The Brooklyn Murders

On the night Sir Vernon Brooklyn, famed theatrical impresario, announces a new will at his seventieth birthday dinner, tension crackles around his estranged stepdaughter Joan's unwanted engagement. By morning, two bodies lie cooling: John Prinsep in his study, George Brooklyn in the garden. The clues point to an impossible conclusion - each man appears to have killed the other. A heavy club at the scene brands Sir Vernon's wastrel brother Walter the murderer, but Joan and her lover Robert Ellery refuse to accept this verdict. As Scotland Yard's Superintendent Wilson begins his official inquiry, Joan and Robert race to establish Walter's true movements, uncovering an intricate web of secrets within the Brooklyn household. The puzzle seems to defy the laws of physics, yet the answer lies hidden somewhere in the family's past. This is the Coles' first detective novel, and it announces the brilliant formal ingenuity that would define Golden Age crime fiction.