A Shot at Nothing(1993)

Roger Ormerod

Philipa Lowe is looking for a new house.

But her friend Oliver does not approve, particularly of the one she most wants to see.

In spite of his reluctance, she goes ahead, and on first sight of it she is full of enthusiasm.

True, it is too big for her, true that she could barely afford it, but at once she falls in love with it.

Oliver's reluctance is soon explained, as this was the house where a murder took place.

Six years before, Clare Steadman was committed to prison for the murder of her husband.

Yet Philipa is not discouraged She is intrigued. When she discovers that Oliver himself was intimately involved in the case, she is fascinated.

It is when Oliver declares that he believes Clare to have been innocent that Philipa interests herself in the evidence — but then the facts come to light, and her innocence seems undeniable.

For how could Clare, with the gun room doors locked against her, and the French window jammed by her own efforts with a shotgun, have reached her husband, in order to make use of the second barrel?

And at what was the third shot fired? At nothing?

Philipa is determined to find out...even if it means risking her own life.

'A Shot at Nothing’ is a chilling mystery story that is perfect for fans of Nikki French and Peter Robinson.



"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.