Kingdom Lost — Patricia Wentworth

When she had let down her case, she locked her bedroom door. And then she put out the light and climbed out of the window.

Marooned as a baby, Valentine Ryven has been on a deserted South Sea island for twenty years, before she is rescued and returned to civilization -- as heiress to a great fortune.

However, since she was given up for dead, her inheritance had passed to cousin Eustace. Now that Valentine is back, Eustace stands to lose it all. Pressed by an intimidating villainess, the unworldly Valentine finds a way to let Eustace keep the money. But when she finds an old letter from her late mentor Edward Bowden -- to be opened only when things were ‘so bad that they couldn't possibly be any worse' -- she'll uncover a shattering truth, transforming everything she has been taught to believe about herself.

Kingdom Lost was originally published in 1930. This new edition features an introduction by crime fiction historian Curtis Evans.

“When I pick up a book by Patricia Wentworth I think, now to enjoy myself -- and I always do.” Mary Dell, Daily Mirror