No graves as yet - Anne Perry

In Cambridge, in 1914, the golden June days seem timeless. But for Joseph Reavley, a university don, the idyllic summer is shattered by his parents' deaths in a car accident. Bringing the terrible news, his brother reveals that their father, a retired MP, had been travelling to see him about a sinister plot he had discovered. Matthew's job in the secret service means that he would understand the mysterious document their father possessed, but when the brothers hunt for it, the document is nowhere to be found. Returning after the funeral with their two sisters, Joseph and Matthew become convinced that their parents' house has been searched. Does someone else know of the missing document? As their suspicions grow, they visit the scene of the crash and examine their parents' ruined car, and find subtle evidence that their deaths may not have been accidental after all.

No Graves As Yet is the utterly compelling first of a five-novel sequence that is a searing, ambitious and masterly portrait of England through the First World War.