In the Balance

The “marvelous” British governess-turned-sleuth helps a new bride who fears her husband intends to murder her in this Golden Age mystery (Daily Mail).

Former schoolteacher Miss Maud Silver is on her way back to London when, with a violent shudder of the train, a young woman is thrust into her compartment. She’s beautiful, well dressed, newly married, and wealthy—a lethal combination.

In a state of shock, Lisle Jerningham explains that she fled her home in a hurry after overhearing a sinister conversation. Her new husband’s first wife died in an apparent accident, and the resultant infusion of cash saved his family home. Now, he’s broke again—and attempting to engineer a second convenient mishap. Miss Silver is unsure whether the drama is real or a figment of Lisle’s imagination—but if this frightened young lady is a target for murder, the killer will have to deal with the governess-turned-sleuth first.

Starring a mature sleuth who “has her place in detective fiction as surely as Lord Peter Wimsey or Hercule Poirot”, In the Balance is a classic British mystery (Manchester Evening News).

Praise for Patricia Wentworth

“Miss Wentworth is a first-rate storyteller.” —The Daily Telegraph

“Patricia Wentworth has created a great detective in Miss Silver, the little old lady who nobody notices, but who in turn notices everything.” —Paula Gosling, CWA Gold Dagger Award winner

“Some of the best examples of the British country-house murder mystery.” —Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine