The Sea Mystery

In this 1928 Inspector French case, a fishing trip off the Welsh coast turns grim when two men haul up a wooden crate and find a battered body sealed inside. With the victim disfigured beyond easy recognition, French faces the hardest part first: giving the dead man a name. From that single crate he works outward, tracing timber, shipping, and the small commercial details most people never notice, until the chain leads back to a coldly planned crime. It is Crofts at his most characteristic, a patient reconstruction that turns dull-sounding evidence into a tightening net. A free PDF and EPUB edition is available here.