Lies, jealousies, death.

A delightful collection of five short mysteries recounted by the last surviving member of the Agora Society, Carl Brooke, of strange happenings in it's history and crimes solved. With a style similar to that of Dr.Watson in the Sherlock Holmes stories, the reader is taken through the processes of describing the crime itself and then the methods of it's solving.

In Two Ticks Before Midnight, Charles Tock, one of the members of the Agora goes missing for a six month period, then returns unexpectedly with a companion and an ancient scroll. It is this that launches the unpleasant and murderous circumstances recorded.

The Penitent Thief has a reformed burglar accused of murder. Everything points to his guilt but he says he didn't do it.

The Peace Party Massacre provides an introduction to Thomas Drake, and a missing man whilst The Case of the Mad Sheik tells the classic tale of transformation after a man comes into possession of a mysterious jewel.

But of all the stories, perhaps this reader's favourite is the final offering, The Captain's Play, in which the police officer who becomes an honorary member of the club, tells the members about one of his cases and invites them, through question and answer, to determine which of the three suspects was the murderer: a great opportunity to match our own detection abilities against those of the society.

Beautifully written in the first person and read with clarity and character by the author himself, this is the perfect book to gently exercise the mind whilst filling in empty hours. My thanks to the rights holder for gifting me a complimentary copy of The Agora Letters, at my request, via Audiobook Boom. It was a pleasure to hear.

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