At Death's Door — Robert Barnard

GRANDE DAME ... GRANDE DEATH

The king of novelists, Benedict Cotterel, was in his bedroom, dictating how to leave his money. The queen of the theater, Dame Myra Mason, was in the local inn, eating crow and honey. Years ago their brief affair had resulted in a daughter, Cordelia. Now she was writing a tell-all biography. Cordelia had never known her father or the half-brother who reluctantly let her into the mansion where the aged writer lived. She was, after all, planning a character assassination. But a murder? Dame Myra's presence at the inn with a new husband in tow was part of an effort to stop Cordelia's dramatic expose. No one guessed that the right cast had been assembled to play out a tragedy ... of desperate secrets and sudden death.