A sophisticated 1930s Greenwich Village couple finds an inconvenient body in their upstairs bathtub in the first installment of an “excellent series” (The New Yorker). Jerry and Pamela North’s upstairs apartment has been empty as long as they can remember. It’s an ordinary Greenwich Village abode, and the Norths are ordinary Villagers—which means they can’t bear to go more than a few days between cocktail parties. So when Pamela decides to stage a soiree in the empty apartment, Jerry goes along begrudgingly. But what seems inconvenient becomes felonious the moment they find a dead man in the tub. He has been bludgeoned, stripped naked, and left to rot. The party is most certainly off. Which neighbor was rude enough to leave a body in the upstairs tub? Though they should know better, Mr. and Mrs. North can’t resist getting involved. Before they know it, they’re right in the thick of a manhunt, and Greenwich Village will never be the same. The Norths Meet Murder is the 1st book in the Mr. and Mrs. North Mysteries, but you may enjoy reading the series in any order.

The Norths Meet Murder opens as Jerry arrives home from his office at a publishing house and finds Pam organizing a party in the vacant apartment on the top floor of their brownstone. The empty flat can provide the space to dance to the radio and to set up a bar that their second floor flat lacks. Since their landlady, Mrs. Bruno, is having trouble leasing the place, she has left the door unlocked in order to allow prospective renters to look it over. So when Pam and Jerry go upstairs to plan the arrangements for the party, they are able to walk right in. However, on their way out they look into the bathroom and discover the corpse of a man with his head bashed in lying naked in the bath tub.

Radiant in her white satin wedding gown, Patricia Blakley was living a dream come true. At last, she was marrying the man she loved, Ted Kimble—a fellow Christian and son of a local preacher. But little did she realize her new husband had a dark side. Shock waves rocked the small, North Carolina town of Pleasant Garden when Patricia's charred body was discovered inside the Kimble's burned-out home. Soon family and friends learned an even worse truth—Patricia had died from a bullet wound to the head. Now, in Unholy Covenant, North Carolina journalist Lynn Chandler-Willis uncovers the story behind the crime. Taking readers from the crime scene to the courtroom, she delivers a passionate account of a crime that forever changed the lives of many in the small North Carolina community.

While vacationing in Florida, Mr. and Mrs. North investigate a doctor’s murder It’s morning in Key West, and Pamela North has gone fishing for pelicans. Her husband, Jerry, insists it’s impossible to go fishing for birds, but when he finds her later on, she’s surrounded by pelicans on all sides. He shouldn’t be surprised; Pamela has made a career out of doing the impossible—and she’s not finished yet. A blizzard is battering New York City, but the Norths have come south for sun and sand and a spot of tennis in old Key West. Murder wasn’t on their agenda, but Pamela has a way of finding it wherever she goes. She’s just gone out for another morning of luring pelicans when she finds a local physician at the end of the pier, a bullet in his chest and his blood all over the dock. The birds will have to wait; the Norths are about to go fishing for a killer. Murder by the Book is the 26th book in the Mr. and Mrs. North Mysteries, but you may enjoy reading the series in any order.

For Mr. and Mrs. North, there’s no vacation from murder In a remote cabin far from New York City, Jerry and Pamela North are getting killed. On the brink of annihilation, they grit their teeth and battle back. In a minute, the fight is finished—and the Norths are named mixed doubles champions. It’s a happy moment during a splendid vacation, but off the tennis court, all is not well. Following an afternoon of fun and games, the evening’s entertainment will be murder. Mr. and Mrs. North have invited their closest friends—an ex-aviator, a mysterious doctor, and NYPD’s own Lt. William Weigand—to join them on this glittering retreat, but the joviality ends when Weigand finds Helen Wilson lying across the path, a knife buried in her neck. A member of the group surely killed her, and unless the Norths act quickly, the murderer will strike again.

Mr. and Mrs. North chase a gunman who killed an author in the middle of his book launch Looking around the Hotel Dumont, Pamela North sees plenty of people she might like to murder. That’s what happens when she’s left alone at a book party, bored to tears. Her husband is a publisher, and when he’s late to an event, all she can do is look from critic to critic and think that, as messy as it can be, homicide has its advantages. She needn’t worry; a good killing will come along soon. The party to celebrate Anthony Payne’s latest release is just winding down when the shooter strikes. Payne is midsentence when he drops, a bullet hole in his bald head. And with a single shot, there’s more than enough blood to wash away all the evening’s tedium—and send the Norths on the hunt for a long-distance killer. Murder Has Its Points is the 25th book in the Mr. and Mrs. North Mysteries, but you may enjoy reading the series in any order.

Bruce Murphy's Encyclopedia of Murder and Mystery is a comprehensive guide to the genre of the murder mystery that catalogues thousands of items in a broad range of categories: authors, titles, plots, characters, weapons, methods of killing, movie and theatrical adaptations. What distinguishes this encyclopedia from the others in the field is its critical stance.