Members of the Greene family keep dying, while the pool of possible perpetrators keeps shrinking…although the servants, each one weirder than the next, remain in the pink of health). Vance—the independently wealthy, staggeringly brilliant, not remotely modest (and did we mention handsome?) amateur sleuth—uses his detective skills to unravel the murders, though sadly not before most of the Greene family has been bumped off.

First published in 1928, The Greene Murder Case topped the year’s bestseller lists and was made into not one, not two, but an astonishing three films, the first starring William Powell, and the second somebody named Grant Richards. The third, a made-for-TV movie, came out just sixteen years ago…in the Czech Republic. That’s our Philo, the Sleuth the World Loves to Hate.