To Ken Beacham, Social Security Inspector, the question seemed quite simple: did Leonard Trent crash his car before or after contacting his Managing Director?
On this simple fact rests the entitlement of his widow Virginia Trent to an Industrial Death Pension.
But then the violent death of the Managing Director blurs the issue, and Ken Beacham finds himself investigating what could have been a murder.
Steadily and insidiously, the background to Trent's death absorbs him - as does his passion for Kaye Trotter, the last person to have seen Trent alive.
Though his marriage is breaking down, and Kaye has introduced a new and unsettling version of the events leading to Leonard Trent's death, Ken feels compelled to persist in his search for the truth.
But could it cost him his wife, his job, and perhaps, Kaye too...?
'The Vital Minute' is a gripping crime thriller from a master story-teller.
"The story gallops along with an irresistible momentum...always fascinating...the shape is near perfect. The characterisation is splendid, the situations dramatic and compelling, the style economic and energetic. What more can a book offer, or a reader ask?" - Reginald Hill
"Eclectic, underrated Ormerod can be relied upon to come up with the startling goods" Sunday Times
"I am glad to announce that the detective novel is still alive and well in Mr Ormerod's skillful hands " The Spectator
"Fast-moving, with well-orchestrated jiggery-pokery; not unlike an early Dick Francis in tone and method" Times Literary Supplement
Roger Ormerod (1920-2005) was a prolific writer of ingenious and densely plotted crime novels - some 35 in all - which were published in the UK and the USA. He lived in Wolverhampton and amongst other things worked as a civil servant and as a Social Security inspector - backgrounds which he made full use of in his fiction, as he did with his hobbies of painting and photography.
Genre: Mystery
On this simple fact rests the entitlement of his widow Virginia Trent to an Industrial Death Pension.
But then the violent death of the Managing Director blurs the issue, and Ken Beacham finds himself investigating what could have been a murder.
Steadily and insidiously, the background to Trent's death absorbs him - as does his passion for Kaye Trotter, the last person to have seen Trent alive.
Though his marriage is breaking down, and Kaye has introduced a new and unsettling version of the events leading to Leonard Trent's death, Ken feels compelled to persist in his search for the truth.
But could it cost him his wife, his job, and perhaps, Kaye too...?
'The Vital Minute' is a gripping crime thriller from a master story-teller.
Praise for Roger Ormerod:
"The story gallops along with an irresistible momentum...always fascinating...the shape is near perfect. The characterisation is splendid, the situations dramatic and compelling, the style economic and energetic. What more can a book offer, or a reader ask?" - Reginald Hill
"Eclectic, underrated Ormerod can be relied upon to come up with the startling goods" Sunday Times
"I am glad to announce that the detective novel is still alive and well in Mr Ormerod's skillful hands " The Spectator
"Fast-moving, with well-orchestrated jiggery-pokery; not unlike an early Dick Francis in tone and method" Times Literary Supplement
Roger Ormerod (1920-2005) was a prolific writer of ingenious and densely plotted crime novels - some 35 in all - which were published in the UK and the USA. He lived in Wolverhampton and amongst other things worked as a civil servant and as a Social Security inspector - backgrounds which he made full use of in his fiction, as he did with his hobbies of painting and photography.
Genre: Mystery
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