It’s “great fun” when a baker’s dozen of Golden Age authors collaborate on a whodunit—including Agatha Christie, Dorothy L. Sayers, and G. K. Chesterton (The Guardian). Originally published in 1931, The Floating Admiral is a classic literary collaboration by members of the Detection Club, in which each chapter is written by a different mystery author, with G. K. Chesterton adding a prologue after the novel was completed. Each writer was tasked with building on what the previous writer created, without ignoring or avoiding whatever plot points had come before. Although Anthony Berkeley wrote the definitive conclusion to the mystery in his final chapter, the writers all provided their own individual solutions, each in a sealed envelope, which appear in the appendix. In the words of Dorothy L. Sayers in her introduction, the spirit of the project was that of a “detection game,” for the amusement of the authors—and their readers. In the sleepy English seaside village of Whynmouth, an old sailor discovers a corpse floating serenely in a rowboat owned by the local vicar. The victim has been stabbed in the chest. It falls to Inspector Rudge to solve this most baffling mystery, in which not only the identity of the killer but the identity of the victim is called into question. The Floating Admiral includes contributions by Canon Victor L. Whitechurch, G. D. H. and Margaret Cole, Henry Wade, Agatha Christie, John Rhode, Milward Kennedy, Dorothy L. Sayers, Ronald A. Knox, Freeman Wills Crofts, Edgar Jepson, Clemence Dane, and Anthony Berkeley. “I was . . . hugely entertained by the virtuoso displays of mental gymnastics, which kept me guessing all the way.” —The Guardian

With “a touch of genius,” this round-robin mystery follow-up to The Floating Admiral features famous detectives including Lord Peter Wimsey (The Times Literary Supplement). Following the success of The Floating Admiral, in which certain members of the Detection Club—including Agatha Christie, Dorothy L. Sayers, and G. K. Chesterton—collaborated on a whodunit, six writers pooled their talents to create another coauthored mystery. This time the premise had an added twist: authors would swap their detective characters, allowing for some extremely entertaining parodies of one another’s sleuths. When a ruthless British newspaper tycoon is shot dead in his home, the high-level suspects include the assistant commissioner of Scotland Yard, casting doubt on the impartiality of a formal police investigation. As a solution, the home secretary brings in four brilliant detectives to solve the murder: Mrs. Bradley, Sir John Saumarez, Lord Peter Wimsey, and Roger Sheringham. Featuring a preface by inaugural Detection Club member Agatha Christie, this playful tour de force gathers together half a dozen Golden Age Mystery masters: John Rhode, Helen Simpson, Gladys Mitchell, Anthony Berkeley, Dorothy L. Sayers, and Milward Kennedy.

The Floating Admiral was the first of the Detection Club’s collaborative novels, in which twelve of its members wrote a single novel. Eighty-five years later, fourteen members of the club have once again collaborated to produce The Sinking Admiral.

Six “perfect murders” by Margery Allingham, Dorothy L. Sayers, and other Golden Age Mystery authors of the Detection Club—plus an essay by Agatha Christie. Founded in England in the 1930s, the Detection Club brought together an impressive array of Golden Age Mystery authors. Their projects included The Floating Admiral, a whodunit in which twelve different writers contributed individual chapters, as well as Ask a Policeman, another collaboration in which the mystery writers swapped detectives to solve a murder. In Six Against the Yard, a half dozen mystery masters—Margery Allingham, Father Ronald Knox, Anthony Berkeley, Russell Thorndike, Dorothy L. Sayers, and Freeman Wills Crofts—each create a perfect crime, a seemingly unsolvable mystery. The stories are then analyzed by Ex-Superintendent Cornish, C.I.D., a real-life retired police detective, to see if they would indeed stump Scotland Yard. This edition also features an afterword by inaugural Detection Club member Agatha Christie on a true unsolved case of arsenic poisoning in Britain in 1929.

Winner of the H.R.F. Keating Award for best biographical/critical book related to crime fiction, and nominated for the Edgar Allen Poe and Macavity Awards for Best Critical/Biographical book.

Dorothy L. Sayers was one of the "Queens of Crime." Alongside writers like Agatha Christie, she perfected the whodunnit, but also used the genre to explore social, ethical, and emotional matters. Her characters, particularly Lord Peter Wimsey and his investigative partner Harriet Vane, struggle with the complexities of life and love in a rapidly changing world while solving some of the most intricate and complex mysteries ever offered to the reading public. Sayers was also an important theoretician of detective fiction, a religious dramatist, a public intellectual, and one of the 20th century's most important translators of Dante. While focusing on her mystery fiction, this companion offers a full view of all aspects of Sayers's career. It is an ideal introduction for readers new to Sayers's diverse and rewarding body of work, and an invaluable companion for her many fans.