The Franchise Affair - Josephine Tey

The Franchise Affair by Josephine Tey / 295-page paperback published in 2023 in the Penguin Modern Classics Crime & Espionage Series 

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'The new crime and espionage series from Penguin Classics makes for a mouth-watering prospect' Daily Telegraph

Abducted, beaten, hidden in an attic, a young woman stages an audacious escape. But is her story everything she claims it to be?

Fifteen-year-old Betty Kane can recall every detail of the room where she says she was held at the country house known as The Franchise - even the crack in its round window. But her alleged kidnappers, a quiet-living mother and daughter, claim they have never seen her before. Somebody has to be lying. But who? As the case sparks a media frenzy, it is up to unassuming village solicitor Robert Blair to find out.

"Permanent classics in the detective field . . . no superlatives are adequate."--New York Times

Josephine Tey began to write full-time after the successful publication of her first novel, The Man in the Queue (1929), which introduced Inspector Grant of Scotland Yard. It wasn't until after the Second World War that the majority of her crime novels were published. Born in Inverness, Tey died in 1952, leaving her entire estate to the National Trust.