Murder at Deviation Junction

Jim Stringer always wanted to be an engine driver but a series of unfortunate events (described in the previous books in the series) robs him of this ambition and ruins his chances of working as an engine driver.

However, he is spotted as a good man with a keen eye and a sharp mind so he becomes a railway policeman, a detective in the force.

It is December in the year of 1909. There is heavy snow in Yorkshire that winter, so it is of no surprise when a train runs smack into a snowdrift and becomes stuck.

What does cause a surprise is when the gang of railworkers who are given the task of clearing the line of snow discover a body hidden at the side of the track.

It should be a simple case, but it all goes terribly, horribly wrong. And Jim's life is put in grave peril.

Why does the case involve a giant steel works?

Who is the murdered man? What connection is there to an exclusive railway dining club that mysteriously and abruptly ceased operating sometime prior to the discovery of the body?

Why does the case interest a reporter from a railway magazine, who seems to know more about the case than he should? And what, exactly, is the reporter so anxious to find?

The novel takes Jim Stringer away from his warm home and his loving wife and child and the familiar surroundings of of the police office at York station to an appointment with a grim and grizzly fate on the be-snowed Scottish Highlands.

But who can Jim Trust? The strange Scottish giant called Small David? The reporter, Bowman?

The novel sets a cracking pace and Andrew Martin paints excellent word pictures to set the scenes of story. So well that you'll swear you can smell the smoke and steam and feel the chill that gnaws at the bones.

The list price is £10.99, but I paid considerably less with Amazon.
ISBN 978-0-571-22965-9

The Blackpool High Flyer

Driving or firing the Blackpool High Flyer was a plum job. The train went cross country from Yorkshire right through Lancashire to the North West coast of England, and the town of Blackpool.

But this was to be no ordinary journey. Jim Stringer, the steam detective, had thought that with his return from London, all the dangers and problems of being a railway detective were long gone and all in the past. But fate had different ideas!

It is only the quick reactions of Clive, the driver, that stopped a terrible catastrophe. Someone had left a millstone on the railway line. And one of the 512 passengers on the Whit Sunday Excursion Train to Blackpool dies as a result of the crash. Or did she die as a result of the crash? How, exactly, did she die? And who would have had a motive to kill her?

Was there a connection with the works outing that was taking place on the train? And if there was, what was the connection?

Jim Stringer thought that it was too much of a coincidence for the millstone to be placed on the track and for just one passenger out of 512 people on board to have died.

But how can Jim Stringer, now a former railway policeman, back in his more normal role of being an engine fireman, find out what had actually transpired?

If the same person had caused the death of the woman, how could they also have been responsible for the placing of the millstone on the railway line? And for what reason would they have wanted the woman passenger dead and what possible motive could they have had for placing the millstone on the railway line?

And who is it that means to see that this will be the last case that Jim Stringer, steam detective, will ever investigate? Are they linked to the mysterious person who left the millstone on the railway line? Or the person who had murdered the woman, if they were not the same person? Or is there another reason that Jim Stringer's life is in danger?

This is a very satisfying mystery novel as it does contain several concurrent mysteries. And all is certainly not what it seems!

It is written by Andrew Martin and published by Faber and Faber, the paperback version costs £7.99.