The first volume of Brief Cases comprises short stories 1 to 5.
Love Me To Death : On Christmas Day DI Falconer and DS Carmichael are summoned to a block of apartments in Market Darley, to investigate the unexplained death of a young woman whose fiance was due to move in with her on New Year's Day. At first, her death seems a complete mystery, then, something that Dr Christmas discovers on the internet indicates that her death could just have been a tragic accident, or was it?
A Sidecar Named Expire : A young man and his girlfriend decide to celebrate their first St Valentine's Day together, with a cosy evening of cocktails at her house. But as the evening progresses,events don't go quite as Malcolm Standing planned. The next morning, DI Falconer and DS Carmichael are called in to try to sort out what really happened.
Battered to Death : DI Falconer and DS Carmichael are both enjoying a well-earned rest day, when they are summoned to a most distressing incident that has occurred at a chip shop on the parade of shops in Upper Darley. It was obviously murder, but was it something to do with the robust behavior of some of the more aggressive customers from the night before or was it closer to home?
Toxic Gossip : DI Falconer becomes involved in a gossip-fueled hate crime, only to find himself questioning his own judgement when it comes to protecting Miriam Darling from her anonymous persecutors.
Driven To It : Abigail Wentworth is looking forward to her reunion lunch with Alison Fairweather. They were old school-friends who met twice a year, usually for Alison to dish the dirt on the others with whom they had been particular friends when they were younger and Abigail, to gloat over what she considered their inferior circumstances, in comparison to her own respectable existence. Then, during lunch itself, she recognizes a face from the past and, from that moment onward, her life skids completely out of control.
An ex-member of Mensa (bored!),Andrea Frazer is married, with four grown-up children, and lives in the Dordogne with her husband Tony and their seven cats. She has wanted to write since she first began to read at the age of five, but has been a little busy raising a family and working as a lecturer in Greek (she has a Fellowship Diploma in Greek), and teaching music. Apart from writing, Andrea continues to teach music, and now also teaches French to ex-pats. Her interests include playing several instruments (but not all at the same time!), reading, and choral singing (she sings with two choirs in a nearby town). In her spare time, she breathes!