The Coffin Trail by Martin Edwards

From the Publisher

What is meant as a fresh start in the English Lakes District begins to reek of buried secrets....

Oxford historian and TV personality Daniel Kind and his new lover, Miranda, both want to escape to a new life. On impulse they buy Tarn Cottage in Brackdale, an idyllic valley in the Lake District that Daniel knew as a boy. He is still fascinated by a place so remote that the dead had to be carried out over the peaks on pack animals along the ancient Coffin Trail. But though the couple hope to live the dream of downsizing, the past has a way of catching up.

Tarn Cottage was once home to Barrie Gilpin, an autistic youth suspected of a savage murder-what looks like the ritualistic killing of a young woman visitor to the valley. She was found laid out on the Sacrifice Stone, an ancient pagan site up on the fell. Barrie fell to his death near the crime scene before he could be questioned. All these years later, Daniel retains his belief in Barrie's innocence and questions his own policeman father's handling of the case. When DCI Hannah Scarlett and her squad launch a cold case review, Brackdale's skeletons begin to rattle&. The wild geography of the Lakes District plays against local literary references, all backdrop to the lives of villagers and outsiders drawn to this beautiful spot - but for what reasons? The Coffin Trail launches a new series by a master British hand.

About the Author:
The first of Martin's eight novels, All the Lonely People, was nominated for the CWA's John Creasey Memorial Dagger and introduced lawyer Harry Devlin. Martin has also written a stand-alone, Take My Breath Away, and completed The Lazarus Widow by the late Bill Knox. His short stories are collected in Where Do You Find Your Ideas? and he has edited 14 anthologies. His ten non-fiction books include Urge to Kill, a study of homicide investigation. He has contributed many essays to reference books such as The Oxford Companion to Crime and Mystery Writing.

Publishers Weekly

In this well-crafted whodunit from veteran British crime writer Edwards (All the Lonely People), Daniel Kind, a popular historian best known for a TV series that tries to solve historical mysteries using classic Holmesian deductive methods, decides to retreat from Oxford academia with his new love, Miranda. By chance, Miranda falls for a cottage in the Lake District that had once been the home of Kind's late friend Barrie Gilpin, a young sufferer of Asperger's syndrome. Gilpin was suspected of the gory ritualistic murder of an attractive woman on the Sacrifice Stone, a local landmark, but fell to his death before the police could question him. By yet another coincidence, Kind's late father was the senior investigating officer involved. Thanks to an anonymous informant, the father's prot g , DCI Hannah Scarlett, is about to reopen the old case. The renewed inquiry stirs up a hornet's nest and foments resentment toward Kind, whose amateur sleuthing is aimed at exonerating Gilpin. Despite the implausible setup and thin characterizations, Edwards's book is an interesting fair-play puzzler that will engage fans who like their contemporary crime in an English village setting. Agent, Georges Borchardt. (Oct. 15) Forecast: Blurbs from such better known British mystery authors as Peter Robinson, Anne Perry and Reginald Hill will cue their fans. Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

Library Journal

When author/professor Daniel and journalist Miranda decide to abandon their hectic big-city lives for bucolic bliss at Tarn Cottage in England's Lakes District, they come under the spell of an old murder. Unbeknownst to Miranda, the alleged perpetrator of a bizarre, bloody killing involving the nearby Sacrifice Stone lived in said Tarn Cottage and was Daniel's friend. Soon Daniel's helping the Cold Case Squad's Hannah Scarlett, who worked with Daniel's recently deceased estranged dad on the original case. With its twisty plot, atmospheric setting, and typical English-village characters, this new series from British crime novelist Edwards (All the Lonely People) will appeal to Peter Robinson and Reginald Hill devotees. Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

What People Are Saying

Marcel Berlins
Martin Edwards writes terrific crime novels.
—The Guardian

Product Details

• Table of Contents

Table of Contents