Exham on Sea Mysteries Books in Order

The Exham on Sea Mysteries are cosy crime stories set in a fictional Somerset seaside town that feels like a blend of beach resort, fishing village and tight-knit parish. There are dog walkers on the sand, gossip in the bakery queue and an eye-catching Victorian lighthouse watching over everything.

Into this community comes Libby Forest, a middle-aged widow determined to remake her life after years in an unhappy marriage. She moves into a small cottage, takes a job baking at the local bakery and dreams of building a cake and chocolate business of her own. Her plans are derailed, and then reshaped, when she and a neighbour's springer spaniel, Shipley, stumble over a body beneath the lighthouse in Murder at the Lighthouse.

Libby ends up working alongside Max Ramshore, an enigmatic local with a shadowy professional background, and Bear, his huge Carpathian sheepdog. Together they make an unlikely sleuthing team. In Murder on the Levels a group of cyclists is poisoned after eating at the bakery, threatening Libby's livelihood. Murder on the Tor sends her into the mists around Glastonbury Tor, where an old necklace, a silent child and a fresh corpse tangle today's crime with ancient legends and the secrets of her late husband's past.

As the series continues, the investigations pull Libby further beyond Exham's sea front. A body in Wells Cathedral Library in Murder at the Cathedral puts her best friend in the frame. A summer wedding on Exmoor goes fatally wrong in Murder at the Bridge, followed by a suspicious death among volunteers at Dunster Castle in Murder at the Castle. Later, anonymous nursery rhyme emails and a killing at nearby Cheddar Gorge threaten both the town and Libby's relationship with Max in Murder at the Gorge.

Murder at the Abbey links a modern attack on a friend with human bones found near Cleeve Abbey and the long-ago murder of a monk. Throughout these books, local history is never just colour in the background. Old scandals, half-remembered tragedies and the traces of earlier lives all feed into the puzzles Libby has to solve.

Part of the appeal of the Exham on Sea stories lies in the recurring cast. There is Mandy, the teenage Goth who works in the bakery, her boyfriend Steve, frank-talking baker Frank Wolf, police detective Joe Ramshore and Libby's aloof marmalade cat, Fuzzy. The town's History Society, the Knitters' Guild and various village committees provide both comic moments and very real motives for mischief.

The tone stays on the cosy side of crime, with very little gore and a lot of emphasis on friendship, food and community ties. At the same time, Libby's investigations force her to confront domestic abuse in her past, the murkier side of small-town respectability and the risk of trusting someone new. Readers can dip in almost anywhere, but following the books in order lets you watch Libby grow from nervous newcomer to confident private investigator while Exham on Sea gradually reveals its darker corners.