A Schooling in Murder - by Andrew Taylor (Hardcover)

About the Book

From the author of The Ashes of London, comes a new historical mystery set in the last days of WWII

Book Synopsis

From the author of The Ashes of London, comes a new historical mystery set in the last days of WWII

'Ten out of ten' The Times

'A grand piece of work - a triumph and one of Taylor's best' MICK HERRON

'A wonderfully unique novel from the master of historical crime fiction. Beautiful, haunting, and quite brilliant' LAURA SHEPHERD-ROBINSON

'As good as I'd expect from a master of the craft' VAL MCDERMID

'A wonderful, subtle novel, set in a strange, enclosed world. Beautiful writing and a gloriously satisfying ending' ANN CLEEVES

__________

England, May 1945

In the last days of World War II, Monkshill Park School for Girls stands far apart from the violence in Europe. Yet a woman has been murdered in its grounds.

Annabel Warnock, a teacher with a secretive past, has disappeared. The teachers and girls whisper that she's run away, but in fact she has met a violent end.

Replacement tutor and amateur crime writer Alec Shaw arrives to find a school riven with bitter rivalries and dangerous tensions. He begins to suspect there is a real-life mystery waiting to be solved... and these echoing halls hide a killer.

Review Quotes

A new departure for this gifted thriller writer... a novel told by a ghost... the veteran Taylor pulls [this] off with considerable aplomb and with the narrative skill his readers have come to expect

-- "Spectator"

Taylor's ability to conjure time past is second to none ... a sublime evocation of a closed world in which the adults are, in their way, as powerless as their young charges

-- "Guardian"

Taylor's position at the apex of historical crime writers is reinforced

-- "Financial Times"

Utterly brilliant ... It's gripping, funny, stylish and suspenseful with several twists that surprised me

--Amanda Craig

A Schooling in Murder turns the country house mystery inside out with wit and wisdom. Ten out of ten.

-- "The Times"

An absolute masterpiece of rising tension

-- "Mirror"

This ticked all the boxes for me. As good as I'd expect from a master of the craft

--Val McDermid

The master of historical crime fiction is back and he's on top form. Taylor has reinvented the classic crime story to create a riveting WWII mystery set within a secretive school amid deadly rivalries. Brilliantly eery and suspenseful. A triumph

--Anna Mazzola

An ingenious and intriguing homage to the golden age of crime fiction - A Schooling in Murder is both wryly beguiling and steeped in atmospheric tension. I could not put it down

--Essie Fox

Crime fiction has a new superstar: Annabel Warnock is simply the best narrator I have read in a long time. Acerbic, inquisitive, irrepressible ... It hardly matters that she's dead, although of course it matters very much in the plot. This is a splendidly lively and richly entertaining novel. I adored it

--Sarah Hilary

Taylor evokes beautifully the tawdry atmosphere, the cast of misfits and the relationships and love affairs that must be hidden, with a lightness of touch that belies the deeper tragic elements of the story. This is a novel of immense charm

--Elizabeth Freemantle

A wonderfully unique novel from the master of historical crime fiction. Beautiful, haunting, and quite brilliant

--Laura Shepherd-Robinson

A Schooling in Murder captures the period brilliantly and what a loveable main character- a total delight

--Leonora Nattrass

A Schooling in Murder is a clever, distinctive, and beautifully written mystery from a crime writer who is top of the class

--Martin Edwards

A heady mix of murder, intrigue, and a supernatural interlocutor. Taylor's prose is characteristically fluid, his ability to conjure empathy for his cast - both real and spectral - wonderfully perceptive, and the plot itself gripping in the very best traditions of mystery writing. A thorough delight from start to finish

--Vaseem Khan

A grand piece of work - a triumph and one of Taylor's best

--Mick Herron

Andrew Taylor re-invents the classic crime story with the dark aplomb of a modern master

--S.G. MacLean

Beguiling

--Douglas Skelton

This most unusual murder mystery - in which the reader is aligned with the murder victim after her death - is an absolute triumph. Andrew Taylor turns the conventions of mystery stories on their head to explore secrets hidden just beneath the surface within a closed community. A Schooling in Murder is clever, tender and utterly haunting.

--Tim Major

An engrossing, eerie and erudite page turner which maintains the suspense until the very end ... I defy anyone not to enjoy this captivating whodunnit!

--SW Perry

About the Author

Andrew Taylor is the author of a number of crime novels, including the ground-breaking Roth Trilogy, which was adapted into the acclaimed drama Fallen Angel, and the historical crime novels The Ashes of London, The Silent Boy, and The American Boy, a No.1 Sunday Times bestseller and a 2005 Richard & Judy Book Club Choice.

He has won many awards, including the CWA Ellis Peters Historical Award (the only author to win it three times) and the CWA's prestigious Diamond Dagger.