There was no doubt at all that the girl was dead. The front of her skull and her facial bones had been splintered like the cracked shell of an egg. What made it even more shocking was the setting of the murder - an idyllic corner of the Scilly Isles where violent crime was almost unknown.

Angry and distressed, the villagers instinctively turn against the only stranger in their midst, the famous pop star and teenage idol Vince Peters. But Superintendent Wycliffe is not so sure. Slowly, methodically, he begins to...

Caroline Bryce came from the top of the social register in the tranquil town of Treen. So it was quite a scandal when her body was dragged from the bottom of the river.

As Superintendent Wycliffe investigates, he is faced with a number of questions: who would want to kill the beautiful Mrs Bryce? Was it a lover's quarrel? Or a family feud? Or a long-held resentment which had suddenly exploded in a moment of madness?

As Wycliffe begins to unravel an intricate tangle of love and hate, he finds...

Cochran Wilder disappeared fifteen years ago while on a walking holiday in Cornwall. Recently released from a psychiatric hospital after being convicted of indecent assault, he had been a serious embarrassment to his father, a prominent MP. Now his body has been found, buried in the dunes. It is clear that he was murdered.

Wycliffe suspects the involvement of six people, now well-established figures in the community, who at the time had been spending an illicit weekend at a chalet near where Wilder's...