BOOK 1: FACE VALUE A man is missing, his burned-out car is found on the moors. A convicted rapist is freed from prison, whereabouts unknown. When a mutilated corpse is found in an abandoned building, the victim’s identity seems clear. Days from retirement, can Detective Inspector Patton tease out the truth?
BOOK 2: STILL LIFE WITH PISTOL Talented art forger Bruno Fillingley runs a painting school from his crumbling manor house. One of his aspiring students is found dead, seated in front of his canvas. Local detectives are convinced Bruno had a hand in it, but Patton ferrets out the facts to prove the killer has been hiding in plain sight.
BOOK 3: AN ALIBI TOO SOON Patton’s old friend and colleague is murdered in a house fire. He’d discovered something dodgy in an old case. As Patton reopens the inquiry, buried grievances are disturbed. Two men stand in his way — a convicted murderer and a disdainful officer — and they’ll stop at nothing to halt his investigations.
BOOK 4: AN OPEN WINDOW Patton’s wife Amelia is hospitalised when a caravan explodes, killing the owner. As she recovers, Amelia learns of an unexpected inheritance from her Uncle Walter. Patton is skeptical that Walter’s death really is suicide. He is sure that Amelia was the intended victim of the caravan blast. Can he crack the case before the murderer gets their way?
BOOK 5: GUILT ON THE LILY A woman from Patton’s old patch writes to him asking for help. Then she’s brutally murdered. His former colleagues warn him off investigating. As Patton pursues the murderer he inadvertently puts his wife Amelia in danger. With one chance to save his wife and solve the case, Patton must untangle the web of deceit fast.
BOOK 6: DEATH OF AN INNOCENT Patton agrees to investigate a burglary for Amelia’s friend. He finds links to a young woman’s drowning. A family feud is uncovered, but does it prove murder? Then another person dies, their death made to look like suicide. Patton’s loyalty is tested as he rushes to identify the killer.
Roger Ormerod was born in Wolverhampton, Staffordshire. He worked as a county court officer, an executive officer in the Department of Social Security, a postman, and a shop loader in an engineering factory.
The author has good and interesting plots. He has good character development. The descriptions are vivid. My only question is that in his earlier books he brings the reader to a scene where his protagonist makes a conclusion that I cannot perceive how he got there. It seems as though there is a page of connections missing...or alternatively, the author has more social intelligence than I have. This phenomenon was repeated in several books, leaving me questioning whether I wanted to continue reading the series. In the author's later books, I did not encounter the "missing connections" so either the author or the reader adjusted to the needs of the other. I am glad to have read absorbing stories.
Have reviewed each book in this series independently. Found it an interesting series but with the number of suspects in each case, it became hard work to keep up. Another point is that at times the logic from Richard was becoming flawed and it showed. Maybe retirement does this. An okay series at the end of the day.