The Poisoned Chocolates Case Summary

The Layton Court Mystery

The renowned British crime writer’s classic locked-room Golden Age mystery that introduced amateur sleuth Roger Sheringham. A party at Layton Court, the country house of Victor Stanworth, is disrupted when the host is found shot through the forehead in his own library, a suicide as far as the police are concerned. After all, the gun is found in his hand, a note has been left, and the room is locked from the inside. But one of the guests, author Roger Sheringham, has his doubts. The bullet wound is not positioned where it could have been easily self-inflicted. With a house full of partygoers and servants, suspects abound. It will take Sheringham’s sharp wit and fearless investigating to deduce who brought the festivities to a fatal end. The founder of the Detection Club in London, along with Agatha Christie and other writers, Anthony Berkeley wrote numerous novels, sometimes using the pseudonyms Francis Iles and A. Monmouth Platts. The Layton Court Mystery is his first book in the Roger Sheringham Cases, which includes The Poisoned Chocolates Case and The Silk Stocking Murders, among other titles. “Certainly, Berkeley’s short and fascinating career deserves to be saluted. For fans of the classic English crime novel, his books remain enjoyable to this day. Nobody has ever done ironic ingenuity better than Anthony Berkeley.” —Mystery Scene “He was one of the most influential crime novelists of the 1920s and 1930s, but has languished somewhat in obscurity since. A troubled, dark, incredibly innovative writer . . .” —Shedunnit

Partners in Crime

A “distinctly worthwhile” book from the Queen of Crime has newlyweds Tommy and Tuppence sleuthing crimes in “the merriest collection of detective stories” (The New York Times). A young couple eager for adventure, Tommy and Tuppence Beresford jump at the offer to take over the International Detective Agency. Big fans of mysteries, they rely on the techniques from the best of their favorite fictional sleuths, like Sherlock Holmes, Father Brown, Inspector French, and Hercule Poirot—coupled, of course, with their own cleverness. Soon they find themselves sussing out spies for the government, searching for thieves in country homes, and hunting a murderer at a costume ball. It seems there is no end to the trouble that follows them in this smart, humorous collection from the Queen of Crime. “Agatha Christie taught me two things: that plotting mysteries was an art, and that a woman detective could be as strong a character as a male detective. A woman detective didn’t need to be a housewife sleuthing in her spare time, she could be an equal in the game.” —Charles Todd, New York Times–bestselling author of the Ian Rutledge Mysteries and Bess Crawford Mysteries

The Avenging Chance and Other Mysteries from Roger Sheringham's Casebook