Showing results for "Flora" in Mystery

Sussex, 1960: It’s the perfect day for Abbeymead’s autumn fair. The village green has been transformed into a riot of stalls and tents, and Flora and Jack are keen to sample all the local produce. But when local cheesemaker Gilbert Barrow crashes into the fair, he brings the festivities to a dead halt. Flora rushes to the van and finds Gilbert slumped over the wheel, killed by his prize-winning round of cheese, which has broken free of its bonds. Flora is immediately alert–surely Gilbert would have been more careful with his treasured prize… and with his life?

Amidst the smell of sherry trifle and the sound of lively music, the guests raise their glasses. But as a loud scream interrupts the toast, amateur detectives Flora Steele and Jack Carrington learn that not everyone is in the party spirit....

The young man with the shock of white-blond hair lay spread-eagled on the floor, surrounded by fallen books. His hand reached out to the scattered pages, as though he was trying to tell her something. But who is he? How did he come to be killed in Flora’s ordinary little bookshop? Flora finds out he was staying at the Priory Hotel, and when the gardener suddenly dies in its beautiful grounds only a few days later, she is certain that something untoward is happening in her quiet village by the sea.

Sussex, 1955: When bookshop owner Flora Steele goes for a walk along the pier she isn’t expecting to spot a young woman’s body in the stormy waters below. And she’s shocked to discover the victim is someone she knows.... Convinced the death was not an accident, Flora persuades attractive local crime writer Jack Carrington to help her find out what really happened to poor Polly Dakers, a popular young woman with a complicated love life, who’d been at the heart of village life in Abbeymead.

Sussex, 1956: When Flora and her partner in crime solving, Jack, arrive at the charming church of St Saviour’s the last thing they’re expecting to find is the curate, Lyle Beaumont, lifeless on the flagstone floor beneath the bell tower, with a mysterious note in his hand.

Sussex, November 1959. There’s a chill in the air at the Lewes bonfire celebration. Carnival floats fill the narrow streets, fireworks crackle overhead, and Flora and Jack feel the heat of the burning torches lining the streets. But when Trevor French, chief of the Grove Bonfire Society, tumbles from his parade float, they know something is afoot. Trevor didn’t just fall – and amidst the crowds, his killer slips away through the smoke-filled night.

When Flora Steele sets off for a peaceful vacation with crime writer Jack Carrington, the last thing she expects to find is a body at their pretty rental cottage! More baffling, they discover Roger Gifford was a man with plenty of friends, and the villagers seem devastated by his sudden death.... So why was he murdered? Who has blood on their hands? His estranged wife, Beatrice, his wayward younger brother, Lionel, or the suspicious newcomer, Mercy Dearlove? Inquisitive, Flora joins forces with handsome Jack to find out how the poor man came to such an untimely end.

Sussex, 1957: When Flora Steele and handsome crime writer Jack Carrington attend the grand re-opening of the Priory Hotel in the beautiful little village of Abbeymead, their day out is cut short when the flame-haired female singer in the band suddenly drops dead before their eyes. Flora is stunned by the unexpected turn of events and immediately deduces foul play. Beverly Russo was a spirited young woman with a big voice, and Flora is determined to get to the bottom of her untimely demise—especially as the detective sergeant leading the investigation is so hopeless.

It’s a sunny morning in Abbeymead as Flora cycles through the village and knocks on the door of the local library, planning to deliver a gift to librarian Maud Frobisher to mark her retirement. But Flora is shocked when she finds Maud slumped in the corner, and even more startled when she recognizes the man holding the murder weapon–an enormous hardback book. Flora’s known Lowell Gracey since her college days, but what is he doing working for Maud and now the main suspect in her murder?

Sussex, 1958: A radiant Flora is being twirled across the dancefloor by her dashing new husband, Jack. It’s the perfect wedding in Abbeymead, until a mysterious stranger is found dead just outside the village. But when Flora finds an envelope tucked into the man’s silver cigarette case, the address is key to discovering the poor chap’s name–Russell Farr. He isn’t known to any of the villagers, so at first all signs point to a tragic accident. That is, until they discover Farr previously worked at the esteemed Cleve College, where Jack is now a writer-in-residence.

Jack is stunned to receive a call from his estranged mother, Sybil, asking him to drop everything and come to France. Together with Flora, his fellow sleuth, they pack their suitcases, dreaming of fragrant lavender fields and freshly baked pain au chocolat. It’s only when they arrive that they discover the shocking truth—Sybil’s friend was killed on a street in Paris, and she is desperate for their help.

Some secrets hide in plain sight. Others are stolen in the dead of night... Flora Maguire has everything she could wish for—a beautiful Belgravia home, a devoted husband, and baby Arthur to dote on. But her perfect world is shattered when she accepts an invitation to tour St Philomena’s Children’s Hospital in poverty-stricken Southwark. The conditions are appalling, but the real horror lies in a chilling discovery: children are vanishing from the hospital.

Sussex, 1959. The sun is shining on the breathtaking castle as the Abbeymead Historical Society prepare their re-enactment of the Battle of Lewes. But the fun ends abruptly when council worker Alex Vicary falls to his death from the castle ramparts. A shadowy figure runs from the scene, but Alex was a beloved member of the community… who could possibly want him dead?

Amateur detective and bookshop owner Flora Steele and her dashing new husband Jack Carrington are finally embarking on the honeymoon of a lifetime. But will gorgeous gondola rides be ruined by their most heart-stopping case ever?

Sussex, 1957: When Flora and Jack hear that Percy Milburn–a newcomer to the area who has ruffled more than a few feathers with his grand plans for modernizing Abbeymead–is missing, they’re determined to find him. But after scouring the village, Flora is shocked to discover the body of the poor man in the cellar of a crumbling farmhouse.

Even the most glamorous stately homes hide secrets and lies from the past... When Flora receives a shocking telegram about her father’s sudden death in a riding accident, she rushes back to her childhood home, Cleeve Abbey. Once a governess to young Eddy, Viscount Trent, and daughter of the Earl’s trusted butler, Flora finds the house steeped in unease. Her plans to lay her father to rest beside her mother, Lily, are upended when mystery surrounds Lily’s final resting place.

Flora Hyde-Clare’s visit to her beau’s ancestral home was always going to be a disaster. Her mother’s nervous habit of rambling nonsensically, her father’s thinly veiled contempt, her own desperate desire to make a good impression on Sebastian Holcroft’s parents, and his seemingly endless parade of siblings all guaranteed that their stay in the country would be intolerably awkward at best. Yet for all her dire misgivings, Flora never imagined one of the household servants would wind up slain in his own bed. But that is precisely what happens to the handsome young land steward.

When 29-year-old Flora Lively loses both of her parents and inherits the family business, she tries hard to make a success of her father's dream - even at the expense of her own dreams. Burdened with Marshall, her father's handpicked American manager, Flora finds solace in her friendship with Joy, an elderly client she helped move into the Maples, the local retirement community.

FBI Special Agent Kimberly Quincy and Sergeant Detective D. D. Warren have built a task force to follow the digital bread crumbs left behind by deceased serial kidnapper Jacob Ness. When a disturbing piece of evidence is discovered in the hills of Georgia, they bring Flora Dane and true-crime savant Keith Edgar to a small town where something seems to be deeply wrong.

You have good reason to be afraid. . . . It was a case that haunts Bobby Dodge to this day—the case that nearly killed him and changed his life forever. Now, in an underground chamber on the grounds of an abandoned Massachusetts mental hospital, the gruesome discovery of six mummified corpses...