Ann Granger

Page Updated: 28/01/2004

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Ann Granger - Page 2

Paperback - Headline (1999)

First British Edition Headline (1999)

Beneath the Stones
Life has not been easy on twelve-year-old Tammy Franklin. In the past two years she's learnt too much about death, too quickly. Twenty months ago she lost her mother to a long, lingering illness and now the body of the woman her father married in a misguided attempt to replace his wife has been found in a railway embankment adjacent to the Franklin farm. And this time the death is murder - Sonia Franklin has been stabbed.
As Superintendent Markby, one of the first on the scene, knows only too well, Tammy also stands to have her father taken from her. For Hugh Franklin, whose second marriage was clearly not happy and who, strangely, had failed to notify the police of his wife's disappearance, is suspect number one in the mind of Inspector Pearce, to whom Markby is determined to delegate the case. But as the investigation continues it becomes apparent that Markby cannot distance himself from it as much as he would like, not least because his girlfriend Meredith happens to know Tammy Franklin's teacher, Jane, who is vehemently convinced of Hugh's innocence. And because for reasons of their own some key witnesses are not revealing quite the whole truth the case is destined to be far more complex than Markby ever envisaged...
Praise for Ann Granger
'A pair of delightful sleuths… More please!' Margaret Yorke
'Probably the best current example of a crime-writer who has taken the classic English village detective story and brought it up to date. In setting, sophistication and every other aspect of fiction writing… sheer, unadulterated bliss' Birmingham Post
'Granger's deft touch raises [her] above the competition and her finely drawn characters [are] affecting and believable… Something quite special' Crime Time

First British Edition Headline (1998)

Paperback - Headline (1999)

Running Scared
The third mystery to feature Fran Varady - the sharp, young investigator who whom the Yorkshire Post describes as 'one of crime fiction's most engaging heroines'
When her close friend Ganesh, left holding the fort at his Uncle Hari's East End corner shop, decides to undertake some 'improvements' Fran is more than dubious about the consequences, especially since he insists on using their less than reliable builder acquaintance, Hitch. But she has no idea of the scale of trouble Ganesh's refurbishment of the shop toilet will lead to. For shortly after having allowed the apparent victim of a mugging to clean up in the old washroom they find a strip of negatives secreted behind the old tiles, and later, a message from the man who left them asking her to meet him. But by the time Fran has found him, the stranger is dead and she has discovered that the photos are of a financier on the run from the serious crime squad. And, with her landlady being pressurised to sell her home, Hitch wreaking havoc at the shop and her new friend, squat-dweller Tig, having gone missing again, Fran's troubles have barely begun
'She has shifted gear to the city with no problem...a fine start' Crime Time
'Ann Granger's skill with character together with her sprightly writing make the most of the story....she is on to another winner' Birmingham Post
'Fran's a delight...the plot is neat and ingenious, the characters rounded and touchingly credible, and the writing of this darkly humorous but humane and generous novel fluent, supple and a pleasure to read' Ham and High

First British Edition Headline (1998)

Call the Dead Again
Mitchell and Markby Cotswold Mystery
When Meredith Mitchell gives a lone hitchhiker a lift into Bamford one evening, she is left feeling uneasy, for the girl is highly secretive. What business can she have at Tudor Lodge, home of Brussels-based lawyer Andrew Penhallow, where she asks to be dropped? Unusually, Penhallow is at home that night...and the next morning he is found murdered in the garden.
His death results in some spectacular revelations about a double life involving his mysterious visitor, Kate Drago, but she is not the only suspect unearthed by Meredith's boyfriend, Superintendent Alan Markby, as he investigates the ghosts of Penhallow's past as well as the secrets of the present; aided and abetted by Meredith but rather hindered by colleague Sergeant Prescott, who has inconveniently fallen in love with the chief suspect…
'A good old-fashioned whodunnit with an up-to-date flavour that will leave you satisfied but hoping for more' Prima

First British Edition Headline (1997)

Keeping Bad Company
Fran Varady knows that making friends with down-and-out 'Alkie' Albie Smith on Marylebone Station concourse is probably not a wise move. But Fran, who knows what it's like not to have the price of a cup of tea, is a soft touch - and, apart from his personal hygiene, he's an entertaining enough companion. Albie, though, has a disturbing tale to tell with an unnerving ring of truth to it: he claims he's witnessed the violent abduction of a young girl, in a distinctively marked blue Cortina. So vivid is Albie's tale that Fran overcomes her instinctive reluctance and reports the crime to the police, only to be sent away with a flea in her ear. But later Fran spots a blue Cortina with a white scrape, parked outside a pub. Seeing its owners does little to allay her mounting suspicions - suspicions confirmed when she is warned off by her old sparring partner Sergeant Parry, and then approached by a self-styled old friend of her father, distraught over the kidnapping of his daughter. But this is only the beginning of Fran's investigation - days later, 'Alkie' Albie is found dead... Keeping Bad Company is the second mystery to feature Ann Granger's likeable young investigator Fran Varady, whom the Yorkshire Post described as 'one of crime fiction's most engaging heroines'. Headline have employed the same model to portray Fran as they did on Asking For Trouble. Ann is really pleased about this as the model does look very much as she imagined Fran in her head!
Praise for Ann Granger's writing:
'To be savoured by connoisseurs of characterisation' Publishers Weekly
'A good ear for understated humour.. A nice ear for dialogue' The Times
'Stylish entertainment' Oxford Times
'A wonderful, lively read… Fran Varady could easily become one of crime fiction's most engaging heroines' Yorkshire Post

First British Edition Headline (1997)

Asking for Trouble
Fran Varady is insolvent, unemployed and, though for the moment she's got the leaky roof of the squat she shares in Jubilee Street over her head, thanks to the attentions of the council eviction department she'll very soon be homeless. Her dreams of becoming an actress, nurtured when her father and grandmother were still alive, seem a long way off. But the quietly resolute Fran, for all her youth and apparent vulnerability, is a survivor. Which her former housemate, Terry, found hanging from the ceiling rose of her room, clearly is not.
Terry, secretive and selfish, was far from popular with the rest of the household, but her death shakes the Jubilee Street Creative Artists' Commune, as the squat residents half jokingly call themselves. And, the more Fran discovers about the death of the young woman whose life briefly intersected with her own, the more she begins to see it was not all it first seemed.
The first book in a series featuring Fran Varady, a youthful, quietly engaging private investigator living on her wits in the city,Asking for Trouble is an exciting departure for Ann Granger whose Mitchell and Markby mysteries are consistently praised for their intelligent characterisation and clever plotting and have an appreciative and rapidly growing readership. Her new heroine, with her combination of acuteness and vulnerability, will appeal to Ann Granger's current fans and win her many more.