Montague Pluke (Nicholas Rhea) Books in Order

Montague Pluke is Nicholas Rhea's most unconventional detective. A Yorkshire police officer with a serious belief in omens, folklore, lucky objects, and old customs, Pluke notices things that more conventional investigators might dismiss before they have even looked closely.

He does not see superstition as nonsense.

The books are set around Crickledale and nearby rural districts, where old villages, churchyards, country estates, moorland, local festivals, and long-held beliefs create an atmosphere of history and unease. A strange symbol, a pressed flower, a local legend, or a traditional warning may not explain a crime by itself, but it can point Pluke toward the people most affected by fear, guilt, or buried memory.

Pluke is an eccentric, but he is not a joke. His habits and beliefs give him an unusual way of reading a case, while the actual investigations still require evidence, persistence, and careful questioning. His wife, Millicent, is also important to the stories. She knows him well enough to challenge his assumptions and sometimes helps bring an overlooked human detail into focus.

The crimes can be grim. The series includes murder, suspected serial killing, old secrets, and communities unsettled by events they cannot easily explain. But the tone is not relentlessly bleak. Rhea mixes tension with dry humour and an affectionate interest in the quirks of country life. The result is a detective series that feels eerie without becoming supernatural.

Titles such as Omens of Death, Superstitious Death, A Well-Pressed Shroud, and The Curse of the Golden Trough make the pattern clear. Folklore is always close to the action, but it is the human reasons behind the crime that matter most. Pluke has to decide when an omen is meaningful, when it is a distraction, and when someone is using old beliefs to hide something modern and dangerous.

Pluke follows clues others overlook.

If you enjoy mysteries with a strong rural setting, an unusual lead character, and a hint of the uncanny around otherwise grounded investigations, this is the series to try. Start with Omens of Death to meet Pluke and his particular way of seeing the world.