Miss Marple encounters a compelling murder mystery in St. Mary Mead, where under the seemingly peaceful exterior of an English country village lurks intrigue, guilt, deception, and death. Colonel Protheroe, local magistrate and overbearing landowner is the most detested man in the village. Everyone—even in the vicar—wishes he were dead. And very soon he is—shot in the head in the vicar’s own study. Faced with a surfeit of suspects, only the inscrutable Miss Marple can unravel the tangled web of clues that will lead to the unmasking of the killer.