Skeletons have a habit of revealing themselves eventually . . . When a human skeleton is discovered on the boundary of a 20-year-old property development, it seems there are a large number of people who may know the identity of the corpse and how it got there. But twenty years is a long time and those individuals were very different people back then. Skeletons are being revealed in all senses and there are many prominent local figures who are beginning to feel uncomfortable and afraid. It's up to Detective Chief Superintendent Lambert and Detective Sergeant Hook to dig around in the past and unearth the truth of how and why the body ended up buried in the ground all those years ago.

A shocking murder in a garden paradise marks the start of a difficult new case for Lambert and Hook. - Dennis Cooper is one of the few full-time resident National Trust curators in England and lives with his wife in the grounds of the spectacular Westbourne Gardens, which receives thousands of visitors each year. On the face of things, Dennis lives a perfect life and has a dream job, but this idyllic setting is riven with dark secrets, and it isn’t long before foul play draws Lambert and Hook into this troubled Eden.From BooklistThe venerable Lambert and Hook series, now celebrating more than 20 years of dependable service, keeps rollin’ on. Lambert and Hook, the Gloucestershire cops (they’re a chief superintendent and detective sergeant, respectively), investigate the murder of a National Trust curator—in terms familiar to North American readers, he’s basically the curator of a national historical site—who, by all accounts, seems to have led a pleasant enough life. Although, as Lambert and Hook discover as they dig beneath the surface, and as they have often discovered over these many years, the most peaceful of lives can conceal unexpected dark corners. As usual, the characters are solidly constructed (and not just the two familiar series leads but the supporting players as well), the setting is well imagined, and the story offers readers enough surprises and misdirection to keep them on their toes. Although it might exist under the radars of many readers, this series is well worth a look. --David Pitt About the AuthorGregson is a Lancastrian by birth, and taught for 27 years in schools, colleges and universities.

The new DCI Peach mystery . . .Alfred Norbury is a learned man. He is never afraid to display his erudition, but he is generous in his encouragement of younger people. The people who assemble around him to form a reading club are also learned. Some of them are simply well-read, whilst others have formal qualifications which rival those of Norbury.But learning is no protection against violence. Murder arrives suddenly, brutally and unexpectedly. The investigation led by Detective Chief Inspector Percy Peach and Detective Sergeant Northcott reveals several people with good reason to hate the victim. They range from the young man who was his latest protégé to the two women forty years older whose lives were radically damaged by him a decade earlier. Peach tackles the case, and the people involved in it, with his normal ebullience. The solution when he arrives at it is both unexpected and moving.

Head teacher Peter Logan is a strange case of Jekyll and Hyde. He's effected impressive improvements at his Cheltenham school, but his private life is in no way exemplary. So when he's shot in the head one September evening, does he die a martyr or is this his just comeuppance? It’s up to Lambert and Hook to find out the truth.From BooklistPeter Logan is headmaster of Greenwood Comprehensive, one of Cheltenham's top schools, and by all accounts, he does an outstanding job. The parents, staff, and pupils admire him, and Greenwood has won kudos for its forward-looking methods and philosophy. But Logan is not quite the gifted headmaster his public image portrays. When he's found stabbed to death in a local park, it soon becomes clear that he had some dark secrets. Chief Superintendent John Lambert and his trusty sidekick, Detective Sergeant Hook, are assigned to the case, which Lambert is determined to solve quickly, because he is due to retire in a few months. But a tangle of suspects and motives complicate matters, with drugs, sex, blackmail, potential pedophilia, and vengeful ex-lovers all figuring into the case. Recommend this solid entry in an entertaining series to fans of such A-list British procedural authors as Peter Robinson and Reginald Hill. Emily MeltonCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reservedAbout the AuthorGregson is a Lancastrian by birth, and taught for 27 years in schools, colleges and universities.

A Lambert and Hook mystery When small-time drug dealer Darren Chivers narrowly escapes a police arrest, he begins to develop a different sort of criminal activity. Blackmail proves lucrative, but ultimately lethal. As Chief Superintendent Lambert and DS Hook interview the dead man’s contacts, secrets tumble out as the investigation progresses and the solution to the puzzle is as startling as it is shocking . . .

Foul play’s afoot at Bruton Rovers Football Club. - Bruton Rovers FC has been promoted to the Premiership, but Jim Capstick’s days as Chairman have made him some enemies in the Lancashire mill town. With the team fighting relegation, the debts are piling high. But when the club is rocked by a murder after Jim makes a surprise announcement, the question’s not who had the motive, but who had the balls to actually do it. ‘Percy’ Peach and DS Lucy Blake have their work cut out for them . . .From BooklistThe irreverent, irrepressible DCI Percy Peach returns to do battle not only with the criminals of Brunton, Lancashire, but also with his pompous boss, Chief Superintendent Thomas Bulstrode Tucker, whose balloon of pretentiousness Peach just loves to burst. Peach’s latest case concerns the murder of Jim Capstick, owner of the Brunton Rovers soccer team. Capstick is found strangled shortly after making the shocking announcement that he’s selling the team. As Peach sees it, nearly everyone in the room at the time of the announcement had a motive for killing Capstick, from his much-younger wife, whose love affair was about to be exposed, to the team coach, who could lose his job under new ownership, to the club secretary, whose secret vice would gain him no favor with the sheik rumored to be buying the team. While Peach is the consummate cop, he has trouble focusing on the case at hand, since he’s due in a few short weeks to tie the knot with his longtime lover, DS Lucy Blake. Another engaging, cleverly plotted, darkly witty British police procedural from a well-liked and always entertaining author. --Emily Melton ReviewThe irreverent, irrepressible DCI Percy Peach returns to do battle not only with the criminals of Brunton, Lancashire, but also with his pompous boss, Chief Superintendent Thomas Bulstrode Tucker, whose balloon of pretentiousness Peach just loves to burst. Peach's latest case concerns the murder of Jim Capstick, owner of the Brunton Rovers soccer team. Capstick is found strangled shortly after making the shock announcement that he's selling the team. As Peach sees it, nearly everyone in the room at the time of the announcement had a motive for killing Capstick, from his much younger wife, whose love affair was about to be exposed, to the team coach, who could lose his job under new ownership, to the club secretary, whose secret vice would gain him no favor with the sheik rumoured to be buying the team. While Peach is the consummate cop, he has trouble focusing on the case at hand, since he's due in a few short weeks to tie the knot with his longtime lover, DS Lucy Blake. Another engaging, cleverly plotted, darkly witty British police procedural from a well-liked and always entertaining author. --Booklist, 15th February 2010

Police sergeant Jack Clark is existing in a world a million miles from his normal life, working undercover with some of the most dangerous villains and pushers in the area and living in a derelict squat. At the end of each day he feels lucky just to be alive. Now his case is nearly over; a police raid is planned to wreck the drug barons' plans. The raid at the large countryside manor is successful, but several hours after numerous arrests are made, the fire brigade are called to attend a fire at the same house. A body is found and all the signs indicate it will be simple case. Then Chief Inspector Percy Peach, Detective Sergeant Lucy Blake and their team are called in to investigate; and an unusual, and unexpected, case of murder unfolds...

A shooting on an estate puts DCI Percy Peach on the trail of a brutal ganglord...When a young man is found with gunshot wounds outside the Thorley Grange estate, DCI Percy Peach is immediately on the case. The estate has recently been taken over by Oliver Ketley, a generous local benefactor leading a double life as a ruthless ganglord. Peach quickly sets out to find the connection between him and the injured man, but Ketley faces much bigger problems: a man in his position has many enemies, and it will only take one of them to end his life...

When Tamsin Hayes decides to kill her husband, she sets in train a series of events she could never have predicted: for there is a seedy side to Tim Hayes, which the police are already investigating when he is violently murdered. Was he dispatched by his wife? Or by one of the other suspects who emerge once DCI ‘Percy’ Peach and DS Lucy Blake begin their investigation?