A serial killer is terrorising the senior citizens of Denton, and the local police are succumbing to a flu epidemic. Tired and demoralized, the force has to contend with a seemingly perfect young couple suffering arson attacks and death threats, a suspicious suicide, burgularies, pornographic videos, and poison-pen letters.

Ten days to Christmas, and on a bitter December afternoon 8-year-old Tracy Uphill goes missing. Detective Inspector Jack Frost, Denton Police Force's scruffiest officer, knows they only have a limited time to find her, and he's also got to nursemaid Detective Constable Clive Barnard, whose uncle just happens to be the Chief Constable....Then the bodies start to pile up and a crime committed many years before leads a murderer to kill again.

Jack Frost was supposed to be on holiday, but with one child dead and another reported missing, there was no chance, no matter how much it pained Chief Superintendent Mullett to recall his scruffiest, most irreverent officer to duty. Had the same person taken both boys? Was there any connection with the pervert who silently entered houses at night to stab babies in their cots? Questions, questions and more questions. And so very few answers.

A multiple rapist is on the loose, a woman reports that her baby has been stolen, and someone is trying to blackmail the local supermarket by poisoning some of the stock. When two young girls are reported missing, the Denton crime wave reaches terrifying heights. As DI Jack Frost staggers exhausted from case to case, something nasty arrives at the station in the form of Detective Chief Inspector Skinner.

A rapist on the loose, a young girl missing, a robbery at a leisure complex run by a low life, and an old man knocked down by a driver who wouldn't stop. Detective Inspector Jack Frost knew that there would be lots more to come.

The crime novel at its compelling best as David Jason, the star of the television series of the same name, reads R. D. Wingfield's A Touch of Frost.

May, 1982. Britain celebrates the sinking of the Belgrano, Jimmy Savile has the run of the airwaves and Denton Police Division welcomes its first black policeman, DC Waters - recently relocated from East London. While the force is busy dealing with a spate of local burglaries, the body of 15-year-old Samantha Ellis is discovered in woodland next to the nearby railway track. Then a 15-year-old boy is found dead on Denton's golf course, his organs removed.

A serial killer is terrorizing the senior citizens of Denton, and the local police are succumbing to a flu epidemic. In uncertain charge of the investigations is Detective Inspector Jack Frost, crumpled, slapdash, and foul-mouthed as ever. Trying to cope despite inadequate backup, but there is never enough time; the unsolved crimes pile up and the vicious killings go on.

Detective InspectorJjack Frost knelt down beside the tiny body. Who did this to you, sonny? he asked, his face tight with compassion. The boy was eight years old, bound and gagged, and stripped naked. He had been dead for some seven or eight hours. Frost should have been on holiday, he had sneaked back into the station late at night to help himself to some of Divisional Commander Mullett's cigarettes and this case had been dumped on him as no other officers were available. And then another boy is reported missing.

Detective Inspector Jack Frost, officially on duty, is nevertheless determined to sneak off to a colleague's leaving party. But first the corpse of a well-known local junkie is found blocking the drain of a Denton public lavatory and then, when Frost attempts to join the revels later on, the nubile daughter of a wealthy businessman is reported missing. Sleepy Denton has never known anything like the crime wave which now threatens to submerge it.

Jack Frost is disheveled, disorganised and disrespectful. His superiors don't like him. He has a habit of doing things his way - and getting results. But when Denton CID is faced with a spate of major crimes, Frost finds himself under pressure. A young woman becomes the sixth victim of a multiple rapist, a teenage girl goes missing, there's a robbery at the Purple Parrot nightclub, and an old man is injured in a hit-and-run. With all this on his plate, Frost has little time and less patience for paperwork.

November 5th, 1982. It's been one of the worst days of Detective Sergeant Jack Frost's life. He has buried his wife Mary, and must now endure the wake, attended by all of Denton's finest. All, that is, apart from DC Sue Clark, who spends the night chasing a bogus tip-off, before being summoned to the discovery of a human foot. And the night gets worse. Local entrepreneur Harry Baskin is shot inside his club, an off-licence is set on fire and a famous painting goes missing. And Superintendant Mullett's attempts to join the Freemasons are being rudely thwarted.

Denton, 1981. Britain is in recession, the IRA is becoming increasingly active and the country’s on alert for an outbreak of rabies. Detective Sergeant Jack Frost is working under his mentor, DI Bert Williams, and coping badly with his increasingly strained marriage. Superintendent Stanley Mullett has been at Denton for only six months and is desperately trying to restore order within the chronically depleted ranks, while refurbishing the dilapidated Eagle Lane HQ.

After a morning’s betting at the races, bookmaker George Price is found in his car, barely alive with a bullet in his head. As he’s rushed to hospital, Detective Inspector Jack Frost and the Denton police force start their hunt for the would-be murderer. But with a long list of enemies who might want the bookie dead, the team have got their work cut out for them. And with a slew of other crimes hitting the area, from counterfeit goods to violent drugs gangs swamping Denton with cheap heroin, the stakes have never been higher.

August, 1983. Denton is preparing for a wedding. DS Waters should be on top of the world with less than a week to go until he marries Kim Myles. But the Sunday before the big day, the body of a young woman is found in the churchyard, and their wedding venue becomes a crime scene. DS Jack Frost has been homeless for the past three months. He's been staying with DC Sue Clarke but with a baby to take care of and the imminent arrival of her mother, she's given him his marching orders.

When art dealer Ivan Fielding is found dead of a heart attack in his home, it doesn’t initially seem like a case for Detective Inspector Frost and the Denton police force. But then signs of a burglary are discovered, and Frost senses there’s more to the story than meets the eye - even though the only thing taken was a worthless amateur painting.