M. C. Beaton
Death Of A Dustman

Fergus Macleod is Lochdubh's abusive drunk dustman, and when he is put in charge of a recycling centre and dubbed the 'environment officer', Constable Hamish Macbeth smells trouble piling up. Sure enough, Fergus becomes a bullying tyrant with his new power, issuing unwarranted fines and blackmailing residents. And when his body is found stuffed in a recycling bin, no-one's sorry - including his long-suffering family. But the lawman's inquiries hit a wall when he finds that many wronged residents are strangely reluctant to spread the dirt on the nefarious dustman.

Arthur Conan Doyle
A Study In Scarlet

Originally named A Tangled Skein by Conan Doyle, this is the first Sherlock Holmes story. The real strength and the unique quality of the novel lies in the introduction of Holmes and Watson to each other, and those dark early scenes when a corpse is discovered in a derelict house in south-east London. The ultimate crusader against crime and criminals through three novels and fifty-six short stories, Holmes' genius is revealed here for the very first time.

David Williams
Practise To Deceive

The cold-blooded murder of Kevin Rees, Auxiliary Nurse at the private Howell Clinic for stroke victims, is greeted with apparent sorrow by all who knew him. Well, nearly all. But is Dr Edwin Howell, maverick neuro-psychiatrist and co-owner of the clinic, just saving face when he anxiously divines the crime was the work of a burglar? Only when DCI Merlin Parry rejects such a facile solution and digs deeper into Rees' background do the unsavoury aspects of the young man's life emerge. But many of those who knew him seem intent on withholding information from the police.