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Murder at the College Paperback – March 8, 2022

by Victor L. Whitechurch (Author)
4.1 out of 5 stars 435 ratings
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The monthly committee meetings at St. Oswald's College were always quite uneventful - until Francis Hatton was found murdered in the meeting room.

In 1930s Exbridge, the murder at St. Oswald's shakes the cloistered sanctity of university life. While workmen, colleagues and acquaintances claim alibis, Hatton, a sometime amateur crime-solver himself, has left a list of certain 'detection problems'- cryptic notes in his possessions that hint at dark motives.

Inspector Ambrose of Scotland Yard must decipher codes of privilege and status to solve the case and uncover the killer hidden in plain sight. But as the case progresses, Ambrose realizes that privilege can breed resentment, ambition, corruption - even murder.

A murder mystery ensconced in old money and ancient tradition, this tale of eccentrics, suspects and secrets within an old university town poses the question: when the ivory tower of privilege crumbles, who really has reason to kill?

Victor L. Whitechurch (1868 -1933), was a Church of England clergyman and author, writing books on religion, novels set in the church, thrillers and detective stories. Murder at the College was his last.

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  1. Print length
    271 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publication date
    March 8, 2022
  4. Dimensions
    5.12 x 0.68 x 7.48 inches
  5. ISBN-10
    1999900480
  6. ISBN-13
    978-1999900489
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Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ The Oleander Press
  • Publication date ‏ : ‎ March 8, 2022
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Print length ‏ : ‎ 271 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1999900480
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1999900489
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 11.2 ounces
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.12 x 0.68 x 7.48 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.1 out of 5 stars 435 ratings

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Victor L. Whitechurch

Victor L. Whitechurch

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4.1 out of 5 stars
435 global ratings

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Customers enjoy this university murder mystery, noting how the story becomes more engaging as it progresses. They find the book well-crafted and easy to read.

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7 customers mention "Story quality"7 positive0 negative

Customers enjoy this university murder mystery, noting that the story becomes more interesting as it develops, with one customer describing it as carefully plotted.

"...In this one each clue is significant and the solution is cleverly dependent on them. Although this book was written many years ago, nothing dates it...." Read more

"This well structured and enjoyable mystery will keep the reader wondering for some time about the identity of the murderer...." Read more

"...at the College May offer no thrills, but it’s an entertaining fair-play Golden Age mystery with a likable detective and a good puzzle." Read more

"This is a story than becomes more interesting as it developed...." Read more

4 customers mention "Readability"4 positive0 negative

Customers find the book readable, with one describing it as an excellent and pleasurable read.

"...These novels may be dated but they are pleasurable...." Read more

"An easy and interesting read,one that captures the imagined consequences and is hard to out aside until the end....looking for more Whitechurch to..." Read more

"...and this one, while it's beginning is less coompelling, becomes an excellent read." Read more

"...I loved it. I won't reveal the surprise but I was definitely taken aback. A great mystery. Highly recommend!" Read more

Top reviews from the United States

  • Allan H. Clark
    5.0 out of 5 stars Carefully plotted university murder mystery.
    Reviewed in the United States on March 31, 2024
    Verified Purchase
    Many mysteries are carelessly drafted with clues scattered everywhere that lead nowhere. In this one each clue is significant and the solution is cleverly dependent on them. Although this book was written many years ago, nothing dates it. There are several unusual features in this wellcrafted story, but it wouldn't be fair to prospective readers to mention them explicitly.
    2 people found this helpful
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  • Galla
    4.0 out of 5 stars Intricate puzzle
    Reviewed in the United States on February 2, 2025
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    This well structured and enjoyable mystery will keep the reader wondering for some time about the identity of the murderer. Only toward the end would one begin to think "aha, is it just possible that the culprit is....."?
    These novels may be dated but they are pleasurable. No cell phones, no DNA testing, no cameras everywhere, none of the paraphernalia and politics of modern day police procedurals. The only complaint I have with this Kindle version is the inclusion of covers from 1930's murder and horror magazines. The publisher, evidently someone from Ukraine, saw fit to add sleazy, misogynistic and violent illustrations that have absolutely nothing to do with the story. Mr. Whitechurch would not be pleased.
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  • richard r. bocchini
    5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent plot:A Challtnge
    Reviewed in the United States on April 26, 2025
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    An easy and interesting read,one that captures the imagined consequences and is hard to out aside until the end....looking for more Whitechurch to read!urch
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  • Patto
    4.0 out of 5 stars 1932 police procedural with fun clues
    Reviewed in the United States on January 23, 2023
    Verified Purchase
    Once a month a committee gets together in a scholar’s rooms to pass judgment on requests for church alterations, memorials, etc. They are art experts and architects charged with protecting the aesthetics of local churches. Usually they all lunch together, except this time Mr. Hatton, architecture expert, stays in the rooms to “write letters.” After lunch, he is discovered to have been murdered.

    The author, Victor Whitechurch, was a clergyman with very definite ideas of what a detective story should be. It should be a problem to be solved by fact-finding and shrewd police methods. It should not be a thriller — and Whitehouse in his preface assures us (rather charmingly) that he has strictly avoided “thrills” in this book.

    What Whitehouse does give us is the very intelligent and determined Detective Sergeant Ambrose who has a wonderful eye for minutiae. A burnt match, a broken shoelace, as well as many hours of investigation will help him catch his murderer.

    The reader examines along with Sergeant Ambrose a long list of likely suspects, from artistic and scholarly types to a willful old squire with a terrible temper.

    Murder at the College May offer no thrills, but it’s an entertaining fair-play Golden Age mystery with a likable detective and a good puzzle.
    12 people found this helpful
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  • Cary M Sheremet
    4.0 out of 5 stars Compelling Story
    Reviewed in the United States on December 29, 2022
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    This is a story than becomes more interesting as it developed. I've enjoyed Victor Whitechurch's Thorpe Hazell stories, and this one, while it's beginning is less coompelling, becomes an excellent read.
    4 people found this helpful
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  • Jaime1300
    5.0 out of 5 stars The Real Deal
    Reviewed in the United States on October 21, 2022
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    Some modern writers write in the style of the Golden Age writers but this is the real deal. I loved it. I won't reveal the surprise but I was definitely taken aback. A great mystery. Highly recommend!
    8 people found this helpful
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  • Hugh Resnick
    5.0 out of 5 stars Really Clever
    Reviewed in the United States on January 12, 2024
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    This is a very well-crafted mystery, very much in the style of early Agatha Christie or Dorothy Sayers - with our sleuths making occasional references to the Father Brown series. I'd never heard of this author before (thank-you algorithm!) but now looking for more of his books. Highly recommended.
    2 people found this helpful
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  • Jehoshephat
    1.0 out of 5 stars On Kindle unreadable
    Reviewed in the United States on February 26, 2025
    Sentence fragments tossed in anywhere, whole sentences misplaced by as much as 2 pages (in my Kindle edition), the whole is ridiculous and unreadable. I note that there's no Money Back option for this one. Don't waste anything here.
    One person found this helpful
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Top reviews from other countries

  • Ann Highfield
    5.0 out of 5 stars Nice!
    Reviewed in Australia on February 1, 2023
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    We’ll written, logically plotted and set out so that the reader can play detective. A neat little novel that is easy to read and very entertaining.
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  • Waldorf
    5.0 out of 5 stars Good Read
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on December 13, 2024
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    A most intricate case from the author cleric, filled with the now familiar misdirection and red-herrings from the start to finish. A thoroughly first-class detective yarn from the Golden Age.
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  • RTB
    3.0 out of 5 stars Whodunit of the ‘humdrum’ variety. Very flatly written, but the puzzle is modestly engaging.
    Reviewed in Australia on February 16, 2023
    Verified Purchase
    Whitechurch wrote detective fiction on an occasional basis over twenty or so years. He is possibly best known for his railway themed short story mysteries, many of which featured Thorpe Hazell who, besides being a railway expert, was a vegetarian and physical fitness enthusiast. These stories appeared in The Strand and elsewhere prior to WW1. But Whitechurch also wrote a number of full length detective novels. This book is a late work from 1932. (It was published in the US as Murder at Exbridge).
    Whitechurch describes what he intends in his Foreward to the. book. ‘ ... a ... problem of how some particular crime was committed and who committed it ... The problem is gradually worked out on the ordinary lines of shrewd police investigation and methods. Every detail of the investigation, as it arises, is made plain to the reader – as he reads, he knows just as much about the case as the detective knows – no less. The author has tried to “play the game” fairly, and, in order to do so, he has strictly avoided “thrills”’.
    Does Whitechurch deliver? Pretty much. As one might expect from the Foreward, the book is in fact rather Croftsian. It is one of those inter-war proto-procedurals which concentrates on the investigation of the crime from the point of view of the police, but with little or no attention to the inter-action of personalities. The police go about their business in a mutedly affable inoffensive manner, politely picking up clues and attempting to piece them together. Apart from a few quirks they, and everyone else involved, are colourless. Characters are recognisable by their names, occupations and, if you can remember them, physical descriptions. AS in Crofts there is an alibi to be broken, although here this is no real challenge. More interestingly, Whitechurch works a variation on a locked room mystery.
    Seasoned readers of inter-war detective fiction will probably spot the villain without too much difficulty, and will wonder why the police ignored such an obvious suspect for so long. Nevertheless the whodunit puzzle is reasonably engaging.
    The solution to it is however, as it is plotted, not particularly satisfying. The police succeed due largely to a number of fortunate co-incidences (The most notable is a chance meeting in a railway compartment but there are several others.) These push the bounds of acceptable plotting, although they cannot be said to exceed what one often finds in detective fiction of this vintage.
    The last three chapters are concerned with tidying up loose ends. Their construction is clumsy. The chapter involving the coroner’s inquest is otiose. The last chapter explains how the murderer escaped the scene of the crime unobserved. This puzzle has a pleasing solution. It is neatly conceived, by no means obscure or overly elaborate, and yet not at all easy to see by the light of day in amongst the detail of the police investigation. (The police themselves do not appear to solve it.)
    As he promises, Whitechurch does indeed avoid thrills but, in the process, he delivers a lot of dull writing. Mainly this is due to an over-reliance on direct speech. This is a chronic problem in detective fiction generally, but here it is taken to extreme lengths. It is the more irksome because of Whitechurch’s bland characterisation. Even so, the book remains quite readable. It is written in a straightforward and succinct style, in which all the relevant detail is clearly realised. Whitechuch also indulges in a degree of play about amateur detection and the influence of detective fiction. This serves to lighten the overall tone and reduce the stodge factor.
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  • May
    4.0 out of 5 stars ATMOSPHERIC
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on March 9, 2024
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    I enjoyed this novel, not for the characters and not really for the plot, although it was twisty and the solution was not obvious. I liked the atmosphere of the thirties, where many people didn't even have a landline, never mind a mobile and policemen had to travel by public transport when on a case.
    A glimpse of a different world.
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  • ceric7
    3.0 out of 5 stars How to solve a problem
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on May 26, 2022
    Verified Purchase
    The author leaves the potential reader in no doubt about what is being offered in this, his final detective novel, first published in 1932.

    'The true "Detective Story" is a "problem," the problem of how some particular crime was committed and who committed it, a problem which, while often demanding smaller problems, should not deviate from the main question in hand. "A Crime, and its solution." That is the description of the real "Detective Story."... The problem is gradually worked out on the ordinary lines of shrewd police investigation and methods. Every detail of the investigation, as it arises, is made plain to the reader —as he reads, he knows just as much about the case as the detective knows—no less. The author has tried to "play the game" fairly, and, in order to do so, he has strictly avoided "thrills."'

    The story is a little more interesting than the plain fare suggested by this Foreword, although it is pretty easy to work out the whodunit and why, well in advance of the police. Not that the detectives portrayed here are stupid, just rather too painstaking and slow-acting for their own good.

    The setting is in a university town, with excursions to London and France, but the emphasis is firmly on police procedure in the capable hands of the "modern" and "well-educated" Superintendent Plestow and DS Ambrose. The narrative is business-like, although the pace of the investigation is rather leisurely, given that a man has been murdered.

    Very readable, but not remotely challenging or puzzling.

    3.25 stars.
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