Coffin Island

Kate Ellis

THE amazing Kate Ellis and her cerebral black detective Wesley Peterson are not just a ‘force’ to be reckoned with... they are something of a crime writing sensation.

Coffin Island is the (staggering!) twenty-eighth novel in the Liverpool-born author’s cleverly constructed, classic crime series which weaves the past and the present into complex, thrilling mysteries, and attracts yet more adoring fans with each much-anticipated outing.

A perfectly matched pair of chalk-and-cheese detectives, excellent police procedural detail, compelling plots, stand-out characters, old fashioned investigative work, and fascinating links to real history make Ellis’s (pictured below) books a delicious crime-reading treat. Her main man, the quick-thinking, right-thinking DI Peterson, is a trained archaeologist who eschewed digging up the past to unearth the criminals who sully his West Country patch. 

His sidekick at work is Gerry Heffernan, a middle-aged, overweight DCI from Liverpool who never allows a little thing like murder to ruin his pleasures, and his out-of-office pal, is archaeologist Neil Watson, whose commissions often lead Wesley into buried secrets and crimes.

Despite many years living in South Devon, DI Wesley Peterson has never visited the tiny, tidal island of St Rumon’s... until coastal erosion from a storm reveals three bodies buried close to the wall that marks the boundary of the local churchyard.

Two are quite clearly ancient skeletons, but one is far more recent, and Wesley realises he has uncovered a case of murder. But whose remains are they and who killed this mystery person?

The island has only a small number of inhabitants yet one resident – in fact, the island’s most prominent resident – keeps cropping up in Wesley's investigation... the author and self-styled academic, Quentin Search. Meanwhile Wesley’s friend, archaeologist Neil Watson, becomes fascinated by the remains of the island’s old priory and his discovery of a journal, written by a sixteenth century cleric called Reverend Thomas Nescombe, reveals an eerie tale of strange rituals and disturbing deaths.

As Wesley begins to wonder whether the past might be repeating itself, there is another murder which further complicates an already puzzling case. It’s quite obvious now that there is a cunning killer on the island... one whose grip is as deadly as the rising tide.

One of the most striking elements of Ellis’s Wesley Peterson series is her ability to keep the pages turning and her readers on their toes. Resisting the temptation to overload her mysteries with clues, she instead drops small nuggets of information into the plot, barely rippling the surface of our consciousness. This devilishly clever strategy leaves little room for second-guessing the culprit and allows the finale to pack a surprising punch.

Add on mysteries steeped in spine-tingling atmospherics and set in intriguing locations – often incorporating gems of real history – and this is the perfect summer thriller whether you’ve read the whole series, or are discovering the wonderfully satisfying DI Wesley Peterson novels for the first time.
(Piatkus, hardback, £21.99)