Showing results by author "Glen Ebisch" in All Categories

When Charles Bentley's new physician asks him to visit her uncle in a retirement community, he is very reluctant. Although he is seventy-five, Charles doesn't consider himself old, and he has no intention of ever ending up in such an environment. However, the uncle is a former police officer, and his suspicion that murders are taking place in the community piques Charles's interest. After some investigation, Charles discovers that although the uncle was wrong about the precise nature of what is happening, a crime has occurred. When he reaches the final scene, Charles discovers that the ...

These are the first four novels featuring Charles Bentley, a retired professor of English Literature who worked at Opal College in Opalsville, Massachusetts in the upper northwestern corner of the state. Upon his retirement, Charles finds himself becoming involved in solving a number of murders that occur in his part of the world. A widower, now without a full-time job, he is also at a decision point in his life where he must deal with new romantic interests and the possibility of pursuing a career path allowing him to develop new talents. Charles rapidly finds that the remaining decades of...

Charles Bentley, a senior professor of English at the prestigious Opal College, is forced into retirement when Garrison Underwood is brought in from England to take his place. When Underwood is found bludgeoned to death in Charles' office, he must discover who murdered Underwood in order to clear himself. Only after the investigation leads to disturbing revelations about his own past and his closest relationships does Charles discover the truth about the body in his office. Newly edited and revised for 2024.

When a dying colleague urges Charles to look into the disappearance over twenty years ago of a female poet whom Charles was half in love with, he is reluctant to do so. He doesn't think he will discover anything new, and he has no desire to rake over old emotions now that he is happily married. But the more he thinks about it, the more he believes that he owes it to her memory. At the same time, Charles is urged to direct a new student play, which is written by the boyfriend of a former movie star, who will also appear in the production. It is a play about marital discord and murder, and ...

Charles Bentley, semi-retired professor of English at prestigious Opal College in the Berkshires of Massachusetts, is confronted in his office one day by Sebastian Locke, a survivalist living in upstate Vermont who is on campus to give a speech. Locke is concerned because his daughter’s history professor approached her in an inappropriate way. Bentley has the daughter in class, so Locke has come to him for information on this professor. Charles gives him some advice, and they also have an intense discussion about Thoreau. Charles decides to attend Locke’s presentation that afternoon, ...

Susan Marlowe is a librarian who doubles as a jewel thief. When Richard Scott, an insurance investigator with mysterious government connections, catches her switching a real diamond for a paste replica, she is forced to help him steal back the famous Eye of Mumbai from an unscrupulous and violent Russian oligarch. Warning herself not to get personally involved with the attractive investigator, Susan soon finds herself becoming progressively more entangled in the theft and in her feelings for Richard. When things go wrong and she is placed in great danger, Susan must rely on her own ...

These are the next three stories in the adventures of Charles Bentley, a retired professor of English at Opal College in Opalsville, Massachusetts. In them, Bentley deals with the problems of getting older, confronting his past, and solving murders. In A Longing for Danger, he attempts to help a woman he once loved, only to face unexpected consequences. In Murder Offstage, he finds himself acting in a play for the first time since he was an undergraduate, when the original actor is murdered. In The Past Never Dies, Charles must confront his experience in Vietnam, which threatens to cost him...

When Charles Bentley, retired English professor and sometime amateur sleuth, marries the chief of police in the Town of Opalsville in the Berkshires of Massachusetts, he expects to support her in sickness and in health. However, he does not anticipate having to discover who killed one of her officers, but this turns out to be the case, despite the fact that Charles is in the midst of a career change to becoming a mystery novelist. As usual, Charles is surrounded by strong, attractive, and somewhat frightening women who offer suggestions on how he should behave. Not deterred by criticism or ...

Charles Bentley receives two surprises. First of all his wife, Joanna, who is also chief of police in Opalsville where they live, wants to have a large Thanksgiving celebration in their new home. She asks Charles to do the inviting. Under some pressure he agrees, wondering all the while where he will round up enough people for such a gathering. The second surprise comes when his old friend Sidney Collins comes to see him. Charles and Sidney were undergraduates together at Yale and went on together for graduate school in English literature at Harvard. Sidney is a well known public ...

Max Moran reluctantly attends a Halloween party at the Congressional Hotel. When he has too much to drink - which is only a couple of glasses of champagne for Max - he goes off to the hotel library, where he promptly falls asleep. He is awakened by a woman dressed as a gypsy who insists on telling his fortune. She catches his undivided attention when she tells him that his lifeline may be about to run out. She also warns him that a mysterious man will soon come into his life, and he should be particularly respectful of this individual. When just such a strange man shows up that night but ...

Charles Bentley, sometimes retired professor of English at Opal College in Opalsville, Massachusetts, once again deals with crime in a small New England college town. HIs investigations take him both on campus and off campus, frequently to some unlikely places, as he and his wife, Joanna, chief of police, pursue those who would commit murder even in a place of pastoral beauty. Charles discovers that as he gets older there is always something new to learn about the hearts of others and about his own.

Charles Bentley is celebrating his seventieth birthday with his family at a local restaurant when a dying man stumbles into the restroom and falls at Charles' feet. A man who has been stabbed in the heart. Charles and his wife, Joanna, chief of police in the town of Opalsville in western Massachusetts, quickly discover that the man was a high-powered divorce lawyer, so he had more than his fair share of enemies. As they investigate further they find that the victim had unusually close relationships with some his clients, which may have increased even more the number of people who wished to ...

Madison Revere, a lawyer in her twenties, is living on the New Jersey shore. She hopes to be made an associate partner at the law firm where she works soon. One night, while out walking her neighbor’s dog, the little pooch suddenly leaps up and bites a man who is passing by. This event sets in motion a chain of events that causes Madison great worry. In addition to biting dogs, Madison must also deal with her lazy, tyrannical boss, a masked stalker, a new love interest, and her status-conscious mother who disapproves of just about everything. Can she solve these problems before the dog ...

When Charles Bentley finds the body of his next door neighbor on her kitchen floor, she shows no signs of obvious injury. Since she had worked on the faculty with him as an artist for a number of years and has remained an acquaintance, he is concerned about what happened to her. He is a bit skeptical when the coroner says she died of a heart attack, since she gave every appearance of being in good health. The more Charles digs into her life, the more he thinks about changing his own. At the end, he finds that she did not die of a heart attack, rather she died for art.

When widowed sixty-five-year-old Ruth breaks her foot in a fall from a ladder, she is surprised when her caregiver turns out to be a sixty-year-old man. Is the successful mystery writer really ready to change her life for love, even if he is handsome and attentive? At the same time Ruth's thirty-year-old niece, Emma, is breaking up with her older lover, who is also a senior partner in the law firm where she works. Will the animosity between them force Emma to change her view of life and her profession? Love can happen in either the early acts of life or in a later one. In either case, it ...

Madison Revere, a lawyer in her late twenties, lives on the New Jersey shore. She has just returned to work after the pandemic quarantine to find herself dealing with the death of an elderly woman in a nursing home. At first it appears as though she died from the virus, but then it begins to look like something more sinister. Madison must discover whether a serial killer is on the loose, murdering the elderly, and- if so-try to stop him before he strikes again. Newly edited and revised!

Clarissa Abbot has been the minister at Shore Side Community Church in Shore Side, New Jersey for just over three months. She feels she is settling into the job well, when difficulties arise. One of the members of her congregation owns a haunted bed and breakfast. The peaceful ghost had previously been something of a tourist attraction, but now it has suddenly begun assaulting people, and the owner wants it exorcised. Clarissa explains that ministers don’t do that, and she also expresses some doubts about whether the attacks are really being carried out by a ghost. This leads the owner to...

Susan Marlowe, librarian and retired jewel thief, gets involved in her old life when her fiancé, Richard Scott, an insurance investigator, asks her if she can discover the identity of the person who fashioned the replica of a stolen pink diamond. Susan's investigations get her into a confrontation with a murderer and into a collaboration with The Phantom, a charming and notorious high-end jewel thief. When their attempts to ensnare the killer don't go as planned, Susan finds herself facing an enraged killer, and she must rely on her wits and luck to survive.

Charles Bentley, retired professor of English at Opal College in Opalsville, Massachusetts, and recently published mystery writer, travels to Royston College in New Hampshire to help a woman he loved over forty years ago. Although she abruptly broke up with him at the time, he still feels obligated to her. She is now Royston's president but is accused of improperly attempting to influence a tenure committee, a charge which could force her from office. She requests that Charles represent her at the hearing, and he somewhat reluctantly agrees to do so. Charles soon discovers that fulfilling ...

Charles Bentley, retired professor of English at Opal College, has taken up meditation, but he finds his concentration shattered when violence enters the meditation center. At the same time, an acquaintance who is a college counselor is viciously attacked in front of his own home, and Charles is enlisted to find out why. He soon finds that the only way to discover answers is to become the bait for a potential killer.