British Mysteries

IT'S BEAUTIFUL....BUT VERY DANGEROUS Barrister-turned-private-eye Maggie Bainbridge and her ex-army sidekick Jimmy Stewart have landed their most high-profile case so far - to find out what happened to the attractive daughter of a prominent politician, two year after the failure of the original police investigation. Meanwhile Jimmy's brother, DI Frank Stewart of the Met, has been offered promotion to DCI - but there's catch. A secret government initiative is looking to smoke out corrupt public servants and coppers - and Frank's been put in charge of the toxic pilot operation. All roads lead...

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 ...

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.

SPARROWHAWK –The Accidental Death of a Dead Man. It was reported as a straightforward road accident. Perhaps it was but the crash scene gave rise to more questions than answers. For Sparrowhawk, this might well be seen as an accidental death; but it couldn’t possibly be the accidental death … of an already dead man … could it? Then there was Merrick Nethercutt. Maybe he was just a frustrated writer and novelist, hungry for literary success … or perhaps a narcissistic psychopath prepared to commit murder in order to claim a place at the table of world prize winning authors. ...

When a trip to Scotland ends in tragedy, travel guide Lana Hansen must sleuth out who murdered her guest before she ends up paying the piper. Lana hasn't seen her ex-husband, Ron, since their divorce was finalized eight months earlier. So when they bump into each on the Royal Mile in Edinburgh, she is not exactly jumping for joy. To make matters worse, Ron threatens a member of her tour group—a beloved and respected magician named Presto the Amazing. Ron is convinced Presto stole one of his magic tricks—the same act that propelled the famous magician into stardom—and swears he will ...

He was forced to hang up his badge. Now, a kidnapping has raced into his retirement.England, 1960’s. Former inspector Tom Ramsay is taking advantage of having to step down. Invalided after getting shot in the line of duty, the plain-speaking man adopts a border collie and gets down to the serious business of hiking the scenic countryside of his ancestry. But after hearing over the radio about a missing local, the fifty-five-year-old ex-cop is shocked when a pleasant walk brings him face-to-face with the victim fleeing her captors. With the young woman reported as a runaway and no ransom ...

A THRILLING STORY OF MURDER AND BETRAYAL FILLED WITH THE SCANDAL, WIT AND INTRIGUE CHARACTERISTIC OF AUSTEN’S CLASSIC NOVELS Fitzwilliam Darcy is devastated. The joy of his recent wedding has been cut short by the news of the sudden death of his father’s beloved cousin, Samuel Darcy. Elizabeth and Darcy travel to Dorset, a popular Regency resort area, to pay their respects to the well-traveled and eccentric Samuel. But this is no summer holiday. Danger bubbles beneath Dorset’s peaceful surface as strange and foreboding events begin to occur. Several of Samuel’s ancient treasures go ...

Alyn is a successful businessman with no time for any supernatural twaddle so when his friend Marty claims to have met a ‘witch girl’ it is just another story. By chance he meets the same girl and is drawn to her in spite of her reputation. But there is another that would keep her from any that seek get close. Ignoring all the warning signs he seeks to get closer still, dismissing as imagination the strange events that happen until at last he is brought face to face with the awesome might of the Guardian. Only then does he realise that he is powerless in the face of the nightmare from ...

A peaceful spring afternoon turns into DC Holly Towns’ worst nightmare, once the sun goes down. A blast of gunfire tears through the glass walls of a turret that rises from one end of Quinn’s Landing. It spins Holly’s world upside down and sends the Criminal Investigations Unit on a single-minded pursuit of the shooter. Holly and former detective, Danny Cavallo, are meeting with Geraldine Quinn at the elegant lakeside home that has been in her family for generations. The older woman claims she’s become nervous on her own and wants Cavallo to install a high-tech security system, with...

When the body of an old man is found lying in the ruins of St Benet’s Abbey, his throat cut, a knife resting in his open hand, DI John Tanner and DC Jenny Evans are given no choice but to accept a ruling of death by misadventure. But when the body goes missing from its tomb, after a priest is found nailed to a cross, and another impaled on a stake, everything begins to point back to the murder of a teenage girl, thrown from the top of a church tower, some 43 years before.

A joyful Christmas festival turns deadly when a corpse ends up as the chilling centrepiece. Can an amateur sleuth unwrap the tinsel-tangled mystery before the merry cheer melts away? Talented antiques enthusiast, Dotty Sayers, is thrilled to be organising a Christmas display at a Yorkshire country house. She enjoys decking the halls, but the season is far from jolly when the chief guide is found dead, her body as cold as ice. When cops dismiss the death, Dotty turns to her prickly American colleague, only to learn he has his own secrets to solve. But when he disappears, this amateur ...

It's nearly Christmas in Oxford, and Detective Inspector Bridget Hart is enjoying a rare day off at Oxford's Christmas Market. A ghost tour seems like a fun way to round off the day. Until, that is, a brutal murder brings the evening to a tragic close. Torn between work and family commitments over the festive season, Bridget soon discovers that the ghost of Christmas past is reaching out to the present with fatal consequences.

A rare orchid is flowering on the magical Garden Isles but when Fran arrives to see it on her latest travel writing adventure she’s horrified to find the plant has been attacked and the exotic bloom is lying chopped on the floor of the glasshouse. Soon Fran is teaming up with tour guide Harry again for a spot of sleuthing and they’re hot on the trail. Who destroyed the special bloom and why? One thing is for sure, there’s a long list of suspects and they need to work fast to catch the vandal before they catch the next ferry off the island and escape to freedom…

Fire in the sky, a catastrophic explosion nearby, and a massive investigation follow a devastating plane crash at Port Alma’s Sky Field airport. Detective Constable Holly Towns is working on the fringes of the high-profile case, trying to find out who turned an old gravel pit into a meth lab, but she keeps getting drawn closer to the crash site and its secrets. Meanwhile, people connected with the lab are being murdered and the CIU officers are worried that a shakeup in the local drug trade will lead to more violence. And there’s one more problem. Holly is being accused of using ...

A quirky, dark-edged mystery full of twists, turns and playful surprises Max Black, retired stock broker and single parent, is facing a crisis. His daughter has left for university, and despite the companionship of his faithful Cairn terrier Monty, he feels panicked, untethered and not very well. His doctor tells him to get out more, change his lifestyle and find himself a job. Could Duntisbourne Hall, a rundown stately home recruiting tour guides, be the answer to his empty-nest syndrome? Joining the team of eccentric retired professionals who shuffle the general public around on tour, he ...

A man is found dead, tied to a chair in the middle of the road, a stag’s antlers on his head. The gruesome scene stuns the town, especially when the victim is identified: Jim Tiernan, who ran the White Hart pub. Tiernan’s pub is at the center of village life and he knew everyone’s secrets. Detective Nicola Bridge grew up in Fleetcombe and has now returned, for the good of her family, from a life away in Liverpool. DC Harry Ward is ten years younger and, despite his newcomer status, determined to earn Nicola’s trust.

A vicious storm. A celebrity murder. And a killer at sea. The Sea Angel is a party boat. But the final cruise of the summer proves to be the last dance for film superstar Kasia Simon. DC Holly Towns snags an extra paid shift on board the Sea Angel, and can hardly believe her luck. A plainclothes gig providing security seems like a holiday. But the night turns deadly, when she finds a body on a lower deck, beautiful and glamorous except for the gunshot wound to the temple. With the rest of the CIU team called to a terrifying sniper incident, Holly is on her own to get the investigation ...

NEW FOR 2023 – STAND-ALONE, #21 IN THE SERIES. MEET MAVERICK BRITISH DETECTIVE DI SKELGILL... "A COMPELLING BRITISH CRIME MYSTERY." SEE NO EVIL, HEAR NO EVIL, SPEAK NO EVIL ... A reality documentary crew is on the hunt for a victim. An unsolved murder from the 1970s that could leave the authorities red-faced. Celebrity criminologist Professor Simeon Freud plans to bask in the glory. Posing as a researcher, DS Jones joins the production team, but Skelgill must work in the shadows. His instincts rebel – not least that his protégé is prey to a narcissist on the one hand and a killer on ...

Victimology: tall, slim, blond hair, jeans. And a Harvest Festival t-shirt… Finding the body of a young woman in Haldane Hill Park rings alarm bells for Detective Constable Holly Towns. But can she even say the words ‘serial killer’ and be taken seriously? The media names him the Port Predator, and he’s not finished. Not even close. Another young woman is missing, and time is running out. Officers in the Criminal Investigations Unit are focused on a set of strong suspects, but Holly is drawn in another direction. The risks are high. She’ll be an outcast if she reveals her suspect,...

"Matt Drabble is a name that will one day be as widely recognized as Stephen King & Dean Koontz" - READERS FAVORITE Lucy Sheppard hadn't been back to the small town of Woodforge Valley in a long time, but it still didn't seem long enough since she'd set foot inside the black hole of terror that had once been her childhood home. The family run care home had closed its doors some time ago and her mother had spent her final months fading away inside the manor house walls. The large building and sprawling grounds have seen better days, a once proud beacon on the local map now lies in tatters as...