Christianna Brand (pen name for Mary Christianna Milne, 1907-1988) wrote a series of mysteries featuring Inspector Cockrill as well as a children's series with Nurse Matilda that was adapted for the movie Nanny McPhee. This is a classic cozy set in the English countryside during the Blitz with a "locked room" storyline. The grandchildren of Sir Richard March are gathered at the house for a weekend when their squabbling and poor "life choices" so outrage Sir Richard that he vows to disinherit them from Swanswater Manor and his fortune. He shuts himself away in a small lodge on the grounds and is found dead next morning. Everyone seems to have an alibi and Inspector Cockrill must solve first this murder and then a 2nd murder of the grounds keeper. This is a reprint series from British Library Crime Classics. Kirkus calls this "Perhaps the most underrated country-house mystery of them all."
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