Dialogues of the Dead (1)

Wetherton CID struggles to track down a serial killer with a penchant for words, as Messrs Dalziel and Pascoe take on their most puzzling and challenging case to date. The sublimely confident killer leaves a dialogue for the police to find after each murder. These chilling documents, carefully written and lovingly illustrated, describe each killing in detail and, at the same time, are strewn with tantalising hints and clues. To celebrate the opening of a refurbished library and a new Heritage Centre, a short story competition is attracting reams of entries, one of which is so graphic that it prompts the police to revise their initial views of a recent fatal accident. This is just the first dialogue: worse is to come as the cocky killer starts writing about and executing a series of murders, in front of the police. So begins a desperate game of cat and mouse between a sinister killer and an increasingly concerned and apprehensive Dalziel and Pascoe, for whom the murders are getting agon