Books in the Dandy Gilver series

Set in 1930s Scotland and brimming with eccentric characters and incisive humour, The Turning Tide is Catriona McPherson's best Dandy Gilver mystery yet.

A cosy Dandy Gilver mystery set in 1930s Scotland. For fans of PG Wodehouse, Dorothy L Sayers and Agatha Christie.Glasgow,1932, is a city in the grip of dance-fever. Public ballrooms and backstreet dancehalls are thronged every night and competition for professional titles is fierce. Even after the sudden death of one of last year's hopefuls there are plenty willing to take his place, and few who stop to wonder why he died.In the melting pot of the Locarno Ballroom in Sauchiehall Street, a debutante rubs shoulders with denizens of Glasgow's meanest streets, her respectable fianc oblivious, her parents dismayed.When she starts receiving threats from a rival, they grow frantic enough to call on Dandy Gilver to save their precious daughter from harm.But as Dandy and her sidekick, Alec Osborne, begin to unravel the secrets of the dancehall, they soon discover that the rot goes much deeper than rivalry and there's more at stake than a silver cup. Despite the pretty frocks and dancing shoes, this apparently glittering world is a darker place than they've ever been before . . .Catriona McPherson's latest novel in the series, Dandy Gilver and a Spot of Toil and Trouble is now available for pre-order.

A delightful Dandy Gilver mystery by Catriona McPherson, set in 1930s Scotland. For fans of PG Wodehouse, Dorothy L Sayers and Agatha Christie.

A cosy Dandy Gilver mystery set in 1920s Scotland. For fans of PG Wodehouse, Alexander McCall Smith and Agatha Christie.'Dan Brown meets Barbara Pym . . . Dandy is brisk, baffled, heroic, kindly, scandalised and - above all - very funny.' Guardian 'One of several authors recreating the Golden Age of the British crime novel and a legion of fans adore the tongue-in-cheek cases that come the way of Dandy Gilver, a very Scottish middle class sleuth.' Northamptonshire Evening TelegraphFriday 3rd June, 1927Dear Alec,'Careful what you wish for, lest it come true' is my new motto, and here is why. I was summoned to Dunfermline, that old grey town, in the matter of a missing heiress.She had flounced off in a sulk over forbidden love and I, suspecting elopement, was loath to take the job of scouring guesthouses to find the little madam and her paramour. Before I could wriggle out of it, though, there was a murder in the mix - or was it suicide? I had hardly begun to decide when it happened again. Then I was sacked. Actually sacked! By two separate people, and both dismissals in writing. And that's not even the worst of it, darling: matters here are careering downwards much in the style of a runaway train.Please hurry - or who knows where it might end,Dandy xxCatriona McPherson's latest novel in the series, Dandy Gilver and a Spot of Toil and Trouble is now available for pre-order.

Dear Alec, Remember my engagement yesterday? The annual duty luncheon for the Reverend Mr Tait from which and whom I expected only boredom? I could hardly have been more wrong, Alec dear, and I am this minute packing to follow the Reverend home to his manse in Fife, there to attend a meeting of the Rural Womens' Institute. Hardly a house party at which one would usually leap, I grant you, but not only is the man himself a perfect darling - imagine Father Christmas shaved clean and draped in tweed - but his parish, it seems, heaves with more violent passions than a Buenos Aires bordello. A stranger, you see, is roaming the night and pouncing on the ladies of the Rural. At least that's the tale they're telling and the one that Mr Tait told me, but since half the village think he's a figment and he only ever strikes at the full moon, I cannot help but wonder if there's something even odder going on . . . Much love and remember me fondly if the dark stranger gets me, Dandy xxCatriona McPherson's latest novel in the series, Dandy Gilver and a Spot of Toil and Trouble is now available for pre-order.

A cosy Dandy Gilver mystery set in 1920s Scotland. For fans of PG Wodehouse, Dorothy L Sayers and Agatha Christie.1st May 1926 - Dear Alec, Just when those who should be working are all downing tools for this wretched strike (and I still can't believe it - I mean to say: riots, Alec - in Edinburgh of all places) guess who is setting her virgin shoulder to its very first wheel? I am dressed in serge and sensible footwear, sleeping in an iron bed and dining off pickled tongue at six o'clock each day. I am, in short, that nice young Mrs Balfour's new maid. But don't worry, Alec dear: things haven't got as bad as all that. It's just that that nice young Mr Balfour is going to kill his wife. At least, she thinks so, and the more I hear about him from butler, cook and bootboy the more I'm inclined to agree. So I'm undercover, in disguise, bent upon foiling. And jolly hard work it is too - tomorrow is my half-day free if you'd care take me out for a restorative bun. (Every maid needs a beau to buy buns for her.) Yours, Dandy xx p.s. Ask for Miss Rossiter: below stairs I am she.Catriona McPherson's latest novel in the series, Dandy Gilver and a Spot of Toil and Trouble is now available for pre-order.

A delightful Dandy Gilver mystery by Catriona McPherson, set in 1930s Scotland. For fans of PG Wodehouse, Dorothy L Sayers and Agatha Christie.

A cosy Dandy Gilver mystery set in 1920s Scotland. For fans of PG Wodehouse, Dorothy L Sayers and Agatha Christie.Perthshire 1929 and the menfolk of the Gilver family have come down, between them, with influenza, bronchitis, pneumonia and pleurisy. Dandy the devoted wife and mother decides it is time to decamp; Dandy the intrepid detective, however, decides to decamp to the scene of a murder she would dearly love to solve. The family repairs to the Borders town of Moffat, there to drink the sulphurous waters straight from the well and to submit to the galvanic wraps and cold salt rubs of the splendid Laidlaw Hydropathic Hotel.But all is not well at the Hydro. The Laidlaw family is at war, the guests are an uneasy mix of old faithfuls and giddy upstarts, and the secret of the lady who arrived but never left cannot be kept for long. And what of those drifting shapes in the Turkish bath? Just steam shifting in the air? Probably. But the Hydro was built in the lee of a Gallow Hill, and in this town the dead can be as much trouble as the living...Catriona McPherson's latest novel in the series, Dandy Gilver and a Spot of Toil and Trouble is now available for pre-order.

A cosy Dandy Gilver mystery set in 1930s Scotland. For fans of PG Wodehouse, Alexander McCall Smith and Agatha Christie.'The perfect read for those who enjoy the bygoneworld charm of Nancy Mitford, Evelyn Waugh and Agatha Christie.' The Lady Scotland, 1932. Aristocratic private investigator Dandy Gilver strikes again with her witty sidekick Alec Osbourne to solve sinister goings on at a convent on a bleak Lanarkshire moor. The convent was set alight following a mass breakout at a neighbouring psychiatric hospital on Christmas Eve, resulting in the death of the mother superior. Most patients were returned safely but a few are still at large. . . As Dandy interviews each nun in turn she senses a stranger is still lurking in the corridors at night - could they be the same person who left blood-red footprints in the sacristy? One of Catriona McPherson's creepiest - and funniest - mysteries yet.Catriona McPherson's latest novel in the series, Dandy Gilver and a Spot of Toil and Trouble is now available for pre-order.

A cosy Dandy Gilver mystery set in 1920s Scotland. For fans of PG Wodehouse, Alexander McCall Smith and Agatha Christie.'1920s lady detective Dandy Gilver lands a sleuthing gig in a setting straight out of Enid Blyton,. Cosier than a pair of WI-knitted mittens, Corpses serves up murder most foul - and is also good for several giggles.' TIME OUT Before she was a detective, before she was a reluctant wife and distracted mother, before she was even a debutante, Dandy Gilver spent one perfect summer with the Lipscotts of Pereford. The golden memories of it have sustained her through many a cold snap in Perthshire. So when two of the Lipscott sisters beg her to help the third, she can hardly refuse. Sweet, pretty Fleur Lipscott: where is she now? The astonishing answer to this is that Fleur - still Miss Lipscott, indeed more Miss Lipscott than ever - is buried alive in the tiny seaside village of Portpatrick, working as a schoolmistress at St Columba's College for Young Ladies.But she is one of the few remaining, for St Columba's has been shedding mistresses as a snake its skins and the exodus is far from over. With mistresses vanishing and corpses mounting up, can Mrs Gilver, detective, pass herself off as Miss Gilver, English mistress, to solve the one and stop the other?Catriona McPherson's latest novel in the series, Dandy Gilver and a Spot of Toil and Trouble is now available for pre-order.