Student Amy Dean has disappeared with her boyfriend Martin - a year after Martin's former girlfriend Virginia was found beaten to death. Then Amy’s body is found, encased in a crude wooden box. The connection between the two incidents seems clear – but John Coffin, Commander of the Police, discovers that both girls worked at Star Court House, a home for battered women and children. Coffin is under pressure – personal and professional – to untangle a tragic web of murder and lies.
Gwendoline Butler was born and brought up in south London and was one of the most universally praised of English mystery authors. Her John Coffin procedural series features the titular police inspector rising through the ranks to Commissioner in London’s Docklands area in the 1960s/70s, and eventually moving to a fictional Second City of London.