Showing results by narrator "Peter Wickham" in All Categories

Having had his retirement snatched from him by malfunctioning technology, Peter “Mad Max” Maxwell finds himself facing yet another year at Leighford High School. His wife, Jacquie, is further annoyed when a family holiday quickly becomes an impromptu Year Seven trip to the Isle of Wight. The situation takes another turn for the worse when the wife of Tom Medlicott, the new Head of Art, goes missing.

John Pearce, having negotiated the highly questionable sale of the two French prizes taken in The Devil to Pay, has left HMS Flirt, as well as the crew and the wounded Henry Digby in Brindisi, and is headed for Naples to see his lover. In an uncomfortable journey, he seeks to work out a way to best both Admiral Sir William Hotham and Captain Ralph Barclay, men who are his sworn enemies. All his calculations are thrown into turmoil when he discovers that Emily is pregnant.

World War Two has ended, but the peace is threatened when a shocking murder takes place in the Sussex countryside. Before long, police discover a link to another killing hundreds of miles away.... Scotland Yard detective Billy Styles is on the case, but a strange twist of fate brings former DI John Madden into the investigations. As the victim count rises, it becomes clear that to catch this serial killer they must act quickly.

During a blackout on the streets of London in late 1944, a young Polish land girl, Rosa Nowak, is suddenly and brutally killed. But the police, their resources already stretched by war regulations and the thriving black market, cannot find any reason why someone would want to murder an innocent refugee. For the former police inspector John Madden, the crime hits close to home. Rosa was working on his farm, and he feels personally responsible for not protecting her.

Run, run, girl. In the name of God, run. It's 1141 and freezing cold. Gwil, a battle-hardened mercenary, watches in horror as a little girl with red hair is dragged away by his own men. Caught in the middle of the fight for England she is just one more victim in a winter of atrocities. But a...

Maxwell’s Millennium is not quite like other people’s - for a start, it is a year later. After much quibbling with the maths department, everyone calls it an honourable draw and he celebrates as only he can: with his cat, his model soldiers and his Southern Comfort. A knock on the door could be Jacquie Carpenter, released from night shift earlier than expected, but instead of a warm girl Maxwell opens his door to find a very cold old lady, dead and naked.

The derelict house on the edge of the sleepy seaside town was a haven for courting couples, down-and-outs - and someone with altogether more sinister intentions. It was there that they found the corpse of 17-year-old Jenny Hyde. She'd been strangled.

Dave Aston is a dead man walking. He was a member of the elite British SAS. Black Ops in Iraq and Afghanistan. Until that final mission into bandit country. Unauthorised, with no back up. That was when his luck ran out ...Now, he's returned home to an alien civilian life. Everything is lost: his marriage, his home and his self-respect. Down and out on the cold, mean streets of his homeland. There he discovers that the astonishing circle of deceit is complete. But is he just too far down to fight back against a new evil force at work in his own back yard?

It's 1794. Stuck in Palermo harbour, the headstrong Lieutenant John Pearce and his trusty Pelicans must repair the battle-damaged HMS Larcher with only meagre funds to do so. Sailing into danger, they encounter enemies. Pearce has no option but to run until, trapped in an Italian bay, he is forced to abandon his ship. Pearce must face a court martial for his actions, but his troubles are only just beginning.

Bursting with life and bawdy humour, National Serviceman Brigg is now a Regular Army sergeant defending the Empire in the beds and bars of Hong Kong. Peace-time diversions include sensual fireworks with a pair of delicious Chinese twins and a tender, erotic affair with the lonely wife of an American serviceman.

Unbeknown to John Pearce, the private letter he is delivering on behalf of the prime minister carries the dismissal of the very man he is sailing to see. The need for a government majority to pursue the war with France means John Pearce must step down as Britain’s best sailor, regretfully relinquishing the position to the incompetent Admiral Hotham. Hotham is equally less than pleased about John Pearce, as he is the one person who knows the truth about his dishonest naval career.

One way or another the Communist guerrilla war in Malaya kept a whole British army occupied from 1948 until 1952. They were the virgin soldiers. Idle, homesick, afraid, bored, oversexed, and unsatisfied. A young virgin like Brigg had to grab his fun while and where he could - in the Liberty Club, in Juicy Lucy's flat or up in Phillipa's room - in one frantic attempt at living before he died or got demobbed...

Deena Harrison was one of Leighford High School's “characters” - setting fire to the toilet block and throwing boys down stairs. But she had the voice of an angel and could act the skin off a rice pudding. The autumn she came down from Oxford, there was something of a crisis in the Drama department at Leighford High. Mrs Carmichael was in danger of losing her baby and the Little Shop of Horrors was in danger of closing down. So Deena comes back to help out.

The position of Assistant Headteacher has become available at Leighford High, but Peter "Mad Max" Maxwell won't be applying. He has his hands full juggling his beloved Sixth Form, fatherhood and impending marriage. When a member of staff dies after a special lunch for the prospective Assistant Headteachers, Maxwell's hopes for a quiet term, followed by a quiet wedding, are swiftly shattered, as he finds himself embroiled in yet another sinister murder case.

1794. Lieutenant John Pearce is caught between a feuding trio of admirals. One puts him in a position of danger while another asks him to undertake a hazardous commission in order to protect his friends, the Pelicans. Meanwhile, Pearce is also trying to construct a perjury case against Admiral Ralph Barclay.

The worst has happened. On the eve of their return to Blighty, Brigg and his fellow National Servicemen find themselves sentenced to another six months in Panglin Barracks. Many of the surviving characters from The Virgin Soldiers live again in these pages: dogged Tasker, the odious Sergeant Wellbeloved, the vulnerable Colonel Bromley Pickering and the comically touching Juicy Lucy.

Firebrand John Pearce has been promoted to lieutenant and is in a position of command on board HMS Faron when he returns to Toulon from his successful mission in Corsica.

History teacher Peter 'Mad Max' Maxwell, a bit of a maverick, is sent on a short-term swap with another teacher at a nearby private school, Grimonds.

When Peter Maxwell attends a school reunion of the class of '65, all is not as it seems among his old chums. They are career men, family men - but the years have taken their toll, and the seething tensions of the school years surface in unlikely ways. At the end of the reunion weekend, a man is dead, hanging from the bell rope of the old school. When a second death occurs, Maxwell finds himself in the midst of a murder investigation. What is the secret that has been lurking under Maxwell's nose all these years - and could he be on the murderer's list for killing number three?

The school outing to the Museum of the Moving Image is not an unqualified success. For in the darkened cinema complex of MOMI, two members of the party disappear without trace....