The Small World of Murder - Tapa dura

It is not the happiest of journeys to the other side of the world for a family Christmas. Nina Hemslow knows that when she accepts the invitation to join her wealthy friends, Nicola and Jocelyn Foley, for the Foleys had recently lost their only child - a daughter who vanished without trace from her pram outside a supermarket, and whom police and parents are convinced is dead. Moreover, the Foley's marriage is on the rocks, and Nina is reluctantly drawn into their mutual suspicions and recriminations, with each accusing the other of desiring the partner's death. And at the winery, where they stay with Jocelyn's brother and his employer's family, things are also difficult, not least when Nina finds her own emotions becoming involved. Yet when sudden death occurs in the midst of an Australian Christmas, with turkey and plum pudding in a temperature of ninety degrees, it poses some very curious problems. Their unravelling and the dramatic solution in London show Elizabeth Ferrars at her vintage best.