Fear Stalks the Village, Ethel Lina White
Fear Stalks the Village, Ethel Lina White
List: $36.49 | Sale: $25.55
Club: $18.24

Fear Stalks the Village

Author: Ethel Lina White

Narrator: Oona Beeson

Unabridged: 10 hr 32 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Soundings

Published: 02/15/2024


Synopsis

A novelist ambles down the lanes of a cosy country village, replete with Tudor houses and quaint cottages. In her writer's mind she pictures the sordid truth beyond the veneer, a seemingly laughable proposition - until the coming of the letters. Anonymous letters from a poisoned pen, sowing discord and defaming everybody from the Rector to the 'queen of the village' Miss Decima Asprey. Naturally, where there is venom in the air and dark secrets are threatening to come to light, the shadow of death is not far behind. Ethel Lina White's 1932 classic is one of the foundation stones of the village mystery sub-genre of crime fiction. Revelling in the delicious contrast of angelic outer appearances and the wickedness behind the facade, White's novel is a witty and satisfying interwar mystery.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Lady Clementina on February 19, 2022

You look at these scattered houses, and you are impressed by their beauty. I look at them, and the only thought that comes to me is a feeling of their isolation and of the impunity with which crime may be committed there. --Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, ‘The Adventure of the Copper Beeches' These words of S......more

Goodreads review by Nancy on February 05, 2024

more like a 3.7 rounded to a 4 full post is here: [URL not allowed] Ahhhhh. My reading has once again returned me to the tranquil English village of the interwar years, one of my favorite settings for British crime fiction. This book features another personal favorite, the dread......more

Goodreads review by Sid on January 31, 2022

I enjoyed this crime classic from 1932, although the beginning was a bit of a struggle. The story is set in an apparently “perfect” English village, in which wealthy people keep immaculate houses, live blameless, impeccably tasteful lives and have diligent, contented servants. The anonymous letters b......more

Goodreads review by Ivonne on December 23, 2024

Gather round, children. You probably think that, before TikTok, Twitter, Facebook and the Internet, there wasn’t written bullying. Indeed, that’s what the denizens of this particular village thought in 1932, too. The villagers are described as “not only well-bred and charming, but endowed with such......more

Goodreads review by Alisha on January 06, 2025

This is a rather somber but effective poison-letter mystery. Ethel Lina White (author of The Wheel Spins, aka The Lady Vanishes, and other thrillers) spins a moody tale of an apparently perfect village, the peace of which is threatened by a spate of vicious letters. I did figure out the culprit, bas......more