The Murder at World's End (2025) by Ross Montgomery

Last year, Ross Montgomery, a British author of more than twenty children's books, debuted with his first novel for adults, The Murder at World's End (2025), which is the first in a new series of historical, retro-Golden Age style detective novels – starring an unlikely detective duo. John Norris, of Pretty Sinister Books, recommended The Murder at World's End as a locked room mystery taking place during the arrival of Halley's Comet ("you'd enjoy that, I'm sure"). Well, you know how easily I can be persuaded with the promise of a good locked room mystery or impossible crime.

Before delving into Montgomery's The Murder at World's End, I want to take a brief detour into the past of the retro-Golden Age mystery novel. A past that was until recently not as deep or rich as the original Golden Age mysteries of the pre-1960s era. Until recently, that is.

The retro-Golden Age detective novels and series of today came out of the reprint renaissance that started in the early 2010s, but the so-called clever send-ups, reinterpretation and subversive takes that came before are a different story. Rarely did they turn out to be as clever or hilarious as promised. There were exceptions like a Charles Forsyte, John Sladek or even a curious, short-lived revival during the 1980s, but, more often than not, the retro-Golden Age mysteries of the post-WWII decades lazily trotted out cliches and tropes – presented as clever, hilarious or brilliantly subversive. More than one had a killer butler escaping the scene of the crime through a secret passage or tried to reinvent the wheel by having an unreliable narrator. Catherine Aird's The Stately Home Murder (1969) is perhaps the best-known of these horrendous country house send-ups and arguably reached its nadir Gilbert Adair's indigestible smug The Act of Roger Murgatroyd (2006). A first in a trilogy that I believe was presented as something of an event at the time, but seems to have been overtaken by history and already forgotten about.

Because what a difference a decade or two and flood of classic reprints can make! A renaissance that has been slowly turning into a revival with writers like Tom Mead, Gigi Pandian, Martin Edwards, Benjamin Stevenson and even a strong independent scene driven by names such as James Scott Byrnside and A. Carver. So the retro, Golden Age mysteries of today actually read like classically-styled detective fiction (e.g. J.S. Savage's The Mystery of Treefall Manor, 2023) instead of superficial imitations of Agatha Christie's work with all the depth of a game of Cluedo. That's something to be appreciative of considering nearly everything we got today was a pipe dream just 15, 16 years ago. Montgomery continues that trend with The Murder at World's End. So let's take a closer look at Montgomery's first stab at the classically-styled detective novel. And what he can do with the locked room mystery.

The Murder at World's End takes place in May, 1910, when Halley's Comet passed by Earth on its 75-year orbit of the Sun. And, on this specific fly-by, the Earth would be passing through the comet's tail and that ended up causing some panic when a spectrograph analysis detected cyanogen gas in the tail. Nothing civilization ending or even dangerous, but that didn't stop the headlines or some people from panicking ("people also lowered themselves into wells or sealed off their homes and papered over the keyholes..."). Montgomery used the comet panic of 1910 as the basis for his locked room mystery.

Lord Stockingham-Welt, the Viscount of World's End and founder of the Cometary Cataclysm Society, believes the world is going to end when the planet passes through the comet's tail ("your government has hidden the truth from you!") – turned Tithe Hall into a doomsday bunker. Tithe Hall stands on a remote tidal island, World's End, somewhere in Cornwall. Even without being turned into a temporary fallout shelter, Tithe Hall is an odd place designed by the Viscount's late father who believed "servants and masters should be kept apart." So the house is a rabbit warren of servants' staircases and "butler's mirrors" allowing "staff to check around corners, so they don't run into Lord Stockingham-Welt unexpectedly." By the way, the book has a gorgeous cross section giving a doll's house view of Tithe Hall.

The Viscount has invited a small group of people to Tithe Hall to weather the End of Days and emerge to rebuild the world. Among those "lucky few" are Edwin Welt, MP, who has an eye on the family fortune. Jolyon Welt, Rear Admiral, who's a red faced, bleary eyed drunk. Lettice Welt is there with her 7-year-old grandson, Gilbert, who's an orphan. The Viscount also invited another founding member of the CCS, Professor Wolff Müller of the Klatsch Institute in Hamburg, who's there to record the day with his camera for posterity. That only leaves the two detectives of the new series, Stephen Pike and Miss Decima Stockingham.

Stephen Pike, innocently convicted for a crime he didn't commit, is now a free and reformed man who has been send to Tithe Hall to work as an under footman, but ends up looking after Miss Decima – who the family has locked away in the old nursery. Miss Decima is the Viscount's octogenarian great-aunt and an absolute terror who curses like sailor's parrot ("never heard language like it, not from a lady or otherwise") and burned through the entire female staff. Stephen is tasked with keeping her company and comfortable, while everyone else busy to "completely seal the house, making it impermeable to the poisonous gases" ("tomorrow, we will rise to a changed world"). However, the next morning they have to break down the door to the Viscount's study when he doesn't answer their knocking. They discovered the Viscount sitting behind his desk, between oxygen tanks, shot through the eye with a crossbow bolt! The room was not merely locked from the inside, but boarded up, keyholes sealed with candle wax and every gap plugged with cotton wadding. A murder in a practically hermetically sealed room and the person who discovered the murder is an ex-convict who only arrived the previous day.

A predicament that gets even worse for Stephen when Inspector James Jarvis, of Scotland Yard, arrives on the scene. Jarvis has to be thickest cop to appear on the printed page since Lestrade. However, that prize goof grew on me after a while with his ludicrous, ill thought out false-solutions that get shot down, one after another, by Miss Decima and eventually Stephen. Chapter 45 is a Jarvis highlight and one for the scrapbooks! Miss Decima concludes she's "the only person in the house clever enough to solve the mystery" enlists Stephen as her Watson ("...you shall push my bath chair"). She also needs Stephen to investigate her "relatives, eavesdrop on conversations, threaten suspects, lie to the police, and maybe break a few fingers," but all joking aside, they end up making a formidable detective duo. A detective pair tailored for the conventions and rules of the upstairs/downstairs domestic situation of the British upper class at the time. Stephen has one foot in the servants' quarters ruled over by the head butler, Mr. Stokes, while Miss Decima has broken free from her confinement to torture her relatives. It made for an interesting dynamic between the two lead characters and the various puzzles the plot presents, but also a good way to setup the series and establish the lead characters without the plot taking a backseat. So the characters and newly established partnership of Stephen and Miss Decima that made the story rattle along at a brisk pace.

Montgomery wrote a very readable mystery novel and guess having written books for children and younger readers in general helped in writing The Murder at World's End. A detective novel also involves putting together a plot that holds up.

The plot of The Murder at World's End holds up for the most part, however, some rough edges and patches that are to be expected from someone playing the Grandest Game in the World. Such as the red herrings (ROT13: yvxr gur qrnq svfu) outnumbering the scant, sparsely-planted clues or that even without an intricate web of clues it's possible to make a pretty good, educated guess in which direction the solution is eventually going to head. Simply because the story and plot demanded such sort of murderer with that kind of motive. Not as bad, but still should be mentioned, is the explanation to the locked room problem. The locked room-trick is, what do you call it, a bit patchy as it reworks several old locked room dodges. Admittedly, the locked room-trick added a new wrinkle on those old dodges, especially the second-half of the trick, but the whole setup of locking and sealing everyone in their rooms demanded something more ambitious or original from the method. It's still fine as long as you don't expect John Dickson Carr-like fireworks or shin honkaku levels of meta-trickery.

So even though Montgomery's The Murder at World's End is still rough around the edges, I tremendously enjoyed as an auspicious debut of both a promising mystery writer and new series. I never judge a promising looking debut too harshly for its imperfections, because all they usually need is some time and experience. After all, Carr and Christie need time and experience before they could produce classics like The Three Coffins (1935) and Murder in the Orient Express (1934). They're the whetstone of talent and good detective fiction. So very much look forward to Montgomery's second Stephen Pike and Miss Decima Stockingham mystery novel, The Shadows of Kensington Gore (2026), which should be out in October.

By the way, on a final note, I have the perfect follow-up for The Murder at World's End. So stay tuned.