Only in New England · the Story of a Gaslight Crime

Fiction based on fact, this is a most unconventional and intriguing book. It deals with the violent and mysterious death of a formidable New England lady which occurred almost fifty years ago in an isolated coastal village. Returning to "Quahog Point" today (virtually unchanged since Victorian times), Mr. Roscoe picks his way into the past, eventually to solve the old mystery. He carries out his investigations with so much relish for New England oddity and Victorian atmosphere that he has accomplished much more than the sleuthing of an old cause celebre: he has created a wonderfully colorful period piece.

In Mr. Roscoe's genial and suspenseful narrative an extraordinary murder trial lives again, and so do the characters involved, in all their sharp-edged identity. This was the gaslight era and Mr. Roscoe makes the most of its bizarre and mournful charm. While the charge was matricide, he thinks of the case as "a gentle kind of crime- a baffler in needlepoint." It's a rare sort of story, which could have occured only in New England. (Information is from flaps of dust cover)