight

Tey's style and her knack for creating bizarre characters are among the best in the field

Their country house will soon play host to a nightmare…

'An ingenious book' SARAH WATERS 
 
'Permanent classics in the detective field . . . no superlatives are adequate' THE NEW YORK TIMES 
 
Marion Shape and her mother are quiet and ordinary villagers, enjoying a peaceful life in their country home, the Franchise. Everything changes when a local schoolgirl accuses them of kidnap and abuse, describing the attic room of the house as her prison. Scotland Yard inspector Alan Grant is called to solve the mystery of the Franchise, but will he fall right in the middle of nightmarish affair that will change a town, and its locals' lives, forever? 
 
'Josephine Tey enjoys a category to herself' NEW STATESMAN

Josephine Tey

Praise for The Franchise Affair

The Franchise Affair is an ingenious book ... The essential mystery is wonderfully established; the claustrophobic building-up of the apparently seamless case against the Sharpes is impeccabl ...

Permanent classics in the detective field . . . no superlatives are adequate

A detective story with a very considerable difference. Ingenious, stimulating and very enjoyable

The Franchise Affair is an ingenious book ... The essential mystery is wonderfully established; the claustrophobic building-up of the apparently seamless case against the Sharpes is impeccabl ...

Permanent classics in the detective field . . . no superlatives are adequate

A detective story with a very considerable difference. Ingenious, stimulating and very enjoyable

The Franchise Affair is an ingenious book ... The essential mystery is wonderfully established; the claustrophobic building-up of the apparently seamless case against the Sharpes is impeccabl ...

Permanent classics in the detective field . . . no superlatives are adequate

A detective story with a very considerable difference. Ingenious, stimulating and very enjoyable

Books by Josephine Tey

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