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ARCHIVIST/SLEUTH BEN REESE DELVES INTO CENTURIES OF
BITTER FAMILY FEUDS AND MURDER AT A SCOTTISH ESTATE
Sally Wright Skillfully Blends the Worlds of Business, Art, Academia, Bacteriology and Rare
Books in her Third Classic Mystery
Praise for Sally Wright's earlier Ben Reese mysteries:
Publish and Perish
"Put together with polish and precision. It echoes such classic writers as Dorothy Sayers
and Ngaio Marsh without in any way imitating them."
- The Washington Times
Pride and Predator
“Wright not only provides clever leads to challenge the reader, but she has also created a
strong and interesting protagonist in Reese.”
-- Publishers Weekly
“If Sally S. Wright’s budding mystery series doesn’t get at least a little buzz out there in
the book world, it won’t be because she doesn’t deserve it.” – Ft. Worth Star-Telegram
"A welcome retreat to the Golden Age of mystery. Definitely a must for those of you who
relish classic mystery authors.”
-- The Snooper
"An evocative storyteller, Wright's descriptions of the ancient land of Scotland and the
family relationships of its inhabitants are as compelling as the mystery itself."
--Mostly Murder
“Get in on the ground floor with a mystery writer who…will be keeping us instructed,
entertained, puzzled, and moved for many years to come.”
-- National Review
Who killed Georgina Fletcher? How did this much-loved professor see it coming? Was it
academic jealousy or something more sinister? And what troubling discovery had she made just
before her death in Oxford?
The questions are many, the clues diverse, the mystery tantalizing. Enter Ben Reese, university
archivist, former WWII scout, hero of Publish and Perish, Pride and Predator, and now Pursuit
and Persuasion. (Ballantine, Mass Market Paper, October 3, 2000, ISBN: 345-42590-1). In a
story that turns on ancient wrongs, fatal obsession and hidden guilt, author Sally Wright creates a
complex multi-layered novel that will delight readers of classic mystery.
The day before she died-apparently of food poisoning-Georgina Fletcher outlined her suspicions
in a letter to her heir, Ellen Winter:
"I have reason to believe that my death was desired, planned and perpetrated with great care and
deliberation. Even if I am right, the circumstances of my death will appear to have been brought
about by natural causes... "
Although Georgina stops short of naming her killer in the letter, Ben and Ellen find no shortage of
suspects in Oxford or at her magnificent Scottish estate.
Was it the nephew who wanted to run Fletcher Tire and Rubber? The colleague who wanted
Georgina out of the English department? Could it have been the temperamental sculptor, the
peculiar gardener, the disgruntled handyman or an aristocratic neighbor? Or was it someone
Georgina alluded to in the poetry she secretly wrote? Someone no one would ever suspect.
Vivid with the local color of Scotland, Pursuit and Persuasion races along as clues pile up and
Ben discovers a string of crimes stretching back decades-crimes that would have gone undetected
if not for Georgina's murder. In a breathtaking climax Ben is trapped by the killer but surprisingly
proves he is as much an action hero as a thinker. "Men of intellect who are men of action interest
me," states author Wright. In this novel, too, she gives Ben new personal direction: "He's probably
getting close to committing himself to his own life again, after the death of his wife," and there's
even a hint of romance this time.
Ben Reese himself is intriguing. Based on a real-life archivist who scouted from Normandy into
Germany, Reese has dealt with suffering and death and taken up work that matters to him –
making readers want to follow him from one tale to another. “Ben Reese sat up against the
headboard straightaway. And it was then that Clarence saw the scars on his upper body. They
were old and well-healed, but terrible nevertheless. A jagged gash curved across his left ribs, and
there were several round indentions (which Clarence knew to be bullet holes, having worked in a
hospital in the First War) spattered over his arms and torso.” – Publish and Perish.
Along with its classic mystery elements, Pursuit and Persuasion offers added fascination in a
wide range of subjects which Ben must delve into, from falconry and stone sculpture to
bacteriology, antique manuscripts, and the first explorations of the New World. The machinations
of business people, academic deception, and life in Malaya earlier in the century also make for
riveting reading. For those in pursuit of first-rate entertainment, Pursuit and Persuasion is the
perfect crime novel.
About the author
Sally Wright, who lives in Bowling Green, Ohio, is the author of two previous Ben Reese
mysteries, Publish and Perish and Pride and Predator. She was born obsessed with books and her
ambition to write novels dates back to the age of six. After earning a degree in oral interpretation
of literature at Northwestern University, she went on to complete graduate work at the University
of Washington, and published many biographical articles including ones on British writers
Malcolm Muggeridge and Nikolai Tolstoy, Leo’s grandnephew. Her literary influences range from
Sayers and Marsh to Tolstoy and Austen to P.D. James and Dick Francis. "And yet it's C.S. Lewis
who's probably influenced me most through the whole body of his work," says Wright. "It was his
Chronicles of Narnia and his "metaphysical novels," The Great Divorce and The Screwtape
Letters-in which he uses "light" fiction to talk about what T.S. Eliot called 'the permanent things'
(consideration of morality, of origin, and spiritual meaning)-it was those books that inspired me to
write mysteries to begin with."
Wright is now working on a fourth novel, which will take Ben Reese to the American South. She
is philosophical about its title: "There will come a day when I have to abandon the "P's" and come
to grips with the rest of the alphabet."
PURSUIT AND PERSUASION
By Sally Wright
Ballantine/Mass Market Paper
Publication Date: October 3, 2000
345-42590-1