British Crime Mystery

Detective Joseph Easter's daughter discovers a cottage hidden in some trees on a large fenland farm. Someone has been living there. The farm owner's wife has been receiving sinister pagan artifacts, including a witch's knife. Are they some sort of warning or message? Joseph and his daughter search the cottage and find an old satchel. Inside are photos of a beautiful girl, Jennifer Cowley. She went missing 15 years ago. She'd been stalked by a young man, who was convicted of her murder, even though her body was never found.

A body in the Cotswolds. A cryptic floral clue. Can a budding community cop unearth the secrets of a 40-year-old case before the truth withers away?With a mixing bowl of responsibilities, Sergeant Keya Varma conscientiously combines her rural police duties with managing the rising success of her bustling café, kneading in the essential support of family and friends. But her well-baked routine crumbles when a local journalist is found dead in his car. Battling her new boss, who relishes red tape more than results, this dedicated detective is simmering with frustration. Yet Keya finds ...

THE LAST WOMAN TO BE TRANSPORTED FROM CUMBRIA BARELY OF AGE, eighteen-year-old Flora Mary Graham was found guilty by a jury of twelve good Kendal men and true of the murder in his prime of the Seventh Earl of Fellside, by striking him about the head and sending him to his death in Blind Beck, the town’s stream running in violent spate on the stormy night of Halloween, 1852. Apprehended at the scene bearing a babe in arms, the child swaddled and soaked, three gold sovereigns were found in Flora’s possession, half a year’s wages for a servant girl such as she. The motive ascribed was ...

STAND-ALONE MURDER MYSTERY, #13 IN THE SERIES. MEET MAVERICK BRITISH DETECTIVE DI SKELGILL... "MAD, BAD AND JUST A LITTLE BIT COZY."MURDER ON THE MIDNIGHT EXPRESS? When the exclusive London-to-Edinburgh sleeper plunges into a snowdrift deep in the Cumbrian fells, DI Skelgill awakes to discover one fellow passenger dead and another missing. Through a blinding blizzard Skelgill leads a daring evacuation – but even before they reach the sanctuary of an isolated coaching inn, a third traveller suffers a life-threatening mishap. As suspicion pervades the elite group of apparent strangers, ...

In July 1939, three men are shot dead within a few days of each other. The incidents are all in Lancashire but in different police force areas. When it is eventually realised that the cases are linked, the various constabularies agree to call in the expertise of Scotland Yard. Detective Chief Inspector Adair, who has been holidaying with his wife and daughter in the same county, is tasked with investigating the crimes. These do not appear to be random shootings. It seems that the gunman has a motive for killing each of the victims. But what could that be? And is the grudge against each one ...

A solstice sunrise reveals a mysterious death at Cotswold’s standing stones. Can a rural police officer illuminate the truth before darkness falls?Passionate and hard-working community cop and café owner, Sergeant Keya Varma, serves up lattes and law in equal measure. Yet her dedication to her dual duties is tested when a festive midsummer gathering turns deadly at an ancient ring of stones. Aided by her fellow officers, this dedicated detective delves into the puzzling demise of a vibrant young woman. With no apparent cause of death and the community united in grief, Keya wonders if the...

Late at night on a deserted Chester ring road, a man is run down and killed. But is it an accident, suicide, or murder? First thing next day Inspector Walter Darriteau is on the case. The dead man was a lay preacher up for promotion. Surely that couldn’t be relevant, but they are zealous and jealous in that game. Or could it be something more sinister? Why didn’t the driver stop? And the wife doesn’t seem too upset about it. Her main concern is the insurance policy that should pay off their mortgage. Where was she when it happened? “The Murder Diaries – Seven Times Over” is the ...

STAND-ALONE MURDER MYSTERY, #3 IN THE SERIES. MEET MAVERICK BRITISH DETECTIVE DI SKELGILL... "MAD, BAD AND JUST A LITTLE BIT COZY."WHEN A MAN IS FOUND STRANGLED by a climbing rope beneath the Lake District's notorious Sharp Edge, it is assumed he is the victim of a tragic accident. But Detective Inspector Skelgill suspects otherwise, and his fears are borne out when a second corpse is discovered close to Striding Edge. Soon it appears that a ritualistic serial killer stalks Cumbria's fells. As the body count increases, Skelgill must determine the connection between the seemingly randomly ...

BOOK ONE He was a ruthless yardie gang-boss, so why did he save the life of a policewoman? Liston Pearce is a gangster, a drug-dealing gang-boss. In a split-second decision he starts a series of life-changing events that he could not have foreseen even in his wildest imagination. This crime thriller is set in The St.Paul's area of The City of Bristol in 1989 a few years after the Bristol riots. With an exciting twisting plot Pearce battles, which path to take? Contains Strong Language. BOOK TWO It’s Bristol, the St. Paul’s area, August 1990. Liston Pearce, who used to be the crime boss,...

When Scotland Yard superintendent Duncan Kincaid takes Gemma, Kit, and Toby for a holiday visit to his family in Cheshire, Gemma is soon entranced with Nantwich's pretty buildings and the historic winding canal, and young Kit is instantly smitten with his cousin Lally. But their visit is marred by family tensions exacerbated by the unraveling of Duncan's sister Juliet's marriage. And tensions are brought to the breaking point on Christmas Eve with Juliet's discovery of a mummified infant's body interred in the wall of an old dairy barn.

Claire Barclay is enthusiastic about her British Mystery Book Tour business. She enjoys taking her guests, usually from America, to the settings of mystery novels where bodies are long dead. Her neighbor's plea for help to deal with a recently murdered well-known author unsettles her. She leaves the body to the police and takes her guests to Cornwall, including a British tourist who far is too interested in the dead author.

NEW FOR 2022 – STAND-ALONE, #19 IN THE SERIES. MEET MAVERICK BRITISH DETECTIVE DI SKELGILL... "A COMPELLING BRITISH CRIME MYSTERY." EVIL LIES UNDETECTED. When shepherd Jud Hope finds an American passport in a fox’s earth, a connection is made to an unidentified fatality – an elderly female walker who fell to her death in a treacherous rocky gill near Ambleside. Meanwhile, a spate of ‘nighthawker’ incidents sees ancient monuments desecrated under cover of darkness. The spotlight falls upon Derek Shaw, a museum curator exploring Cumbria’s Roman heritage. Onto this stage emerges a ...

STAND-ALONE MURDER MYSTERY, #15 IN THE SERIES. MEET MAVERICK BRITISH DETECTIVE DI SKELGILL... "MAD, BAD AND JUST A LITTLE BIT COZY."VIRILE; HANDSOME; RUTHLESS. When gamekeeper Lawrence Melling takes over at traditional Lakeland sporting estate Shuteham Hall he soon ruffles the feathers of not only elderly Lord Edward Bullingdon and his younger model wife Miranda, but also their adult offspring and fellow estate workers. Meanwhile local conservationists perceive an existential threat to rare hen harriers nesting on nearby Over Moor. And when Miranda’s jewellery worth a six-figure sum goes ...

The mystical Britain sites list the Welsh village of Llangynog as a “thin place,” a place where the lines between worlds can be crossed, at least by those whose minds are open to such things. Bronwyn Bagley is one of those people, although she wants desperately not to be. Aware that she is different from others, she longs for a normal life, a life with a career and – someday – a relationship with someone who won’t see her as an oddity. Thus, she waits and hopes, while guarding her secrets closely. Detective Chief Inspector Will Cooper has suffered an unwilling transfer to the ...

STAND-ALONE MURDER MYSTERY, #4 IN THE SERIES. MEET MAVERICK BRITISH DETECTIVE DI SKELGILL... "MAD, BAD AND JUST A LITTLE BIT COZY."BY THE TIME Detective Inspector Skelgill becomes the tenth person to be stranded on secluded Grisholm (Pigs’ Isle in Old Norse) where a writers’ retreat is taking place, one of the assembled literati is already dead. Though natural causes may provide the explanation, a second ‘accidental’ death and a raft of curious experiences convince Skelgill that a cold and calculating killer is at large. But where is his evidence? Set around Derwentwater in the ...

Ten years ago, DCI Oldroyd was the only person who could see the monster hiding behind Adam Blake’s charm. Oldroyd proved that Blake was a deadly serial killer, responsible for murdering many innocent people. Having vowed to take revenge on Oldroyd, on a crisp autumn morning Blake escapes from jail… Hours later, in the Yorkshire market town of Otley, a man is found strangled inside the old courthouse. Written in bold black ink across the victim’s forehead is a single chilling word: vindicta—revenge. Oldroyd’s blood runs cold when he picks up a call and hears an all-too-familiar voice.

A picture-perfect murder? A photographer is killed and abandoned in a macabre display on the banks of the Hay River. Constable Ezra McCann’s home is nearby and his celebrity family feel like they're targets. McCann is on the alert. He also has a strong suspicion that the new nanny is not who she seems, and that’s one more thing keeping him awake at night. Can Inspector Hilary Casgrain and the small Elk Ridge Police Department handle a crime with international overtones? Or is this really a homegrown killer stalking anyone who gets in his way? When a second body is discovered nearby, ...

In 1950, a death occurs under the uniquely-banded cliffs in Hunstanton. It is soon realised that this is a case of murder, but the Norfolk police inspector runs into difficulties, and Scotland Yard DCI Philip Bryce finds himself back in the county for the second time in a matter of months. A local amateur detective with a considerable knowledge of murder cases (both real and fictional) is determined to help the police, and comes up with various suggestions. However, initially neither he nor the police seem to be able to pin all the usual key elements – means, motive, and opportunity – ...

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ "A well-written, gripping story. Great characters, great location and plenty of drama." ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ "A stunning crime and mystery debut with twists and turns to keep you turning the pages." Exe Marks the Spot is perfect for fans of crime, mystery and detective stories by authors like Richard Osman, Ian Moore, Sarah Yarwood-Lovett, Fiona Leitch and Robert Thorogood. A disappearance. A murder. Two mysteries connected. Meet Angus Darrow, straight-laced, ex-police detective, turned private investigator. He’s hired to find a missing vulnerable ...

STAND-ALONE, #18 IN THE SERIES. MEET MAVERICK DETECTIVE DI SKELGILL... "A COMPELLING BRITISH CRIME MYSTERY." A BLIND EYE TURNED, AN INJUSTICE DONE. High in lonely Swinesdale, notorious burglars Jake and Boris Baddun perish in a burnt-out stolen Mercedes. Known associate Dale Spooner leaves his biological signature and the predatory DI Alec Smart moves in for the kill. Spooner is convicted, and now languishes in jail. A rumour reaches Skelgill: Spooner is innocent and can prove it – a cast-iron alibi, a video on a hidden mobile phone. But Spooner will not talk. At stake is the safety of ...