The Redeemed (Coroner Jenny Cooper Series) [Paperback]

'Jenny Cooper has made it into her third breathlessly enjoyable novel. She's stubborn, insubordinate, leads a chaotic life and is prone to exceed her legal powers . . . Fortunately she is also obsessed with seeing that, as coroner, she does justice to the dead -- in effect the clients of her job -- and their loved ones left behind. In The Redeemed she is not satisfied that a man whose body is found with a sign of the cross slashed on his torso had committed suicide. A priest attempts to persuade her that a man convicted of killing a porn star-turned-campaigner for decency is innocent. The two deaths, and others that follow, are linked to a local church. Cooper does her utmost to discover the truth, against the wishes of the Establishment' --The Times

'There is something impressive about the character of Mrs Jenny Cooper . . . She seeks the truth, whatever it takes, and with an apparent fearlessness that makes the reader's heart race . . . This is a clever and complex novel that shows the author is prepared to explore the difficult ambivalences and ambiguities of human behaviour' --Courier Mail, Australia

'Readers of Patricia Cornwell will very much enjoy this psychological thriller' --Library Journal

'The Redeemed, is the third crime novel in M R Hall's successful Jenny Cooper series, which continues to go from strength to strength . . . Jenny Cooper is a great series character' --Bookseller

Coroner Jenny Cooper investigates . . . A mystery from the past. A deadly secret in the present. The body of a dead man is discovered in an overgrown cemetery in Bristol, the sign of the cross gouged into his flesh. At first it seems to coroner Jenny Cooper that all the evidence points to a horrific, if routine, suicide. Then an enigmatic young priest, Father Lucas Starr, arrives on Jenny’s doorstep, entreating her to hold an inquest into the death of Eva Donaldson, a high profile political campaigner whose past life continued to haunt her. A young man, Paul Craven, has recently been sentenced for Eva’s brutal murder. But despite Craven’s conviction and the evidence against him, Father Lucas is convinced of the man’s innocence. Jenny’s lone quest for justice will take her to the dark heart of an establishment who wish to silence her, and on an inner journey to confront ghosts that have haunted her for a lifetime. For Jenny Cooper answers to no one but the dead . . .

M. R. Hall is a screenwriter and producer and former criminal barrister. Educated at Hereford Cathedral School and Worcester College, Oxford, he lives in the Wye Valley in Monmouthshire with his wife and two sons. Also available in the Coroner Jenny Cooper series: The Coroner, The Disappeared.