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A Schooling in Murder

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A Schooling in Murder

By: Andrew Taylor
Narrated by: Nathalie Buscombe
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*A Times Best Book of the Year* From the author of The Ashes of London, comes a new historical mystery set in the last days of WWII

'Ten out of ten' The Times

‘A grand piece of work – a triumph and one of Taylor’s best’ MICK HERRON

'A wonderfully unique novel from the master of historical crime fiction. Beautiful, haunting, and quite brilliant' LAURA SHEPHERD-ROBINSON

‘As good as I’d expect from a master of the craft’ VAL MCDERMID

'A wonderful, subtle novel, set in a strange, enclosed world. Beautiful writing and a gloriously satisfying ending' ANN CLEEVES

__________

England, May 1945

In the last days of World War II, Monkshill Park School for Girls stands far apart from the violence in Europe. Yet a woman has been murdered in its grounds.

Annabel Warnock, a teacher with a secretive past, has disappeared. The teachers and girls whisper that she’s run away, but in fact she has met a violent end.

Replacement tutor and amateur crime writer Alec Shaw arrives to find a school riven with bitter rivalries and dangerous tensions. He begins to suspect there is a real-life mystery waiting to be solved… and these echoing halls hide a killer.

©2025 Andrew Taylor (P)2025 HarperCollins Publishers 20th Century Crime Ghosts Historical Historical Fiction Horror Literature & Fiction Mystery Mystery, Thriller & Suspense Women Sleuths England Murder
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Critic reviews

A wonderfully unique novel from the master of historical crime fiction. Beautiful, haunting, and quite brilliant

(Laura Shepherd-Robinson)

A grand piece of work – a triumph and one of Taylor’s best

(Mick Herron)

This ticked all the boxes for me. As good as I’d expect from a master of the craft

(Val McDermid)

A heady mix of murder, intrigue, and a supernatural interlocutor. Taylor’s prose is characteristically fluid, his ability to conjure empathy for his cast – both real and spectral – wonderfully perceptive, and the plot itself gripping in the very best traditions of mystery writing. A thorough delight from start to finish

(Vaseem Khan)

An engrossing, eerie and erudite page turner which maintains the suspense until the very end … I defy anyone not to enjoy this captivating whodunnit!

(SW Perry)

A Schooling in Murder captures the period brilliantly and what a loveable main character– a total delight

(Leonora Nattrass)

Beguiling

(Douglas Skelton)

This most unusual murder mystery – in which the reader is aligned with the murder victim after her death – is an absolute triumph. Andrew Taylor turns the conventions of mystery stories on their head to explore secrets hidden just beneath the surface within a closed community. A Schooling in Murder is clever, tender and utterly haunting.

(Tim Major)

Andrew Taylor re-invents the classic crime story with the dark aplomb of a modern master

(S.G. MacLean)

A Schooling in Murder is a clever, distinctive, and beautifully written mystery from a crime writer who is top of the class

(Martin Edwards)

An ingenious and intriguing homage to the golden age of crime fiction – A Schooling in Murder is both wryly beguiling and steeped in atmospheric tension. I could not put it down

(Essie Fox)

Taylor evokes beautifully the tawdry atmosphere, the cast of misfits and the relationships and love affairs that must be hidden, with a lightness of touch that belies the deeper tragic elements of the story. This is a novel of immense charm

(Elizabeth Freemantle)

Crime fiction has a new superstar: Annabel Warnock is simply the best narrator I have read in a long time. Acerbic, inquisitive, irrepressible … It hardly matters that she's dead, although of course it matters very much in the plot. This is a splendidly lively and richly entertaining novel. I adored it

(Sarah Hilary)
All stars
Most relevant
I very much enjoyed the beautifully crafted tales of the girls boarding school which were familiar to me. I was gripped by the mystery. Unfortunately the ending was totally disappointing with many loose threads remaining.

Fascinating Detail

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No spoilers. Andrew Taylor is one of the most reliable and gifted authors writing today. He shows a ready facility to engage the listener or reader from the very first sentence until the novel concludes. This is especially true here, and I would advise any prospective listener not to fall into the trap of researching this novel for fear it will totally undermine the listening pleasure by discovering how it ends. Here is a novel with a satisfying conclusion that will please all and try none. Not a pleasure to waste then. After completing this novel, I played 20 minutes of it though my smart-speaker during a meal in order to test the reaction of my skilled listener wife. She was immediately hooked. This is a stand-alone murder mystery novel and is an object lesson in plotting, characterisation, historical realism – even down to cigarette smoking, a meat-safe and cheeky use of characters hooked on crime fiction. Yes there is humour. There are, also, so many story threads that listeners will always be trying to work-out where these will lead and to what significance. Andrew Taylor’s fictional narrator is sympathetically rendered. The audiobook performer treats this novel well and entirely reliably too. Voice characterisations are fitting for the 1945 setting. Many Audible listeners will know Andrew Taylor for his wonderful Marwood and Lovett’s Restoration novels. Many listeners, including me, thought that series had ended. Not quite so. Another novel is in draft stage, projected publication 2027.

Entirely Satisfying

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Wonderful combination of great story with some superb narration. One of the best Audible fiction books I’ve listened to. Engrossing, original and excellently narrated

Brilliant Story! Brilliant Narration!

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I have just finished this and feel a little sad because I was enjoying it so much. The right blend of detail and pace made the story flow. Enough characters to be rounded but not too many to keep track. Guessing the key point did not detract from my enjoyment..

Excellent listen

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A very satisfying listen. The ghost writer in search of her murderer, launched this novel in a different direction from other murder mysteries which successfully drove my interest.
Boarding schools must have been a pretty hideous life for those who were sent there in the 30's and 40's.
The characters were not particularly likeable, the teachers equally so, however the only connection from the spirit world to theirs was controlled and limited. It meant the narrative and development of the story was also on a 'slow drip' and allowed the supporting characters are chance to develop as well.

This did not disappoint, I liked the curves in the plot. Andrew Taylor is a favourite author and a clever writer.

Cleverly written

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