British Detective

A man lies in an alley, beaten to death. Another man stumbles away, his memory of what happened erased by a blow to his head. Nearby, a walking stick has been flung aside, bloodied and broken. In the most personal case he has ever investigated, DCI Will Cooper is assigned to solve a crime in which his former partner and nemesis, Sean Notley, is the main suspect. Although he has sworn to remain impartial, Will is desperate to atone for the actions which caused the rift between them and led to Notley’s quitting the force. The only way to ease his guilt is to prove Notley innocent, despite ...

Detective Constable Oliver Cole is called in from a rare day off work to visit The Caledonian Hotel in Newcastle Upon Tyne where a body of a middle-aged man has been discovered in suspicious circumstances. An Elvis Presley impersonator has been murdered and left naked and tied to his bed with a knife protruding from his chest, and Oliver is set to embark upon his second major case with DCI Jack Collier. The case, however, is not as straightforward as it first appears as Oliver soon discovers that the dead man, David Forest, has been living in hiding for over 15 years from the Glasgow ...

Detective Chief Inspector James Thaw owes several people for his career, a fact that he is made aware of when he receives a shocking request. How far will he go to pay back a debt he feels obligated to honour? While investigating the murder of one man and the savage attack on another his actions take him outside of the law, causing him to take a leave of absence. How far will he go to pay back this debt, to wipe the ledger clean?

In this 5th book of the series, DC Oliver Cole returns to Northumbria from sitting his Sergeant’s exams to find some changes in the short time he’s been away. He faces an appraisal with his DCI Jack Collier and finds out exactly what Jack thinks about his performance. He also has to come to terms with a new DS, Jason Glover, standing in for Colin Davis who is on sick leave. Things do not go well on Oliver’s first day back when a body is discovered in an industrial waste bin in Byker and Oliver is kept out of the investigation, being sent to look into a routine mugging instead. Within ...

A wealthy, beautiful victim. An infamous murder that caught the attention of the entire country. Everyone was certain that the man convicted of this notorious crime was in fact guilty. But then a deathbed confession nearly twenty years later casts doubt upon the investigation. Has an innocent man been wrongfully convicted of a crime he did not commit? DCI James Thaw and DS Kevin Friday are assigned this politically sensitive case. They soon find themselves fighting against the wishes of the victim’s family as well as the detective who handled the original investigation. Even if the ...

The remains of a 17th-century witch, an MP found hanging above a five-pointed star and three girls with powers beyond anyone's control. As DI Tanner and DS Evans endeavour to make plans for their big day, the chance discovery of Norfolk's last known witch, tried and hanged by Norfolk’s infamous Witchfinder General, sparks a chain of the most horrific events, none of which Tanner seems able to prevent.

In 1950, Philip Bryce is suddenly given two pieces of unexpected but welcome news - one domestic, the other work-related. He is also given a new case to tackle. It’s a change from the murder cases he spends a lot of time on, but it’s tricky. This is one involving ‘demands with menaces’ – the offence commonly known as blackmail. And the first three victims are very high-ranking people. Bryce investigates, with the newly-promoted Inspector Haig alongside him. But who is the blackmailer? From where does he or she acquire the information? And just how innocent are the ‘victims’?

Alan Woolsham was at the top of his game. He was an acclaimed television star in England and had come to New York to film four special TV shows dealing with British antiques. The shows were to be taped at the Whitney Museum, and Alan hoped to open up a whole new viewing audience for his wildly successful show. But things didn’t go as planned. Murder does have a way of changing things. So much for stardom in the States. Marty and her husband, Jeff, were in New York City for what the hype promised to be a television and museum extravaganza about British antiques. Marty, an art and antique ...

SPIDER MOUTHDI FRED FAIRSERVICE has just returned from holiday when he’s confronted with several mysterious deaths; the mutilated dead body of a junkie, the apparent suicide of a housewife, and the murder of a cannibal, kicks off the strangest investigation of his dark and brutal career. But the strangest element of the case is the connection to the deaths of several old men and women who are found with spiders placed in their mouths.

Judgement is in the eye of the beholder Adrian Harvey, London wine merchant, has lost the Christmas spirit. Someone is stalking him, stealing his post and vandalising his shop. When the police question him after an anonymous tip-off, he's more than anxious. He's scared. And who is that nun? Long time neighbour and friend DI Beatrice Stubbs is dispatched to Germany to investigate a series of apparently related art thefts, so Adrian seizes the chance to flee the city. He follows her to Hamburg to do some Christmas shopping and visit his ex. Yet the stalker is still on his heels. While ...

Detective Constable Oliver Cole has his period of annual leave interrupted when he finds out that Lancashire Police have requested that he travels to Lancashire to assist them with a difficult case. An actor had been murdered at The Midland Hotel in Morecambe in particularly mysterious circumstances having drank a glass of champagne laced with cyanide. The officer in charge, DCI Dominic Wilson, had previously received a warning that someone was about to die and that it would be the first of seven deaths, but the warning had been dismissed by him as a crank. The discovery of a second clue in...

Pick up a glass of fine wine and join West Virginia police detective Josh Draper and his spunky sidekick Annie McBride in another puzzling murder mystery, this involving a treasure from the past. When an Italian diplomat turns up dead at a rambling estate in the Allegheny Mountains, the U.S. Government calls on Josh and his subtle people skills to ferret out the killer without ruffling diplomatic feathers. He’s locked in the mansion without weapon or police resources until he can work out which of the smooth European negotiators is behind the brutal death and why. You won’t rest a ...

When the murdered body of a Merton College undergraduate turns up in the centre of Oxford, Detective Inspector Amanda Godspeed must investigate her first murder case. All the clues point to Botswana, and Amanda is drawn into a world she had never even dreamed of. The deadly case awakens in her something that won't go away: Is it a feeling of wanderlust or something deeper? As they race against the clock to avert further catastrophe Amanda is forced to question all that she once took for granted.

A skeletal hand is unearthed in the vault under the Pump Room in Bath, England, near the site where Mary Shelley wrote Frankenstein. Then a skull is excavated. The bones came from different corpses, and one is modern. Detective Superintendent Peter Diamond must solve a series of crimes including murder and forgery, requiring a knowledge of history, 19th-century art, literature...and human nature.

John Lardiner runs down a street in the ancient city of York and vanishes off the face of the earth. In a dangerous race against time, Victorian adventurer William Quest is summoned to York to solve the mystery – what has happened to John Lardiner? Forced into an uneasy alliance with the city police, William Quest finds his own life in peril. Men who pry into the disappearance of John Lardiner end up dead. In York’s jumble of alleys and narrow medieval streets, William Quest finds himself pursued by a sinister organisation. Can he solve the mystery of John Lardiner’s vanishing before ...

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.

In a world of lies, one truth remains. Dead men tell no tales...When the body of an unidentified man is found at the foot of Sheringham cliffs with injuries inconsistent with a fall, DI Tom Janssen must piece together his final days to determine how he fell to his death...or who pushed him...The investigation quickly reveals a network of locals with ties to the victim, but as for the man himself...he remains something of a mystery. The dead man doesn't fit in; not with his social circle, not with his business interests, and when others come looking for him, the intrigue only deepens.

The most original crime novel in years - British ‘Golden Age’ sleuth meets American hard-boiled crime! It’s the summer of 1920: Kit Aston travels to San Francisco for his cousin’s marriage to the mysterious Dain Collins. When a private investigator tailing Dain Collins is killed, Kit Aston, his fiancée Mary and Aunt Agatha team up with Pinkerton detective, Dashiell Hammett, in a case involving murder, kidnap and the theft of a certain legendary bird from Malta. The latest Kit Aston mystery is a delightful reimagining of some of Dashiell Hammett’s greatest novels: the Maltese ...

Twenty-something Eleanor Wright does tricks for men for cash to feed a growing drugs habit. She lives in a rundown caravan in an isolated spot down by the river. One Friday night, the caravan burns down and Eleanor perishes within. But is it an accident, suicide, or murder? Inspector Walter Darriteau and his team are called to investigate and embark on a journey none of them could have predicted. "Kissing a Killer" is the fourth Inspector Walter Darriteau murder/mystery and perhaps his most difficult case to date. This is a whodunnit to keep you guessing right till the end.

October 1912. The inhabitants of Littleton Cotterell emerge from their homes after a week of torrential storms to the gruesome news that one of Sid Hyde’s prized sheep has been mauled to death. As rumours abound of a vicious beast stalking the Gloucestershire countryside in search of prey, Lady Hardcastle and her fearless lady’s maid, Florence Armstrong, set out to find what is surely a rational explanation. Then Hyde himself is brutally killed in a similar attack, and the villagers go from curious to terrified.