At this stately home, now open for public tours, visitors revel in the lush atmosphere created by its three hundred rooms, its exceptional display of fine china, its chilling dungeon with historic suits of armor on display, evoking the spirits of knights from a forgotten age. Young Michael's sister, a visitor to the mansion with their mum, presses her for an explanation of "what's a chastity belt?" while Michael fools around with one of the suits of armor. He lifts the visor and stares inside, only to find a face staring back at him! A dead human body has been stashed inside the armor after having been done in by a savage blow to the back of the head. Detective Inspector C.D. Sloan and his wisecracking sidekick Crosby are called in to figure out whodunit and why.

Mystery fans will relish this delightful entry in Catherine Aird's highly esteemed classic series starring Sloan, of the Berebury Criminal Investigations Dept. in Calleshire, England, and his amiable but not very able assistant, Crosby. The two are introduced in The Religious Body, the first of 18 C.D. Sloan mysteries. Aird's work is among the very best of the British police procedural genre, particularly noteworthy for the delightful sense of humor woven throughout.

The Stately Home Murder was originally published as The Complete Steel.