Magpie Murders

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What to expect

Chosen for the Duchess of Cornwall's online book club The Reading Room

'The finest crime novel of the year' Daily Mail

Seven for a mystery that needs to be solved . . .



Editor Susan Ryland has worked with bestselling crime writer Alan Conway for years. Readers love his detective, Atticus Pünd, a celebrated solver of crimes in the sleepy English villages of the 1950s.

But Conway's latest tale of murder at Pye Hall is not quite what it seems. Yes, there are dead bodies and a host of intriguing suspects, but hidden in the pages of the manuscript lies another story: a tale written between the very words on the page, telling of real-life jealousy, greed, ruthless ambition and murder.

From the creator of Midsomer Murders comes a fiendish mystery perfect for fans of Agatha Christie's Miss Marple and Hercule Poirot.

Now available to preorder: MOONFLOWER MURDERS, the fiendishly brilliant follow-up to Magpie Murders

Praise for Magpie Murders - the gripping Sunday Times bestselling crime thriller:

'Ingenious' Sunday Times
'Thrilling and compelling with a stunning twist' Daily Mail
'A stylish thriller' Sunday Mirror
'A cunning reinvention of the thriller' Mail on Sunday

Critics Review

  • Want to read a great whodunnit? Anthony Horowitz has one for you: MAGPIE MURDERS. It’s as good as an Agatha Christie. Better, in some ways. Cleverer.

    Stephen King
  • An ingenious novel-within-a-novel whodunit about the death of a crime writer . . . Part crime novel, part pastiche, this magnificent piece of crime fiction plays with the genre while also taking it seriously

    Sunday Times
  • A cunning re-invention of the thriller formula

    Mail on Sunday
  • Superbly written, with great suspects, a perfect period feel and a cracking reveal at the end

    Spectator
  • A stylish, multi-layered thriller – playful, ingenious and wonderfully entertaining

    Sunday Mirror
  • Brilliant. Really, really brilliant. I loved it.

    Sophie Hannah, author of The Monogram Murders

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