When Parcel Force driver Bob Naylor plucks up courage to join his local writers circle in Chichester, he is nervous. He's not much of a reader, let alone a writer. He expects to meet people unlike himself, with names like Maurice, Amelia, Zach and Thomasine - and he finds them. But while he is prepared for some naked ambition he doesn't know it will include murder ... The death in a house fire of publisher Edgar Blacker propels Bob straight into a murder mystery. For Blacker had only recently addressed the circle. Most of its members had shown limn their work and he d actually promised to publish Maurice's book about unsolved murders. And then, for some reason, he pulled out of the deal. Being catapulted into the middle of a detective story excites and inspires some of the circle. Bob is pressed into helping Thomasine's unofficial investigation. Naomi and Zach go one step further - they start writing an on line, blow-by-blow account of the case. Soon they are relaying news of an attempted murder and the death of another of the circle. For the real-life detective Henrietta Mallin, these amateur sleuths muddy the waters. Especially as one thinks he's a genius, one mar well be a genius, and one has more in common with Lady Macbeth than Jane Austen. But Hen won't take nonsense from any of them as she unravels the sinister secret of the circle.