The Seventh Hypothesis

Characters dressed in the garb of 17th century plague doctors roaming alleyways haunted by Jack the Ripper...A plague victim vanishing off a stretcher under the noses of witnesses a few feet away…The corpse of the same victim reappearing under the nose of a police officer half a mile away. How are such things possible in the London of 1938?

Are the events connected to a conversation overheard between a celebrated writer of mystery plays and his principal actor, where each accepts a challenge to commit a murder and pin it on the other? What is the connection to a replica of Maelzel’s chess-playing robot? The famous criminologist Dr. Twist and Inspector Hurst of Scotland Yard face one of the most diabolically clever criminals in their long collaboration.

“The Seventh Hypothesis” is the fifth Paul Halter novel to be translated in English. The author, a best selling novelist in his native France, has written over thirty novels, almost all "locked room" or "impossible crime," and is widely regarded as the successor to John Dickson Carr. He appeared on BBC Radio 4’s programme “Miles Jupp in a Locked Room,” broadcast on May 21, 2012. His prize-winning novel “The Fourth Door” and “The Demon of Dartmoor” both also featuring Dr Twist have been published by Locked Room International, as have two novels featuring the dilettante Owen Burns: “The Lord of Misrule” and “The Seven Wonders of Crime.” A sixth novel: “The Riddle of Monte Verita” by Jean-Paul Torok (“wonderfully captures and evokes the glory days of the detective story”) was published earlier in 2012.

For information about signed and lettered editions of all six novels, limited hardcover editions of Halter’s critically acclaimed “The Night of the Wolf” and future publication plans, please go to lockedroominternational.com or contact pugmire1@yahoo.com