Harpercollins. 04/01/1995. Reissue. While most contemporary mysteries kick off with a dead body, and gallop along at a headlong pace, GAUDY NIGHT, first published in 1935, is a far more mannered work. Rather than focus on violence, this classic novel uses both the mystery and the personal lives of the characters to debate whether it's possible for a woman to balance the demands of the intellectual life and of a successful marriage. The detective novelist Harriet Vane returns to Shrewsbury, her Oxford alma mater. The Dean has asked her to track down a "Poison Pen," a perpetrator of a series of venomous notes and acts of petty vandalism. The "Poison Pen" seems to be trying to ruin the reputation of Shrewsbury, and, by extension, that of women's education as a whole. The evidence suggests that the guilty party must be someone at the college: a maid, a student, or possibly even one of the professors. Harriet can't identify the culprit and is obliged to summon Lord Peter Wimsey, the aristocratic amateur sleuth who, despite Harriet's many rejections, still wants to marry her. The central issue of the book--the tension between a woman's personal and professional life--remains relevant today. Originally published at $7.99 You save 87% off the cover price!

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Random House Inc. 03/01/1996. Reprint. THE INFORMATION is a satirical novel about literary rivalry. Richard Tull, the novel's narrator, is an unpublished novelist who has dedicated himself to the destruction of his old Oxford friend Gwyn Barry, also a novelist, who is meeting with much more success. Originally published at $14.95 You save 93% off the cover price!

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