-
Watching the Dark.
Banks is back his twentieth mystery – and this time he's investigating the murder of one of his own. Detective Inspector Bill Quinn is killed by a crossbow in the tranquil grounds of a police rehabilitation centre, and compromising photos are found in his room. DCI Banks, brought in to investigate, is assailed on all sides. By Joanna Passero, the Professional Standards inspector who insists on shadowing the investigation in case of police corruption. By his own conviction that a policeman shouldn't be deemed guilty without evidence. By Annie Cabbot, back at work after six months' recuperation, and beset by her own doubts and demons. And by an English girl who disappeared in Estonia six years ago, who seems to hold the secret at the heart of this case . . .
-
Children of the Revolution
Ex-college lecturer Gavin Miller is found dead; his distorted body strewn across a disused railway track near home. There’s no sign of struggle, and no concrete evidence except for one distinguishing package: £5,000 of cash, tucked inside the man’s pocket. But the DCI Banks delves into Miller’s past; he uncovers a troubled existence tarnished by accusations of abuse and misconduct which throws up an array of puzzling questions. What really occurred at the college where the victim used to teach? How was he embroiled in political activism at Essex University, over forty year ago? And what links him to an upstanding pillar of the community, who also harbours a dark secret from her past? One thing is clear: someone will stop at nothing – even murder – to prevent Banks from discovering the truth… ‘If you haven’t encountered DCI Banks before, prepare for a crash course in taut, clen writing and subtle psychology. And watch for those twists – they’ll get you every time.’ IAN BANKIN
-
Before The Poison
After years of Hollywood success composer Chris Lowndes wanted only one thing: to take his beloved wife home to the Yorkshire Dales. But Laura is gone, and Chris is on his own. He welcomes the isolation of Kilnsgate House, and the beauty of the dale. And it doesn’t surprise him that a man died there, sixty years ago. That his wife was convicted of murder. That something is pulling him deeper and deeper into the story of Grace Elizabeth Fox, who was hanged by the neck until she was dead . .
-
Piece Of My Heart
THE END OF THE SUMMER OF ‘69. THE END OF THE BIGGEST ROCK FESTIVAL YORKSHIRE HAS EVER SEEN. AND THE END OF A LIFE. As the organisers clear up after the party, they find an abandoned sleeping bag containing the body of a young woman, brutally murdered. Detective Chief Inspector Stanley Chadwick, a hard-headed WWII veteran, is assigned to the case. Chadwick has no time for the youth of the day, disrespectful and caring nothing for the sacrifices of an older generation. But the victim was related to a local band, the up-and-coming Mad Hatters, and Chadwick finds himself drawn unwillingly into the psychedelic Sixties pop scene. After a difficult summer, DCI Alan Banks is back home in the Yorkshire Dales. When he is called to investigate the murder of a journalist writing en article on the Mad Hatters, he discovers it is not the first time the ageing rock superstars have been brushed by tragedy. And Banks will have to go back a generation to discover exactly what kind of hornets’ nest has been stirred up.
-
Piece Of My Heart
This is the stunning new Inspector Banks novel, by an author ready for the Number One slot. As volunteers clean up after a huge outdoor rock concert in Yorkshire in 1969, they discover the body of a young woman wrapped in a sleeping bag. She has been brutally murdered. The detective assigned to the case, Stanley Chadwick, is a hard-headed, strait-laced veteran of the Second World War. He could not have less in common with - or less regard for - young, disrespectful, long-haired hippies, smoking marijuana and listening to the pulsing sounds of rock and roll. But he has a murder to solve, and it looks as if the victim was somehow associated with the up-and-coming psychedelic pastoral band the Mad Hatters. In the present, Inspector Alan Banks is investigating the murder of a freelance music journalist, who was working on a feature about the Mad Hatters for "MOJO" magazine. This is not the first time that the Mad Hatters, now aging rock superstars, have been brushed by tragedy. Banks finds he has to delve into the past to find out exactly what hornets' nest the journalist inadvertently stirred up.