Murder in the Dark finds the newly promoted DS Matilda Stone dispatched to Hiddledean Hall where all three of her aunts are attending the 15th Wildermarsh Crime Writer's Festival. In a crime as strange as the fiction on display, the prestigious Golden Pick Axe Award has been found buried in the head of a prize nominee, and pages from his latest manuscript have been stolen. Everyone present is a suspect, from the rival nominees – including Matilda's Aunt Beth – to hot headed agents and slimy publishers. Or does the solution to the crime lie in the fictional story that someone has gone to such extreme lengths to hide?