A Casterbridge Tale
An Inspector Hawkins Mystery
'A gripping race against time!’
'A huge achievement'
'A great read, in the best traditions of Victorian Crime novels’
'The plotting is excellent, and the attention to detail impressive''
'Yet again, Mike Langridge is channelling Thomas Hardy, whilst allowing his own honesty and love for all that is Hardy shine through.'
'I am already a Hardy fan but I think that this book will be a door through which those yet to be converted can step through with confidence and trust. Fantastic, Mr Langridge, thank you!'
In his second novel, Mike Langridge continues his association with Thomas Hardy’s Wessex and renews his links to the Durbeyfield family established in ‘The Second Mrs Clare’. Following a thwarted assassination attempt on Her Majesty Queen Victoria, Detective Inspector Hawkins of Casterbridge Police comes up against a ruthless republican faction bent on carrying out vicious threats against the Home Secretary and his family if the assassin is not released from prison. Faced with an impossible dilemma, Hawkins must negotiate his way between his duty and his conscience, jeopardising his career and his life as he tracks down the instigators of a brutal and outrageous crime. Hawkins and his newly appointed assistant, Detective Constable Tom Piddington, race against time as they desperately try to decipher the evidence that will reveal the whereabouts of the perpetrators and their victim.‘