Fast Fashion and Flaneurs

Bill Wonder, the tyrannical billionaire fashion tycoon is found splattered on the pavement outside his fashion school in the West End of London.

Was he pushed from the balcony, did he jump, or it could have happened because of his high heel shoes?

The mystery of his death is stitched together by Sadie Silver, a hapless fashion history teacher, who needs to understand the incident to uncover her family’s sartorial secrets.

But wait, could she have killed Bill? 

After all, she was the last person to see Bill alive, and he really seemed to hate her new look.

Jayne’s Secret Temptation

We all have a “moral compass”, learned either from parents, religious leaders, school teachers or peers. It is basically a set of rules we live our life by. Some of us are unwavering in our direction, others are more liberal in the interpretation of their core values.

This book attempts to explore what happens when these core values are challenged. It begs the question: “What would you do when confronted with huge risk or reward?” No matter what you say, it’s what you do that counts.

Jayne’s Secret Temptation introduces you to colourful characters with a novel and new approach with a degree of humour and realism.

It comes with a guaranteed surprise but is nonetheless a believable tale. You never know, it could actually happen!

Lasseter's Legendary Lost Reef

Headlines are made when a gold discovery that is claimed to be Lasseter’s legendary lost reef is made by the international company Krennerite Gold Corp. This is the most fabled lost gold reef in Australia’s long mining and exploration history, purported to have been discovered more than a century before. James Buchanan, a world-famous exploration geologist is intrigued because the region of the rediscovery is not known as a gold-bearing district but is frustrated in his efforts to access the discovery site to test his scepticism. Unexpectedly, James is approached by the Chinese chairman of the board of Krennerite, who is concerned about the veracity of the discovery and the damage to his reputation if any fraud is uncovered. He and James devise a plan which involves James and the chairman’s daughter Pearl posing as tourists in the Central Australian region near Alice Springs and Ayers Rock to remotely investigate the discovery site using a drone. How will they handle their contrasting western and Chinese cultures in the wild and dangerous Australian outback? Will conflict or romance evolve from their interaction? Will the reported discovery really represent Lasseter’s long-lost gold reef or are there more sinister motives and activities at play? Will rapidly evolving and challenging events played out in the Australian outback, in Western Australia, and China make positive or negative changes to the lives of those involved? Only time will tell!

Lights Out for Granddad

Stephanie Golding takes licentious advantage of men. Or so it seems. Is that why she is brutally murdered at the crest of a quiet ravine, and with a weapon suggesting more torture than passionate death? Her fiancé vehemently denies involvement, so does everyone else.

The murderer in this apparently vengeful killing is investigated relentlessly by Detective Chief Inspector Charles Merstowe and his team of police and medical experts. Voyeurs, opportunists, friends of the victim, a mysterious white-haired man, shadows: all are suspect. Secrets must be uncovered, foibles exposed and explanations ruthlessly delved. Merstowe knows this, but the case fast becomes a losing challenge. Not much adds up. And what about upsetting machinations and revelations closer to home? There are unwelcome surprises there too. Even the police are disturbed.

An eventual ownership of the crime raises more fog than it diffuses. Perhaps only another death will clear the air completely of jealousy, hatred, blame, retribution and revenge. In the meantime, the veteran Merstowe is forced to question his own skills as a detective. His protégé questions his morals as well. His own doubts cast shadows over himself. Is he remotely on the right track? Was the victim in fact an angel? Or was she instead a cunning devil, too clever by half? Who were really her friends, and who her enemies? Most importantly, what’s wrong with the evidence? Stephanie Golding suffered in death. But why? It needs to be sorted out.

Love Ever After

Everyone in town knows the Miller house and its occupant: old lady Miller. Local kids call it haunted while the adults just shake their head sadly thinking about poor Mrs Miller living all alone. Beyond that, no one gives it much thought, until the night Jason, his girlfriend, Erica, and a handful of friends venture off into the dark to check out the lake that borders her house. The lake is rumoured to hold the remnants of an earlier town lost to a flood. While checking out the forgotten town hidden in the murky water, the house seems to come to life.

With a dangerous storm coming, murderers on the loose and the mystery of the house looming over them, their small, sleepy town comes to life with imminent threats. Jason wants nothing more than to protect the love of his life, but with the group’s curiosity and a mystery to the Miller house that they just can’t let go, they are pulled into a tangled hunt that changes their lives forever.

Mary Copeland: Victorian detective

Mary Copeland: Victorian detective examines the life of this young woman who is raised by her uncle and aunt in London in the late nineteenth century and who develops into a detective of stature who works on request for Scotland Yard. As a woman, however, it is almost impossible to fulfil a social function and so she has to do her job anonymously. She is assisted in this by employees of Scotland Yard, with whom she forms a secret unit over time.

The stories, which take place from 1888, include many painters from the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. The titles of the four stories are taken from paintings from that time. Swiers impressively manages to portray the London of those days, just after The Ripper Murders and before The London Dock Strike.

In the Netherlands, the first four books on Mary Copeland were published between 2019 and 2022 and subsequent volumes are in preparation.

Melancholy of the Heart - Echoes on the Wind

From an early age Ruth had always struggled to fit in. Her only solace was provided by the abundance of nature she enjoyed living by the beautiful North Cornwall coast. She took pleasure in seeing the resilience of sea pinks, small pink flowers clinging to the cliffs and the warm coconut aroma of vivid orange gorse. As an only child she felt lost and isolated until her gift made itself known to her. This gift gave her a reason to live in a world she barely understood. She was not prepared however for the toll on her emotional and physical self her gift would exact from her, never knowing when she would be called upon to help those no longer of this time find forgiveness.

Mirror of hope

Marcos was an accomplished painter who had given up on love and had decided that he was going to grow old and maybe wise but being wise was not guaranteed after what he had just experienced.

His parents were his bench mark for love and marriage he held his life up to, his mum was always trying to find him the “one”, his dad knew his wife meant well but couldn’t stop herself.

He knew he loved painting and could often dream in colour, he dreamt about fairies, sandy beaches, the circus and other wonderful things but one constant in his dreams was something he would never be able to tell anyone about, or they would definitely have the men in white coats with strait jackets come and bundle him in the back of an ambulance or ensure he had no sharp knives around to do a Van Gogh.

Was he going mad or does love make you crazy? Queen said it right in “Crazy little thing called love”.

Come and see what or who Marcos was going crazy for.

Would you hold out for the love of your life, do you even believe there is only one person for you?

Moorland Forensics - Conspiracy of Souls

In 1986 young investigative reporter for the Newton Abbot Star and daughter of wealthy philanthropist Lord Ilbert-Tavistock tragically disappears under mysterious circumstances, never to be seen again.

Over 30 years later the fresh graves of two teenage girls are uncovered on the desolate wastes of Dartmoor, followed by the sadistic murder of a City art expert, sending shockwaves through the South West.

Contracted to assist the police task force; siblings James, Fiona and Katie Sinclair at Moorland Forensic Consultants uncover links to the murders with the medieval Benedictine Priory of St Oswald’s and tumultuous events from the battlefields of WW2.

With the police close to admitting defeat and pressure mounting from an outraged media, in a last-ditch effort the team travels to Southern Germany to obtain vital evidence.

Moorland Forensics race against the clock to prevent more deaths, whilst James is battling his own demons, taking things one step too far.

Murder Never Sleeps

Victor Madison was a man who never took "no" for an answer and Private Investigator Paul West immediately sensed that he could be trouble the moment he walked through his office door. He didn't ask, he demanded that West find his only daughter, Cindy, who had been missing for over two years. Money was no object. Police Inspector Charlie King, West's former partner, was the lead investigator into Cindy's missing case which was a cold one but was once again active when he was given permission to work on it with West. Their investigation took them to Alabama where they became involved with a collection of fascinating and questionable characters, including a local sheriff who made them his deputies; a bank manager with self-serving interests; a charismatic pastor and cult leader who knew a dark secret; and a besotted enabler who would go to any devious means to protect him… and she did. Madison's daughter was found, but not in the manner the reader could ever guess, or imagine. The suspense, in this page-turning mystery, never wanes right up to the last page and the chilling climax.

Murder on the Angkor Express

The Kingdom of Cambodia is struggling into the twenty-first century, following the Pol Pot “killing fields” which erased a third of the population in the late 1970s. The encroaching dragons of mighty China and vibrant Vietnam vie with the tiger of Thailand to squeeze the precious life from the Mekong River Basin.

Politics is still dominated by the enduring shadow of the Khmer Rouge whose tentacles pervade a corrupt oligarchy, which is fighting to keep out the popular opposition leader, Sam Rainsy.

With a backdrop of potential civil war, our hero Chief Inspector Suon has to solve the case of Leap Son. A body found at the end of the murderous six-hour bus journey from Battambang to Siem Reap. With a coachload of tourists, all with a tale to tell or a secret to keep. Will Chief Inspector Suon be able to solve a crime committed in full view of all yet seen by no-one? More importantly, will he be allowed to?

Murder Unchained

When Private Investigator Paul West took on his next case, it seemed easy and one that would pay handsomely. All West had to do was compile a profile of Jason Knox for his only son, Matthew, who had no memory of him. His father had walked away from Matthew’s mother when he was an infant and left him the sole beneficiary of his multi-million-dollar estate.

It didn’t take long before he was thrust into one of the most complex cases in a long and illustrious career. It took him to Ebony River, a small town, on Vancouver Island’s east coast that seldom gave a wink or nod to the outside world.

What he found was the two-year-old unsolved murder of Jason Knox and his wife that was still baffling RCMP Sergeant Andy Holt. When West told him why he had come to Ebony River, Holt asked him if he would go undercover and help him solve the case.

West’s investigation concentrated on an eclectic range of residents including: bikers with an agenda, a former member of the town council with a grudge to settle, a small church time had left behind, a farmer’s Sunday dinner that revealed hidden secrets and a mayor desperately trying to get re-elected.

Murder Unchained is a page-turner. It will keep the reader guessing up to the last page.