Showing results by narrator "Jane McDowell" in All Categories

The Night Hawks, a group of metal detectorists, are searching for buried treasure when they find a body on the beach in North Norfolk. At first Nelson thinks that the dead man might be an asylum seeker but he turns out to be a local boy, Jem Taylor, recently released from prison. Ruth is more interested in the treasure, a hoard of Bronze Age weapons. Nelson at first thinks that Taylor's death is accidental drowning, but a second death suggests murder.

Three of Lord Peter Wimsey's most baffling cases demonstrate his unique detection skills at their most spectacular. The engima of a house numbered thirteen in a street of even numbers; an indignant child accused of theft; a dream about a game of chess that uncovers the true story behind a violent death. Each of the stories introduces a different side of the twentieth century's most ingenious detective hero.

Kate’s retirement in Cornwall hasn’t quite gone as planned - Lavender Cottage is in need of substantial repairs, and her sister Angie’s fondness for gin does rather stretch the purse strings. So when Kate is asked to do some nursing at the luxury retirement flats in Seaview Grange, she jumps at the chance. The old Victorian house has stunning views of the sea, and the retirees are a peaceful bunch. That is, until Edina Martinelli, a glamorous ex-opera singer, is found poisoned in her home.

Dr Ruth Galloway's forensic skills are called upon when builders, demolishing an old house in Norwich, uncover the bones of a child - minus the skull - beneath a doorway. Is it some ritual sacrifice or just plain straightforward murder? Ruth links up with DCI Harry Nelson to investigate. The house was once a children's home. Nelson traces the Catholic priest who used to run the place. He tells him that two children did go missing forty years before - a boy and a girl. They were never found.

Kate Palmer is delighted when she learns that her home, the beautiful seaside village of Tinworthy, is the setting for a new TV show. She’s even more excited when she, her handsome husband, Woody, and her drama-queen sister, Angie, are all invited to be extras. But when the cameras start rolling, the trio is in for a nasty surprise when the film’s writer and producer, Crispin Wyngarde, drops dead....

The Special Operations Executive (SOE) set up by Winston Churchill in 1941 saw its role in France as helping the Resistance by recruiting and organising guerrilla fighters; supplying and training them; and then disrupting the invaders by any means necessary. The aim of this work was to prepare for the invasion of Europe by Allied forces and the eventual liberation of France. It was soon decided that women would play a vital role. Lonely Courage tells their remarkable story and sheds new light on what life was really like for these brave women.

This is Karen's story of an unbreakable love for her daughter despite unimaginable tragedy: from her despair through Becky's troubled teenage years, to the agonising eight years when Becky was missing, and then the dramatic story of how a killer's confession led to a terrible discovery. Karen was thrown into a world where the truth was never guaranteed; where taxi driver Christopher Halliwell nearly got away with murder; where the police officer who found her daughter was punished instead.

Everything has changed for Dr Ruth Galloway. She has a new job, home and partner and is no longer North Norfolk police's resident forensic archaeologist. That is, until convicted murderer Amyas March offers to make DCI Nelson a deal. Nelson was always sure that March killed more women than he was charged with. Now March confirms this and offers to show Nelson where the other bodies are buried - but only if Ruth will do the digging.

Dr Ruth Galloway is called in by a team of archaeologists investigating coastal erosion on the north Norfolk coast, when they unearth six bodies buried at the foot of a cliff. They seem to have been there a very long time. Ruth must help discover how long, and how on earth they got there. Ruth and DCI Nelson are drawn together once more to unravel the past. Tests reveal that the bodies have lain, preserved in the sand, for sixty years. The mystery of their deaths stretches back to the Second World War, a time when Great Britain was threatened by invasion.

It was the body of a tall stout man. On his dead face, a handsome pair of gold pince-nez mocked death with grotesque elegance. The body wore nothing else.Lord Peter Wimsey knew immediately what the corpse was supposed to be. His problem was to find out whose body had found its way into Mr Alfred Thipps' Battersea bathroom.

Naomi and I are best friends. School runs, dog walks, a shoulder to cry on over a glass of wine - we’re inseparable. But now my husband has walked out, I need her more than ever. I know she will help me pick up the pieces. Because she knows about the lie I told to protect her. She knows how much I’ve sacrificed for this friendship. And she’d never let anyone hurt me. Would she?

DCI Nelson has been receiving threatening letters telling him to 'go to the stone circle and rescue the innocent who is buried there'. He is shaken, not only because children are very much on his mind, with Michelle's baby due to be born, but because although the letters are anonymous, they are somehow familiar. They read like the letters that first drew him into the case of The Crossing Places, and to Ruth. But the author of those letters is dead....

Skye has been with Tim forever and the last thing she's thinking about is saying 'I do'. It's Tim that enters the dream wedding competition - he's longing to win an all-expenses-paid trip to romantic Montenello. An escape to a beautiful Italian hill town might be just what they need to find love again... Ana definitely isn't interested in getting married - she doesn't need a man to make her happy. But when she loses her job at a glossy food magazine, she jumps at the chance of a new life, renovating a crumbling Italian farmhouse.

Kate Palmer is stunned when she wakes up one morning to discover the body of a man in the beautiful garden of Lavender Cottage. She’s spent the last few years renovating her cozy clifftop cottage with its gorgeous views of the sparkling Cornish Sea. And a death right under her nose is more than a little unsettling....

Lainey Hollingsworth has spent her whole life on the outside of a secret. Her mother would never discuss the reasons she abandoned Italy when Lainey was a new born, nor has she ever stayed in touch with the family she left behind. Now Lainey's mother is dead, taking the secret with her, and leaving Lainey free to find out about her roots. Her husband, Tom, appears supportive, until he hits her with a bombshell that shatters the very foundations of their marriage. Another secret Lainey never knew anything about.

Italy, 1964. Maria Domenica is the eldest daughter in the Carrozza family from the tiny southern village of San Giulio. At 16, Maria's life is limited to the confines of her mother's rural kitchen (where she bakes bread every morning, the way the Carrozza women always have), and the Caffe Angeli, a place of friendship, strong espresso and famous ricotta sfolgliatelle. Her parents have high hopes for their beautiful first-born, but she has other plans.

The best of the golden age crime writers, praised by all the top modern writers in the field including P. D. James and Ruth Rendell, Dorothy L. Sayers created the immortal Lord Peter Wimsey. The 11th book featuring Lord Peter, set in a country church, is often named as the best detective story ever written. When his sexton finds a corpse in the wrong grave, the rector of Fenchurch St Paul asks Lord Peter Wimsey to find out who the dead man was and how he came to be there.

A lifetime ago, a patient escaped Nazareth mental asylum. They covered their tracks carefully. Or so they thought. Thirty years ago, Marianne Smy committed a crime then fled from her home to leave the past behind. Or so she thought. Now, Marianne has been forced to return. Nazareth asylum has been converted to luxury flats, but its terrible hold on her is still strong. A successful academic, a loving mother and a loyal wife, she fears her secret being revealed and her world shattering. She is right to be scared.

The best of the golden age crime writers, praised by all the top modern writers in the field including P. D. James and Ruth Rendell, Dorothy L. Sayers created the immortal Lord Peter Wimsey. He made his fifth appearance in this brilliant collection of ingenious short stories. The best of the golden age crime writers, praised by all the top modern writers in the field including P. D. James and Ruth Rendell, Dorothy L. Sayers created the immortal Lord Peter Wimsey.

The best of the golden age crime writers, praised by all the top modern writers in the field including P. D. James and Ruth Rendell, Dorothy L. Sayers created the immortal Lord Peter Wimsey. This book of short stories is his ninth appearance and introduces another detective, Montague Egg. Poisoned port, pet cats in peril, purloined pearls...Lord Peter Wimsey solves the mysteries of the man who was blown into the fourth dimension and the murder in fancy dress.