IT'S meant to be a time of convalescence in sleepy Sandytown after Supt Dalziel survived a terrorist bomb, but trouble just seems to follow him around.

Death seems always at his elbow and when the Lady of the Manor is murdered in a particularly gruesome way, DCI Pascoe is called in to investigate and the old partnership is resumed.

With Dalziel as full-bodied as a pint of best bitter, a cast of characters that would do justice to Tom Sharpe and the re-emergence of the tormenting Franny Roote to add a little sharpness to the plot, this is Hill at the top of his form.