In 1930 London a deathbed plea from his wife leads Sir Cecil Lawton to seek the aid of Maisie Dobbs, psychologist and investigator. As Maisie soon learns, Agnes Lawton never accepted that her aviator son was killed in the Great War, a torment that led her not only to the edge of madness but to the doors of those who practice the dark arts and commune with the spirit world. In accepting the assignment, Maisie finds her spiritual strength tested, as...

Maisie is asked to investigate a potential land purchase. Her inquiries take her to a village in Kent during the hop picking season. Mysterious fires erupt in the village and a series of petty crime suggest a darker criminal element at work. A peculiar secrecy shrouds the village, and Maisie needs to use her skills to solve one of her most intriguing cases yet.

Spring 1937. In the four years since she left England, Maisie Dobbs has experienced love, contentment, stability -- and the deepest tragedy a woman can endure. Now, all she wants is the peace she believes she might find by returning to India. But her sojourn in the hills of Darjeeling is cut short when her stepmother summons her home to England; her aging father Frankie Dobbs is not getting any younger. But on a ship bound for England, Maisie realizes...

In 1931 London, when artist Nick Bassington-Hope falls to his death before the opening of an exhibition of his work and police refuse to investigate, his journalist sister Georgina enlists the aid of psychologist Maisie Dobbs to uncover the truth.

Having witnessed a suicide on a busy London street, Maisie Dobbs learns that she has been mentioned in a threatening letter to the prime minister and is subsequently recruited by Scotland Yard.