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Oscar Wilde and a Death of No Importance

Oscar Wilde and a Death of No Importance
A Mystery  
This edition: eBook, 288 pages
Availability: Available for immediate download
List Price: $10.99
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Description

One of Britain's premier royal biographers pens the first in a series of fiendishly clever and stylish historical murder mysteries

Lovers of historical mystery will relish this chilling Victorian tale based on real events and cloaked in authenticity. Best of all, it casts British literature's most fascinating and controversial figure as the lead sleuth.

A young artist's model has been murdered, and legendary wit Oscar Wilde enlists his friends Arthur Conan Doyle and Robert Sherard to help him investigate. But when they arrive at the scene of the crime they find no sign of the gruesome killing -- save one small spatter of blood, high on the wall. Set in London, Paris, Oxford, and Edinburgh at the height of Queen Victoria's reign, here is a gripping eyewitness account of Wilde's secret involvement in the curious case of Billy Wood, a young man whose brutal murder served as the inspiration for The Picture of Dorian Gray. Told by Wilde's contemporary -- poet Robert Sherard -- this novel provides a fascinating and evocative portrait of the great playwright and his own "consulting detective," Sherlock Holmes creator, Arthur Conan Doyle.

"I always wanted to meet Oscar Wilde and now I feel that I have done, and shared a terrific, bizarre and frightening adventure with him. I recommend the experience."
-- Anne Perry
"Brandreth's accomplishment is evident in the force of Wilde's personality, which fairly leaps off the page...readers will delight in the effortless characterization and deft portrait of late-Victorian England."
-- Stephanie Barron, author of Jane and the Barque of Frailty
"A witty fin de siècle entertainment, and the rattlingly elegant dialogue is peppered with witticisms uttered by Wilde well before he ever thought of putting them into his plays."
-- Sunday Times (London)
"Genius...Wilde has sprung back to life in this thrilling and richly atmospheric new novel.... Magnificent...an unforgettable shocker about sex and vice, love and death."
-- Sunday Express
"This excellent novel...I'd be staggered if, by the end of 2007, you'd read many better whodunnits. Brandreth demonstrates supremely measured skill as a storyteller."
-- Nottingham Evening Post
"Wilde as detective is thoroughly convincing.... The period, and the two or three worlds in which Wilde himself moved, are richly evoked...an excellent detective story. I'm keenly looking forward to the rest of the series."
-- The District Messenger, journal of the Sherlock Holmes Society of London

"Brandreth...spins a tale of human frailty and self-preservation...a promising start."

-- Library Journal

"Oscar Wilde makes a stylish sleuth in this clever series debut."

-- Publishers Weekly

"A first-class stunner...[A] wow of a history-mystery...fascinating..."

-- Booklist (Starred review)
"Nothing less than... Sherlock Holmes...except the uncannily brilliant sleuth is not Holmes but Oscar Wilde.... a first-class stunner." - Booklist (starred review)
"Brandreth...captures Wilde's frothy joie de vivre and develops this first installment of a proposed series with color and aplomb."- Kirkus
"Oscar Wilde makes a stylish sleuth in this clever series debut...Brandreth blends history and invention, integrates a nicely complex solution with entertaining subplots and delivers the whole in witty, precise prose."- Publishers Weekly
"Highly entertaining mystery and, no doubt, a work of literature even Wilde himself would have applauded."- I Love a Mystery
"An intriguing tightrope walk...engaging, often ingenious...a pleasure."- Pittsburgh Tribune Review
"It contains loads of period detail and many witty aphorisms, and is a lot of fun."- Globe and Mail (Toronto)
"Wilde's personality...leaps off the page...readers will delight in the effortless characterization and deft portrait of late Victorian England."- Stephanie Barron, author of Jane and the Barque of Frality and Jane and the Unpleasantness at Scargrave Manor
"Witty...elegant dialogue is peppered with witticisms uttered by Wilde well before he ever thought of putting them into his plays."- Sunday Times
"The plot races along like a carriage pulled by thoroughbreds...So enjoyably plausible"- The Scotsman
"Both a romp through fin-de-siècle London...and a carefully researched portrait of Oscar Wilde...Very entertaining."- Literary Review
"Brandreth has the Wildean lingo down pat.... A sparkling treat for fans of Wilde and Sherlock Holmes alike"- Easy Living
"...thrilling and richly atmospheric new novel...Brandreth's stroke of genius...magnificent..."- Sunday Express
"Very funny"- The Independent on Sunday
"Gyles Brandreth and Oscar Wilde seem made for one another...much here to enjoy...nicely structured plot zips along."- Daily Telegraph
"Not only a good piece of detective fiction in its own right...Future tales in the series are something to look forward to."- Leicester Mercury
"This excellent novel ... I'd be staggered if...you'd read many better whodunnits. Brandreth demonstrates supremely measured skill as a story-teller."- Nottingham Evening Post
"Wilde as detective is thoroughly convincing...an excellent detective story. I'm keenly looking forward to the series"- The District Messenger, Journal of the Sherlock Holmes Society of London
"Brandreth knows his Wilde...an excellent read, and it seems the scene may be set for others in the same style
-- and with the same lead character."- Gay Times