1. A Conspiracy of Violence
When Oliver Cromwell dies and the Commonwealth collapses, former Parliamentarian intelligencer Thomas Chaloner loses the service that defined his adult life. After the monarchy is restored, the Earl of Clarendon reluctantly employs him to investigate rumours of hidden gold inside the Tower of London. The assignment…
2. Blood on the Strand
In Restoration London, merchant Matthew Webb is murdered after dining with some of the capital's most influential men. Thomas Chaloner is ordered to investigate, but the trail moves steadily towards Whitehall and people protected by proximity to the King. Assisted by his friend Aphra Behn, Chaloner…
3. The Butcher of Smithfield
London's competing newsmen are fighting to control what the public believes. Handwritten newsletters challenge official printed newsbooks, and both sides mix genuine intelligence with rumour, propaganda and deliberate falsehood. When the struggle produces murder, Thomas Chaloner investigates writers, printers and government agents who profit from privileged…
4. The Westminster Poisoner
A conscientious Treasury official is murdered in Westminster, and the Earl of Clarendon quickly identifies another clerk as the likely culprit. Thomas Chaloner distrusts the convenient solution and begins examining the office's accounts, routines and private alliances. His enquiries reveal a lucrative network of corruption protected…
5. A Murder on London Bridge
The notorious Puritan iconoclast Dick Culmer is killed on London Bridge. Thomas Chaloner's investigation connects the victim to religious radicals who believe the Restoration has betrayed England's godly cause. Inside Whitehall, Chaloner detects signs of a more ambitious conspiracy involving explosives and an attack on the…
6. The Body in the Thames
In the summer of 1664, Dutch delegates arrive in London hoping to prevent the worsening rivalry between their republic and England from becoming war. When one of the visitors is murdered and his body is recovered from the Thames, the diplomatic mission threatens to collapse. Thomas…
7. The Piccadilly Plot
Thomas Chaloner returns from an assignment in Tangier and almost immediately witnesses a murder. His pursuit of the killer draws him into a network involving stolen corpses, clandestine medical activity and planned attacks on senior officials. The conspiracy eventually points towards Queen Catherine of Braganza, whom…
8. Death in St James’s Park
A cart loaded with gunpowder explodes outside the General Letter Office, suggesting an attack on the institution responsible for carrying—and secretly intercepting—the nation's correspondence. Thomas Chaloner wants to investigate, but his employer assigns him instead to the poisoning of birds in the royal aviary. The apparently…
9. Murder on High Holborn
With England moving towards war with the Dutch, a court official is found murdered at a private establishment run by Chaloner's friend Temperance. The death appears scandalous rather than political, but connections soon emerge with the radical Fifth Monarchists. Ordered to penetrate the sect, Chaloner discovers…
10. The Cheapside Corpse
In the spring of 1665, the death of a wealthy vintner and the murder of goldsmith-banker Dick Wheler unsettle London's financial community. A banking crisis already threatens the government's ability to fund war, giving powerful men reason to conceal losses and eliminate rivals. Thomas Chaloner investigates…
11. The Chelsea Strangler
During the plague summer of 1665, the court and most wealthy Londoners flee the capital. Thomas Chaloner is sent to Chelsea to investigate thefts from a private asylum supported by the Earl of Clarendon, but a series of stranglings soon becomes the more urgent danger. The…
12. The Executioner of St Paul’s
The Great Plague has emptied much of London when Thomas Chaloner is ordered back into the city to investigate a skeleton found in a grave. The remains are decades old, but someone is prepared to kill again to prevent their identification. The case becomes entangled with…
13. Intrigue in Covent Garden
By January 1666, plague deaths are declining, but London is impoverished and bitter towards the returning court. Thomas Chaloner is asked to investigate the murder of a prominent physician, the sinking of a warship in the Thames and the disappearance of a popular courtier. He finds…
14. The Clerkenwell Affair
In the spring of 1666, a courtier dies suddenly at Whitehall. Although the royal physician declares the death natural, the victim's influential offices and the number of men eager to inherit them persuade the Earl of Clarendon that he was murdered. Thomas Chaloner's enquiries lead from…
15. The Pudding Lane Plot
London is recovering from plague in 1666, while Whitehall has returned to extravagance and the city is full of rumours about war, regicides and approaching catastrophe. Two victims at opposite ends of the capital are killed with the same unusual blade. Thomas Chaloner traces both men…