After an old university friend and fellow archaeologist's murdered, forensic archaeologist Ruth Galloway travels to Lancashire to examine the bones he found, which reveal a shocking fact about King Arthur, and discovers a campus living in fear of a sinister right-wing group called the White Hand.

Norwich is riddled with old chalk-mining tunnels, but no one's sure exactly how many. When Ruth is called in to investigate a set of human remains found in one of them, she notices the bones are almost translucent, a sign they were boiled soon after death. Once more, she finds herself at the helm of a murder investigation. Meanwhile, DCI Nelson is hunting for a missing homeless woman, Barbara, who he hears has gone "underground." Could she have disappeared...

In this highly atmospheric mystery, Ruth Galloway and DI Nelson have their summer vacations horribly disrupted by a murder in a medieval Italian town where dark secrets are buried as deep as bones.

DCI Nelson has been receiving threatening letters. They are anonymous, yet reminiscent of ones he has received in the past, from the person who drew him into a case that's haunted him for years. At the same time, Ruth receives a letter purporting to be from that very same person--her former mentor, and the reason she first started working with Nelson. But the author of those letters is dead. Or is he? The past is reaching out for Ruth and Nelson,...

Every year a ceremony is held in Norwich for the bodies in the paupers' graves: the Service for the Outcast Dead. Ruth has a particular interest in this year's proceedings. Her recent dig at Norwich Castle turned up the body of the notorious Mother Hook, who was hanged in 1867 for the murder of five children. Now Ruth is the reluctant star of the TV series Women Who Kill, working alongside the program's alluring history expert, Professor Chet Bruce....

Convicted murderer Amyas March offers to make DCI Nelson a deal. Nelson was always sure that March killed more women than he was charged with, and March offers to show Nelson where the other bodies are buried-- but only if Ruth Galloway will do the digging. When she warily agrees, March tells her that four more bodies are buried near a village bordering the fens. The area is said to be haunted by the Lantern Men, mysterious figures holding lights...