It was the dog who first knew something was wrong. When the alarm clock clicked on at 6.55 he opened one brown eye and waited. But nothing happened. The time on the clock radio added another minute and the wet tongue ran twice over the cold face before Ben realized this morning was different.

His mistress would not wake. By eleven o'clock Evelyn Shiers had finished at the market. Strange, she thought as she caught sight of the red car still standing in her neighbour's drive. Was she on holiday? Why was the dog whining? And at the doctor's surgery the two receptionists were in a quandary, too. Where was Sister Marilyn Smith?

Later that afternoon Detective Inspector Joanna Piercy and Detective Sergeant Mike Korpanski break into Marilyn Smith's house. It is in the third bedroom that they find the missing nurse, lying spread-eagled across the bed. She is provocatively dressed and  elaborately made up. She is also quite dead.

Despite a lack of evidence at post mortem, Detective Inspector Piercy remains convinced that Marilyn was murdered. A newcomer in an isolated Moorlands town, Joanna Piercy must battle against the prejudice of colleagues and the closed ranks of a small community in her determination to find a killer. Or is she wrong? Perhaps her colleagues are right and her recent promotion has made her over-zealous. Is it possible that Marilyn Smith's death was not murder after all?

N.B. The first edition of Winding Up The Serpent is now a collector's item, fetching up over $900 a copy. Luckily, Allison and Busby have released the paperback edition.