Rampton Farm, Northumberland, has always been a gloomy, godforsaken place. Now it’s earmarked for demolition—to make way for just another tawdry amusement park. It will be progress, and nothing can stand in the way—except perhaps Arnold Landon, the Planning Officer who must glean the lie of the land.

Eric Ward thinks there is something odd about Arthur Egan’s life and death. But Ward is a former police inspector and trained to be suspicious. Egan left a large sum. But Ward makes no progress tracing the dead man’s offspring. A photograph of an unknown tombstone is his only clue. He discovers Egan served a term for manslaughter and that the evidence against him may have been planted. Why had he accepted his fate so meekly?

Former detective sergeant Norman Norman’s retirement is boring him to tears. So when he’s asked to assist an upcoming female DI and mentor a new team of misfits in a sleepy Welsh coastal town, he jumps at the opportunity. But the training has barely begun when a woman’s corpse washes up on the sand. With no reports of missing persons, DS Norman is stumped...until the post-mortem reveals a shocking hint to the culprit being local. But with a growing list of suspects who all have alibis, the experienced cop and his fledgling team’s first case could be their last.

A young woman is brutally attacked on her way home. It looks like she was the victim of a jilted—and twisted—ex-lover. But then two more women, also engaged to be married, are found dead. The press call the killer the "Surrey Stalker". And there’s a stack of similar cold case files. The pressure is on for young, ambitious DI Rob Miller. But with all the time he’s spending at the office, Rob’s also running a fine line trying to keep his fiancée, Yvette, onside as they try to plan their wedding.

Detective Chief Inspector Harry Grimm is forced to take leave from Bristol’s Major Investigations Team when his boss, tired of Harry chasing the ghost of his murderous father, sends him north on secondment. Used to city life and high stress, Harry fears his life will now be spent handing out speeding tickets, finding lost sheep, and directing tourists. But when a local teenager runs away, Harry finds himself pulled into an investigation much worse than anyone could have ever expected.