A spate of robberies targeting elderly women has shocked the normally sedate town of Leek to its core. And now it appears that the robbers have moved on to murder. At the eerily named Spite Hall, the body of Nancy Lawrence has been found bludgeoned to death, lying over the tapestry she was in the process of embroidering. When Detective Inspector Joanna Piercy begins her investigation she is surprised to find that the victim's next door neighbor is Nan's brother with whom Nan has not spoken in years. With the aid of her colleagues, Joanna unravels a mystery - the tangled threads of which are rooted years in the past.Originally published as Embroidering Shrouds