Charlotte Armstrong

Mischief

The Balloon Man

The Unsuspected

After his father’s sudden death, a college student seeks revenge Ladd Cunningham never felt comfortable in his father’s office. After high school he went to Stanford University rather than enter the family business, and he planned never to return. But then his father became ill, dying a slow, painful death, and Ladd was forced to come back. Ladd’s new stepfather David Crown presses him, trying to learn if Ladd plans to finish college or take the reins at Cunningham Company. Ladd says nothing, and Crown gives him a box of his father’s effects. Inside the dead man’s planner, Ladd finds a note implicating Crown in his father’s death. Murder is too good for a criminal. Ladd wants vengeance—slow, calculated, and irreversible.

A Little Less Than Kind

Patricia Highsmith

Margaret Millar

Dolores Hitchens

Though women crime and suspense writers dominate today's bestseller lists, the extraordinary work of the mid-century pioneers is largely unknown. Their work, influential in its day and still vibrant and extraordinarily riveting today, is long overdue for rediscovery. This volume, the first of a two-volume collector's set, gathers four classic works that together reveal the vital and unacknowledged lineage that leads to today's leading crime writers. From the 1950s here are Charlotte Weinman, Patricia Highsmith, Margaret Millar & Dolores Hitchens.

Four Suspense Novels of the 1950s: Mischief / the Blunderer / Beast in View / Fool's Gold

Women Crime Writers

A longtime bachelor finally marries—only to learn the corrosive power of jealousy For fifty-five years, Kenneth Gibson has lived in backwaters. A former army clerk, he makes a quiet living teaching poetry to indifferent undergrads. His life is happily dull until the day he meets Rosemary, a damaged girl whose frailty compels Kenneth to try to make her well. They wed, and as Rosemary recovers from her depression, Gibson falls in love, transforming his world. But his wife will never love him. She is smitten with their landlord, a dashing young chemical engineer named Paul. Gibson wants to let her go, but he cannot bear to be parted with the first love he has ever known. In Paul’s house is a case of poison, and this love triangle can only end in death.

A Dram of Poison

The One-Faced Girl

California businessman J. Middleton Little is on company assignment in Chicago when he's caught eavesdropping on a top-secret confab between high-level government officials. J. knows he isn't just hearing things;they actually referred to the coming Armageddon. To ensure his silence, J.'s been offered the chance of a lifetime: seven seats on an "ark" scheduled to carry the last vestiges of the human race from Earth before the apocalypse. In a matter of minutes, J. has gone from a self-described "middle-class, middle-income, middlebrow man-of-the-street" to one of the most privileged men in the universe. The only stipulation: He can't tell a single soul until the proper time. For now, it's back to life in Burbank with his dutiful, intuitive wife;an underhanded and scheming son;his impossibly spoiled daughter;his unhinged father;and a mother-in-law whose religious fanaticism is making J. think twice about his role as savior – especially when he finds himself shadowed by an insidious pack of secret agents, counterspies, and a lone madman on a terrifying mission. Soon enough, J.'s once-ordinary world will be ripped apart by threats, deceit, cover-ups, secrets, and shifting family loyalties. It will also leave J. wondering what he really does know, what he doesn't, what he's been led to believe, and above all, why. J. Middleton Little has a lot to learn before the end. This smart, inventive thriller by "the American queen of suspense novelists" is impossible to put down (New York Telegraph).

Seven Seats to the Moon

A longtime bachelor finally marries -- only to learn the corrosive power of jealousy . For fifty-five years, Kenneth Gibson has lived in backwaters. A former army clerk, he makes a quiet living teaching poetry to indifferent undergrads. His life is happily dull until the day he meets Rosemary, a damaged girl whose frailty compels Kenneth to try to make her well. They wed, and as Rosemary recovers from her depression, Gibson falls in love, transforming his world. But his wife will never love him. She is smitten with their landlord, a dashing young chemical engineer named Paul. Gibson wants to let her go, but he cannot bear to be parted with the first love he has ever known. In Paul's house is a case of poison, and this love triangle can only end in death.

Something Blue

A middle-aged widow makes a new life in a strange apartment house. Nona Henry's husband is dead, and with him the life they spent years building in New York City. Unable to bear the Manhattan winter without him, Nona goes west to Pasadena, California, land of sun, sand, and rebirth. She finds a picture postcard advertising a boarding house called Sans Souci and, charmed by the elegant hotel's stately patio, makes a one-month reservation. Reality does not live up to the postcard. Sans Souci is dingy, cramped, and dark, a claptrap hotel full of shabby rooms whose windows overlook a run-down neighborhood. But Nona will not give in. Sixteen other widows live in the hotel. Some are lifers, some just passing through. In this eclectic mix of women whose men have gone, Nona finds a niche, and learns that the end of her old life can't stop her from beginning again.

The Seventeen Widows of Sans Souci

Lemon in the Basket (Crime Classic)

When the publicity-seeking antics of a budding Hollywood starlet known as the Dream Walker tarnish the usually spotless reputation of a family friend, Manhattan acting teacher Olivia Hudson decides to beat the actress at her own game. Reprint.

The Dream Walker

Edgar Award winner: A longtime bachelor finally marries—only to learn the corrosive power of jealousy For fifty-five years, Kenneth Gibson has lived in backwaters. A former army clerk, he makes a quiet living teaching poetry to indifferent undergrads. His life is happily dull until the day he meets Rosemary, a damaged girl whose frailty compels Kenneth to try to make her well. They wed, and as Rosemary recovers from her depression, Gibson falls in love, transforming his world. But his wife will never love him. She is smitten with their landlord, a dashing young chemical engineer named Paul. Gibson wants to let her go, but he cannot bear to be parted with the first love he has ever known. In Paul’s house is a case of poison, and this love triangle can only end in death.

A madwoman holds a professor prisoner in this frightening thriller by the Edgar Award–winning “mistress of day-lit terror” (The New York Times). California University mathematics instructor Pat O’Shea is horrified to learn that a fellow faculty member is responsible for the theft of a valuable piece of lab equipment. But biology professor Everett Adams hasn’t just turned thief; he’s also become a stark raving madman. After a confrontation, Adams leaves his accuser for dead, badly beaten on the outside of town. Now, no one has seen either man in days. When O’Shea awakens in a dilapidated old bungalow on a deserted stretch of nowhere, he’s not in the hands of a rescuer, but rather at the mercy of a captor. The watchful old woman is demented, homicidal, and taking wicked delight in keeping a hostage. Her killer hound stands guard, and if all goes according to plan, the gravely injured O’Shea will never be allowed to leave. Frustrated by the ineffective work of the authorities, O’Shea’s wife, Anabel, is committed to conducting her own investigation into her husband’s disappearance. Amassing a trail of evidence, she follows a strange path of baffling clues, family skeletons, and fatal secrets. One by one, they will lead Anabel to a house on the dark side of a dead-end road.

The Witch's House

A government secret about the end of the world will change what’s left of a man’s suburban life in this thriller by an Edgar Award–winning author. California businessman J. Middleton Little is on company assignment in Chicago when he’s caught eavesdropping on a top-secret confab between high-level government officials. J. knows he isn’t just hearing things; they actually referred to the coming Armageddon. To ensure his silence, J.’s been offered the chance of a lifetime: seven seats on an “ark” scheduled to carry the last vestiges of the human race from Earth before the apocalypse. In a matter of minutes, J. has gone from a self-described “middle-class, middle-income, middlebrow man-of-the-street” to one of the most privileged men in the universe. The only stipulation: He can’t tell a single soul until the proper time. For now, it’s back to life in Burbank with his dutiful, intuitive wife; an underhanded and scheming son; his impossibly spoiled daughter; his unhinged father; and a mother-in-law whose religious fanaticism is making J. think twice about his role as savior—especially when he finds himself shadowed by an insidious pack of secret agents, counterspies, and a lone madman on a terrifying mission. Soon enough, J.’s once-ordinary world will be ripped apart by threats, deceit, cover-ups, secrets, and shifting family loyalties. It will also leave J. wondering what he really does know, what he doesn’t, what he’s been led to believe, and above all, why. J. Middleton Little has a lot to learn before the end. This smart, inventive thriller by “the American queen of suspense novelists” is impossible to put down (New York Telegraph).

A professor becomes enchanted with a girl who carries a dangerous jinx History student Sarah Shepherd does not look like a killer. She is shy, but her writing so impresses Professor David Wakeley that he asks her to become his research assistant. Terrified, she begs him to stay away. For Sarah Shepherd is stalked by death, and the professor could be her next victim. For years, people close to her have died: an office colleague, a coworker’s mother, and Sarah’s husband, who dropped dead on their wedding day. David doesn’t believe her until a few days later, when his parked car rolls down a hill, seemingly under its own power, and kills a stranger. Something is tormenting this young girl, and David suspects it may be her family. To Sarah’s relatives, a group of old vaudevillians, deceit and even murder are second nature.

The Better to Eat You

Gathers the recipes of renowned chef Charlotte Armstrong, including potato pancakes with smoked salmon and scallion cream, crawfish pie, and sweet potato pie with bourbon praline sauce

Down Home Cooking from an Uptown Girl

Charlotte's Table

A middle-aged widow makes a new life in a strange apartment house Nona Henry’s husband is dead, and with him the life they spent years building in New York City. Unable to bear the Manhattan winter without him, Nona goes west to Pasadena, California, land of sun, sand, and rebirth. She finds a picture postcard advertising a boarding house called Sans Souci and, charmed by the elegant hotel’s stately patio, makes a one-month reservation. Reality does not live up to the postcard. Sans Souci is dingy, cramped, and dark, a claptrap hotel full of shabby rooms whose windows overlook a run-down neighborhood. But Nona will not give in. Sixteen other widows live in the hotel. Some are lifers, some just passing through. In this eclectic mix of women whose men have gone, Nona finds a niche, and learns that the end of her old life can’t stop her from beginning again.

Charlotte Armstrong

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