About the Author

Author of two major murder mystery series, featuring Thea Osborne, house sitter in the Cotswolds and Persimmon Brown, Lake District florist. Also "ghost writer" of the novels based on the ITV series Rosemary and Thyme. Seven earlier titles (known as the Westcountry mysteries) feature Drew Slocombe, undertaker (who turns up again in the Cotswolds) and Den Cooper, police officer. These titles are to be reissued by Joffe Books as ebooks, summer 2022.

LIST OF TITLES IN CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER

A Dirty Death (Den Cooper and Lilah)

Dark Undertakings (Drew and Karen Slocombe)

Death of a Friend (Den and Lilah)

Grave Concerns (Drew, Karen and Maggs)

A Death to Record (Den and Lilah)

The Sting of Death (Den, Drew, Karen)

A Market for Murder (Den, Drew and Karen)

COTSWOLDS

A Cotswold Killing (Thea Osborne)

A Cotswold Ordeal (Thea and Phil)

Death in the Cotswolds (Thea, Phil and Ariadne)

Mystery in the Cotswolds (Thea and Phil)

Blood in the Cotswolds (Thea and Phil)

Slaughter in the Cotswolds (Thea)

Fear in the Cotswolds (Thea)

A Grave in the Cotswolds (Drew and Thea)

Deception in the Cotswolds (Thea)

Malice in the Cotswolds (Thea)

Shadows in the Cotswolds (Thea)

Trouble in the Cotswolds (Thea)

Revenge in the Cotswolds (Thea)

Guilt in the Cotswolds (Thea and Drew)

Peril in the Cotswolds (Thea and Drew - now married)

Crisis in the Cotswolds (Thea and Drew)

Secrets in the Cotswolds (Thea and Drew) 

A Cotswold Christmas Mystery (Thea and Stephanie) 

Betrayal in the Cotswolds(Thea) (July 2022)

A Discovery in the Cotswolds (Sept 2023)

THE LAKE DISTRICT

The Windermere Witness

The Ambleside Alibi

The Coniston Case

The Troutbeck Testimony

The Hawkshead Hostage

The Bowness Bequest (first appearance of Christopher Henderson)

The Staveley Suspect

The Grasmere Grudge 

The Patterdale Plot 

The Ullswater Undertaking 

The Threlkeld Theory

The Askham Accusation

The Borrowdale Body

All these titles can be ordered from www.allisonandbusby.com

New Books

SABINE BARING-GOULD

THE MAN WHO TOLD A THOUSAND STORIES

A full biography of a man who did everything in excess. He lived to be ninety; he fathered fifteen children; he wrote 130 books; he collected folksongs and wrote hymns. He never ran short of energy. His novels were bestsellers in the final decades of the Victorian era. He was almost never dull, even when writing collections of sermons or Lives of the Saints. The biography took an alarming 15 years to write, and is the result of exhaustive researches into Baring-Gould's archives, as well as reading nearly all his books. It is 540 pages, in a handsome hardback format, with illustrations. This is a limited edition of 500 copies and is extremely good value.

 See rave review in 'The Week'

 http://theweek.com/articles/763465/last-man-who-knew-everything

HARDBACK £22.00 plus £2.95 post and packing.

Available only from Praxis Books.

Email orders to rebeccatope@btinternet.com

 Please email me with your address and the book will be sent immediately. Postage to America is £14.80. To Australia it's £15.75.

Payment is best achieved via Paypal, but other methods are possible.

There is now an ebook of it - Anyone wishing to buy it on Amazon should persevere in searching for it.

The top of the list to come up says 'currently unavailable' which refers to the cancelled Sharpe Books version.

If you search under 'All Departments' it comes up properly.

The book is a great bargain and well worth reading, I promise.

Some Personal Stuff

I grew up on farms, first in Cheshire, then in Devon. It was a childhood full of powerful elemental experiences, in a background of unspoken parental dstress in a painful marriage. Cruelty, death, frustration alternated with idyllic summer days, the teamwork of the harvest, the delight of the young animals. No two days were quite the same. Some of these memories have found their way into A Dirty Death, my first novel. I have lived in various parts of England since then - London and Sussex, before returning to the western side of the country. I now live in rural Herefordshire, on a smallholding situated close to the beautiful Black Mountains. I have a dog and a cat - the pigs I enjoyed so much are all gone now, leaving rather a gap. Their paddock is slowly being transformed into a wild garden, with trees, pond and lots of bamboo. 

I have four children and five grandchildren. Coming from large famiies on both sides, I have relatives everywhere, and have been enjoying reading old letters and diaries, family trees and memoirs, prompted by the acqusition of a mass of material when my mother died.

I blundered accidentally into writing crime fiction, and still wonder how it happened. It could just as easily have been historical, or sagas or even non-fiction. Indeed, I am currently trying my hand at two of those genres, as a change of pace. And I have large plans for a series of memoirs.              

I travel whenever possible, with France and Greece firm favourites. Plus America, Australia, Argentina...places with wide open roads and easy driving.

I give talks to libraries, groups and anyone else who might be interested.