This book is a collection of great and insightful essays which discuss heroic endeavors to save endangered heirs and estates by searching devotedly for the truth in various criminal and civil situations. This book focuses especially on important works by Arthur Conan Doyle, Theodor Storm, Frances Hodgson Burnett, and Agatha Christie, while also discussing works by other important European authors. In each of these literary masterpieces the landowner or heir is emotionally and physically endangered and his or her house and estate imperiled by one or more individuals from within his or her own family or from within the sphere of influence of the family. In these works by Arthur Conan Doyle, Theodor Storm, Frances Hodgson Burnett, and Agatha Christie there is a valiant attempt by such individuals as Sherlock Holmes, Dr. Watson, Mary Lennox, Hercule Poirot, and others to save the landowners and heirs who are endangered and the estates which are threatened by thoroughly investigating their situations and by searching meticulously for the truth. These protagonists share and exemplify the "passion for getting at the truth" which Hercule Poirot in Agatha Christies Murder in Three Acts declares is the primary motivating force and inspiration for his criminal investigations.

Hugo G. Walter has a B.A. from Princeton University, an M.A. from Old Dominion University, a Ph.D. in literature from Yale University, and a Ph.D. in interdisciplinary humanities from Drew University. Dr. Walter is Professor of English and Humanities at Berkeley College. His two most recent publications are Magnificent Houses in Twentieth Century European Literature (Lang, 2012) and Sanctuaries in Washington Irvings The Sketch Book (Lang, 2014).