Trouble Next Door

genre: A Cosy Mystery

When Doctor and Mrs Jones disappear from the house next door, their quiet cul-de-sac becomes the centre of a police investigation. Helen tries to keep the rumours away from her twelve-year-old son Jack, whose observant but unconventional way of seeing the world often lands him in trouble.

But Jack is more concerned about the disappearance of his beloved Blue Ted. What no one realises is that Jack may also hold the key to the Joneses’ mysterious disappearance. While quietly watching the badgers in the field behind the houses, he has unwittingly set events in motion.

Meanwhile, Helen is juggling family life: caring for her grandmother as dementia tightens its grip, keeping up with Jack’s latest misadventures, and supporting her teenage daughter Maisie, an aspiring journalist, who is awaiting the airing of a radio interview she has recorded with her Local Hero — the now missing, Doctor Jones.

As rumours spread and an unexpected compulsory purchase order threatens their home, misunderstandings multiply and the truth about the neighbours’ disappearance slowly begins to emerge.

A warm, gently humorous mystery about family, community, and seeing the world differently.