Anne Morice s ingenious mysteries featur-

ing her actress/sleuth Tessa Crichton are

set in the colorful milieu of London s West

End theater scene. Readers will be delighted

once again to find Tessa snooping through

her accustomed haunts as she unravels all

imtricate knot.

It was well known in theatrical circles

that the celebrated Edwardian playwright,

Sheridan Seymour, had three children by

his mistress, Kitty Lampeter. Seymour him-

self had no quahns in acknowledging them

and left his money to his illegitimate son.

The copyright to his plays he left in equal

shares to his legitimate daughters, but over

the years Baba, the youngest, hadby means

usually foul gained sole control.

Now that Seymonr s work was enjoying

a popular revival on the West End stage

Baba was rich. Never a woman to be con-

tent with her lot, she now planned to write

her father s biography in which, to the

consternation of her relations, she threat-

ened to reveal that two of the Lampeters

were not Seymour s children. She claimed

she could prove this allegation in a collec-

tion of letters recently discovered in an old

house,

When Tessa Crichton is appealed to to

try and prevent the biography s publica-

tion. she needs no encore agement. With all