The Sixth Bell

A dead man. A missing page. A lie buried for forty-four years. When forensic document examiner Delia Frayne agrees to catalog the archives of a historic bell foundry in the English village of Wickenford, she expects months of dusty ledgers and forgotten records. Instead, she finds evidence of a forgery. Just days before his death, foundry historian Aubrey Cann discovered that a crucial entry in a 1982 daybook had been altered.
Someone inserted a line that shifted responsibility for a fatal accident that destroyed a family, ruined a business, and haunted the village for decades. Then Aubrey died. The coroner ruled it an accident. The town accepted it. The case was closed. But Delia isn't convinced. As she examines damaged documents, missing pages, hidden impressions, and clues concealed for more than four decades, she uncovers a web of loyalty, guilt, and secrets that the people of Wickenford would rather leave buried.
Everyone remembers the tragedy. No one wants to talk about the truth. With each discovery, Delia moves closer to exposing what really happened on that summer morning in 1982-and why someone may have been willing to kill to keep the past from resurfacing. Set in a beautifully realized English village and filled with rich atmosphere, memorable characters, and a meticulously crafted mystery, The Sixth Bell is the first novel in the Wickenford Mystery series.
Perfect for readers who enjoy Richard Osman, Elly Griffiths, Ann Cleeves, traditional British mysteries, village secrets, cold cases, and amateur sleuth investigations. Sometimes the smallest alteration changes everything. And sometimes a missing page is worth killing for.