Songbird

Detective Sergeant Chris Waters got the call at 05.29 that July morning. This is it, said DCI Reeve, you'll be first there, it's all yours, you're the crime scene manager. Suddenly, after months of waiting and wondering, Waters finds himself in at the deep end, and alone at the scene of a puzzling murder. As the investigation proceeds, the detectives at Kings Lake Central find themselves visiting familiar places and talking to some familiar faces, while old enemies reappear in the incident room. Before this is over, Chris Waters will need to make a career-changing decision, and another member of the CID team will find herself facing an unexpected challenge. And DC Smith? Gone, but not forgotten? Surely, he would say, you cannot write me off with a worn-out cliché like that . . .  Peter Grainger is a former sixth-form English teacher and the author of 23 novels. He lives with his wife, sometimes a grandson, and a dog in a cottage in the Cambridgeshire fens. He travels as often as possible to the Norfolk coast he once called home.