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The second Ashcombe File
A Debt of Salt
Every port keeps two sets of books.
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About this book
A trawler comes home empty with a full manifest, and a page is missing from the ledger.
A trawler comes home empty with a full manifest, and the harbourmaster's ledger has a page missing. Ashcombe's second case is a lesson in how quickly a respectable port will close ranks around a profitable lie — and how far a family will go to keep a name on the door.
The author on this book
Do I need to read the Ashcombe Files in order?
Each case is solved within its own book, so you can start anywhere. That said, Ashcombe's own story runs straight through the series, and readers tell me the third book lands hardest if you've been there from the start.
How historically accurate is the setting?
The places are invented, the period isn't. The drainage of the fens, the decline of the coastal trade and the way a 1923 village closed ranks around its own are all drawn from the record.
Content guidance
A murder mystery of the period: bodies, blunt violence and the language of the time, handled without dwelling on detail.
Occasional period-appropriate swearing.
Murders described after the fact, not on the page.
Implied only.
Heavy drinking and tobacco throughout, true to the era.
Themes: Grief, Shell shock, Corruption
If you enjoyed...
The Sea Detective by Mark Douglas-Home
Coastline, tides and evidence that travels by water.
Raven Black by Ann Cleeves
A small community's silence treated as evidence in itself.
Reader reviews
I read it in two sittings
The fen itself is almost the villain. I could feel the damp coming off the page, and I didn't work out who had folded his hands for him until the last forty pages.
Harriet L. · verified purchase
Quiet, patient, then devastating
Marsh doesn't rush anything. She lets a village talk itself into a corner and then walks Ashcombe to the wall with it. The best historical mystery I have read this year.
Michael R. · verified purchase
Wonderful sense of place
I came for the period detail and stayed for the detective. One small wobble in the middle, but the ending more than earns it.
Priya N. · verified purchase
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Book details
Pages
334 (est.)
Word count
101,200
Chapters
34
Language
English
Published
4 November 2025
Also available on
Publisher
Ashcombe Press
The Ashcombe Files
"For the ones who came home with nothing and said nothing about it."