In two previous Dodie Fanshaw mysteries, the deaths could have been accidents, but she was sure they were murders and determined to unmask the villains. This death is clearly murder, and the police investigate the many people who had grudges against the new Rector, from his family and his new parishioners. The trouble is, most of them have no alibis, and not all of them tell the truth. Dodie, visiting Sir William and Lady Talbot at the Manor, is able to discover the vital clue.

Luke, Earl of Frayne, is determined to recover Frayne Caste, even if it means marrying the present owner, Damaris Hallem, a girl he has never met. Luke's father, an inveterate gambler, lost the Castle fifty years earlier to Damaris's grandfather, an innkeeper. As it is the first estate his family obtained Luke wants to regain it. Damaris, unwillingly obeying her grandfather's wishes, comes to London for the Season with her friend Mary, Lady Gordon, and her two young children. She will be twenty-one in July, and is looking forward to controlling her inheritance, which has been in the charge of...

The Fifth Dodie Fanshaw Mystery A suspicious death, a newcomer who becomes involved in village affairs, and Dodie Fanshaw on the trail of the truth, create a delicious cosy crime novel. Catherine, widowed, returns to her home in the Lancashire hills. She and Ian Hanson, a retired newcomer, quickly become involved in village activities. She goes to work for Martin, whose wife died in a tragic accident for which he was blamed, but exonerated, until the rumours start up again and Martin's mother, a former dancer with Dodie, asks Dodie to help.

How can a disgraced Earl make the most of his return from exile, especially when he is impersonating his half-brother, John, the real Earl?



Silas,expects to find a flourishing estate at The Priory and marry an heiress when he returns from a twenty-year exile in India.



He is attracted to Fanny, the heiress daughter of a wealthy trader he meets on the homeward-bound ship, but she dislikes him and her brother Gerard, who is to take over his dead fathers business, rejects him.



Then he meets his family, cousins Lucien and Amanda, and Aunt Charlotte, and finds his inheritance...

Molly Morgan, a Shropshire lass, was transported to the new penal colony at Botany Bay in 1790. She survived with the help of her lovers, and stowed away to come back to England, one of the few convicts to manage this. She was transported a second time. Later, because of her wealth and good works she became known as the Queen of Hunter Valley.

When Edmund, Viscount Tremaine, is reported dead at Waterloo, Jane, his fiancee, is devastated. Her father's death has left her and her sister Elinor almost destitute. William, the new Viscount, arrives. At Waterloo a farmer, Gervaas, helping bury the dead, finds an unconscious man who has lost his memory. He stays at the farm, hoping he will remember who he is.

Persuaded by her grandfather to supervise the coming out of Matilda, his great-niece, Louise reluctantly goes to London to take part in the season for the first time since her soldier husband was killed three years before.



Matilda is difficult, but Louise enjoys meeting old and new friends and the balls.



But finding a husband for Matilda proved more difficult than anticipated.

Brigid is happy working as a companion to Sophia, but knows she will soon have to look for a new position as governess or companion.



What she will not accept is marriage to Matthew, Sophias brother, for she is penniless.



Another possibility is suggested when she meets her unknown uncle and aunt and they offer her a home.



Can she accept, or would it be a trap from which she cannot escape?

Eugenie, orphaned in Switzerland, and working her way home through France to England, is helped by the stranger Hugues. Enjoying London Society, she is worried by the behaviour of her cousin George. Then the Earl of Lyndhurst comes to the rescue.

Eve longs to escape from her rigidly disciplinarian father, and experience life away from her small Herefordshire village. Her brother James longs to join the army fighting Napoleon in the peninsula.



Eve is fascinated by cider-making, and despite her fathers disapproval, makes it with the help of a local farmer.



When Justin, the Earl of Newark, discovers her in boys clothes high up an apple tree picking her apples, he is intrigued.