British Women Detectives

The year is 1928, and after the death of a maid at a glamorous society party, fortune heir Bryan Guinness seizes life and proposes to 18-year-old Diana, the most beautiful of the six Mitford sisters. The maid's death is ruled an accident, and the newlyweds put it behind them to begin a whirlwind life. Accompanying Diana as her lady's maid is Louisa Cannon, as well as a coterie of friends, family and hangers on, from Nancy Mitford to Evelyn Waugh. When a second victim is found in Paris in 1931, Louisa begins to see links with the death of the maid two years previously.

The Vanishing Act By Claire Winfield In the quiet Yorkshire village of Beckwith, the disappearance of librarian Eleanor Bird barely ripples the surface—until Detective Inspector Martha Davies is called in. At first glance, Eleanor seems like the kind of woman who might slip away unnoticed: quiet, solitary, unremarkable. But as Martha begins to unravel the threads of her life, a different picture emerges—one of a woman with a radical past, hidden names, and secrets buried deeper than the village wants to admit. With the help of Eleanor’s anxious colleague Penny, and a growing unease ...

An internet troll. A Rugby Club. A murder. When a Devon Rugby Club is hit by a string of vicious internet troll messages, they call upon Private Investigators Angus Darrow and Charlotte Lockwood to find out who's behind them. The stakes are high, with the club's reputation on the line and accusations of match-fixing looming. As Angus and Charlotte delve deeper into their investigation, they discover that there's more at play than just nasty messages. The situation takes a deadly turn when a member of the rugby club is found murdered, and the detectives realize that they're dealing with ...

An unexpected jackpot win, a handsome new villager, and an angry landlord... When Allie Day wins three-quarters of a million pounds in a mysterious jackpot, she attempts to help out her friend Bree, owner of her favorite Cotswolds cafe. "Winters will have you giggling into your book!" But instead of making things better, Allie's attempts to help lead her into hot water - and straight to a dead body! Before she knows it, Allie is accused of murder, and written up in the local papers as a killer – and worse, she seems to be in the real killer’s crosshairs! When the killer tries to strike ...

On the first snowy night of winter, Detective Inspector Vera Stanhope sets off for her home in the hills. Though the road is familiar, she misses a turning and soon becomes lost and disorientated. A car has skidded off the narrow road in front of her, its door left open, and she stops to help. There is no driver to be seen, so Vera assumes that the owner has gone to find help. But a cry calls her back: a toddler is strapped in the back seat.

Professor Claire Lane’s students are always close to her heart. When one disappears into fells and becks of the Lake District in Northwest England, she is not convinced the woman has gone to meditate on Scafell Pike. A talented and gifted writer, Bo Huan, a Chinese National follows her dream. Claire in desperation seeks help from her fiancé Lord Ralph McGinniss, known for his uncomplicated investigations as a Senior Detective at Scotland Yard. The Lake District is meant for walking and enjoying nature, not murder and international spying. Ralph and Claire join forces to solve a delicate ...

'I can't deny it, I just love these characters! ' - Goodreads reviewer Investment Trust boss Hugo Morgan has celebrated his fiftieth birthday by dumping his wife of twenty-two years and is now intent on marrying a younger model. Tasked with checking out the back story of the shiny new Mrs Morgan are ex-barrister turned private eye Maggie Bainbridge and her faithful assistant Jimmy Stewart. A SUSPICIOUS SUICIDE Beautiful and clever, twenty-three year old Chardonnay Clarke has died under the wheels of a tube train, leaving behind a heart-breaking message on her social media. But in DI Frank ...

When a celebrity chef from Exmouth mysteriously disappears, private investigators Lockwood and Darrow are discreetly enlisted to investigate, keeping a step ahead of the relentless press. Though the chef's known mental health struggles hint at a possible explanation, as the duo delve deeper, they unearth a tangled web of secrets that suggest a far darker narrative. The quest for truth threatens to have wide-ranging implications, placing them in the crosshairs of the town's most dangerous secrets. The pair must work swiftly to expose the truth before the town's underbelly consumes them.

With London's streets deserted, a young flower girl is murdered. But why was she out so late on the foggiest night of the year? Inspector Witherspoon of Scotland Yard has nowhere to even begin looking for a suspect. However, Mrs. Jeffries, his housekeeper, is even more accomplished at detection than she is at household management. A policeman's widow herself, her quick wits allow her to nudge the inspector in the right direction to solve the mystery.

Cynically exploiting the Christmas Eve suicide of her husband Alasdair, beautiful Eilish Macbeth has turned tragedy into triumph by writing a million-selling book for children who have suffered the heartbreaking loss of a parent. But then a witness emerges who claims that Alasdair Macbeth was murdered, plunging private investigator Maggie Bainbridge into a case that is as perplexing as any she ever has worked on. Can Maggie and her little team battle their way through a mountain of lies and deceit to get to the truth?

Some cases get buried. Vicky Pearce digs them up. Detective Vicky Pearce has a reputation: sharp-tongued, relentless, and unafraid to walk into the shadows others avoid. When a string of missing rough sleepers is dismissed as just another tragedy of the streets, Vicky’s instincts tell her there's more beneath the surface — and she’s determined to uncover it. With a new detective sergeant by her side, still battling his own ghosts, Vicky follows the trail into the heart of a hidden world where society’s most vulnerable vanish without a trace. As the case escalates, her investigation ...

It's with a heavy heart that Jane Austen takes up a new residence at Chawton Cottage in Hampshire. Secretly mourning the lost love of her life, she's stunned to learn that the late Lord Harold Trowbridge has made her heir to an extraordinary bequest: a Bengal chest filled with his diaries, letters, and most intimate correspondence. From these, Jane is expected to write a memoir of the Gentleman Rogue for posterity. But before she can put pen to paper on this labor of love, she discovers a corpse in the cellar of her new home.

When Inspector Witherspoon becomes the main suspect in a murder case, Scotland Yard refuses to let him investigate. But no one said anything about Mrs. Jeffries and her polished detection skills, proving that behind every great man there's a woman - and that a crime solver's work is never done.

A new assignment for Penny Küfer! Has Niní Delight, the head of a luxury lingerie chain, really taken her own life with arsenic? The young woman had everything one could wish for: the villa of her dreams, professional success, a famous burlesque diva for a sister and, on top of that, a mysterious new lover. Who’d want to end such a life in this way? The police have ruled out foul play. But—as Penny will soon discover—nothing is what it seems in the world of silk, French lace, and glamour...

Christopher Gilhaney isn't a popular man, and he proves why once again when he insults every guest at Abigail Chase's Guy Fawkes Night dinner party. When Gilhaney is shot dead under the cover of the night's fireworks, his murder is deemed a robbery gone wrong. But when the case hasn't been solved six weeks later, Inspector Witherspoon is called upon to find the killer - and quickly!

Minerva Kenny is a dear woman, but her tendency to "borrow" things without asking has finally caught up with her. William Barrett has learned Minerva's shameful secret, and he's holding it over her head. Mrs. Jeffries and the staff at Upper Edmonton Gardens have hatched a scheme to save her - but when they try to recover the damning evidence from Barrett, they discover something more shocking: Barrett's corpse. Considering the victim's wicked ways, Minerva is far from the only suspect.

Jem Jago is back at work with her antique books, and spending her weekends exploring her new home - the windswept Isles of Scilly - in her little sailboat, 'Bellatrix'. She’s really starting to settle into island life. Unfortunately, murder in the Scillies is not as rare as some of her manuscripts. In Tatteredly’s second-hand bookstore, she discovers the body of beautiful Gina Marrak. Poking around the scene of the crime, Jem finds an unusual book, which leads her down an unlikely path.

Lord Francis and Lady Ottilia Fanshawe have suffered a devastating blow. With Ottilia sunk deep into a depression, Francis is desperate to get his beloved wife back. So when he hears about a murder at the seaside town of Weymouth, an idea starts to form.... A young girl's body has been discovered, laid out in an open coffin, surrounded by candles. The staged scene, and the fact that the victim was a member of a theatrical troupe, suggests one of her colleagues is the killer. Knowing Ottilia's sharp intuition and penchant for solving mysteries, Francis brings her to the murder site.

In the second in the series, Kate Brannigan investigates the bizarre case of the missing conservatories, unearthing an unscrupulous lawyer (later found hanging from his balcony in flimsy women's apparel); a supersalesman with an overstuffed bank account; and a brother-sister pair who are double-crossing everyone. And this real estate fiddling ties in with a separate scam involving Kate's best buds - and murder of the most unexpected order.

DI Barney Mains blames himself for the grotesque murder of a top banker in France. He's obsessed with the belief that he allowed a near-mythical assassin to escape certain death to kill again. And when a duplicate murder is reported 1000 miles away in Barney's home town in Scotland, the guilt drives him ever closer to the edge. How many more must pay the ultimate price for his failure? But then death comes closer to home. He is left with no choice but to face his demons, before a shocking confrontation which will change everything...