Over My Dead Body

Nero Wolfe didn't take cases involving beautiful women. Until he did. When two fencing instructors arrive at his office with a problem they can't solve elsewhere, the famously reclusive detective finds himself drawn into a murder at an exclusive fencing academy. A poisoned blade has been used to kill, and something far more dangerous than a human life has vanished from a glass case: col de mort, a substance deadly enough to shake international foundations. Archie Goodwin narrates with his characteristic wit as Wolfe navigates a world of elegant violence, international espionage, and two women who may be more than they seem. The murder is merely the surface tension over something far sinister. For fans of intellectual puzzles and golden age detection, this is Wolfe at his most reluctant and most brilliant.