Riot Act	Click book cover   for larger image
		Busted Flush Press US Trade Paperback July 2010	ISIS Publishing UK Large Print Apr 2010	Piatkus Books UK Hardback Aug 2002 Paperback Mar 2003

Riot Act is the second book in the Charlie Fox series . . .

'I am a violent man, Miss Fox,' Garton-Jones said, without bravado or inflection. 'I can − and will − do whatever is necessary to control this estate. Remember that.'

A self-defence expert with a motorbike and an attitude, Charlie Fox doesn't need to go looking for trouble. It generally finds her. House-sitting for a friend seems like an easy favour at first but the house in question is in the Lavender Gardens estate. Teenage gangs are running riot and Charlie's desperate neighbours have been forced to employ an expensive − and ruthless − security firm to apply rough justice where the legal kind has failed. The situation gets even uglier when a young Asian boy is fatally wounded in what appears to be a racially motivated shooting.

Caught in the middle of an urban battlefield, Charlie's more than able to take care of herself but then she comes face to face with a spectre from her army past. As the tensions rise, lives will depend on Charlie working out just who she can really trust . . .

From the author's notebook

I started writing Riot Act at the end of 2000, and was hoping people would believe the plot because at that time there hadn't been any race riots in northern cities for around five years. I was amazed when Bradford, Burnley and Oldham erupted into violence during the summer of 2001.

Friday, the Rhodesian Ridgeback Charlie is looking after in Riot Act, was originally going to be a very peripheral character, but he rewrote his part when I wasn't looking and grew into a major player. The first draft didn't tell you what happened to the dog at the end, but complaints from my test readers ensured I added a note into the epilogue about the dog's fate.