England, 1685. Decades after the end of the civil war, the country is once again divided when Charles II's illegitimate son, the Protestant Duke of Monmouth, arrives in Dorset to incite rebellion against his Catholic uncle.

Armed only with pitchforks, Monmouth's army is quickly defeated by King James II's superior forces and charged with high treason. Those found guilty will be hanged, drawn and quartered.

As Dorset braces for carnage, the redoubtable Lady Jayne Harrier and her enigmatic son, assisted by the reclusive daughter of a local magistrate, contrive ways to save men from the gallows.

Compelling and powerful, The Players is a story of guile, deceit and compassion during the dark days of The Bloody Assizes. Secrets are kept and surprising friendships formed in a dangerous gamble to thwart a brutal king's thirst for vengeance...

In prison, they call her the Sculptress for the strange figurines she carves - symbols of the day she hacked her mother and sister to pieces and reassembled them in a blood-drenched jigsaw. Sullen, menacing, grotesquely fat, Olive Martin is burned-out journalist Rosalind Leigh's only hope of getting a new book published.But as she interviews Olive in her cell, Roz finds flaws in the Sculptress's confession. Is she really guilty as she insists? Drawn into Olive's world of obsessive lies and love, nothing can stop Roz's pursuit of the chilling, convoluted truth. Not the tidy suburbanites who would rather forget the murders, not an attack on her life - not even the thought of what might happen if the Sculptress went free...

It seems Mathilda's favorite heirloom was also an instrument of torture from the Middle Ages, an iron cage used to gag yapping women. Among the Dorset villagers, only Sarah Blakeney, Mathilda's doctor for her final year, seems even mildly disturbed that the miserable nag has been muzzled forever.

OR TRAGIC VICTIM?But suicide starts to look like homicide, and Sarah's sorrow seems a bit contrived when the bombshell drops that Mathilda has disinherited her daughter and granddaughter, leaving her entire fortune to Sarah. Now the object of vicious gossip and the police's prime suspect in a brutal murder, Sarah must prove her innocence by delving into Mathilda's past to unmask the real killer. What she finds beneath the sleepy village facade is a grisly potpourri of blackmail, butchery, and perversion.

When Lieutenant Charles Acland is flown home from Iraq with serious head injuries, he faces not only permanent disfigurement but also an apparent change to his previously outgoing personality. Crippled by migraines, and suspicious of his psychiatrist, he begins to display sporadic bouts of aggression, particularly against women, especially his ex-fiancee who seems unable to accept that the relationship is over. After his injuries prevent his return to the army, he cuts all ties with his former life and moves to London. Alone and unmonitored, he sinks into a private world of guilt and paranoid distrust ...until a customer annoys him in a Bermondsey pub and he attracts the attention of local police investigating three murders which appear to have been motivated by extreme rage ...Under suspicion, Acland is forced to confront the real issues behind his isolation. How much control does he have over the dark side of his personality? Do his migraines contribute to his rages? Has he always been the duplicitous chameleon that his ex-fiancee claims? And why if he hates women does he look to a woman for help?

When a rotting, unidentified corpse is discovered it marks the beginning of a nightmare murder investigation for the three women living there. But is it the beginning? Or does the body lying in the ice-house mean that the police can close an old file?

Buried secrets and gritty bravery, The Devil's Feather is the psychological thriller from crime queen Minette Walters. Have you ever wanted to bury a secret so deeply that no one will find out about it? With private security firms supplying bodyguards in every theatre of war, who will notice the emergence of a sexual psychopath from the ranks of the mercenaries? Reuters correspondent Connie Burns is no stranger to the world's troublespots, including the vicious civil unrest in Sierra Leone and the war in Iraq. But as she begins to suspect that a foreigner is using the chaos of war to act out sadistic fantasies against women, her efforts to bring him to justice leave her devastated. Degraded and terrified, she goes into hiding in England and strikes up a friendship with Jess Derbyshire, a loner whose reclusive nature may well be masking secrets of her own. Connie draws from the other woman's strength and makes the hazardous decision to attempt a third unmasking of a serial killer . . . Knowing he will come looking for her . . .

A thirty year old murder case and a possible wrongful conviction, Disordered Minds is the mystery thriller from crime queen Minette Walters. In 1970, Harold Stamp, a retarded twenty-year-old was convicted on disputed evidence and a retracted confession of brutally murdering his grandmother - the one person who understood and protected him. Less than three years later he is dead, driven to suicide by isolation and despair. A fate befitting a murderer, perhaps, but what if he were innocent? Thirty years on, Jonathan Hughes, an anthropologist specializing in social stereotyping, comes across the case by accident. He finds alarming disparities in the evidence and has little doubt that Stamp's conviction was a terrible miscarriage of justice. But how far is Hughes prepared to go in the search for justice? Is the forgotten story of one friendless young man compelling enough to make him leave his books and face his own demons? And with what result? If Stamp didn't murder Grace Jeffries then somebody else did . . . and sleeping dogs are best left alone . . .

Winner of the Crime Writers' Association John Creasey Award for best first novel, The Ice House is the mystery thriller from crime queen Minette Walters. It was evident, if there were no other entrance to the ice house, that the body had at some point traversed this thorny barrier . . . The big question was, how long ago? How long had that nightmare been there? The people of Streech village had never trusted the three women living up at the Grange - not since Phoebe Maybury's husband suddenly, inexplicably, vanished. Ten years later a corpse is discovered in the grounds and Phoebe's nightmare begins. For once they have identified the body the police are determined to charge her with murder . . .

The definitive edition of Minette Walters' thrilling tale of courage and defiance during the time of the Black Death, featuring The Last Hours and The Turn of Midnight. England, 1348: A deadly plague is spreading across the land, and people are dying by the thousands. In Dorset, young Lady Anne takes control of her lands with her trusted steward, Thaddeus Thurkell, at her side. Compassionate and resourceful, she decides to quarantine the estate, bringing some two hundred serfs inside the moated walls. But in such a confined space, conflicts soon arise... As time passes, the people of Develish have no way of knowing who, if anyone, has survived. And with dwindling stores, they soon have no choice but to leave their relative safety. But what awaits Lady Anne and her people in the desolate wasteland beyond the walls? 'Wonderful and sweeping' Kate Mosse 'Enthralling' Julian Fellowes 'Vividly wrought and powerful' Elizabeth Fremantle

'Historical fiction at its finest' - Belfast Telegraph Dorset, 1642. When bloody civil war breaks out between the King and Parliament, families and communities across England are riven by different allegiances. A rare few choose neutrality. One such is Jayne Swift, a Dorset physician from a Royalist family, who offers her services to both sides in the conflict. Through her dedication to treating the sick and wounded, regardless of belief, Jayne becomes a witness to the brutality of war and the devastation it wreaks. Yet her recurring companion at every event is a man she should despise because he embraces civil war as the means to an end. She knows him as William Harrier, but is ignorant about every other aspect of his life. His past is a mystery and his future uncertain. The Swift and the Harrier is a sweeping tale of adventure and loss, sacrifice and love, with a unique and unforgettable heroine at its heart.

Winner of the CWA Gold Dagger Award for Best Crime Novel of the Year, The Scold's Bridle is the mystery thriller from crime queen Minette Walters. I wonder if I should keep these diaries under lock and key. Jenny Spede has disturbed them again . . . What does she make, I wonder, of an old woman, deformed by arthritis, stripping naked for a young man? The pills worry me more. Ten is such a round number to be missing . . . Mathilda Gillespie's body was found nearly two days after she had taken an overdose and slashed her wrists with a Stanley knife. But what shocked Dr Sarah Blakeney the most was the scold's bridle obscuring the dead woman's face, a metal contraption grotesquely adorned with a garland of nettles and Michaelmas daisies. What happened at Cedar House in the tortured hours before Mathilda's death? The police assume that the coroner will return a verdict of suicide. Only Dr Blakeney, it seems, doubts the verdict. Until it is discovered that Mathilda's diaries have disappeared . . .

Chickenfeed As part of World Book Day 2006, Minette Walters took part in the Quick Reads initiative, designed to encourage developing readers and adult learners as they explore the exciting world of books. Chickenfeed, Walter's contribution, is a crackling tale based on the true story of the 'chicken farm murder' that took place in Blackness Road, Crowborough, East Sussex in December, 1924. Although Norman Thorne never confessed to killing his girlfriend Elsie, he was tried and hanged for the crime. Minette's fictionalised account of their relationship is told from the points of view of both Elsie and Norman, from the time of their first meeting at chapel when Norman is 18 and Elsie is 22, until the eve of Norman's trial for her murder just over four years later. In the real-life case, an exchange of letters between the lovers, in which Elsie told Norman that she was pregnant, formed part of the evidence that suggested Norman's motive for murder. When the lovers grow apart, Elsie creates a fantasy to replace the reality of their fractured relationship. Meanwhile Norman has fallen for another woman yet cannot bring himself to tell Elsie that he no longer wants to marry her. Burrowing deep into an English legend, Walters creates a suspenseful tale of fiction based in fact, leaving it to the reader decide whether Norman was guilty of the heinous crime. The Tinder Box In the small village of Sowerbridge, Patrick O'Riordan has been arrested for the brutal murder of elderly Lavinia Fanshaw and her live-in nurse, Dorothy Jenkins. As shock turns to fury, the village residents form a united front against the O'Riordan family, while friend and neighbour Siobhan Lavenham remains convinced that Patrick has fallen victim to a prejudiced investigation. Jeopardizing her own position within the bigoted community, Siobhan stands firmly by his family in defense of the O'Riordan name. Yet when terrible secrets about the O'Riordans' past are revealed, Siobhan is forced to question her loyalties. Could Patrick be capable of murder after all? Could his family's tales of attacks be devious fabrications? And if so, what other lies lurk beneath the surface of their world? As the truth unravels, it becomes clear that beneath a cunning facade, someone's chilling ambition is about to ignite. Praise for Innocent Victims: Fans of Edgar-winner Walter will welcome this collection... the poignant Chickenfeed, based on an infamous 1924 murder case in East Sussex. [And] The Tinder Box, a compelling tale of prejudice and gossip [where] everything falls into place to produce a shockingly different picture than expected.-Publishers Weekly Walters is a Gold Dagger and Edgar award winner (among other honors), these two works were both No. 1 best sellers in the UK, and you were wondering whether to purchase? -Library Journal The Tinderbox question of whether the execution of a man was justified is never answered in the novella Chickenfeed, and since this is based on a real criminal case, it makes it all the more fascinating.-Washington Times

Exposing the horrifying consequences when communities ignore the people who need them the most, The Shape of Snakes is the psychological mystery from crime queen Minette Walters. November 1978. Britain is on strike. The dead lie unburied, rubbish piles in the streets - and somewhere in West London a black woman dies in a rain-soaked gutter. Her passing would have gone unmourned but for the young woman who finds her and who believes - apparently against reason - that Annie was murdered. But whatever the truth about Annie - whether she was as mad as her neighbours claimed, whether she lived in squalor as the police said - something passed between her and Mrs Ranelagh in the moment of death which binds this one woman to her cause for the next twenty years. But why is Mrs Ranelagh so convinced it was murder when by her own account Annie died without speaking? And why would any woman spend twenty painstaking years uncovering the truth - unless her reasons are personal . . . ?

Set in the bleak environments of London's homeless community, The Echo is the mystery thriller from crime queen Minette Walters. It was the smell that Mrs Powell noticed first. Slightly sweet. Slightly unpleasant . . . It shocked her badly to find a dead man in the corner, his head slumped on his knees. Who was Billy Blake, other than a homeless alcoholic who wandered the streets? Why was he found dead from starvation in one of the richest areas of one of the richest capitals in the world? And why did he die alone in the garage of wealthy architect Amanda Powell - a woman whose wealth can only be explained if her husband is dead . . .?

Acid Row. The name the beleaguered inhabitants give to their 'sink' estate. A no-man's land of single mothers and fatherless children - where angry, alienated youth controls the streets. Into this battleground comes Sophie Morrison, a young doctor visiting a patient in Acid Row. Little does she know that she is entering the home of a known paedophile . . . and with reports circulating that a tormented child called Amy has disappeared, the vigilantes are out in force. Soon Sophie is trapped at the centre of a terrifying siege, with a man she has come to despise. Whipped to a frenzy by unsubstantiated rumour, the mob unleashes its hatred. Against authority . . . the law . . . and the 'pervert'. 'Protecting Amy' becomes the catch-all defence for the terrible events that follow. And if murder is part of it, then so be it. But is Amy really missing? Filled with suspense and shattering revelations, Acid Row is a taut psychological thriller from crime queen Minette Walters.

Mary Farren went into the gun room one morning about half-past eleven, took her husband's revolver and loaded it, then shot herself. The butler heard the sound of the gun from the pantry...The fourteen haunting stories in this collection span the whole of Daphne du Maurier's writing career and explore every human emotion: an apparently happily married woman commits suicide; a steamer in wartime is rescued by a mysterious sailing-ship; a dull husband breaks loose in a surprising fashion; a con woman plays her game once too often; and a famous novelist looks for romance, only to meet with bitter disappointent. Each meticulously observed tale shows du Maurier's mastery of the genre.

Winner of the CWA Gold Dagger Award for Fiction, Fox Evil is the bestselling thriller from crime queen Minette Walters. When elderly Ailsa Lockyer-Fox is found dead in her garden, dressed only in night clothes and with blood stains on the ground near her body, the finger of suspicion points at her wealthy, landowning husband, Colonel James Lockyer-Fox. A coroner's inquest gives a verdict of 'natural causes' but the gossip surrounding him refuses to go away. Why? Because he's guilty? Or because resentful women in the isolated Dorset village where he lives rule the roost? Shenstead is a place of too few people and too many secrets. Why have James and Ailsa cut their children out of their wills? What happened in the past to create such animosity within the family? And why is James so desperate to find his illegitimate grandchild? Friendless and alone, his reclusive behaviour begins to alarm his London-based solicitor, Mark Ankerton, whose concern deepens when he discovers that James has become the victim of a relentless campaign which accuses him of far worse than the death of his wife. Allegations which he refuses to challenge . . . Why? Because they're a motive for murder? . . .

A deadly plague is spreading across the land... June, 1348: the Black Death enters England through the port of Melcombe in the county of Dorsetshire. Unprepared for the virulence of the disease, and the speed with which it spreads, the people of the county start to die in their thousands. In the estate of Develish, Lady Anne takes control of her people's future - including the lives of two hundred bonded serfs. Strong, compassionate and resourceful, Lady Anne chooses a bastard slave, Thaddeus Thurkell, to act as her steward. Together, they decide to quarantine Develish by bringing the serfs inside the walls. With this sudden overturning of the accepted social order, where serfs exist only to serve their lords, conflicts soon arise. Ignorant of what is happening in the world outside, they wrestle with themselves, with God and with the terrible uncertainty of their futures. Lady Anne's people fear starvation but they fear the pestilence more. Who amongst them has the courage to leave the security of the walls? And how safe is anyone in Develish when a dreadful event threatens the uneasy status quo..?

'Historical fiction at its finest' - Belfast Telegraph Dorset, 1642. When bloody civil war breaks out between the King and Parliament, families and communities across England are riven by different allegiances. A rare few choose neutrality. One such is Jayne Swift, a Dorset physician from a Royalist family, who offers her services to both sides in the conflict. Through her dedication to treating the sick and wounded, regardless of belief, Jayne becomes a witness to the brutality of war and the devastation it wreaks. Yet her recurring companion at every event is a man she should despise because he embraces civil war as the means to an end. She knows him as William Harrier, but is ignorant about every other aspect of his life. His past is a mystery and his future uncertain. The Swift and the Harrier is a sweeping tale of adventure and loss, sacrifice and love, with a unique and unforgettable heroine at its heart.

The terrifying Hammer novella by Minette Walters, bestselling author of The Sculptress and The Scold's Bridle Muna's bedroom is a dark windowless cellar and her activities are confined to cooking and cleaning. She's grown used to being maltreated by the Songoli family; to being a slave. She's never been outside, doesn't know how to read or write, and cannot speak English. At least that's what the Songolis believe. But Muna is far cleverer - and her plans more terrifying - than the Songolis, or anyone else, can ever imagine ...

A deadly plague is spreading across the land... England, 1348: as the Black Death spreads through the country, people start to die by the thousands. In Dorset, young Lady Anne takes control of her lands, with her trusted steward, Thaddeus, at her side. Compassionate and resourceful, she decides to quarantine the estate against the terrifying pestilence, bringing some two hundred serfs inside the moated walls. But in such a confined space, conflicts soon arise. Ignorant of the world outside, Lady Anne's people wrestle with the terrible uncertainty of their futures. Fearing starvation but fearing the disease even more, who amongst them has the courage to leave the security of the walls? And how safe is anyone when a dreadful event threatens the uneasy status quo...?

A blistering new thriller about the horrors of war and the struggle to survive in the face of pure evil.
Foreign correspondent Connie Burns is hunting a British mercenary that she believes is responsible for the rape and murder of five women in Sierra Leone in 2002. Two years later she finds him training Iraqi police in Baghdad. Connie is determined to expose his crimes, but then she is kidnapped and released after three days of unspeakable torture. Silently, she returns to England and attempts to isolate herself, but it soon becomes apparent that the horrors of the world and her own nightmarish past aren't so easy to escape from.

A deadly plague is spreading across the land... __________________ As the year 1349 approaches, the Black Death continues its devastating course across England. In Dorseteshire, the quarantined people of Develish question whether they are the only survivors. Guided by their beloved young mistress, Lady Anne, they wait, knowing that when their dwindling stores are finally gone they will have no choice but to leave. But where will they find safety in the desolate wasteland outside? One man has the courage to find out. Thaddeus Thurkell, a free-thinking, educated serf, strikes out in search of supplies and news. A compelling leader, he and his companions quickly throw off the shackles of serfdom and set their minds to ensuring Develish's future - and freedom for its people. But what use is freedom that cannot be gained lawfully? When Lady Anne and Thaddeus conceive an audacious plan to secure her people's independence, neither foresees the life-threatening struggle over power, money and religion that follows... 'Wonderful and sweeping, with a fabulous sense of place and history.' Kate Mosse on The Last Hours

In this acclaimed psychological mystery, Jinx Kingsley, a prominent photographer and millionaire's daughter, wakes up in an exclusive hospital suffering from amnesia. Not only can she not remember the car accident that caused her memory loss, but she doesn't remember that her impending wedding has been called off or that her former fiance and his girlfriend have been brutally murdered in the same way her first husband had been ten years before. Now she must try to piece together her memories in order to determine her innocence. With deft psychological explorations and shocking twists, Walters brings the story to an awe-inspiring conclusion.