The Last Train to Scarborough

'A thoroughly engaging and entertaining read. All aboard.'

Sunday Express 'Terrific.'

Daily Telegraph

It's March 1914, and Jim Stringer is uneasy about his next assignment.

It's not so much the prospect of a Scarborough lodging house in the gloomy off-season that bothers him, or even the fact that the last railwayman to stay in the house has disappeared without trace. It's more that his governor, Chief Inspector Saul Weatherhill, seems to be deliberately holding back details of the case – and that he's been sent to Scarborough with a trigger-happy assistant.

The lodging house is called Paradise, but, as Jim discovers, it's hardly that in reality. It is, however, home to the seductive and beautiful Amanda Rickerby, a woman evidently capable of derailing Jim's marriage – and a good deal more besides.

As a storm brews in Scarborough, it becomes increasingly unlikely that Jim will ever ride the train back to York. 'Like all the Jim Stringer adventures, The Last Train to Scarborough bewitches with its detail, dry humour and laid-back ruminations, but the strangeness of the plot and the originality of the murder method puts this latest book into a weird class of its own.'

Observer Praise for the Jim Stringer series:

'Breathe in the heady mixture of smoke, oil and steam – and the odd spot of real ale – and feel the crunch of cinders beneath your feet… you're in historic railway territory again.'

Manchester Evening News

'Finely honed crime novels with plotting as precise as a Swiss watch.'

Daily Express

'This series is, er, really building up a head of steam.'

Observer Readers love Jim Stringer, railway detective:

'It's hard to envisage anyone not warming to Jim Stringer.'

Independent

'An unlikely sleuth – ingenuous, naive and a little anxious – but an endearing narrator, a solid bloke who'd be good company over a pint of stout down the pub.'

Telegraph

'The best sleuth that 200 years of the railways have ever produced.'

Independent on Sunday