Karen Charlton Books in Order

During a summer stay in the village of Ealing, Lavender is drawn into the poisoning of the vicar's wife and a vicious campaign of anonymous letters. When a second woman dies, he and Ned Woods must untangle local grudges while an unseen threat closes in on their own families.

A corpse sits up on the slab at Guy's Hospital and his missing pantaloons seem to bring misfortune wherever they go. With a new magistrate trying to split them up, Lavender and Woods juggle jewel thefts, libellous pamphlets and a string of murders that may share one bizarre thread.

As York braces for the outbreak of war in 1939, friends Jemma and Bobbie steal a quiet afternoon to dream about opening a detective agency. When a motorist insists he saw a murder staged in a shop window but no body is found, the pair tackle their first baffling case.

In 1940, with her husband missing in action, Jemma James returns to York and opens a detective agency with her bold friend Bobbie Baker. Their first cases, from blackmail to a woman intent on erasing her past, lead them to an old murder that suddenly puts Jemma under suspicion.

As news from Dunkirk darkens June 1940, Jemma and Bobbie investigate vicious crimes at York's museums, including the murder of a curator. Hired to clear a timid clerk of suspicion, they follow clues from glamorous actresses to dusty fossil rooms, where buried secrets prove deadlier than bombs.

Detective Stephen Lavender and Constable Ned Woods are summoned to a remote estate in the Ely marshes to investigate a reported murder, only to find no body and a vanished witness. As they confront a divided family from their past, secrets in the fens threaten Lavender's career and his partnership with Woods.

During the brutal winter of 1814, Lavender and Woods leave the festive chaos of the Thames Frost Fair to search for a missing man. When a corpse surfaces beneath Blackfriars Bridge, they must solve the case before the ice and the clues disappear.

A young barmaid known as Irish Nell is found murdered at the bottom of a well near Hampstead, and newly promoted Principal Officer Stephen Lavender joins Ned Woods on the case. Their hunt for her killers forces Lavender to choose between legal justice and a more troubling truth.

In Regency Mayfair, a flashy businessman is found stabbed in a locked bedroom with no weapon in sight. Lavender and Woods follow his trail from London to Essex, unpicking a nest of lies in a Park Lane lodging house before a second body falls.

London in 1812 seethes with gangs and whispers of revolt when Lavender is called to investigate a brutal highway robbery and a cold blooded murder. As Ned Woods discovers a severed foot on Greenwich Beach, their search links old plague pits, Westminster intrigue and a plot that could shake the country.

When an elderly villager is beaten and robbed in a Northamptonshire backwater, local magistrates summon Lavender and Woods to help, blaming the feared Panther Gang. Digging into the Sculthorpe family, the pair uncover festering grudges and secrets that mirror the ghosts stalking Woods himself.

After a rising actress is found dead in suspicious circumstances at the Sans Pareil Theatre, Lavender and Woods are drawn behind the scenes of Regency London's playhouses. Their murder inquiry soon collides with wartime spying and treachery, where almost everyone seems to be acting a part.

A daring pickpocket snatches a priceless watch in crowded Piccadilly and Constable Ned Woods takes the blame. With a royal scandal looming, Lavender races through London taverns and alleyways to catch the real thieves before a ruthless gang silences his friend for good.

The legendary Skelton diamonds vanish in London, and Lavender is summoned by a powerful politician he does not entirely trust. With Woods at his side, he hunts the jewels through backstreet taverns and gilded drawing rooms, unsure who is thief, victim or puppet master.

In remote Northumberland, a young heiress vanishes from her locked bedchamber in the bleak tower house of Linn Hagh. Called in from Bow Street, Lavender and Woods navigate hostile servants, suspicious gypsies and a simmering family feud to uncover what really happened to Helen Carnaby.

This non fiction companion to Catching the Eagle traces seven generations of the Charlton family, from border reivers to railwaymen and First World War soldiers. Blending memoir and genealogy, it follows the research that uncovered Jamie Charlton, the convicted thief at the heart of the novel.

Set in a Northumberland village after a harsh winter, this prequel follows impoverished labourer Jamie Charlton through one difficult day in February 1809. As he hunts for work and dodges creditors, his pride and mounting debts strain his bond with his anxious brother William.

After a huge rent robbery at Kirkley Hall in 1809, suspicion falls on hot tempered farm labourer Jamie Charlton and the estate steward. As Bow Street officer Stephen Lavender investigates, Jamie's younger brother William fights to clear him, even while wrestling with forbidden feelings for Jamie's wife.