SOLVED. Murder mystery - tagline something about who *didn't* want to kill the Dean's wife [s]

[Delanie]

I read this book maybe fifteen years ago. The protagonist is a professor at a college who doesn't want to go along with the college's holiday celebrations--apparently it's this over-the-top extravaganza, complete with college students dressed as elves and sleigh rides. The Dean's wife is a pushy woman who keeps nagging this professor, so he finally does a Clark Grizwold on his house and locks the place and goes on vacation for the holidays. then when he comes home he goes back into his dark house and trips over the corpse of the Dean's wife. That's about all I remember, other than laughing REALLY hard at his annoyance over the Christmas stuff. Anybody got an idea?

[Mir]

No, but it sounds like a fun read.

[April Ann]

Death & Mad Heroine keeps coming up but it doesn't seem to match. It was published in 1985.

[Erica]

There is a lot of pressure to go along with creepy not-quite-hazing traditional rituals at the college in du Maurier's "The Flight of the Falcon." Lots of students being allowed to get away with stuff if they're in character. I'm not sure I remember a body of a dean's wife.

[Slinkyboy]

This sounds like

Rest You Merry by Charlotte MacLeod.

[April Ann]

Slinkyboy wrote: "This sounds like

Rest You Merry by Charlotte MacLeod."

Here's a description:

Summary:
Professor Peter Shandy returns from his Christmas holiday to find the corpse of a faculty wife on his living-room floor and an entangling mystery connected with the town's elaborate Christmas festivities

[Delanie]

YES!!!!!! Rest You Merry is it! They have it listed on Amazon and you can read the whole first chapter--DEFINITELY it, and it made me laugh all over again! GENIUS!