Lament for a Maker is part of Michael Innes’ Inspector Appleby mystery series.

Something is amiss at a remote castle isolated in the Scottish Highlands. Raving recluse Ranald Guthrie, much despised laird of Erchany, has been wandering his halls obsessively reciting an old Scottish poem: Timor mortis conturbat me. Fear of death disturbs me…

In the depths of a howling winter night, Guthrie falls to his death from the tower of his castle.

Inspector Appleby is called in to investigate this deadly accident. Immersing himself in the lonesome world in which Guthrie spent his final days, Appleby must separate dreadful truth from chilling legend to determine what really happened on that terrible night.

Was this truly an accident? Was Guthrie driven mad enough to take his own life? Or does something darker lurk within this gothic castle?

Lament for a Maker was originally published in 1938.

PRAISE FOR MICHAEL INNES & LAMENT FOR A MAKER

‘The most brilliant first novel I have had the luck to read.’ — Nicholas Blake, Spectator

‘In its own line not inferior to Trent’s Last Case.’ — London Mercury

‘Altogether a brilliant piece of work.’ — Birmingham Post

‘A fiendishly clever and macabre crime.’ — Reader Review

‘Mr Innes is in a class by himself among detective story writers.’ — Times Literary Supplement

‘Wickedly witty.’ — The Daily Mail

‘As farfetched and literary as Sayers’ — Cambridge Companion on Crime Fiction

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