Merlin Richards

The Merlin Richards mysteries follow a young Welsh architect attempting to establish a career in the United States at the end of the 1920s and during the Great Depression. Murder at the Arizona Biltmore places him among designers and builders in the Arizona desert, while Homicide in Chicago takes him to an ambitious residential commission in 1931.

Architecture provides both the professional setting and the structure of the crimes. Plans, materials, rival designers and wealthy clients become sources of evidence and conflict as Richards finds that solving a murder may be the only way to preserve his reputation and continue the career he crossed the Atlantic to pursue.