When the body of Pauline Brent is found hanging from a yew tree in a local graveyard, DS Wesley Peterson immediately suspects foul play. Then history provides him with a clue. Wesley's archaeologist friend, Neil Watson, has excavated a corpse at his nearby dig - a young woman who, local legend has it, had been publicly hanged from the very same tree before being buried on unhallowed ground five centuries ago.

Wesley is now forced to consider the possibility that the killer knows the tree's dark history. Has Pauline also been 'executed' rather than murdered, and, if so, for what crime? To catch a dangerous killer Wesley has to discover as much as he can about the victim. But Pauline appears to have been a woman with few friends, no relatives and a past she has carefully tried to hide . . .

Besides providing a clever dual mystery, Ellis humanizes her characters. . . . This is a series that just gets stronger with each new book. Publishers Weekly
A beguiling author who interweaves past and present . . . works well on both levels. Times

Kate Ellis was born in Liverpool and studied drama in Manchester. Kate has twice been nominated for the Crime Writers' Association Short Story Dagger and the novel THE PLAGUE MAIDEN was nominated for the Theakstons Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year in 2005.