Here we are at the beginning of February, and just five weeks until The Dead Will Rise is published. So…here’s a little bit from the book to whet your appetites. At least, I hope it will. You can pre-order. I’d be very grateful. So far the book has received a starred review from Publishers Weekly and raves from Kirkus and Booklist, the big three of the US trade magazines. I’ll glad take that.

Now, go ahead and jump in…

Joseph Clark was one of the new breed of men. He was an engineer, his life wrapped in numbers and measurements. Clark’s world was machines, everything powered by steam and turbines. All of it exact, calculated to the tiniest fraction of an inch.

He’d started just five years earlier with a small wooden workshop on Mabgate. Now the Clark Foundry was solid stone, sprawling along the street, eating up everything with a giant’s appetite. The new buildings were permanent and commanding, shifts of men running all day and all night.

            He stood in the kitchen of Simon’s house on a Monday morning, looking awkward as he worked the brim of his hat through his fingers. Clark was barely thirty, but already his knowledge and patents had made him rich, a man with a fortune that grew larger each day. More wealth than many landowners. Yet money couldn’t disguise his discomfort around people, Simon thought. They weren’t as solid or reliable as numbers.

            ‘Please, take a seat,’ he said, but Clark gave a quick shake of his head. His suit was of the costliest wool, the linen of his shirt and stock starched pure white. But they might as well have come straight off the back of a beggar from the way he wore them. He carried the distracted air of a man who spent his life in another world.

            Clark cleared his throat then began to speak, pausing often as he searched for the words he wanted.

            ‘One of my assistants is named Harmony Jordan. He’s been with me since I began the business. A fortnight ago, his daughter died . . . she was just ten years old. The family lives in Headingley . . . she was buried in St Michael’s churchyard.’ He took a breath and Simon studied the man’s face. He was concentrating, marshalling the precise facts of what he needed to say. ‘A week later, the family went to lay flowers on the grave. It looked as if it had been . . . disturbed. Jordan called the sexton. When the gravediggers opened up the ground, they discovered that his daughter’s body had been removed from the coffin.’

            Simon heard Rosie gasp in horror. He knew what she was thinking: Richard and Amos. On the other side of him, Jane sat silent, staring straight ahead.

            ‘How long ago is it since they found the body was gone?’

            ‘It happened on Friday. But they don’t know when it was taken. Harmony told me on Saturday. That’s why I’m here, Mr Westow. I want to hire you.’

            Simon pursed his lips. ‘I’m a thief-taker. You know that. I find items that have been stolen.’

            ‘I do.’ Clark looked directly into his face. ‘Gwendolyn Jordan was stolen.’

            ‘I understand. But I don’t think I’m the person to help you.’

            The man cocked his head, taken aback. ‘Why not? It’s your work, isn’t it? Surely, taking bodies must be one of the worst things you can imagine.’

            ‘I don’t believe there could be anything worse,’ Simon agreed. He sighed. ‘You have to realize, Mr Clark: all I know about bodysnatching is what I’ve read in the newspapers. I’ve never even heard of it happening before in Leeds. You said Mr Jordan doesn’t know exactly when it happened?’

            ‘No. Just somewhere in the seven days between burial and discovery.’

            Simon chewed the inside of his lip as he thought. ‘The corpse could be anywhere by now. My understanding is that the surgeons and medical schools buy them to dissect for anatomy lessons. There are places in Edinburgh and London. Very likely a few other cities, too.’

            ‘That doesn’t help Harmony and his wife,’ Clark said.

            ‘No, of course not,’ Simon agreed. ‘Believe me, Mr Clark, I know that very well. I’m a parent too. What they’re going through must be unendurable. But do you realize that even if I found the people who did it and they were convicted, they’d only go to prison for a few weeks? Months at the most. The law is very clear: taking a body is only a misdemeanour. It’s not deemed to be property.’

            He saw Clark’s face harden. ‘What? Why, in God’s name?’

‘I wish I knew the answer to that.’

‘They also took the dress her parents had made for the burial.’

            ‘Did they?’ Simon pounced on the words. ‘That could make all the difference.’ A dress was property. If it cost enough, stealing it was a felony. The thieves could be transported, maybe even hanged.

            ‘I imagine they’ll have sold it in Leeds,’ Clark said. ‘I want you to find the men who did it.’

            Simon glanced at Jane. Her face showed nothing, hands pressed flat on the table. He’d wanted a short break from work, but this was a job they could do. No, more than that. This was one he had to do.

            ‘All right.’

            ‘I’ll pay you well beyond the value of the dress, don’t worry about that,’ the man continued. ‘And believe me, I will definitely fund the prosecution of the men behind all this.’

‘That’s your choice.’

‘I also want you to find out what happened to the body. Where it went, who bought it.’

            ‘I can try,’ Simon told him. ‘I can’t guarantee anything on that.’

            ‘Just give me a name,’ Clark said. ‘That’s all I need. I know people all over the country. Give me that and I’ll be able to discover where she is and bring her home.’ His expression softened. ‘Harmony has been with me from the start. He’s important to me.’

            Loyalty, friendship. Maybe there was more to the man than numbers.

As she walked home, Jane kept reading words. Anything at all, everything she saw. She was eager for them. All the signs above shops, the advertisements pasted to walls and fences. Her lips moved silently, forming the words, hearing them in her mind.

            When she was eight years old, after her father raped her, her mother had thrown her on to the streets. Survival became the only thing that mattered. Reading and writing couldn’t help her find food or somewhere to sleep. Now, her life had changed. She was settled. She had her work with Simon, and she’d found contentment living with Mrs Shields, the old woman with a gentle soul who owned the cottage hidden away behind Green Dragon Yard.

            The desire for change had arrived during the autumn. It had been growing through the year. An urge for something more in her life, something new. She’d asked Catherine Shields to teach her to read. As soon as she began to learn, she discovered she was hungry for it all, pushing herself, angry at her failure whenever she stumbled over a phrase or a spelling.

            ‘There’s no rush, child,’ Mrs Shields told her with a soft smile. ‘It’s not a race.’

            Jane drank it down, wanting more and more, to master everything. Rosie showed her numbers, how to add and subtract. One more thing she’d never had the chance to understand. A few times, when she was alone, she’d even scratched on some paper with a nib, trying to make her hand form letters and words.

            Then, just three weeks before, as she strolled along Commercial Street, Jane spotted a bolt of muslin in a seamstress’s window. She’d never paid attention to cloth or patterns. What was the need? Her clothes were old, they were garments for work, for wear and tear and dirt. She had money to afford better but she’d simply never had the urge. It was pointless, it was vanity.

But from nowhere the desire began to nag at her, imagining herself in a dress made from this material. For a week she denied it, telling herself it was frivolous and vain. She had no need of a new frock. Where did she ever go that demanded one? Yet finally she gave in, thrilled by the soft ring of the bell as she entered the shop.

            When the dress was finished and she tried it on, she didn’t recognize the young woman in the mirror. This wasn’t the person she imagined; it was nobody she knew. Long dark hair and a heart-shaped face that led down to the point of her chin.

            She ran her hands over the fabric. It was soft to the touch, rippling under her fingertips. A rich chocolate brown colour, with small designs the shade of ripe raspberries. Modestly cut, high over the bosom, nothing to draw attention. The first new garment she’d ever owned. Jane clutched the package under her arm as she walked up the Head Row.

            As soon as she reached the house, she tucked it away in a chest, unopened, still tied in its brown paper. Suddenly she felt ashamed that she’d bought it. It was too good to wear for work. An indulgence. Money wasted on a pointless whim.