{"title":"Author: Colin Bostock-Smith","description":"\u003cp\u003eColin Bostock-Smith was raised in a remote Devonshire village but made his way to London where he was first a journalist on the London Evening Standard, then turned to writing comedy scripts for the likes of the Two Ronnies, Rowan Atkinson, Tim Brooke-Taylor, Basil Brush and President Ronald Reagan.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eToday he lives in deepest East Sussex with his partner Ruth, and writes novels about crime and passion in a remote Devonshire village, set in the 1950s.\u003c\/p\u003e","products":[{"product_id":"sting-of-the-nettle-by-colin-bostock-smith-9781915649454","title":"Sting of the Nettle","description":"\u003cp\u003eIt’s 1952 and newly married PC Derek Martin despairs of ever finding a crime to solve in the sleepy Devon village to which he’s just been appointed. Reporting bicyclists for not having their lights on is hardly what he signed up for. His first big case shatters the peace of rural West Devon. It’s a shotgun killing of a local farmer. Suicide assume the locals. Accidental death claims the coroner. But when PC Martin starts to investigate, he is knocked off his motorbike. Another accident? A warning? And what do a local villain and the son of a gentleman farmer have to do with the sixteen-year-old daughter of the village publican?\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eMaybe a village bobby’s life isn’t quite as dull as Derek Martin imagined.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Colin Bostock-Smith","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":54381075857749,"sku":null,"price":10.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0877\/7462\/6133\/files\/9781915649454.png?v=1784119839"},{"product_id":"an-unkind-harvest-by-colin-bostock-smith-9781915649515","title":"An Unkind Harvest","description":"\u003cp\u003eIt’s August 1952 and in the West Devon village of North Tawe, local PC, Derek Martin, worries about strange happenings. ‘Niggles’, he calls these worries, although the last niggle he had, led to a showdown with a shotgun wielding drug addict and now, ever worsening nightmares. It being a village, everybody gets to know about his nightmares including the loudmouth new owner of Langley Farm – a man who does no farming at all. Add in to the mix a starving, half-clothed foreigner, the lead stealing son of the local ‘crime family’, a twelve-year-old genius, and handcuffed men trapped in a blazing barn and PC Derek Martin learns just how unkind this harvest will be.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Colin Bostock-Smith","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":54381076021589,"sku":null,"price":10.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0877\/7462\/6133\/files\/9781915649515.webp?v=1784119838"},{"product_id":"the-man-who-walked-with-goats-by-colin-bostock-smith-9781915649546","title":"The Man Who Walked With Goats","description":"\u003cp\u003eIt’s the New Year and 1953 brings a whole new set of crimes to the Devon village of North Tawe for PC Derek Martin to solve.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eA gang of beatniks led by a strikingly attractive young woman who demands to be known as Aphrodite Wonder Girl, takes over the derelict chapel.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eA badly beaten eleven-year-old, runaway boy is found hiding in a hedge and who on earth would want to murder the Revd Donald Simpson, the non-conformist minister who walks his two goats through the village every day?\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Colin Bostock-Smith","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":54381076250965,"sku":null,"price":10.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0877\/7462\/6133\/files\/9781915649546.webp?v=1784119838"},{"product_id":"the-bones-beneath-the-bramble-by-colin-bostock-smith-9781915649553","title":"The Bones Beneath the Bramble","description":"\u003cp\u003eWhen the bones of a young woman are dug up in a farmhouse garden, P.C. Derek Martin discovers a link between her death and pre-War English fascism. He is, however, distracted not just by the chance of a promotion to CID, which would uproot him and his wife Mary from their idyllic village life but also by an armed robbery.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eMeanwhile the huge but child-like Ivor, home on leave from his psychiatric hospital, becomes convinced that Mary is ‘holy’ and that Derek is the anti-Christ.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eFor a village copper, driven on by his famous niggles, it is almost too much to handle.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Colin Bostock-Smith","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":54381076480341,"sku":null,"price":10.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0877\/7462\/6133\/files\/9781915649553.webp?v=1784119839"}],"url":"https:\/\/www.gumshoebooks.com\/collections\/author-colin-bostock-smith.oembed","provider":"Gumshoe Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}