Escapade

New York: St, Martin's Oress, 1995. First Edition First Printing Stated . Hard Back. Fine/Fine. 5 3/4" x 8 1/2. 355 Pages.July 1995 Edition. No defects noted. Interior text pages are flawless. Dust jacket protected with Polyfit mylar. Mylar cover has tape residue in middle front and sticker residue on spine Flaop price $22.95 is unclipped. Authenticated author's signature on title page. In the summer of 1921. English society is fascinated by the spiritual world, perhaps no one more than the great mystery writer Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, one of thirteen eager guests at a weekend party and seance in a stately Devon manor house steeped in history and tradition. As Sir Arthur puts it something very strange and very sinister. is occurring here at Maplewhite. Whatever it is. warns his skeptical friend Harry Houdini that it is most certainly of this world and no other. Their suspicions arc amply confirmed when their host, the Earl of Axminstcr, is found murdered in a locked room. Suspects and secrets abound, from the lovely Lady Purleigh and her nubile daughter, Cecily, to Dr. Erik Auerbach, the Viennese psychoanalyst to Mme. Sosostris, the renowned European medium. Nobody is quite what they appear to be and everyone has something to hide, in a mystery so puzzling that it baffles not only Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, but even the Great Houdini himself. Only the two greatest masterminds of artful deceit could solve a crime so ingeniously crafted and cunningly executed. And only Walter Satterthwait could write Escapade, a brilliant comic novel that's also a traditional mystery, one that plays fair with the reader and yet stiII manages to break nearly all the rules.