Daisy Dalrymple’s Mysteries by Carola Dunn follow the investigations of a charming and perspicacious writer. With her skills, she assists Scotland Yard’s Detective Inspector Alec Fletcher in solving murders. It takes place in 1920s England, a nation recovering from World War I and now undergoing rapid social change.
Daisy Dalrymple is a young upper-class woman. She works as a journalist for a living, publishing scandalous stories and making enemies while she’s at it.
She isn’t afraid to use her family name to ensure at least a little bit of success. She does this in the first book of the series, Death at Wentwater Court. Here, she uses her family name to arrange an opportunity to start a set of articles. The subject is country manor houses, starting with a Christmas visit to Wentwater.
When someone dies, it is clear not everything is as it appears. When young Chief Inspector Alec Fletching arrives, Daisy points out that it may not have been an accident.
Daisy and Alec’s connection does not feel forced. Daisy’s involvement in the case evolves almost spontaneously.
Daisy’s life becomes more typical as the series progresses. She marries and has children, but she still tries to pursue her hobbies. In the end, she can’t seem to get away from the murders. The books are a terrific blend of a cozy crime novel and a Golden Age murder mystery.
Daisy Dalrymple Series in order
Daisy Dalrymple Mysteries
- Death at Wentwater Court (1994)
- The Winter Garden Mystery (1995)
- Requiem for a Mezzo (1996)
- Murder on the Flying Scotsman (1996)
- Damsel in Distress (1997)
- Dead in the Water (1998)
- Styx and Stones (1999)
- Rattle His Bones (2000)
- To Davy Jones Below (2001)
- The Case of the Murdered Muckraker (2002)
- Mistletoe and Murder (2002)
- Die Laughing (2003)
- A Mourning Wedding (2004)
- Fall of a Philanderer (2005)
- Gunpowder Plot (2006)
- The Bloody Tower (2007)
- Black Ship (2008)
- Sheer Folly (2009)
- Anthem for Doomed Youth (2011)
- Gone West (2012)
- Heirs of the Body (2013)
- Superfluous Women (2015)
- The Corpse at the Crystal Palace (2019)
Similar authors
- Jane Willan’s Sister Agatha and Father Selwyn Mystery series. It follows Sister Agatha and her race against time to resolve the death of Jacob, the sexton.
- Marion Chesney’s Edwardian Murder Mysteries series. It follows a father and daughter in a quest to find murderers and blend in with the high society.
- Darcie Wilde’s Rosalind Thorne Mysteries is set in 19th-century London and focuses on a woman privy to the secrets of high society, including those capable of murder.
See also: Hamish Macbeth Books in Order.
Most recommended books of the series
- Superfluous Women (Daisy Dalrymple, #22) (3.93 Goodreads score)
- Heirs of the Body (Daisy Dalrymple, #21) (3.89 Goodreads score)
- Murder on the Flying Scotsman (Daisy Dalrymple, #4) (3.85 Goodreads score)
- Anthem for Doomed Youth (Daisy Dalrymple, #19) (3.85 Goodreads score)
- Gunpowder Plot (Daisy Dalrymple, #15) (3.84 Goodreads score)
Latest releases in the series
The latest book titled The Corpse at the Crystal Palace was published in 2018. It was the 23rd book in the series.
Book summaries
Death at Wentwater Court (1994)
It’s the early 1920s in England–the country is still recovering from the Great War and undergoing rapid social changes that many are not quite ready to accept. During this heady and tumultuous time, the Honorable Daisy Dalrymple, the daughter of a Viscount, makes a decision shocking to her class: rather than be supported by her relations, she will earn her own living as a writer. Landing an assignment for Town & Country magazine for a series of articles on country manor houses, she travels to Wentwater Court in early January 1923 to begin research on her first piece. But all is not well there when she arrives. Lord Wentwater’s young wife has become the center of a storm of jealousy, animosity, and, possibly, some not-unwanted amorous attention, which has disrupted the peace of the bucolic country household.Still, this is as nothing compared to the trouble that ensues when one of the holiday guests drowns in a tragic early-morning skating accident. Especially when Daisy discovers that his death was no accident….
The Winter Garden Mystery (1995)
In England, 1923, the Honourable Daisy Dalrymple has made a decision that, while shocking to her class, is in perfect keeping with the spirit of the times. Rather than live with relatives until she marries, she has undertaken to earn her own living with her writing. Her series of articles on country manor houses has proven popular with the readers of Town and Country and in February she travels to Occles Hall to research her latest piece.What she finds there is a household under the thumb of the ill-tempered and demanding Lady Valeria. The discovery of the body of a pregnant maid buried in the winter garden does nothing to improve Lady Valeria’s mood. When the local constabulary arrests the Welsh under-gardener who had been involved with the maid for the murder, Daisy is sure of his innocence and suspects that the whole affair is consciously being swept under the carpet. Wary of the air of secrecy that permeates Occles hall and determined to prove the innocence of the young Welshman, Daisy convinces Alec Fletcher of Scotland Yard to investigate the murder–a murder that is more complex and horrifying than either could have imagined.
Requiem for a Mezzo (1996)
In March 1923, the Honourable Daisy Dalrymple takes a break from her writing to attend a performance of Verdi’s Requiem at the Albert Hall with Scotland Yard’s Detective Chief Inspector Alec Fletcher. The tickets are a gift from Muriel Westlea, Daisy’s neighbor and the sister of Bettina Westlea, who will be singing the mezzo role. What should be a pleasant afternoon is quickly disrupted when, during the performance, Bettina falls dead on stage–killed by cyanide poisoning. While it is quickly determined that Bettina’s on-stage glass of liqueur was laced with the poison, discovering the person responsible will not prove to be an easy task.Bettina was neither well liked nor well behaved, and many of her colleagues, associates, and even her family had good reason to want her dead. Daisy, determined to help Detective Chief Inspector Fletcher whether he wants help or not, decides to do some investigating on her own. But with so many suspects, the murderer may well go free….
Murder on the Flying Scotsman (1996)
It is the spring of 1923 and the Honourable Daisy Dalrymple is on her way to a stately home in Scotland to research her next article for Town and Country. On board the Flying Scotsman, the famous London-to-Edinburgh train, Daisy meets an old schoolfellow, Anne Breton. Anne, along with all of her relatives, is en route to visit the deathbed of the family scion and notorious miser, Alistair McGowan. As it currently stands, Alistair’s will leaves the entire family fortune to his brother Albert, and the rest of the family is rushing to his side, each hoping to convince him to change his will in their favor.Daisy, meanwhile, has her hands full taking care of Detective Inspector Alec Fletcher’s young daughter Belinda, who ran away from home and stowed away aboard the train. She barely has time to take notice of the intricate family feud taking place all around her–that is, until Albert McGowan is found murdered on the train and Daisy is surrounded by an entire family of suspects.
Damsel in Distress (1997)
It’s Spring 1923 and love is in bloom as the Honourable Phillip Petrie finds himself totally smitten with Miss Gloria Arbuckle, daughter of an American millionaire. But before the enthusiastic suitor can pop the question, his beloved is abducted by kidnappers. As Gloria’s distraught father begins assembling the ransom, Phillip enlists his childhood friend, the Honourable Daisy Dalrymple to help him recover his missing sweetheart. Strictly forbidden to contact the police, Daisy must resist the temptation to bring her occasional collaborator Scotland Yard’s Detective Chief Inspector Alec Fletcher into the case. But as she closes in on the abductors’ rural hideway, she begins to suspect that Gloria isn’t the only fair damsel whose life hangs in the balance…
Dead in the Water (1998)
In July 1923, the Honourable Daisy Dalrymple travels to Henley-on-Thames to visit her aunt and uncle, watch the annual intercollegiate rowing races, and spend a quiet weekend with her fiancé, Alec Fletcher of Scotland Yard. But things go awry when a murder occurs on her cousin’s team and Daisy is again in the middle.
Styx and Stones (1999)
In the 1920’s, in post-WWI England, the Honourable Daisy Dalrymple, newly married to Detective Inspector Alec Fletcher, is asked by her brother-in-law to discreetly investigate a series of poisoned pen letters that many of the local villagers have been receiving. When the pompous and unbearable brother of the local vicar is killed by a very large rock dropped on his head from a great height, it seems clear to all that this campaign of gossip has escalated to murder. With the help of her husband, who’d rather she not get involved in murder, Daisy undertakes to uncover the identity of the viper in the local nest is and who that person has driven to murder before the murderer strikes a second time.
Rattle His Bones (2000)
In the summer of 1923, the Honourable Daisy Dalrymple makes what should an uneventful research trip to the Museum of Natural History with her nephew Derek and her soon-to-be step-daughter Belinda in tow. But as she interviews the various curators for her article on the museums of London, she soon discovers that the Museum of Natural History is a hothouse of professional rivalry and jealousy, particularly between Dr. Smith Woodward, the Keeper of Geology – responsible for the fossil collection, and Dr. Pettigrew, the Keeper of Minerology – responsible for the Museum’s fabulous gem collection. On a later trip, as closing time nears, Daisy hears two voices followed by a tremendous crash and rushes into the next hall to discover Dr. Pettigrew dead – murdered amidst a pile of dinosaur bones.Daisy’s fiance, Detective Chief Inspector Alec Fletcher of Scotland Yard, is assigned to investigate and together they must unravel a most baffling case of missing gems, dispossessed European royalty, professional rivalry and murder most foul.
To Davy Jones Below (2001)
In late 1923 the newly married Daisy Dalrymple and Detective Chief Inspector Alec Fletcher of Scotland Yard take an ocean voyage to America for their honeymoon. Accompanied by Daisy’s childhood friend Phillip Petrie, his wife, Gloria, and Gloria’s father, American millionaire industrialist Caleb P. Arbuckle, Daisy and Alec are looking forward to a pleasant, uneventful trip. But at the last minute they are joined by Arbuckle’s new friend, Yorkshire millionaire Jethro Gotobed, and his new wife, Wanda, a showgirl whom all but Gotobed are convinced is a gold digger of the worst sort.Then, having barely lifted anchor, the ocean liner is beset by a series of suspicious accidents and deaths. With harsh weather and rough seas putting many-including Alec-out of commission due to seasickness, it soon falls to Daisy to figure out what connection there might be between the seemingly unrelated incidents. Convinced that there’s a murderer aboard ship, Daisy must unmask the culprit or culprits before anyone else-especially herself-falls victim.
The Case of the Murdered Muckraker (2002)
In late 1923, the newly married Daisy Dalrymple and her husband Detective Chief Inspector Alec Fletcher of Scotland Yard, come to America for a honeymoon visit. In the midst of a pleasure trip, however, both work in a bit of business – Alec travels to Washington, D. C. to consult with the U.S. government, Daisy to New York to meet with her American magazine editor. While in New York, Daisy stays at the famed Chelsea Hotel, which is not only close to the Flatiron Building offices of Abroad magazine, where she’ll be meeting with her editor, but home to many of New York’s artists and writers.After her late morning meeting, Daisy agrees to accompany her editor, Mr. Thorwald, to lunch but as they are leaving the offices, they hear a gun shot and see a man plummeting down an elevator shaft. The man killed was one of her fellow residents at the Chelsea Hotel, Otis Carmody, who was a journalist with no end of enemies – personal and professional – who would delight in his death. Again in the midst of a murder investigation, Daisy’s search for the killer takes her to all levels of society, and even a mad dash across the country itself, as she attempts to solve a puzzle that would baffle even Philo Vance himself.
Mistletoe and Murder (2002)
In December 1923, the formidable Dowager Viscountess Dalrymple has decided that for Christmas the family will all gather at Brockdene in Cornwall at the invitation of Lord Westmoor. Her daughter – Daisy Dalrymple Fletcher – is something less than pleased but yields to the demands of her mother, especially as she’ll be there just before the holidays working on another article for Town and Country about the estate itself. But the family gathering quickly goes awry. Brockdene, it seems, is only occupied by the Norvilles – poor relations of Lord Westmoor – and Westmoor himself won’t be joining them. So Daisy, her husband Detective Chief Inspector Alec Fletcher of Scotland Yard, and their family must spend their Christmas holiday trapped in an ancestral estate with a rich history of lore, ghost stories, rumors of hidden treasure and secret passageways with a family seething with resentments, grudges and a faintly scandalous history.The veneer of civility that pervades the halls of Brockdene, however, begins to wear thin when long-held family secrets threaten to bubble over, and one of the Christmas guests if found savagely murdered. With few clues as to who committed the murder and with too many motives as to why, it is once again up to Daisy to sort out the truth that lies beneath a generation of poisonous secrets.
Die Laughing (2003)
One morning in April 1924, The Honourable Daisy Dalrymple Fletcher finds herself in a most unenviable position. Despite her best attempts to elude the inevitable, she must face her darkest fears and with all strength and courage she can muster, must confront the one person she has tried hardest to avoid – the dentist. But upon arriving for her appointment, she finds the waiting room deserted and adjoining examination room locked with no hint of either Dr. Talmadge or his nurse. Thinking to leave quietly, Daisy’s retreat is halted by the return of the nurse and, with the help of Mrs. Talmadge, the two begin searching for the inexplicably absent doctor. Exhausting all other possibilities, they resort to looking once again in the surgery where they find him stilling in his dentist’s chair with the nitrous mask strapped to his face, the tank of nitrous turned on full, a smile on his face and stone, cold dead.While the circumstances of his death are out of the ordinary, there’s no reason to suspect that it was anything other than a tragic, if inevitable, accident of a careless dope fiend. At least to everyone but Daisy herself. Sure that there is something more than happenstance and an accident involved in the dentist’s untimely death, Daisy is determined to uncover the truth behind a case of what she is certain is murder most foul.
A Mourning Wedding (2004)
The inimitable Daisy Dalrymple Fletcher and her husband Detective Chief Inspector Alec Fletcher seem to get a reprieve from their sleuthing duties when they are invited to the wedding of their friend, Lucy Fotheringay.Lucy’s grandfather is hosting the ceremony at his beautiful estate and so it promises to be a typical affair with hordes of gossipy aunts and other colorful but not necessarily pleasant relatives. Daisy meets all these characters and observes the ensuing familial fraternization with a certain kind of amusing nonchalance. That is, until Lucy’s great aunt is found strangled to death in her bed. Lucy, in the meantime, has arranged to meet her betrothed in the conservatory, but when she arrives she finds him trying to revive her uncle, who has died-or has he been murdered? And just like that a normally celebratory occasion turns suspicious. Now Daisy must sift through a throng of relatives-aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents- once wedding guests and now murder suspects. And she must find the killer quickly before another family member becomes a corpse.
Fall of a Philanderer (2005)
In the summer of 1924, the Honourable Daisy Dalrymple Fletcher is off on a summer holiday by the sea with her step-daughter Belinda and Belinda’s chum Deva, and her husband, Detective Chief Inspector Alec Fletcher of Scotland Yard. Currently three months pregnant, Daisy is anticipating a relaxing, non-dramatic holiday. But Daisy doesn’t have that kind of luck. It seems that a local low-rent Don Juan has been busily seducing the local womanfolk and, in a town this small, no secret is kept for long. A fact that is amply illustrated when the Fletcher’s simple picnic is interrupted by the discovery of a broken body at the foot of the cliff–that of the philandering local innkeeper of bad memory. Like Jacqueline Winspear’s much praised novels about Maisy Dobbs, Carola Dunn vividly evokes the life and times of 1920’s England wrapped in a classic mystery to delight her many fans.
Gunpowder Plot (2006)
In the winter of 1924, Daisy Dalrymple Fletcher travels to a school friend’s house to witness the estate’s famous Guy Fawkes celebration. But she gets more than a quiet weekend at the quaint family manse that she was originally hoping for. The home is the site of some severe family tension – the Viscount and head of family is a strict and unyielding sort, insisting that everyone – especially his children – meet his own unreasonable expectations. On the evening of the Guy Fawkes celebration, the Viscount is found dead on the floor of his study, killed by his own hand. What’s more, he apparently first killed a guest – a married woman visiting England from Australia – before turning the gun on himself. Now it’s up to Alec Fletcher, Daisy’s husband and a DCI of Scotland Yard, to unravel the mystery and the long held family secrets that led to this state of affairs before anyone else can fall prey to the tragic cycle of events. A solution that will require, perhaps, more than a little help from Daisy herself.
The Bloody Tower (2007)
In early 1925, the Honourable Daisy Dalrymple Fletcher, recent mother of twins, resumes her journalistic career by agreeing to write a piece about the Tower of London – the Bloody Tower – for an American magazine. Invited to observe the centuries old ritual Ceremony of the Keys, she’s spending the night (her first time away from her babies) since the complex is locked and guarded, and the high walls are surrounded by a disused moat. Having been given a tour of the Crown Jewels, interviewed and observed the Yeoman Warders, and met the Ravenmaster, Daisy has more than enough material for her article and decides to leave as early as possible the next morning to return to her family. But when walking down the stairs, she almost trips over the dead body of one of the Yeoman Warders. That there’s something seriously amiss cannot be denied, due to the pike sticking out of his back. With her husband, Scotland Yard DCI Alec Fletcher assigned to resolve the case, Daisy once again finds herself in the middle of a case of murder most foul.
Black Ship (2008)
In 1925, the Honourable Daisy Dalrymple Fletcher, her husband, Alec Fletcher (a Scotland Yard Detective) and their new twin infant children inherit and move to a new, larger house on the outskirts of London proper, in a stage of slight disrepair (thanks to an aged, now deceased, uncle). Set in a small circle of houses and a communal garden, it seems a near idyllic setting. That is until a dead body turns up half-hidden under the bushes of the communal garden, rumors of bootleggers, American gangsters, and an international liquor smuggling operation via black ships turn everything upside down. And it’s up to Daisy – well, Alec with some help from Daisy – to find out who the dead man is, why he was murdered and who did him in!
Sheer Folly (2009)
In March of 1926, Daisy Dalrymple Fletcher and her friend and collaborator Lucy (a.k.a. Lady Gerald) head off for several days at stately home reputed to have the best grotto in the country. Working on a book of follies (architectural), they plan to research and photograph it. Leaving her husband and young twins behind, Daisy is expecting a productive weekend at Appsworth Hall, with the only potential difficulty being keeping Lucy from offending the current owner, a manufacturer of plumbing products. Alas, it’s not to be quite so simple. At the home, they find themselves faced with a curious assortment of people including the abominable, tactless Lord Rydal, who is rumored to be having an affair with one of the guests while at the same time in ardent and artless pursuit of the hand in marriage of another. When the grotto explodes with Lord Rydal in it, it’s not a question of who would do it—as most who’ve met him would be sorely tempted—but who actually did do it.
Anthem for Doomed Youth (2011)
In the Spring of 1926, the corpses of three men are found in shallow graves off the beaten path in Epping Forest outside of London—each shot through the heart and bearing no identification. DCI Alec Fletcher of Scotland Yard, the lead detective, is immediately given two urgent orders by his supervisor at the Yard: solve the murders quickly and keep his wife, the Honourable Daisy Dalrymple Fletcher, away from the case! Thankfully, Daisy’s off visiting their daughter at school. But when a teacher is found dead, Daisy is once again in the thick of it. As Daisy tries to solve one murder, Alec discovers that the three victims in his case were in the same Army company during World War I, that their murders are likely related to specific events that unfolded during that tragic conflict, and that, unless the killer is revealed and stopped, those three might only be the beginning.
Gone West (2012)
In September 1926, the Honourable Daisy Dalrymple Fletcher visits Sybil Sutherby, a school friend now living in Derbyshire as the confidential secretary to a novelist. Suspecting that something is seriously amiss, Sybil has asked Daisy to discretely investigate. Upon arrival, Daisy finds a household of relatives and would-be suitors living off the hospitality of Humphrey Birtwhistle, who had been supporting them through his thrice-yearly, pseudonymous Westerns. When he took ill, though, Sybiltook over writing them while he recovered, only to see the sales increase. Now, she fears that someone in the household is poisoning Birtwhistle to keep him ill and Sybil writing the better-paying versions. But before Daisy can even get decently underway, Humphrey Birtwhistle dies under suspicious circumstances and Daisy now faces a death to untangle, a house full of suspects and a Scotland Yard detective husband who is less than pleased at this turn of events.
Heirs of the Body (2013)
The Daisy Dalrymple series continues in Heirs of the Body—when one of four potential claimants to the title of Lord Dalrymple dies a sudden, nasty death, the question on everyone’s mind is, “was it murder”?In the late 1920’s in England, The Honourable Daisy Dalrymple Fletcher is recruited to help her cousin Edgar—i.e. the Lord Dalrymple. About to turn fifty, Lord Dalrymple decides it is time to find out who would be the heir to the viscountcy. With the help of the family lawyer, who advertises Empire-wide, they have come up with four potential claimants. For his fiftieth birthday, Edgar invites those would-be heirs—along with Daisy and the rest of the family—to Fairacres, the family estate.In the meantime, Daisy is asked to be the family’s representative at the lawyer’s interviews with the claimants. Those four are a hotelier from Scarborough, a diamond merchant from South Africa, a young mixed-raced boy from Trinidad, and a sailor from Jamaica. However, according to his very pregnant wife, the sailor has gone missing.Daisy and Alec must uncover a conspiracy if they are going to stop the killing in the latest from the accomplished master of the genre, Carola Dunn.
Superfluous Women (2015)
In England in the late 1920s, The Honourable Daisy Dalrymple Fletcher, on a convalescent trip to the countryside, goes to visit three old school friends in the area. The three, all unmarried, have recently bought a house together. They are a part of the generation of “superfluous women”—brought up expecting marriage and a family, but left without any prospects after more than 700,000 British men were killed in the Great War.Daisy and her husband Alec—Detective Chief Inspector Alec Fletcher, of Scotland Yard —go for a Sunday lunch with Daisy’s friends, where one of the women mentions a wine cellar below their house, which remains curiously locked, no key to be found. Alec offers to pick the lock, but when he opens the door, what greets them is not a cache of wine, but the stench of a long-dead body.And with that, what was a pleasant Sunday lunch has taken an unexpected turn. Now Daisy’s three friends are the most obvious suspects in a murder and her husband Alec is a witness, so he can’t officially take over the investigation. So before the local detective, Superintendent Underwood, can officially bring charges against her friends, Daisy is determined to use all her resources (Alec) and skills to solve the mystery behind this perplexing locked-room crime.
The Corpse at the Crystal Palace (2019)
A casual outing to the Crystal Palace in London takes a mysterious and murderous turn in The Corpse at the Crystal Palace, the latest mystery in Carola Dunn’s beloved Daisy Dalrymple series.April 1928: Daisy Dalrymple Fletcher is visited in London by her young cousins. On the list of must-see sites is the Crystal Palace. Discovering that her children’s nanny, Nanny Gilpin, has never seen the Palace, Daisy decides to make a day of it—bringing her cousins, her 3-year-old twins, her step-daughter Belinda, the nurserymaid, and Nanny Gilpin. Yet this ordinary outing goes wrong when Mrs. Gilpin goes off to the ladies’ room and fails to return. When Daisy goes to look for her, she doesn’t find her nanny but instead the body of another woman dressed in a nanny’s uniform.Meanwhile, Belinda and the cousins spot Mrs. Gilpin chasing after yet another nanny. Intrigued, they trail the two through the vast Crystal Palace and into the park. After briefly losing sight of their quarry, they stumble across Mrs. Gilpin lying unconscious in a small lake inhabited by huge concrete dinosaurs.When she comes to, Mrs. Gilpin can’t remember what happened after leaving the twins in the nurserymaid’s care. Daisy’s husband, Detective Chief Inspector Alec Fletcher of Scotland Yard, finds himself embroiled in the investigation of the murdered nanny. Worried about her children’s own injured nanny, Daisy is determined to help. First she has to discover the identity of the third nanny, the presumed murderer, and to do so, Daisy must uncover why the amnesic Mrs. Gilpin deserted her charges to follow the missing third nanny.
