Published 2020

For four hundred years between the 13th and 17th centuries the Border Reivers terrorised people on both sides of the border, often encouraged by the respective crowns showing no mercy to those they attacked.

Two hundred and fifty years later Cumberland and South west Scotland are a long way from the battlefields of World War 1. It is easy to imagine that the violencel and horrors of the conflict will only be felt many miles away in foreign lands. Nothing could be further from the truth. The murder of a soldier, arson attack on a barracks full of new recruits, horrific crash of a troop train transporting reinforcements south to the front line and an attempt to sabotage a local munitions works suggests an even more deadly raider has found his way to the borderlands.

It falls to habitual pipe smoker Inspector 'Smoking Joe' Johnstone of the Carlisle City Policeto track him down and eliminate the threat. But can he do so before more lives are lost or before he himself becomes a victim of 'THE REIVER'?