A Melissa Craig Mystery
8 primary works • 20 total works
Book 2
Book 3
Book 6
Book 7
Book 8
Book 9
Book 11
Book 12
'A gifted and knowledgeable writer . . . engaging and readable' Financial Times
Women in the quiet Cotswold town of Stowbridge are living in fear of a sex strangler. At the same time, surrounding villages are suffering a spate of burglaries, one of which leads to the death of Gloucestershire's most prolific novelist, Leonora Jewell.
Crime writer Melissa Craig is persuaded to complete Jewell's unfinished novel and soon suspects that the author's death was not, as was first supposed, accidental. Clues in the script suggest a motive for murder. But as the intrepid writer pieces together the clues - and stumbles across yet another planned twist in Leonora's novel - so the mystery of Stowbridge's crime-wave deepens.
The Cotswold village of Upper Benbury is buzzing with rumour and gossip. The body of a young gipsy girl has been found in a discarded freezer.
A local newshound, hot on the trail of the story, persuades crime writer Melissa Craig to accompany him to the gipsy encampment. Then Melissa learns that members of the victim's family are planning their own brand of justice for the outsider who lured their girl away - and her determination to track down and warn the Romanys' intended victim lands her in grave danger, exposing dark secrets in unexpected places.
Melissa Craig is a successful crime novelist who has left London to pursue her career in the more relaxed atmosphere of the Cotswolds. It doesn't take her long to discover that fact and fiction are sometimes frighteningly similar, and the gentle country existence she planned for herself is, instead, providing grist for her creative mill.
Finishing Touch finds Melissa becoming more involved with the local community, and teaching creative writing at the local Tech. But murder stalks the college art department, reminding both Melissa and Iris, her artist neighbour, of a bizarre event they had witnessed some time before.
'A gently old-fashioned whodunit, riddled with lurking anguish' The Times
'A gifted and knowledgeable writer . . . engaging and readable' Financial Times
Crime novelist Melissa Craig flees London, her agent and her over-protective lover to take refuge in the Cotswolds and produce bestsellers in peace. But a series of bizarre phone calls leads her to a young journalist convinced a real crime has been committed.
When a corpse is discovered under the leaf-mould in woodlands, professional curiosity gets the better of judgement. And in the course of her investigations, Melissa finds that the truth is stranger than her own fiction.
After a third murder within six months, the residents of Thanebury village now live in fear. Despite her local reputation for solving mysteries, crime writer Melissa Craig has no intention of getting involved - until a fourth victim turns up in her own village of Upper Benbury.
As Melissa hunts for clues, a fifth murder occurs, and it becomes clear that at least one very disturbed mind is at work . . .
'All the best ingredients of English crime . . . a novel of sharp insights' Cotswold Life
A gifted and knowledgeable writer . . . engaging and readable' Financial Times
Melissa Craig has taken time away from writing bestselling mysteries to script a murder play for an amateur drama group. 'Murder with a giggle' is how she thinks of it. But no one is laughing when a cast member dies in the cellar of the old Cotswold Heyshill Manor Hotel where the play is to be produced.
Persuaded by the manager to investigate, Melissa finds . . . nothing. No well-ordered clues, no sure suspects, just lots of tension. Then she chances upon a vital discovery in the hotel's parking lot, and everything begins to fall into place. This isn't a matter of "murderous plots and murky deeds, all in rhyming couplets" but a death-defying journey along a trail of crime on an international scale.
When Melissa Craig arrives for a stay in Uphanger Manor in the Cotswolds, she walks straight into an atmosphere of hostility and suspicion, which alerts her crime-writer's mind. Why is the owner, Stewart Miles Haughan, so unpopular with his employees? What lies behind the tension between him and his wife? Who is the composer of the haunting poems that keep appearing among his correspondence, and why is he taking them so seriously?
Haughan practically coerces Melissa into trying to track down the anonymous poet. Then things start to turn nasty . . .
'Full of sharp insights with an unexpected twist in the tail' Val McDermid
Two fatal cases of food poisoning at Framleigh House, the smart residential home where Melissa Craig's mother Sylvia is staying, are treated as accidental by the authorities.
To Melissa's consternation, Sylvia decides to do some detective work of her own: why do the once-married couple ignore one another in company but make a secret rendezvous in the grounds? Do the two gay actors fit into the puzzle? Can Sylvia trust the confidante whom she has roped into her 'investigation'?
When another resident is taken ill Melissa starts to take her mother's concerns seriously and begins to investigate with the aid of local journalist Bruce Ingram. And in so doing puts her own life in jeopardy.
A deliciously intriguing mystery with a surprising sting
Aidan Cresney seems to be a model citizen. An active member of the parish council and a former barrister, he took up beekeeping as a retirement hobby. Cresney confidently boasts that bees will never attack an apiarist 'who knows what he's doing'. Yet one day he is found dead after suffering multiple stings.
When a second family member dies in similar circumstances, tongues begin to wag. And Melissa Craig, the Cotswolds' intrepid crime-writing sleuth, starts to uncover some disturbing secrets.
'A gifted and knowledgeable writer . . . engaging and readable' Financial Times
Melissa Craig accompanies her artist neighbor Iris to France, where Iris will teach a two-week course at Philippe Bonard's language and culture centre, while Melissa researches Camisard history for her new thriller.
Then a former student plummets down a cliff - on the face of it a tragic accident. But the discover, days later, of a second body in almost the identical spot seems to suggest murder instead. And Melissa, uncovering the strange and violent history of the area, and the past treacheries of a Gestapo infiltrator, finds herself drawn yet again into a present-day mystery.