In a tranquil Kentish village, Dr Sandys and his wife are preparing for Christmas with their guest, Liane 'Lee' Crauford. Festivities start badly when their party is spoiled by an enigmatic widow new to the village, and the atmosphere hits rock bottom when the pompous local nobleman and ceramic-collector Sir Henry Metcalfe unexpectedly dies. Sensing potential villains among Metcalfe's circle, Lee teams up with Detective-Inspector Hugh Gordon to discover the killer playing merry hell with her holiday in this lost vintage mystery, republished for the first time since 1952.

Susan Gilruth was the pen name used by the English writer Susannah Margaret Godley (19111992) for her seven crime and detective novels published between 1951 and 1963. While her 1956 novel A Corpse for Charybdis was adapted for the radio and broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in 1968 and The Snake is Living Yet (1963) was reprinted in a Japanese series alongside titles by Michael Innes and E. C. R. Lorac in the 2000s, her books have become rare collector's items, and her stories gems to be rediscovered by a new readership.