The Old Wine Shades

Over the course of three nights, Harry - a stranger who sits down next to Jury one night in a London pub - spins a complicated story about a good friend of his whose wife, son and dog disappeared over nine-months ago during a house viewing in Surrey. There has been no trace of them and no clue as to what happened. But the dog has come back.





Dumbfounded, Jury wonders if Harry Johnson is just winding him up. Or did it really happen? When Jury investigates, all seems to be just as Harry described it. Until he finds the body...



Martha Grimes is a self-acclaimed Anglophile who has been publishing a book (and sometimes two) every year for the past twenty-five years.





Born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Grimes earned her BA and MA from the University of Maryland. Though she is best known for her detective fiction series that features Richard Jury, a Scotland Yard inspector, Martha Grimes is the author of two further book series - the Andi Oliver series and the Emma Graham series - as well as a collection of poems, a short story and a further two novels.





In 1983, Grimes was the recipient of the Nero Wolfe Award for the best mystery of the year for The Anodyne Necklace. In 2012, she was awarded the title of Grand Master by The Edgar Awards Mystery Writers of America.



The author's gift at melding suspense, logical twists and wry humour makes this one of the stronger entries in this deservedly popular series.



A top-notch Grimes, replete with an especially suave villain and a most peculiar twist.



Like a set of Russian nesting dolls, The Old Wine Shades is a brilliantly crafted story within a story within a story; with more tangents than a high school geometry textbook, this delightfully offbeat and sharp-witted installment of Grimes's popular series is highly recommended for any and all discerning fans of British whodunits à la Ruth Rendell and P. D. James. There is most definitely trouble afoot...



Delivers on its mysterious premise while celebrating the power of storytelling.



Grimes builds a captivating mystery with plenty of twists and quirky characters. Jury fans will not be disappointed.



One of the most complex and entertaining in the [Jury] series.



Even fans who can't appreciate the passing strangeness of this truly special adventure will be won over by a precocious little girl and a dog of rare intelligence.



One of the established masters of the genre.



[Grimes's] gift for evoking mood and emotion is as keen as her talent for inventing a demanding puzzle, and solving it.



[Grimes] excels at creating a haunting atmosphere and characters both poignant and preposterous.



Grimes is gifted at exploring the private, sometimes horrifying, yet utterly mundane thoughts of ordinary people.



Read any one [of her novels] and you'll want to read them all.



Grimes's love of the offbeat, the whimsical and the absurd makes [the Richard Jury series] utterly unlike anyone else's detective novels.



Grimes is not the next Dorothy Sayers, not the next Agatha Christie. She is better than both.