Showing results by narrator "Simon Brett" in All Categories

Meet Major Bricket, an infrequent resident of Highfield House in Stunston Peveril, Suffolk. In the past the Major's work assignments, frequently in foreign countries, have prevented him from spending much time there and as a result, there is an air of mystery around him while everyone in the village speculates on the nature of his occupation. But now the Major has retired and has come home for good in his open-topped little red sports car... and what a homecoming it is, for lying spreadeagled on his lawn in the summer sunshine is the corpse of a clown.

Carole Seddon doesn’t care for the theatre. But her neighbour Jude counts the job of actress among her many and varied past careers. So when Jude attends the closing night of a new play based on a classic TV sitcom, Carole is interested – but only because she suspects the leading man, Drake Purslow, is one of her scandalous friend’s ex-lovers. The night turns out to be more dramatic than either Carole or Jude could have ever predicted. After the performance, Jude makes her way to Drake’s dressing room, only to find him dead.

Very little disturbs the ordered calm of Fethering, a pleasingly self-contained retirement town on England's southern coast. Which is precisely why Carole Seddon, who has outlived both her husband and her career at the Home Office, has chosen to reside there. So the last thing Carole expects to encounter in Fethering is a new neighbour with but one name and an obviously colourful past.

Carole Seddon's trusty Renault is one of her most treasured possessions. So when it is vandalised, there's only one person she will entrust with its repair: Bill Shefford has been servicing the vehicles of the good citizens of Fethering for many years. But how could something like this happen in Fethering of all places? Then the note is shoved under Carole's kitchen door: Watch out. The car window was just the start. She has been deliberately targeted. But by whom and why?

When Carole goes for a trim at Connie’s Clip Joint, she doesn’t expect to find herself at the scene of a murder. But in the back room, strangled by the lead of a hairdryer, sits Connie’s young assistant Kyra. Carole and her sleuthing friend Jude are soon enjoying some tactical snooping, and it seems that Fethering’s fingers are pointing at Kyra’s boyfriend Nathan, who has disappeared. As our discreet lady detectives decide there are only so many haircuts they can have for the sake of neighbourhood crime-solving, they also realise that this is no cut-and-dried case....

Jude has never been averse to a bit of a flutter; her friend Carole, on the other hand, thinks that the local betting shop is a den of iniquity. But when Jude stumbles upon the body of a Polish immigrant, Tadeusz Jankowski, the race is on to find his killer. The odds aren’t looking good. No one seems to know anything about the mysterious Tadeusz - even his sister can’t shed any light on what he was doing in Fethering.

Having decided to redecorate Woodside Cottage, Jude has engaged the services of local man Pete, who has painted and decorated the homes of Fethering residents for many years. Pete is currently working on Footscrow House, a large Victorian building being converted into holiday flats. Whilst at 'Fiasco House', Jude and Pete make a surprising discovery behind a wall panel: a woman's handbag! The casual discovery becomes serious when the police identify the handbag's owner as Anita Garner, a young woman who vanished in suspicious circumstances 20 years earlier.

It wasn't the rain that upset Carole Seddon during her walk on the West Sussex Downs. It wasn't the dilapidated barn in which she was forced to seek shelter. No, what upset her most was the human skeleton she discovered there.... So begins the second investigation for straitlaced Carole and her more laid-back neighbour Jude. This time their enquiries take them away from Fethering to the small download hamlet of Weldsham, where gossips quickly identify the corpse as Tamsin Lutteridge, a young woman who had disappeared from the village months before....

The Hopwicke Country House Hotel, owned by Jude's glamorous friend Suzy Longthorne, is to host an event for the all-male society the Pillars of Sussex. On the night, Jude helps Suzy serve dinner, and in the early hours of the morning they watch with relief as the guests drag themselves to their beds. The next morning, one young solicitor does not come down for breakfast. Jude heads for Nigel Ackford's room, presuming he is feeling the effects of the night before. It soon becomes apparent, however, that Nigel has been spared his hangover....

Charles Paris is in clover. He has been contracted for three whole months to play brainless bobby Sergeant Clump, foil to the charismatic amateur sleuth, Stanislas Braid, in a TV series of that name. Recourse to the whiskey bottle is still needed, however, to get him through a day’s filming - one made all the more arduous by the pompous posturings of the show’s star, and the constant outraged interruptions of the ancient author whose detective novels are being adapted. Indeed, there is plenty of friction about.

When the owner of Polly's Cake Shop announces her retirement, the Fethering residents start to worry about the loss of this popular amenity. Alarmed by rumours that the café might become a Starbucks, a group clubs together to form an action committee. The plan is that Polly's should become a community venture managed and run by volunteers from the village. Roped in to help, Jude finds the committee meetings fraught with petty power struggles, clashing personalities and monstrous egos.

Amateur sleuths Jude and Carole take on their third case when a terrible discovery is made in the cellar of a grand old house. Grant and Kim Roxby had hoped that their first dinner party at Pelling House would make an impression with their new neighbours. And the next day it's certainly the talk of the town. For their guests - including the couple's old friend Jude - had been enjoying a pleasant meal before they were rudely interrupted by a gruesome discovery. A human torso hidden in the cellar.

Fethering residents Jude and Carole get more than they bargained for when a meal in their local pub leaves everyone with food poisoning. When a series of disasters start to befall the business it looks like it could be the end of the road for the Crown and Anchor. The two amateur detectives wonder if it might just be more than a run of bad luck. When a young man is found in the kitchen with a knife through his heart, Carole and Jude swing into action. There's a killer on the loose, and our lady sleuths need to uncover who it is before it's last orders for the pub - and themselves.

When Alexandra Richards approaches professional declutterer Ellen Curtis to ask her to help sort out her mother's chaotic flat, Ellen gets the impression Alexandra doesn't like her mother very much. But when Ingrid Richards' body is discovered in her burned-out home, Alexandra's exasperated words don't seem such a joke. Due to the hazardous state of the victim's over-cluttered residence, the police are inclined to dismiss her death as an unfortunate accident. Ellen's not so sure.

Chaired by Simon Brett (author of the hugely popular Charles Paris series), this intriguing, interactive panel show challenges professional crime novelists to put their experience and expertise to the test as they try to unravel various mind-bending mysteries. Each episode features a death and a denouement - with various red herrings and misdirections along the way. As the murder scenario is described and the clues laid out, our writer-detectives take turns cross-examining the suspects.

Carole Seddon's son is soon to be married to Gaby. But Marie and Harold Martin seem desperate to keep plans for their daughter's big day as low-key as possible. After a quiet engagement party, Harold disappears...only to be found dead the next day in a burnt out car in Epping Forest. Carole discovers that the Martins are hiding secrets that can be traced back 30 years, to the murder of Marie's best friend. Now the girl's killer has been released from prison and is back in his old stomping ground.

Although she hadn't known Leonard Mallett well, Carole Seddon feels duty bound to attend her fellow committee member's funeral. As she suspected, the sermon is very predictable - not unlike Leonard himself. What she couldn't have predicted was that the deceased's daughter would use the occasion to publicly accuse her stepmother of murder. Did Heather Mallett really kill her husband? Deciding to get to the heart of the matter, Carole's neighbour Jude joins the new community choir - and discovers that amidst the clashing egos and petty resentments lurk some decidedly false notes.

The Elizabethan house of Bracketts is about to be turned into a museum. It had once been the home of the celebrated poet Esmund Chadleigh and is to become a shrine to his life and poetry - but the transition is far from smooth. Carole Seddon had been reluctant to join the Bracketts Board, and now she realises that she should have listened to her instinct. The simmering tension between the board members is about to boil over. A human skeleton is discovered in the kitchen garden, and before too long there is a second body, not yet cold.

Invited to a Private View of the work of controversial artist Denzil Willoughby, the good citizens of Fethering are not quite sure what to expect. And it certainly turns out to be a lively affair, culminating in a confrontation between Willoughby and his ex-lover, followed by a heated argument with the gallery owner and a rival artist. But what no one could have anticipated was that the evening would end in sudden, violent death.

When Jude agrees to lend her vintage chaise longue for the local Amateur Dramatic Society’s production of George Bernard Shaw’s The Devil’s Disciple, little does she realise she’ll end up in a starring role. It’s an ambitious play, culminating in a dramatic execution scene: a scene that’s played for real when one of the leading actors is found hanging from the specially constructed stage gallows during rehearsals. A tragic accident - or something more sinister?