Oscar Wilde Murder Mysteries
"Oscar Wilde Murder Mysteries" is a series of 7 novels written by Gyles Brandreth published by John Murray and Corsair Publishing between 2007 and 2017.
In 6 of these novels, the main characters are Oscar Wilde and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. The novel "Oscar Wilde and the Murders at Reading Gaol", set during Wilde's imprisonment, doesn't have Arthur Conan Doyle in the story.
Novels
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Oscar Wilde and the Candlelight Murders (10 may 2007, John Murray) -
Oscar Wilde and the Ring of Death (1 may 2008, John Murray) -
Oscar Wilde and the Dead Man's Smile (14 may 2009, John Murray) -
Oscar Wilde and the Nest of Vipers (28 october 2010, John Murray) -
Oscar Wilde and the Vatican Murders (2011, John Murray) -
Jack the Ripper: Case Closed (15 june 2017, Corsair)
Plot summaries
Oscar Wilde and the Candlelight Murders (2007)
London, 1889. Oscar Wilde, celebrated poet, wit, playwright and raconteur, is the literary sensation of his age. All Europe lies at his feet. Yet when he chances upon the naked corpse of sixteen-year-old Billy Wood, posed by candlelight in a dark and stifling upstairs room, he cannot ignore the brutal murder. With the help of fellow author Arthur Conan Doyle, he sets out to solve the crime — and it is Oscar Wilde's peculiar genius and his unparalleled access to all degrees of late-Victorian life — from society drawing rooms and the bohemian demi-monde to the criminal underclass — that prove the decisive factors in their investigation of what turns out to be the first in a series of bizarre and apparently inexplicable killings.
Oscar Wilde and the Candlelight Murders is a gripping detective story that explores the secret world of Oscar Wilde – his surprising friendships, his complex marriage, and his unusual association with Inspector Aidan Fraser of Scotland Yard.
Set against the exotic backdrop of fin-de-siècle London and Paris, Gyles Brandreth evokes Oscar Wilde's trademark wit and brilliance with huge flair, intertwining all the intrigue of the classic English murder mystery with a compelling portrait of one of the greatest characters of the Victorian age.
Oscar Wilde and the Ring of Death (2008)
It's 1892, and Oscar Wilde is the toast of London, riding high on the success of his play Lady Windermere's Fan and celebrating with friends at a dinner party where he conjures up a game called "murder" that begs the question: Who would you kill, if you had no chance of being caught? Oscar Wilde and friends, including Arthur Conan Doyle, Bram Stoker, and poet Robert Sherard (the novel's narrator) write the names of their "victims" on pieces of paper and choose them one by one. After leaving the party, Oscar Wilde scoffs at the suggestion that he may have instigated a very dangerous game indeed...
The very next day, the game takes an all-too sinister turn when the first "victim" turns up dead. Soon Oscar Wilde and his band of amateur detectives must travel through the realms of politics, theater, and even the circus and the boxing ring to unearth misguided passions that have the potential to become deadly poisons…not only for the perpetrators of the seemingly perfect crimes, but also for the trio of detectives investigating them.
Richly atmospheric and as entertaining as Oscar Wilde himself, here is the second in a series destined to delight mystery readers and fans of historical fiction alike.
Oscar Wilde and the Dead Man's Smile (2009)
Paris, 1883. Oscar Wilde, aged 27, has come to the city of decadence to discover its charms, to rekindle his friendship with the divine Sarah Bernhardt and to collaborate with France's most celebrated actor-manager, Edmond La Grange. As he throws himself into his work (and his pleasures), Oscar discovers dark secrets lying at the heart of the La Grange company – and is confronted by murders, both foul and bizarre. To solve the crimes, to unravel the mystery, Oscar risks his life – and his reputation – embarking on a dangerous adventure that takes him from bohemian night clubs to an asylum for the insane, from a duel in the Buttes de Chaumont to the gates of Reading Gaol.
Oscar Wilde and the Nest of Vipers (2010)
Set in 1890, the story opens at a glittering London party where the Duchess of Albemarle is found dead — half-clothed with two small puncture wounds on her throat — sparking whispers of vampires. To avoid scandal, the Prince of Wales quietly asks Oscar Wilde and his friend Arthur Conan Doyle to investigate. Narrator Robert Sherard chronicles their inquiry in an epistolary mix of diaries, letters, telegrams, and clippings as the case snakes through high society's "nest of vipers." What looks like the supernatural proves grimly earthly, exposing predation, secrets, and royal-adjacent peril as Oscar Wilde and Arthur Conan Doyle unmask a human killer behind the vampiric theater.
Oscar Wilde and the Vatican Murders (2011)
Oscar Wilde and Arthur Conan Doyle must penetrate the highest echelons of the Catholic Church to solve a macabre series of killings. In 1892, Arthur Conan Doyle, exhausted by his creation Sherlock Holmes, retires to the spa at Bad Homburg. But his rest cure does not go as planned. The first person he encounters is Arthur Conan Doyle, and when the two friends make a series of macabre discoveries amongst the portmanteau of fan mail Conan Doyle has brought to answer - a severed finger, a lock of hair and finally an entire severed hand — the game is once more afoot. The trail leads to Rome, to the very heart of the Eternal City, the Vatican itself. Pope Pius IX has just died. These are uncertain times. To uncover the mystery and why the creator of Sherlock Holmes has been summoned in this way, Oscar and Conan Doyle must penetrate the innermost circle of the Catholic Church - seven men who have a very great deal to lose.
Jack the Ripper: Case Closed (2017)
London. 1894. Police Chief Macnaghten, Oscar Wilde and Arthur Conan Doyle are in a Chelsea drawing room, gathered to discuss the case of Jack the Ripper, the most notorious murderer in England. And thus the three men set out to solve one of the world's most famous mysteries - the ultimate truth about the identity of Jack the Ripper. Case Closed is Arthur Conan Doyle's account of the events of 1894, the year of the return of Jack the Ripper. Based on Arthur Conan Doyle's real-life friendship with Conan Doyle and the extraordinary but little-known fact that in 1894 the detective in charge of the Jack the Ripper investigations was Arthur Conan Doyle's neighbour in Tite Street, Chelsea, this is a revelatory and gripping detective story, combining the intrigue of a classic murder mystery with a witty and compelling portrait of one of the greatest characters of the Victorian age.
