London: Piatkus, (1998). SIGNED hardcover first edition - The author's first novel and the first book in this series of crime novels featuring Wesley Peterson, a black detective with a degree in archeology, the son of two Trinidadian doctors and a young husband, who has transferred from the Met to the seaside town of Tradmouth, where he becomes one of Devon's first black police officers. His old college friend Neil is heading an archaeological dig at a Tudor merchant's house, and the skeleton of a strangled young woman and a newborn baby are uncovered. Meanwhile Peterson is in involved in the search for a missing child and in the case of a brutal murder of a young woman. Behind all of these crimes, both medieval and modern, are the age-old motives of jealousy, sexual obsession, and desperate longing for a child. SIGNED by Ellis on a laid-in printed bookplate. An engrossing and rewarding series, with both an historical and a contemporary mystery, and well-drawn characters. 246 pp. ISBN: 0-749904542.