Murder in the Poe Room

About the Book

A murder is committed in the historic Poe Room at the University of Virginia involving a poisoned bottle of Amontillado wine and Poe’s poem, The Raven. Ellen Randolph, a member of Virginia’s aristocracy, and her friend Fannie Groomes, an African-American domestic, gradually unravel the tangled web of this murder and another committed many years before when a body was sealed behind a wall in one of the heat tunnels that run underneath the University grounds. Ellen and her friend Martin Harrison, a retired English professor, come close to losing their lives as the murderer tries to conceal lying, cheating, stealing, blackmail, and murder.

About the Author

Mary Alice Gunter was born in Asheville, North Carolina. She graduated from Duke University with a BA, from Temple University with a Master's degree in English Literature, and from the University of Virginia with a Doctorate in Education. She has lived in Charlottesville for forty years and was elected to the City Council in 1982. She is now an associate professor emerita at the University of Virginia and lives only a few blocks from the downtown mall.