"Within three minutes, everyone was there. Perhaps it was something about being summoned - the last person to ring that gong had been Anthony; there was something spectral in the renew of his call. Perhaps it was the sound itself, the harshness of metal, hard-edge clamour in a place of softness, snow and mourning - what ever it was they seemed on edge."

The first in a new crime fiction series sees a group of university friends reunited and snowed in, in a manor house in Northumberland, with the dead body of one of them. Art historian and Dane, Torben Helle, police inspector Ruth Thompson and lawyer Leyla Moradi investigate and soon uncover secrets and lies. Golden Age country house vibes combined with examinations of modern friendships, this is funny and clever. And there's a building floor plan at the front and back of the hardback!

This book was a bit of a slow burner, but I really like the way the mystery was resolved (which is nice for a change - many of the mystery books currently being published have very unsatisfying endings but this one really worked).