Kirjahaku

John Smith is what is known as a 'placeholder name', like the American term John Doe. It is the name bestowed on unidentified corpses, amnesiacs and hospital patients - which is why the odd young man staked out to die in the remains of a 4,000-year-old Neolithic Circle on the edge of the Lancashire Fells ends up with it. However his violent allergic reaction to iron and steel causes problems for his rescuers and when he refuses to co-operate with the police, Detective Chief Inspector Stone washes his hands of him. So 'John Smith' simply disappears - literally. And that's when strange things start to happen around the city of Preston.

The murder of Jennifer Southern in her cottage on the outskirts of a Lancashire village re-ignites a legacy of witchcraft that was thought to have ended four hundred years ago when the Pendle Witches were hanged at Lancaster Castle in 1612. But their descendants have lived on, following the old ways and keeping themselves to themselves until now it seems someone is determined to wipe them out. As the death toll rises, events finally force the police to work with the modern-day witches in a bid to hunt down the killer.

On the edge of a playing field in the Lancashire town of Longridge is an abandoned railway tunnel that is reputedly haunted. It used to serve an old stone quarry that has now been given a new lease of life as a holiday park. Six eighteen-year-old friends are staying in a static caravan at the park when one night a violent storm forces them to stay indoors. One of the girls downloads a talking Ouija Board app to her laptop for 'a bit of fun', but the following morning the three boys in the group have gone missing. Detective Sergeant Pauline Pilkington is handed the job of finding out what has happened to them but has little luck until DCI Stone calls in the Unusual Investigations team of former Detective Constable Jerry Ratcliffe and his partner, the corporeal spirit of murdered witch Kat Hewitt. Their enquires lead them to an encounter with a boggart known as The Headless Woman of Longridge. Then Sergeant Pilkington disappears as well.

How come my new computer panics when I type the word 'poltergeist'? What would happen if the spiral of history brought two famous star-crossed lovers back together again in the 21st century? How would you deal with a toddler who started to show magical powers at pre-school? What if your daughter's imaginary friend suddenly started to become all too real? What is the secret of the isolated Inn discovered by a group of hikers on the Lancashire Moors? And how has Private Investigator Kat Hewitt's dead granddad ended up in the local police station on Christmas Day? Six strange stories of magic and the paranormal from the author of the Detective Inspector Stone Supernatural Crime novels.

In 2014 I self-published 'Fell Creatures', my third supernatural crime novel. It concerned a group of travelers led by a werewolf witch from a run down village in Transylvania. She had promised them a better life in the UK and planned to settle on Wolf Fell in the hills above a small village called Chipping in Lancashire. But she met stiff opposition and only one werewolf survived - a very young and very scared female - who decided she wanted no part in the carnage and ran away. Luckily she was accepted by a pack of spectral wolves, led by the ancient Viking alpha male Hrolfr, who utilize the fairy portals in the region to live in the old forests and escape the modern world. However, after seven years she has reached maturity and her presence is having an effect on the young male wolves in the pack. Hrolfr therefore decides it is time she finds a mate among her own kind. But things have changed and the world is now ravaged by a pandemic. How can she find a mate now? This then, is what happened to Rosie, The Last Werewolf...

A chance encounter with a charismatic fortune teller called Marcus at a psychic fair in Manchester leads Emma Craine into a situation that imperils her soul. For he has a familiar - an incubus which is the reincarnation of Sinistrari, the infamous 17th century Vicar General of Avignon. To maintain his youth, and power over women, Marcus has struck a deal with Sinistrari: every seven years he must mark someone out for him - to do with as he will - and Emma is his latest victim. But in attempting to open Emma's psychic senses he inadvertently awakens her to the power of the Earth Mother. She also finds allies in her sister and her husband and they desperately fight back when the incubus tries to collect on the pledge. Subtle help is also supplied by the enigmatic witches of Pendle who recognise Emma as one of their own, but will it be enough to save her when the demon comes to call for the final time?

In a tarn in a country park in the heart of the Lancashire countryside lies the body of a young man. His death causes all sorts of problems for Detective Chief Inspector Alf Stone and his team because, according to the police pathologist, this his not the first time he has appeared on the autopsy slab. The investigation brings to light the ancient 'were' tradition of the county where witches became hares to escape the attention of the law. Now Mary Conway has chosen to learn the art of becoming a were herself for the sole purpose of halting the resurgence of the illegal so called 'sport' of hare coursing. But her intervention uncovers a far more sinister threat: camped not far from the country park are a group of renegade Romani, led by the wolf-witch Daciana Lupescu, who have fled the Carpathian Mountains of Transylvania and plan to set up a colony on Wolf Fell not far from the country park.

Someone has been hanging coloured bags of dog pooh on bushes! Figaro the Cat Detective and his partner Harrison the toad set out to discover the culprit and, with the help of his two best human friends in all the world, stop it happening again.

The pumpkins are all ready for the Hallowe'en Jack-o'-Lantern competition in Grandad Gordon's allotment when someone creeps in at the dead of night and smashes them all to bits Figaro the Cat Detective, and his trusty sidekick Harrison the toad, have just twenty-four hours to solve the mystery and help save the day.

Father Christmas has a problem. One of his reindeer is injured and he has to make a forced landing on the village green. Can Figaro the Cat Detective, with the help of the village children, come up with a solution to the crisis and save Christmas?

A succubus is stalking the streets of Preston. But she's not just giving certain young men erotic dreams: she's leeching the life out of them. With Detective Chief Inspector Alf Stone still on paternity leave after the birth of his son, it's down to DI Alexandra Johnson to investigate. But why are all the victims called Ryan? And how on earth do you bring an entity to justice? With the help of young witch Mary Conway, the newly formed 'Unusual Investigations' team of Ratcliffe and Kat, her new sergeant and a computer whizz of a PCSO, Johnson begins to unravel a web of intrigue that goes back fifteen years. Then Stone returns and starts digging into a cold case...

In a children's playground in a Lancashire village a baby girl is stolen from her pram by an elf who had a brief liaison with her mother. Not understanding that human children grow up very differently to elves, Pinkie Dianthus takes little Tiffany to Fairyland to look after him in his old age. But he soon realises his mistake when she won't stop crying because she wants a feed and her nappy needs changing He hurriedly returns her to her mother only to be collared by trainee werewolf Thomas Chester and his girlfriend Rosie. They hand him over to the police and a powerful young witch, Mary Conway, who makes him vow to leave Tiffany and her mother alone. But he soon breaks his promise and kidnaps his daughter twice more. She escapes but, because time runs strangely in Fairyland, each time she returns to the human realm she is older than when she left. When Tiffany is taken for a third time, just after the Beltane celebrations at her new home, Mary decides the time has come to sort things out with the elves once and for all.