Displeasure Island

'Warm, smart and laugh-out-loud funny' Andrea Mara 'Delightful' Stuart Turton 'Alice Bell writes with real verve' Janice Hallett Professional medium turned detective Claire, her best friend Sophie (a 17-year-old ghost) and their pals are enjoying a much-needed cheap holiday in an unfinished hotel on Spike Island off the coast of Ireland. Claire is flattered to be asked by the local ghost of a pirate captain to investigate the theft of treasure from the shipwreck that stranded him there several hundred years ago. But just when she thinks she is closing in on the culprit, a murder takes place, and Claire and her friends quickly become the chief suspects. Can they recover the treasure, solve the murder and clear their names before all is lost?

Alice Bell grew up in South West England, in the sort of middle-of-nowhere where teenagers spend their weekends drinking Smirnoff Ice in a field that also has at least one horse in it. She is the deputy editor of Rock Paper Shotgun, a popular PC gaming website, and in 2019 she was named one of the 100 most influential women in the UK games industry. After spending several years in London, Alice now lives in Cork in Ireland. She has probably read more detective fiction and watched more episodes of Midsomer Murders than is sensible. Her debut novel, Grave Expectations, was selected for the BBC Radio 2 Book Club. Displeasure Island is her second novel.