The Ghost in Blackwood House

A locked study. An unemptied water glass. And a silent grey figure pacing a gallery where no living foot can tread.

In the bitter frost of November 1886, Dr. Elias Vale is summoned in the small hours to Blackwood House in Grenville Square. Cornelius Blackwood-reclusive antiquarian, hoarder of ruined estates, and buyer of curiosities other men ruined themselves to acquire-sits upright in his armchair before a dying hearth. A newly arrived auction catalogue rests open on his knee. His pupils are contracted to pinpoints. He is dead behind heavy oak doors bolted top and bottom from the inside.

The parish physician declares sudden heart failure. But private inquiry agent Edmund Ashcroft measures what others overlook:

• An empty water glass on the table with dried droplet marks-yet no jug, kettle, or carafe anywhere in the bolted room from which it could have been filled.
• A minute, raw puncture on the ball of the dead man's thumb.
• And in the dark wood-panelled gallery upstairs, a silent grey lady in silk who walks without opening doors.

Ashcroft was retained by the heir to lay the ghostly disturbance of the house, not to bury the truth. As Dr. Vale joins him in untangling a web of disinherited relatives, suspicious auction transactions, and domestic secrets, they discover that Blackwood House holds more than one restless presence. Behind thirty years of silence lies an ancient wrong-and a small lead token stamped with a lantern that whispers of an older, forgotten tragedy.

To solve an impossible locked-room murder, Ashcroft must measure every inch of the room. But to lay the ghost, he and Vale must confront a debt that thirty years of human silence could never erase.

The Ghost in Blackwood House is the gripping opening novel in The Ashcroft Mysteries, an acclaimed eight-book Victorian supernatural detective series set in London, 1886-1892. Combining the clinical fair-play deduction of Sherlock Holmes with the chilling atmosphere of Sheridan Le Fanu, each case presents a meticulously plotted crime where the dead may speak-but the living must solve.

Perfect for readers who love:

• Classic Victorian locked-room whodunits and impossible crimes
• Grounded historical mysteries with genuine, atmospheric gothic chill
• An analytical consulting detective and a humane, observant physician partner
• Meticulous fair-play clues (toxicology, postal timelines, physical evidence)
• Immersive, authentic late-Victorian London settings (fog, gaslight, Bloomsbury squares)
• Richly seeded overarching series mysteries that reward observant readers

Fans of Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes, Wilkie Collins's The Moonstone, Laura Purcell's The Silent Companions, and Charles Finch's Charles Lenox mysteries will be captivated by Ashcroft and Vale's dark, elegant investigations.

Book One of The Ashcroft Mysteries. Complete standalone murder mystery. No cliffhangers.