Novels and short stories
Local Resistance
A Bob Robbins Home Front Mystery
Murder and Make Do
According to PC Laurie Oliver nothing ever happens in Porthferris.
But in the spring of 1941, Maisie Rose Hawkins leaves her husband
out in the rain to die; an axe-wielding farmer threatens a rationing
inspector; and an elderly spinster is suspected of murder. While
Dad’s Army is practising hilarious defence measures and an Army
major is equipping the disused copper mine as an Operations Base
for Churchill’s ‘Secret Army’, a German u-boat surfaces in the bay
at night. Everybody knows everybody’s secrets, but nobody quite
knows the truth. Can reluctant wartime detective Bob Robbins discover
what is really going on, and why there is so much local resistance?
Private Lives
A Bob Robbins Home Front Mystery
Cozy crime with a sinister twist and a dash of dark humour
While reluctant wartime detective Bob Robbins is enjoying a few
days’ holiday on the North Devon coast he becomes involved in a
shooting incident on a derelict farm. An elderly farmer lies injured,
and then disappears. A young man is found dead in the barn. Bob
reports the incident to the local police in Bideford, but they are
so over-stretched with extra Home Front duties he finds himself
in charge of the case. In urgent need of assistance, Bob requests
the help of the young police recruit Laurie Oliver. They take rooms
at Peony Villas, an unusual sort of guest house where a troupe of
London actors are in residence, and where Bob soon finds himself
involved in yet another peculiar mystery.
Courting Danger
A Bob Robbins Home Front Mystery.
Wartime rural police procedural
Cornwall, England, 1943.
Dumpy, grumpy wartime Detective Segreant Bob Robbins is called out
to investigate a suspected suicide in a remote moorland pool. Gogmagog
Ditch has a history steeped in Cornish folklore, but what attracted
the victim to such a desolate spot and why?
Dr Corin Lanyon was liked by all and loved by many – especially
women. As Bob untangles the victim’s various relationships and close
connection to a Celtic Circle heritage group, he confirms the doctor’s
death was no accident. Ably assisted by the bright but naïve PC
Laurie Oliver, Bob uncovers a web of criminality, deceit, and stolen
museum artefacts, but could any of the eclectic ensemble be guilty
of murder?
Secret Meetings
Book 4 in the Bob Robbins Home Front Mystery
A wartime country house murder mystery
I began writing Secret Meetings largely because I wanted to have
a go at a country murder mystery. While doing research, I came across
a snippet about Winston Churchill and General Eisenhower disappearing
for an ultra-secret meeting in Scotland before the Normandy Landings.
How, I wondered, could Churchill disappear from public view in 1944?
Answer: they used an impersonator. Enter DS Bob Robbins.
Reading more about D-Day gave me the material for a wartime espionage
story. Except, as in most of my novels, there is also a more domestic
affair involving questions of loyalty and double dealing running
through it.
International events and skulduggery, domestic politics, love and
loyalty; a similar outline to The Chosen Man Trilogy, but set in
one location. I thought this would make it easier. It didn’t. Not
at all. Secret Meetings was hard to write, and especially hard to
get right, so I am especially thrilled by the positive reviews it
is now getting.