Jill Paton Walsh

The recovery of the magnificent gem in Lord Attenbury's dazzling heirloom launched a shell-shocked young aristocrat on his career as a detective in 1921. Thirty years later, a happily married Lord Peter has just shared the secrets of that mystery with his wife, the detective novelist Harriet Vane. Suddenly, the new Lord Attenbury-grandson of Lord Peter's first client-seeks his help to prove who owns the emeralds. As Harriet and Peter contemplate the...

A novel of the effects of Communism on the lives of ordinary people in the aftermath of World War II chronicles fifty years in a small Eastern European town.

When Robert refuses to share any of his toys, Connie imagines bigger and better ones for herself.

Birdy rescues Matthew from his orphan master and discovers that he has a voice of priceless beauty that eventually causes his mysterious disappearance. Will Birdy be able to save him?

Thirty years prior, the recovery of a magnificent gem in Lord Attenbury's dazzling heirloom launched Lord Peter Wimsey on his career. Now the grandson of Wimsey's first client seeks his help to prove who rightfully owns that gigantic emerald.

In the process of discussing with her husband the plot of her latest novel, mystery writer Lady Wimsey finds the solution to a real-life murder. The novel is an unfinished 1930s manuscript by British writer Sayers, completed by Walsh on the basis of the outline.

After her mother dies, a middle-aged Englishwoman tries to learn about her father, a secret the mother kept from her. The search takes her to a fishing port and artists' colony in Cornwall where she learns of her father's involvement in a lifeboat disaster.

This story of Tessa, a bright Catholic young woman at Oxford in the 1950s, captures the spirit of the time and place. Moreover, it is an interesting look at the faith of the very faithful under various stresses: forbidden love (a priest); political crisis (Suez, the bomb); intellectual confusion (cloister fever). Tessa is beautiful and devout. She is also selfless, kind, and loving. Hints of wit do not redeem her from an earnestness that is almost...