tive Judge Dee returns for a fourth and final time in The Chinese Nail Murders. Though the setting is exotic and the time period ancient, Judge Dee has all the style and swagger of a modern Sherlock Holmes.

Judge Dee is appointed to the magistrate of Pei-chow--a distant frontier district in the barren north of the ancient Chinese Empire. It is here that he is faced with three strange and disturbing crimes: the theft of precious jewels, the disappearance of a girl in love, and the fiendish murder involving the nude, headless body of a woman. And even more curious, the crimes seem to be linked together by clues from a popular game of the period, the Seven Board.

First published in the 1950s, The Chinese Nail Murders includes charming illustrations and an epilogue that details the origins of each case and how the author discovered them.