Miss Marple at an Italian finishing school with Americans Ruth Van Rydock and Caroline "Carrie" Louise Serrocold. While Miss Marple is described as 'an old lady' in many of the stories, her age is mentioned in "At Bertram's Hotel", where it is said she visited the hotel when she was fourteen and almost sixty years have passed since then. Excluding "Sleeping Murder", 41 years passed between the first and last-written novels, and many characters grow and age. An example would be the Vicar's nephew: in "The Murder at the Vicarage", the Reverend Clement's nephew Dennis is a teenager; in "The Mirror Crack'd
Miss Silver Miss Silver Miss Silver is a fictional detective featured in 32 novels by British novelist Patricia Wentworth. Miss Maud Silver is a retired governess-turned-private detective. Like Miss Marple, Miss Silver's age and demeanor make her appear harmless. Some admire the character, believing that "while Miss Marple may receive ten times the attention as Miss Silver, ... the woefully neglected Miss Silver is the real deal - a professional investigator and stand-up woman, a true forerunner of all future female private eyes." Others disagree, claiming that the character "has none of the credibility of ... Miss Marple... Her spinsterish appearance is