1. The Railway Detective
London, 1851. The London to Birmingham mail train is robbed and derailed, injuring the driver and others aboard. With the opening of the Great Exhibition at hand, interest is mounting in the engineering triumphs of the railways, but not everyone feels like celebrating. Planned with military…
2. The Excursion Train
London, 1852. On the shocking discovery of a passenger's body on the Great Western Railway excursion train, Detective Inspector Robert Colbeck and his assistant, Sergeant Victor Leeming, are dispatched to the scene. Faced with what initially appears to be a motiveless murder, Colbeck is intrigued by…
3. The Railway Viaduct
As a train speeds over the Sankey Viaduct, the dead body of a man is hurled into the canal below. Inspector Robert Colbeck and Sergeant Victor Leeming take charge of their most complex and difficult case yet. Hampered by the fact that the corpse has nothing…
4. The Iron Horse
'A small crowd of passengers stood beside the piles of luggage and a collective gasp of horror went up. As the lid of the hatbox flipped open, its contents were tipped roughly out. Reginald Hibbert could not believe his eyes. Rolling around below him on the…
5. Murder on the Brighton Express
October 1854. As an autumnal evening draws to a close, crowds of passengers rush onto the soon to depart London to Brighton Express. A man watches from shadows nearby, grimly satisfied when the train pulls out of the station... Chaos, fatalities and unbelievable destruction are the…
6. The Silver Locomotive Mystery
In 1854, young silversmith Hugh Kellow leaves Paddington for Cardiff carrying a valuable silver coffee pot modelled as a locomotive. He talks too freely about the object to two interested passengers, and his journey ends with his body discovered at the Cardiff Railway Hotel beside an…
7. Railway to the Grave
Now here's a murd'rous tale of woe, See a hero misbehave. For it shows a valiant soldier go By railway to the grave. Yorkshire 1855. Colonel Aubrey Tarleton is a man respected by his neighbours in the small Yorkshire village of South Otterington - as much…
8. Blood on the Line
The year is 1855, and on the LNWR train to London, a criminal is being escorted to his appointment with the hangman. But the wily Jeremy Oxley, con-man, thief and murderer, has one last ace up his sleeve: a beautiful and ruthless accomplice willing to do…
9. The Stationmaster’s Farewell
Exeter, 1857. During the Guy Fawkes celebrations, respected stationmaster Joel Heygate fails to appear. When the bonfire has burned down, his charred remains are found among the ashes, turning a public festival into a murder scene for the South Devon Railway. Colbeck and Leeming discover that…
10. Peril on the Royal Train
Spring, 1858. The route of the Caledonian Railway through the southern uplands of the Scottish countryside is disrupted by a fatal crash. Inspector Robert Colbeck and Sergeant Victor Leeming are called from the crime of London to investigate, and must contend with old enemy Superintendent Rory…
11. A Ticket to Oblivion
Young Imogen Burnhope and her maid Rhoda board a non-stop train to Oxford to visit her Aunt Cassandra, who waits on the platform at Oxford station where the train terminates, to greet them. Only they never arrive. The train is searched and the coachman swears he…
12. Timetable of Death
In 1859, a child playing hide-and-seek in Spondon churchyard discovers the body of Cedric Norton, a senior director of the Midland Railway, concealed in a freshly dug grave. Inspector Robert Colbeck and Sergeant Victor Leeming travel to Derbyshire to determine why an influential railway man was…
13. Signal for Vengeance
Wimborne, Dorset, 1860. Rebecca Tullidge is trapped in an unhappy marriage and has begun an affair with a railway officer. When she discovers her lover dead on the tracks, local ambitions and private scandal immediately complicate the investigation. Inspector Robert Colbeck and Sergeant Victor Leeming are…
14. The Circus Train Conspiracy
Following a string of successful performances, the Moscardi Circus is travelling by train to Newcastle for their next show. Yet a collision on the track with a couple of sleepers causes pandemonium: passengers are thrown about, animals escape into the night and the future of the…
15. A Christmas Railway Mystery
December 1860. Headed for the morning shift at the Swindon Locomotive works is an army of men pouring out of terraced houses built by the GWR, a miniature town and planned community that aims to provide for its employees from cradle to grave. Unfortunately, boiler smith…
16. Points of Danger
1861, East Anglia. Alone in a first-class carriage, the Swarbricks are robbed at gunpoint, but when the universally-admired Swarbrick fights back, the train robber takes more than money and jewellery, killing the man working to unify East Anglia's tangle of railway networks. Inspector Colbeck is brought…
17. Fear on the Phantom Special
Halloween, 1861. A special train with two carriages steams across the Lake District at night on its way to a place notorious for its record of supernatural incidents. Most of those on board have been fortified by alcohol so the mood is boisterous. Without warning the…
18. Slaughter in the Sapperton Tunnel
A goods train speeds through the Sapperton Tunnel, but disaster strikes before it can reach the other end as it collides with an unusual blockage on the line: seven sheep penned onto the tracks. Specially requested to investigate the carnage in Gloucestershire, Inspector Colbeck and Sergeant…
19. Tragedy on the Branch Line
When Bernard Pomeroy finds a letter slipped under his door in the early hours, he flies into a panic. After dashing off a short note to a friend, he hands it to the porter at Corpus Christi College before hastening on to the railway station and…
20. The Railway Detective’s Christmas Case
December 1864. As a cold winter wind scours the Worcestershire countryside, an excursion train comes through a tunnel in the Malvern Hills to be confronted by a blockage on the line ahead. The driver manages to slow the train down so that the impact is minimised,…
21. Death at the Terminus
York, 1865. An explosion tears through the brake van of a passenger train waiting to depart, and guard Jack Follis emerges fatally burned. The North Eastern Railway summons Colbeck and Leeming to determine whether the blast was an accident, vandalism or a carefully targeted killing. The…
22. Murder in Transit
In 1866, Giles Blanchard shares a Portsmouth-bound railway compartment with an elegant woman who steals papers suitable for blackmail. She leaves the train safely; Blanchard never reaches his home on the Isle of Wight and is found to have been murdered during the journey. Colbeck and…
23. Mystery at the Station Hotel
Shrewsbury, 1866. Hotel staff find railway executive Julian Lockyer dead in his room with a knife in his hand, but the apparent suicide immediately troubles Inspector Colbeck. Lockyer was close to becoming chairman of the Great Western Railway and had concealed the purpose of his journey…
24. Murder on the Great Northern Railway
April 1867. A first-class compartment on the train from King’s Cross to Lincoln contains a man dressed as a senior churchman and a powerful attendant guarding a leather bag. By evening, Scotland Yard has received news of a shooting and the theft of a valuable silver…