Chris Chibnall

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Doctor Who: Adventures in Lockdown

Death At The White Hart

With a confounding crime and a stellar cast of characters, Death at the White Hart is everything I love in a crime novel, with a community set-up that I hope means this will become a much-loved series

Jennie Godfrey, bestselling author of The List of Suspicious Things

Brilliant characterisation and fabulous suspense - as unputdownable as you'd expect from the writer of Broadchurch

From the multi-award winning creator of BROADCHURCH and showrunner of DOCTOR WHO, get ready for the most exciting crime fiction debut of 2025... 
 ****** 
 
 A picture-perfect village. 
A harrowing crime scene. 
A web of secrets. 
A victim who knew all of them. 
Introducing Detective Nicola Bridge, in the unputdownable debut novel from one of the Britain’s most acclaimed storytellers.

When Nicola Bridge moves back to Dorset after years as a CID detective in the big city, the last thing she expects is for the picturesque village of Fleetcombe to become a grisly crime scene. 
 
Jim Tiernan, landlord of the White Hart pub, has been found dead, the body staged with macabre relish on an isolated country road. As soon as she starts asking questions, Nicola realises everyone in the village has something to hide. 
 
Frankie, the hairdresser who isn’t a skilled enough actor to conceal they’re lying about the night of the murder. 
 
Eddie, the delivery driver whose heart starts racing every time he drives past the crime scene. 
 
Deakins, the embittered farmer still living in the shadow of a supposedly murderous ancestor. 
 
And even the little girl, hidden at the top of the playground slide, who’s watching them all. 
 
Whispers. Rumours. Lies. But Nicola knows that somewhere among them, a killer is hiding in plain sight. 
 
Because sometimes the smallest communities hide the darkest secrets . . .

The villagers of Fleetcombe like to think of it as one of the most picturesque spots in Dorset: two pubs, a small playground, enough gorgeous cottages to keep a thatcher in business. 
 
It’s the last place you’d expect such a grisly murder. 
 
A body is discovered, tied to a chair in the middle of a nearby road, a stag’s antlers on his head. The victim is soon identified: Jim Tiernan, landlord of the White Hart pub. 
 
Detective Nicola Bridge is not short of suspects: in a small village, the pub landlord knows everyone’s business. And beneath the idyllic surface, the residents of Fleetcombe have plenty they want to keep hidden. 
 
Someone knows what happened to Jim Tiernan. Someone who drank with him in the busy pub the night he died. Someone who might just be dangerous enough to kill again. 
 
As the village’s many dark secrets come to the surface, can Nicola catch the killer before it’s too late?

Death At The White Hart

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Chris Chibnall

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