Narrated by Peter Wickham
#1. Maxwell's House [1994], 8 hours 44 mins
A deeply cynical view of modern British schools pervades this absorbing series
launch, which pits a dedicated teacher who prides himself on his eccentricity,
against a killer, the police and the educational establishment. After 17-year-
old Jennifer Hyde is found dead, ostensibly after being raped, in a deserted
building called the Red House near Birmingham, the police, led by ambitious
Chief Inspector Henry Hall, mobilize their resources. But one of her teachers,
Peter Maxwell the head of sixth form at Leighford High aka Mad Max to his
students and some of his colleagues, feels responsibility for her fate and
decides to investigate, questioning police effectiveness and dedication...
#2. Maxwell's Flame [1995], 8 hours 17 mins
Peter Maxwell didn't want to attend the GNVQ (a certificate of vocational
education in the UK) course. He didn't want to get mixed up in murder either -
but perhaps it was all part of death's rich tapestry. And while a disparate
gathering of teachers was breaking ice upstairs at the Carnforth Centre,
someone else was in the basement - breaking skulls. But what the killer couldn't
have foreseen was that one of the victims was an old flame of Maxwell's. So now
it was personal. And when "Mad Max" takes something personally, he doesn't get
madder, he gets results!
#3. Maxwell's Movie [1997], 7 hours 25 mins
The school trip to the Museum of the Moving Image was Peter Maxwell's idea.
It results in the disappearance of one of his colleagues, Alice Goode, and
sixth-former Ronnie Parsons. Maxwell's subsequent search takes him to the
sleazy world of Soho, to blackmail, vice and murder!
#4. Maxwell's War [1999] , 8 hours 8 mins Read by Christopher Scott.
The Whitsun half term is usually a time for history teacher Peter Maxwell to
put his feet up, drop his guard and oil his bicycle chain. But not this time.
Maxwell's brief idyll is cut short by a desperate call for help from an old
school friend, Cambridge lecturer John Irving, who is acting as historical
advisor to a film company making a bodice-ripper. They need military know-how
and Irving hasn't a clue. Filming is interrupted when the director is shot dead
during a staged skirmish on the beach. The gun that did the killing was fired
by one of Maxwell's 6th formers earning a few bob as an extra, and Maxwell
himself had given the order to fire!
#5. Maxwell's Curse [2000], 8 hours 24 mins
31 December 2000 history teacher Peter 'Mad Max' Maxwell sits down to celebrate
the Millennium, the proper one, of course. Shortly before 12 o'clock the doorbell
rings, and he finds a dead woman on his doorstep. That's the start of the fifth
novel in M.J. Trow's Maxwell series. The particulars of the case this time points
to witchcraft. The background is well-researched, and, like the earlier novels in
this series, Maxwell's Curse is exciting and fun. The unlikely hero of an
eccentric history teacher once again picks up the challenge and battles crime.
#6. Maxwell's Ride [2000], 8 hours 15 mins
Peter "Mad Max" Maxwell's two precocious nieces insist he takes them to a theme
park. While riding the Wild Water, a passenger is killed in the float ahead, and
Maxwell and the girls become eyewitnesses to murder. The dead man was an
accountant working with CHARTS, a charity organisation sponsoring Leighford High
School where Maxwell works. Mad Max delves into CHARTS and begins to unearth
a complex web of murky secrets.
#7. Maxwell's Reunion [2001], 8 hours 23 mins
When Peter Maxwell attends a school reunion of the class of '65, all is not as
it seems among his old chums. They are career men, family men - but the years
have taken their toll, and the seething tensions of the school years surface in
unlikely ways. At the end of the reunion weekend, a man is dead, hanging from
the bell rope of the old school. When a second death occurs, Maxwell finds
himself in the midst of a murder investigation. What is the secret that has been
lurking under Maxwell's nose all these years - and could he be on the murderer's
list for killing No. 3?
#8. Maxwell's Match [2002], 10 hours 31 mins
As part of a two-week staff exchange scheme, Peter 'Mad Max' Maxwell is swapping
the delights of Leighford High for the altogether more sophisticated charms of
local private school, Grimmonds. This is a school where the teachers wear gowns,
a school with interhouse rugby, debating societies and fencing lessons. It's
a far cry from his familiar comprehensive - Grimmods is steeped in tradition and
dripping with money. But within a day of stepping through the imposing school
gates, Maxwell has yet again stumbled upon an unnatural death. One of the
Housemasters has fallen from the school roof - but did he jump or was he pushed?
Two days later another teacher is found floating in the lake and this time it's
definitely murder....
#9. Maxwell's Inspection [2003], 9 hours 38 mins
There comes a time in every teacher's life when he must face his Nemesis -
the four-yearly Ofsted Inspection. The team arrives at Leighford High one
glorious summer and proceeds to stick its collective nose into various
classrooms. The immediate problem of Head of Sixth Form, Peter Maxwell, is
the attractive and vivacious Sally Meninger, a Humanities expert who proceeds
to cast aspersions on Maxwell's metier as a teacher. Out on the town one night
to relieve the tension, the Head of Sixth Form finds her in an intimate
situation with her fellow Inspector, Alan Whiting. On the third day, with the
atmosphere at the High School decidedly fraught, Whiting is found stabbed to
death in the office set aside for the Inspection team...
#10. Maxwell's Grave [2004], 9 hours 57 mins (Thanks to Telpointer)
When Peter 'Mad Max' Maxwell took his kids from Leighford High on an
archaeological dig, all should have been learning and fun. The professionals
were very excited - was the grave they had found that of Alfred the Great?
No, because the corpse was not Saxon and it wasn't a king, but an altogether
more recent murder. No sooner has the first body been found than a second,
a policeman on the case, is found dead at the wheel of his car. What knowledge
did he possess that led to his death?
#11. Maxwell's Mask [2005], 10 hours 43 mins
Deena Harrison was one of Leighford High School's 'characters'. She set fire
to the toilet block when she was eleven, and threw Ollie Wendell down the
science lab stairs soon after her twelfth birthday. But she had the voice of
an angel and could act the skin off a rice pudding, so Mr Diamond, the
headteacher, invoked all sorts of inclusion clauses and EU Equal Opportunities
initiatives to keep her on. The autumn she came down from Oxford, there was
something of a crisis in the drama department at Leighford High. Mrs Carmichael
was in danger of losing her baby and the Little Shop of Horrors was in danger
of closing down. So Deena came back - just to help out. And people started
dying. But Deena's old Head of Sixth Form had a habit of solving murders ...
Mad Max is once again on his bike.
#12. Maxwell's Point [2007], 10 hours 11 mins
With girlfriend DS Jacquie Carpenter back at work and little baby Nolan rapidly
growing into a feisty toddler, Peter 'Mad Max' Maxwell, Head of Sixth Form at
Leighford High, decides to hire an au pair. The exotic Juanita Reyes hails from
the sun-drenched isle of Menorca, and whilst the good old British weather can't
hold a candle to the Menorcan sun, Juanita doesn't appear to mind a bit. She
seems perfectly happy in the sleepy little seaside town, doting on baby Nolan
and working hard to improve her English. Then one afternoon Max returns home
to find Nolan gurgling happily in his cot, but sees no sign of his au pair;
the lovely Juanita has disappeared into thin air. Meanwhile, two ramblers are
surprised and more than a little disturbed when Patches the border Collie digs
up an arm, which presumably belongs to a body, on Dead Man's Point-the lonely
cliff top rising high over the sea...
#13. Maxwell's Chain [2008], 10 hours 14 mins
Peter 'Mad Max' Maxwell is a very busy man; as Head of Sixth Form at Leighford
High he does his best to resist Ofsted imperatives and mark GCSE coursework,
whilst trying to cram as much History as possible into the reluctant heads of
Nine Eff Gee and their like. Despite this, Max still finds time for some
amateur sleuthing, even though his policewoman 'Significant Other', DS Jacquie
Carpenter, has decided that this time he's leaving any murder investigations
to her. But how can he refuse when the terminally nervous school photographer
asks for his help after accidentally photographing a murder on the beach?
Their discovery of a body buried in the sand dunes sets in motion a chain of
events that only the redoubtable Mad Max can break, but one thing is certain;
life in Leighford will never be the same again...
#14. Maxwell's Revenge [2009], 9 hours 52 mins
With the beginning of a new school year under way, Peter 'Mad Max' Maxwell
prepares to get stuck into his curricular routine and is looking forward to
his forthcoming wedding to fiancee DS Jacquie Carpenter. The immediate task in
hand for senior staff members is the hiring of a new assistant head teacher,
for which the school caterers have prepared a private buffet. But during the
lunch meeting, disaster strikes, as guests and staff alike become seriously
ill in a matter of minutes. After being reluctantly thrust into the role of
acting headmaster, Maxwell works in conjunction with the police, including his
lovely Jacquie, to try to unravel the mystery. But with certain fingers pointing
at him and Jacquie worried that the attack has infiltrated his life in a way that
could soon get out of control, is Maxwell in more danger than he thinks?
#15. Maxwell's Retirement [2010], 9 hours 53 mins (Thanks to Yo_M)
Leighford High.s Head of Sixth Form, Peter Maxwell, has a complete aversion to
technology. Computers and mobile phones, texts and emails; these are not things
that .dinosaur. Mad Max wants to know about. However, it soon becomes of vital
importance that he learns when some of his female pupils start receiving strange
and threatening messages, from an unknown sender who claims to know intimate
details about the girls. personal lives. Then Max starts receiving them too, and
two of the girls go missing. When a body is found it seems that the prank has
taken a sinister turn. With threats to his own life, will Max manage to solve
the case and reach his retirement?
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