Tom Gabriel has now got his PI's licence and has been asked to find a woman's missing husband, but nothing is what it seems. The more he finds, the less he understands.Rae has been promoted to Investigative Journalist, and with Tom's help is trying to identify a John Doe found on Porpoise Point, but she's in terrible danger because there are powerful people who don't want her to find out.There are still seventeen missing children from Tom and Rae's last case. Little Sally Stackhouse helps him by giving him a name that's connected to the missing children, but he must go away to discover that the danger is much closer to home.

PC Lola Laveque in Missing Persons identifies a pattern. Murders are thin on the ground, so Parish and Richards decide to investigate. Their investigations lead them all over Essex, and eventually to Maldon where they discover one man's obsession for his family. Also, Sergeant Ed Gorman has a different problem with his family. After the death of an investigative journalist, Parish decides to stop looking for his parents.

Detective Inspector Quigg and Sergeant Lulu Begone (on an exchange programme from the South African Police Service) must hunt down a festive serial killer who is selecting his victims to match the Christmas carol - The Twelve Days of Christmas. Each day, victims are found stabbed with their clothes removed and their faces ripped off. A verse from the carol is daubed on the wall in blood. Will Quigg find the killer before he is forced to resign? Also, Quigg must choose between two women, or must he? And can he persuade the Chief to let Sergeant Begone be his partner on a permanent basis?

Tom Gabriel retired, or at least he thought he had. All he wants to do is join his dead wife Carrie, but life and death are never that simple. Gretchen Hebb asks him to find her daughter – Mercy – who works as an investigative journalist for the St. Augustine Record. She was investigating missing children, but has now disappeared herself. Tom begins asking questions, but is forced to take cub reporter – Butterfly Raeburn 'Rae' with him. Soon, both are drawn into a dangerous investigation, which will change their lives forever. Little Sally Stackhouse has escaped, and is being chased by Henry Appling – Henry has a hunting rifle.

Richards is seconded to the Serious Crime Analysis Section (SCAS) at Bramshill in Hampshire, but sometimes evil sneaks in before the door is bolted . . .When Epping detectives put Carrie's murder on the pending pile, Parish knows that he must find her killer . . .Jerry goes back to work, and decides to take things easy by going to see Mrs Birmingham about a request to write her Last Will & Testament - what could possibly go wrong?A man comes into the station and confesses to murdering a woman four months previously. Stick and Xena must find out whether he's telling the truth, and where her head is . . .Also, Zara Roche - Israel Voss' apprentice - is in Italy when she receives a sealed letter from his solicitors that changes everything . . .

Novella (24,000-words): With a new partner he doesn't want, a journalist who defies the laws of physics and an unknown man letting himself into his house, Detective Inspector Josiah Dark of the Serious Crimes Division must find out why Santa has been busy leaving gory Christmas presents around Greater Manchester.

A grave containing the skeleton of ten year-old Amy Linton – missing for eight years – is found in Galleyhill Wood in Essex, and then Head of Forensics, Paul Toadstone, finds more skeletons in the same grave, and more graves in the woods. A reporter, who might have known something about the dead children, is gruesomely murdered, and the newspaper where he worked is destroyed by fire. Parish and Richards slowly begin to collect the evidence and put the pieces of the puzzle together, but there are other players in this game. John Linton wants revenge on the person who killed his daughter and destroyed his life; Alex Knight wants to escape from an unwanted life with MI6, but to do that she must kill Parish; and a shadowy organisation will do anything to remain a secret. As the body count rises, the Chief brings in two additional detectives to help them; Richards' love life goes from bad to worse; Parish begins the search for his parents; and the detectives must mourn...