The Civil War left its mark on Dr. John Turner. He turns his back on medicine and sees his unexpected inheritance in England as an opportunity to start over. But he never imagines how God intends to use his new role as lord of Ashford Hall or the beautiful woman he finds there to ease his troubled soul. A tragic loss led Penelope Howard to bury her heart and dreams in her work for the Hall and the village of Woodley. But the arrival of the new heir stirs not only her discarded longings but her compassion as well.

Ever since he made his first appearance in A Study In Scarlet, Sherlock Holmes has enthralled and delighted millions of fans throughout the world. Now Audible is proud to present Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes, read by Stephen Fry. A lifelong fan of Doyle's detective fiction, Fry has narrated the definitive collection of Sherlock Holmes - four novels and four collections of short stories. And, exclusively for Audible, Stephen has written and narrated eight insightful introductions, one for each title.

Esme is born into a world of words. Motherless and irrepressibly curious, she spends her childhood in the Scriptorium, an Oxford garden shed in which her father and a team of dedicated lexicographers are collecting words for the very first Oxford English Dictionary. Young Esme’s place is beneath the sorting table, unseen and unheard. One day a slip of paper containing the word bondmaid flutters beneath the table. She rescues the slip and, learning that the word means “slave girl,” begins to collect other words discarded or neglected by the dictionary men.

The orphaned Elsie Camden learned as a girl that there were two kinds of wizards in the world: those who pay for the power to cast spells and those, like her, born with the ability to break them. But as an unlicensed magic user, her gift is a crime. Commissioned by an underground group known as the Cowls, Elsie uses her spellbreaking to push back against the aristocrats and help the common man. Elite magic user Bacchus Kelsey is one elusive spell away from his mastership when he catches Elsie breaking an enchantment. To protect her secret, Elsie strikes a bargain.

Lucy Scarpelli, an Italian dressmaker from New York, befriends socialite Rowena Langdon as she's making her summer wardrobe. It's an unlikely friendship, but one that Rowena encourages by inviting Lucy to the family mansion in Newport, Rhode Island. Grateful for Lucy's skill in creating clothes that hide her physical injury, Rowena encourages Lucy to dream of a better future.

It is 1940 and William, 12, Edmund, 11, and Anna, nine, aren't terribly upset by the death of the not-so-grandmotherly grandmother who has taken care of them since their parents died. But the children do need a guardian, and in the dark days of World War II London, those are in short supply, especially if they hope to stay together. Could the mass wartime evacuation of children from London to the countryside be the answer?

Edinburgh, 1911: When Maud McIntyre and her lady’s maid, Daisy, form a detective agency, they never dream their first case will take place at a glamorous house in the Scottish Highlands. But when the duchess of Duddingston, concerned that a notorious jewelry thief will target her lavish weekend party, employs Maud to go undercover as a guest to find the culprit, the agency has its first case to solve....

Julia Hollis’ opulent life in Victorian London crashes to pieces when her husband passes away. Worse, she is told by his bankers that he gambled away their fortune. Now the family’s hope rests on The Larkspur, an old abandoned coaching inn in the quaint village of Gresham. Driven by dread and her desire to provide for her children, Julia decides to turn the dilapidated inn into a lodging house. But can she - who was accustomed to servants attending to every need - do what needs to be done and cope when boarders begin arriving?

June 1933. Independent, young Kitty Underhay has been left in charge of her family’s hotel, The Dolphin, on the tranquil English coast. But when several rooms are broken into and searched, including Kitty’s own, she quickly realizes that something out of the ordinary is afoot at the hotel. Soon, rumors are flying in the cozy town that someone is on the hunt for a stolen ruby. A ruby that Kitty’s mother may well have possessed when she herself went missing during the Great War.

Twelve-year-old Myrtle Hardcastle has a passion for justice and a highly unconventional obsession with criminal science. Armed with her father’s law books and her mum’s microscope, Myrtle studies toxicology and keeps abreast of the latest developments in crime scene analysis. When her next-door neighbor, a wealthy spinster and eccentric breeder of rare flowers, dies under mysterious circumstances, Myrtle seizes her chance. With her unflappable governess, Miss Ada Judson, by her side, Myrtle takes it upon herself to prove Miss Wodehouse was murdered.

England 1912. Danby Hall is the only home Lady Cecilia Bates has ever known. Despite the rigid rules of etiquette and her mother's fervent desire to see her married off, Cecilia can't imagine life anywhere else. But now, with an agricultural depression sweeping the countryside, the Bates family's possession of the hall is suddenly in peril. A possible solution arrives in the form of the imperious American heiress Annabel Clarke. The Bates and their staff arrange a grand house party upon the heiress's arrival. Then a guest dies after sipping from a glass meant for Annabel....

New York City, 1899. Tillie Pembroke’s sister lies dead, her body drained of blood and with two puncture wounds on her neck. Bram Stoker’s new novel, Dracula, has just been published, and Tillie’s imagination leaps to the impossible: the murderer is a vampire. But it can’t be - can it? A ravenous reader and researcher, Tillie has something of an addiction to truth, and she won’t rest until she unravels the mystery of her sister’s death.

December 1899. After the death of her beloved grandmother, Cleopatra Fox moves into the luxury hotel owned by her estranged uncle in the hopes of putting hardship and loneliness behind her. But the poisoning of a guest on Christmas eve throws her new life, and the hotel, into chaos. Cleo quickly realizes no one can be trusted, not Scotland Yard and especially not the hotel’s charming assistant manager.

India Steele is desperate. Her father is dead, her fiancé took her inheritance, and no one will employ her, despite years working for her watchmaker father. Indeed, the other London watchmakers seem frightened of her. Alone, poor, and at the end of her tether, India takes employment with the only person who’ll accept her–an enigmatic and mysterious man from America. A man who possesses a strange watch that rejuvenates him when he’s ill.

Spring, 1905: Free-spirited like the Thoroughbreds she rides across the Kentucky countryside, Stella takes adventure by the reins when she's asked to attend a mysterious wedding in rural England. But once she arrives at the lush Morrington Hall estate, her cold and ambitious father confesses that he won't only give away his best racehorses as gifts - he has also arranged to give away his daughter as bride to the Earl of Atherly's financially strapped son. Stella refuses to be sold off like a prized pony. Yet despite a rough start, there's something intriguing about her groom-to-be.

Constance Duncan has more important things on her mind than finding a husband - for herself, at any rate. Constance connects lonely hearts, and nothing will distract her from it - until she finds herself irresistibly drawn to a man of disastrously different views. Max Ensor is a politician whose outmoded attitudes outrage her - even as his powerful presence intrigues her. Clearly there is only one thing to do with such an exasperating man: convert him! Little does Constance know that Max has the same plan in mind for her....

England 1912. Danby Hall is the only home Lady Cecilia Bates has ever known. Despite the rigid rules of etiquette and her mother's fervent desire to see her married off, Cecilia can't imagine life anywhere else. But now, with an agricultural depression sweeping the countryside, the Bates family's possession of the hall is suddenly in peril. A possible solution arrives in the form of the imperious American heiress Annabel Clarke. The Bates and their staff arrange a grand house party upon the heiress's arrival. Then a guest dies after sipping from a glass meant for Annabel....

London, 1880. Kat Holloway, highly sought-after young cook to the wealthy of London, finds herself embroiled in murder when she’s accused of poisoning her employer, the loathsome Sir Lionel Leigh-Bradbury. Her only help as she works to clear her name comes from the mysterious Daniel McAdam, a handsome man-of-all-work who seems to know everyone and always happens to be in the right place at the right time.

Maisie Dobbs got her start as a maid in an aristocratic London household when she was thirteen. Her employer, suffragette Lady Rowan Compton, soon became her patron, taking the remarkably bright youngster under her wing. Lady Rowan’s friend, Maurice Blanche, often retained as an investigator by the European elite, recognized Maisie’s intuitive gifts. The outbreak of war changed everything. Ten years after the Armistice, in the spring of 1929, Maisie sets out on her own as a private investigator, one who has learned that coincidences are meaningful, and truth elusive.

Lady Cecilia of Danby Hall feels adrift. She couldn’t be less interested in helping to plan the church’s upcoming bazaar. Instead, what excites her most is the Woman’s Suffrage Union meeting she has just attended. Inspired by the famous and charismatic leader of the group, Mrs. Amelia Price, Cecilia is eager to join the Union - if she can hide it from her parents, that is. But when Mrs. Price is found dead at the foot of the stairs in her home, her Votes for Women sash torn away, Cecilia knows she must attend to a more urgent matter: finding the killer.

In the cold Toronto winter of 1895, the naked body of a servant girl is found frozen in a deserted laneway. The young victim was pregnant when she died. Detective William Murdoch soon discovers that many of those connected with the girl's life have secrets to hide. Was her death on attempt to cover up a scandal in one of the city's influential families?

The orphaned Elsie Camden learned as a girl that there were two kinds of wizards in the world: those who pay for the power to cast spells and those, like her, born with the ability to break them. But as an unlicensed magic user, her gift is a crime. Commissioned by an underground group known as the Cowls, Elsie uses her spellbreaking to push back against the aristocrats and help the common man. Elite magic user Bacchus Kelsey is one elusive spell away from his mastership when he catches Elsie breaking an enchantment. To protect her secret, Elsie strikes a bargain.

Charles Lenox, Victorian gentleman and armchair explorer, likes nothing more than to relax in his private study with a cup of tea, a roaring fire and a good book. But when his lifelong friend Lady Jane asks for his help, Lenox cannot resist the chance to unravel a mystery. Prudence Smith, one of Jane's former servants, is dead of an apparent suicide. But Lenox suspects something far more sinister: murder, by a rare and deadly poison.

Despite living at her father’s inn her entire life, Elizabeth Doyle has always managed to avoid involvement with the smugglers who frequently gather there. Until now. When a handsome smuggler is brought to her with dire injuries, Elizabeth risks everything to hide him - completely unaware that the wounded man is not who he appears to be. When an opportunity arises to infiltrate the notorious smuggling gang he believes caused his father’s death, Jonas Ainsworth, the Viscount Langton, pretends to be one of them.

Lady Sophronia Bremerton is a far cry from the typical debutante, but she’s the toast of London’s upper class for one simple reason: she’s a society columnist for the London Illustrated News, and the gentry loves seeing their exploits printed in the gossip pages. But Sophie has bigger plans - she aspires to be an investigative reporter. When a stuffy ballroom during yet another Season proves to be nothing more than the usual rumor mill, Sophie seeks respite in the library, alongside four other young women who, for their own reasons, are also looking for escape.

1913: In a sprawling manor on the outskirts of London, three young women seek to fulfill their destinies and desires amidst the unspoken rules of society and the distant rumblings of war.... Sir Philip Buxton raised three girls into beautiful and capable young women in a bohemian household that defied Edwardian tradition. Eldest sister Rowena was taught to value people, not wealth or status. But everything she believes will be tested when Sir Philip dies, and the girls must live under their uncle’s guardianship....

From the internationally best-selling author of Somewhere in France comes an enthralling historical novel about one of the most famous wedding dresses of the 20th century - Queen Elizabeth’s wedding gown - and the fascinating women who made it.

An expert in etiquette, Emma takes her pristine reputation most seriously. But the devilish Lord Marlowe is determined to prove that some rules of proper behavior are made to be broken....

When Laura McAllister, a young lady's maid, learns her three siblings have been taken from their mother and emigrated to Canada without her mother's knowledge, she becomes determined to search for them and reunite the family. But a lack of funds and resistance from authorities push her to use a false name and take a position with a child emigration society to gain passage to Canada.

It's 1905, and to recover from the loss of her fiance, Potter moves into a small farmhouse in Sawrey. Populated by colorful characters, both humans and critters, her new life is full of promise. That is, until a villager dies and murder is suspected. Now it's up to this amateur sleuth to find a killer roaming the English countryside.

"Of all the conundrums that have puzzled Sherlockian scholars, few have been thornier than the "vexed question" of Dr. Watson's wives. In these ten stories, listeners will meet the all-but-unknown women who preceded and succeeded Mary Morstan, as well as learning more about poor Mary's fate. Other cases involve Our Heroes with all levels of Victorian society, including prime ministers and prostitutes, aristocrats and generals, amateur sleuths and Scotland Yarders, composers, novelists, and even ghosts.

Sherlock Holmes has been a beloved character from his first story, and his mystique endures to the modern age in print and on screen, but he has had a long life in the theater, as well. Where did it begin? What are the themes, stories, and characterizations that make his stage presence unique and just as enduring?

Increasing numbers of crime shows and movies have featured detectives on the autism spectrum. Portrayals of such characters have been met with acclaim and criticism. Is the entertainment industry celebrating neurodiversity or is it reinforcing stereotypes? In The Autistic Sleuth, over two dozen characters appearing in filmed productions from around the globe will be analyzed to explore how film and television present atypical minds through some of the world's most popular detectives.

Sherlock Holmes concluded that it was because the intruder was known to the dog. Madsen’s new mystery questions whether the identity of one of the greatest criminals of all time, Jack the Ripper, was deduced by Conan Doyle. Conan Doyle was already famous with his popular Sherlock Holmes stories when Jack the Ripper struck London in October 1888. So why was Conan Doyle silent about this case? This thrilling adventure may well hold the key....

Emily Watson lives in a quaint English manor house with her twin sister, confined to a 20-mile radius around the estate for reasons she has never known. When the mysterious Professor Moriarty comes to visit and her sister goes missing, she discovers she is the half-sister of Dr. John Watson. Traveling to London to meet him, she finds that he is the biographer and flatmate of famed consulting detective Sherlock Holmes, in whom Professor Moriarty has expressed a sinister interest.

On New Year's Day 1891, Sherlock Holmes summons the limping street urchin, Wiggins, to Baker Street and decrees he must die at dawn. Wiggins, however, has other plans. To fulfil the dying wish of his mother, Irene Adler, he schemes with his two formidable American aunties to keep two important facts from the great detective: Mrs. Hudson is actually his Aunt Grizelda, and he is both Holmes' child and a girl pretending to be a boy. Through a series of mysterious letters Adler bequeathed to Wiggins, the dark backstory of her parents and all their long-kept family secrets unravel.

What is a crimson trail? Is it blood? Or paint? Or yarn? Why would Sherlock Holmes revisit a previously solved case? How could an open window be important and how can a house be blackmailed? Dr. John Watson reveals the answers to these questions in The Crimson Trail and Other Stories along with cases involving the disappearance of a poet's intended, a Christmas card clue, a missing tiara, a caped murderer, a vampire attack, and a mythical moor creature.

Sherlock Holmes, the best-known detective (sorry, consulting detective) on Earth, celebrates his 160th birthday on January 6, 2014. As a tribute to his genius, and to mark the occasion, The Holmes Sutra is presented (by a crazed fan) as: a compilation of 160 mantras (aphorisms/slogans/sayings - call them what you will) - some original, some canonical, some based on various print/media adaptations - that are aimed to make Sherlock Holmes (and his fans) smile and a test of the readers' Holmes Mania Quotient (HMQ).

June 1946. London, England. A murdered man. A mysterious woman. A note in another language. Irene Holmes, daughter of the long-retired Sherlock Holmes, used her unique talents of deduction and observation to assist her childhood friend Detective Eddy Lestrade with his cases during the war. With the war over, Eddy keeps her on as a consultant, finding her essential to solving crimes. During one of these cases, Irene meets Joe, a man who finds her instantly intriguing and has enough opinions of his own to keep up with her challenging personality.

“From now on, I am going to be Sherlock Holmes, the World’s Greatest Cat Detective.” With those words, my friend Spot decided he would become a crime-solving kitty. “And you, of course,” he said dramatically, “will be my faithful friend, Dr. John Watson. The one who writes down all of my adventures and shares them with the world! We’ll be famous! Everyone will know the name ‘Sherlock Holmes, the World’s Greatest Cat Detective’!” I wasn’t too worried. I was sure that, by morning, Spot would have forgotten all about becoming Sherlock Holmes. Boy, was I wrong.