Murder doesn't have to be a dreadful, dreary business, at least when it occurs in the pages of fiction. It can be told in a civilized, witty, and learned fashion with an observant eye on society's pretensions and pomposities. Ard no one has a sharper eye than Amanda Cross, whose delightful Kate Fansler, professor-cum-sleuth, returns to find Death in a Tenured Position….

One of Kate's former classmates has been appointed to the Harvard University faculty as its first woman English professor in a tenured post. Janet Mandelbaum, a dour, earnest scholar, has never been one of Kate's favorite people. But when Janet becomes the victim of a vicious prank linking her to radical lesbians, Kate goes to the rescue. She finds she can give little comfort to Janet, who soon is found dead of cyanide poisoning in a men's washroom.

If Cross has wicked fun with Harvard's entrenched...