Homer Kelly

The peaceful town of Concord, Massachusetts, is best known as the birthplace of the American Revolution and the home of the Transcendentalists—Thoreau, Emerson, and the Alcotts. Then some letters surface suggesting that the famous thinkers did more together than think, and two of Concord's prominent citizens end up dead. It's up to Lieutenant-Detective (and Emerson scholar) Homer Kelly and the beautiful Mary Morgan to piece together the bizarre clues and catch a transcendental murderer.

When Winifred Gaw is discovered murdered in Emily Dickinson's bedroom, Horace Kelly decides to investigate the baffling crime.

Former detective Homer Kelly, wondering about the amazing number of sudden deaths in town, discovers that the deaths might have been planned and the local church may be involved.

What does Homer Kelly (an ex-detective, now a professor) know about art? Nothing at all. And therefore, when Titus Moon, the new young director of the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, invites Homer to a trustee's meeting, and Homer realizes he is going to be expected to ward off the disaster threatening that distinguished Boston landmark, "Mrs. Jack Gardner's palace," Homer is worried. The great and famous collection assembled by Mrs. Gardner around the turn of the century includes Raphaels, Rembrandts, Botticellis, a Vermeer, a Rubens and one of the most famous Renaissance paintings in the United States, Titian's magnificent The Rape of Europa. Homer, as he listens to the trustees, realizes why the safety of these works of art is in jeopardy. Mrs. Gardner's will stipulates that everything in the museum must stay exactly as it has always been, or the collection will be dismantled. Homer and security chief Charlie Tibby struggle to bring things to rights, with the help of Titus Moon and his new assistants Polly Swallow and Aurora O'Doyle. And, as their efforts fail, as the problems accelerate, the trustees bring to a vote again and again an apocalyptic question: "Should the museum be dismantled and its contents sold at auction, in accordance with the stringent terms of Mrs. Gardner's will?" In the end, there is murder, anger, and anguish until matters are brought to a grand finale with a wild jostling that tumbles events into a spectacular new shape.

In Italy to teach at the American School for Florentine Studies, sleuthing professor Homer Kelly must set aside his syllabi and turn detective when the school's Italian maid and her lover are murdered.

At the Church of the Commonwealth in Boston's Back Bay, great anticipation is afoot. A new pipe organ is being installed, after a strangely suspicious fire destroyed the old one, and left the church sexton burned to a crisp. As Alan Starr, master organist, begins the complex job of voicing the great organ, he notices that the church seems to have gained a new congregant - a baby boy who has crawled up the church steps, completely unchaperoned. At fourteen months, Charley. Hall is on his own - his father is dead and his mother has unaccountably vanished. And so, despite the fierce amount of work facing him on the new organ, Alan Starr sets out to find the child's mother. Fortunately, the new organ is equipped with a unique stop knob marked "DIV INSP"--For "Divine Inspiration." It's a musical joke, but it's just what Alan will need when he teams up with Homer Kelly to investigate Rosalind Hall's mysterious disappearance - only to discover. That competition for the job of chief organist is reaching deadly proportions. Divine Inspiration is a mystery of other-worldly charm - set amid ecclesiastical mayhem and musical mischief - by the queen of the New England mystery. Accented with Bach's glorious musical puzzles, church politics, pipe organs, and Langton's inimitable line drawings detailing the nooks and crannies of Boston, Divine Inspiration is vintage Langton - with all the stops pulled out.

Murder strikes in the natural history museum of the University of Oxford, famed for its zoological specimens. PI Homer Kelly, a Harvard professor who is in town to give a lecture, will solve it.

"The seductive city of Venice has lured Homer Kelly to a rare books conference, and wife Mary has eagerly come along, camera in tow. Upon arrival they find their Venetian host, Sam Bell, reveling in an examination of holy relics entrusted to him by the new Procurator of Saint Mark's, Lucia Costanza. Sam is convinced they are fraudulent. (He may be surprised.)"--BOOK JACKET. "But soon the Kellys' tranquil getaway turns into a life-and-death adventure, when Lucia's soon-to-be ex-husband is killed and Lucia disappears, branding herself the prime suspect. Bucolic Venice begins to look more and more sinister as Sam's borrowed relics disappear one by one and his motherless little daughter, Ursula, begins to behave in a most unusual way."--BOOK JACKET. "The plot thickens with the help of Mary's simple snapshots of jade-green canals, the Rialto Bridge, the Piazza San Marco, the ancient Ghetto, and churches, palaces, and squares in every remote corner of the city. Before long she is in danger, pursued across a maze of ancient bridges while the lagoon overflows and floods the streets. In the end there is a miracle - could it possibly be real? - and a treasure is uncovered, painfully recalling the fate of Venetian Jews in World War II."--BOOK JACKET.

A murder on the ground of Jefferson's mansion at Monticello leads history buff Homer Kelly on a search for Tom Dean, a young man seen trespassing on the property, who has become the prime suspect in the killings of several local women.

Homer and Mary Kelly offer to help their friend Leonard find an elusive woman he had an all-too-brief encounter with at an art exhibit, but as their search for the mysterious lady continues, they begin to wonder if the woman is better left alone. Leonard Sheldrake is a huge fan of the famous conceptual artist M. C Escher. When Leonard hears that the visionary artist's work is coming to a show in his hometown of Cambridge, Massachusetts, he is ecstatic; little does he know how the show will change his life forever. Meeting a woman in a green coat, Frieda, who also is an Escher enthusiast, Leonard falls instantly in love. But just as quickly, Frieda disappears from the gallery without a trace, leaving Leonard with a swelling in his heart -- and a warning that he wouldn't love her if he knew more about her. Enter amateur sleuths Homer and Mary Kelly, who vow to help Leonard find Frieda. Investigating the identity of this enigmatic woman, they begin to peel away layers of a darker, more twisted mystery, creating an Escher-like labyrinth of its own. Features the art of M. C. Escher.