This early work by Anna Katharine Green was originally published in 1886
and we are now republishing it with a brand new introduction. 'The Mill
Mystery' is one of Green's novels of crime and mystery. Anna Katharine
Green was born in Brooklyn, New York, USA in 1846. She aspired to be a
writer from a young age, and corresponded with Ralph Waldo Emerson
during her late teens. When her poetry failed to gain recognition, Green
produced her first and best-known novel, The Leavenworth Case (1878).
Praised by Wilkie Collins, the novel was year's bestseller, establishing
Green's reputation. Green wrote at a time when fiction, and especially
crime fiction, was dominated by men. However, she is now credited with
shaping detective fiction into its classic form, and developing the
trope of the recurring detective.