This author crafts compelling crime fiction, weaving intricate plots across diverse historical settings and global locales. His work spans series set in Victorian London, post-war Spain, and contemporary Cheshire, demonstrating a talent for creating complex mysteries and believable characters. He excels at drawing readers into a world of suspense and investigation, underpinned by a deep understanding of historical context and human psychology. His narratives are known for their intellectual depth and authentic atmosphere.
Despite being retired from the Force, ex-DCI Monika Paniatowski doesn't hesitate to help when her former sergeant, Kate Meadows, gets mixed up in a crime she didn't commit. But as Monika gets deeper into the investigation, she's forced to ask herself the unthinkable: is Kate really innocent, or is she helping her old friend get away with murder?
Bristol, 1991. On his way to a meeting with several members of Conroy Enterprises, Rob Conroy - black sheep of the family - is the only one to walk away alive when the hire car crashes. As Rob struggles to make sense of it all, one thing becomes clear: the crash was not an accident, so the intended victim might not be dead ...
DCI Monika Paniatowski has never forgotten her first, difficult encounter with Whitebridge businessman Jordan Gough. Nor, she thinks, has he. So when he claims he's been receiving death threats and only she can help, she thinks he's up to something - and makes a terrible mistake .
"Superior... Refreshingly, Spencer doesn't make Redhead, who's capable of snark and petty malice, wholly likable. Readers will look forward to the further adventures of this distinctive lead" - Publishers Weekly Starred ReviewPrivate investigator Jennie Redhead is hired to investigate a murder that's left the police baffled, in this gripping historical mystery set partly in 1970's Oxford and partly in war-torn 1940's London.Oxford, 1975. Three years ago, world-renowned anthropologist Grace Stockton was slain in a brutal, unprovoked attack. Despite a large-scale police investigation, the identity of the prime suspect was never uncovered . . . and neither was the location of Grace's head. But Grace's daughter, the wealthy academic Julia Pemberton, refuses to accept that the trail has run cold. Determined to find out who killed her mother, she knows just the woman for the private investigator Jennie Redhead. Who was the woman caught on CCTV visiting Grace's isolated home on the day of the murder? And why did she cut off her victim's head? Jennie's search for answers takes her on a dark, disturbing journey into the past, from the ancient tribal customs of Papua New Guinea, to war-torn 1940's London, and to a dark tangle of secrets and scandal that someone is desperate should never be revealed . . .
The discovery of a body on a local allotment site re-opens an unresolved cold case for Monika Paniatowski and her team. He was going to have to terminate Monika, he decided. It was a pity, but there it was.The body has lain buried for years, and has no face and no fingertips. Monika Paniatowski's team have no real leads, but when they discuss the case at her hospital bedside - where she lies paralysed - Monika begins to see possible links with a case she closed four years earlier.Are the two cases connected? Did the first murder make the second almost inevitable? She doesn't know, but she does know that she is being watched by an old enemy who will kill her if he decides there is ever any chance of her sharing her thoughts and information with her team.
The investigation into the brutal murder of a Blackpool policeman in the middle of the holiday season was never going to easy, but the case itself is not Woodend's only problem. There is trouble at home: his new boss, DS Ainsworth, is just waiting for an opportunity to stick a knife in his back; his invaluable assistant, Bob Rutter, had been replaced by a new sergeant more intent on advancing her own career than helping him -- and the Blackpool police themselves seem to think it might be better if the killer were never found
The night after the mysterious appearance of the legendary Dark Lady on the road outside Westbury Park, a German efficiency expert, Gerhard Schultz, is found battered to death in the woods, and Chief Inspector Charlie Woodend is faced with his most puzzling case yet. Why did Schultz seem so frightened when one of his colleagues mentioned the legend of the Dark Lady?
After the murder of a seventeen-year-old girl, an Oxford secret society is exposed in this series first
When human bones are discovered in the cellars beneath St Luke's College ? two bodies, buried thirty years apart ? the bursar, Charlie Swift, hires Jennie Redhead to investigate. As she uncovers a series of scandals stretching back sixty years, Jennie wonders how well she really knows her old friend Charlie ?and whether she can trust him.
Chief Inspector Charlie Woodend and his loyal sergeant tackle a murder with as many suspects as there are clues in this tight puzzler. Swann's Lake, 1960. When Robbie Peterson, a criminal-turned-club-owner, is found dead in his office, a six-inch nail driven deep into his skull, Chief Inspector Woodend and Sergeant Bob Rutter are brought up from London to investigate. Why was Robbie's office broken into twice on the day of his funeral? What caused Robbie's son-in-law to attack his own brother on the night of the murder? As the case unfolds, Woodend uncovers several crimes, but it is only as it draws to a close that he realizes the murder has nothing to do with Robbie's criminal past--and everything to do with his domestic present.