Dead Reckoning

In the spring of 1646 after four years of fierce conflict, the English Civil War draws to a close. Captain Matthew Fletcher, invalided out of the war two years before has gained a well earned reputation as a successful investigator of mysterious happenings and crimes. He has come to Nottinghamshire, a county riven apart by the competing forces of King and Parliament in search of a lost love, but on arrival he is asked to examine the unexplained death of a local landowner. The enquiry quickly develops into a major investigation and Matthew is aided by old comrades from the army and a travelling fortune telling healer. With another murder and the disappearance of key witnesses they are caught up in the maelstrom of family and political feuds, the murky underworld of the city and the tensions of an occupying army. A people hardened and wearied by the privations of the national struggle are too ready to explain away mysterious events by malign powers beyond their understanding. The investigators themselves come under suspicion and are forced into hiding in the doubtful refuge along the river. Spoils of War is a tense story of detection, intrigue and mystery set in the atmospheric Trent valley in the final throes of the Civil War.