Seeds of Murder
No one knew what finally prompted a shy young schoolboy to walk out of Warren Hall School never to return. The discovery of some of Stephen Willett's bloodstained clothing in an overgrown ditch throws suspicion on Wally Price, a local odd-job man, and his suicide is seen as an admission of guilt.
Over fifty years later another tragedy strikes Warren Hall when the body of a stranger is discovered in the school grounds. The local postmaster is charged with murder and solicitor Rosa Epton is summoned from London to advise him on his defence.
Then a second murder at the school - and the discovery of some damning evidence against her client - makes Rosa determined to investigate leads that the police have overlooked. So she embarks on the most challenging assignment of her career: one that involves long-held secrets and dangerous confrontations. For a killer stands between Rosa and the truth.
Rosa, however, is not the only person on the dead man's trail. Everyone from inquisitive journalists to MI5 appears to be taking an interest - and none so much as the dead man's mother, a cockney matriarch with a score to settle.
Michael Underwood (the pseudonym of John Michael Evelyn) was born in Worthing, Sussex and educated at Christ Church College, Oxford. He was called to the Bar in 1939 and served in the British army during World War Two. He returned to work in the Department of Public Prosecutions until his retirement in 1976, and wrote almost 50 crime novels informed by his career in the law. His five series characters include Sergeant Nick Atwell and lawyer Rosa Epton, of whom it was said by the Washington Post that she 'outdoes Perry Mason'.