Princeton Architecture Professor Jamie Ramsgill travels to England to research a new book and to visit his former mentor Rainer Grass. However, Grass, head of the architecture school at Cambridge University, has disappeared. The last anyone claims to have seen him was at his retirement party in the Old Hall of Queens' College, where he shocked his students and colleagues by rescinding his resignation. Given that nearly everyone at the party had reason to despise him, it's not long before Ramsgill concludes that Grass was murdered.With an old school friend, now a Detective Chief Inspector, Ramsgill decides to try to resolve the mystery of Grass's disappearance. All he has to do is figure out how Grass left a locked quadrangle without being seen, where his body is hidden, and how the crime was committed in the middle of a crowded party.Ruins of Civility is a complex mystery with richly drawn characters amidst a backdrop of medieval colleges, lazy water-courses, and crocketed spires - a genteel setting for a most hideous crime. Read Less