Judy Chard has had a life-long interest in crime and until recently was a member of the Crime Writers' Club. She has written numerous articles and short stories for both national and local magazines and newspapers and for five years edited Devon Life.
She is also well-known to listeners of BBC Radio 2 and Radio Devon.
In her latest book, Judy has chosen a number of intriguing stories to retell, ranging from the 17th to 20th century. In fact, one is very much in the news at the moment, being the story of the disappearance of Pat Allen and her two children from their home in Salcombe in 1975.
At the time the book was written police had re-opened the case, but since then the husband has been arrested and charged in relation to the disappearance.
Another of the more recent stories is that of the eerie disappearance of Donald Crowhurst in 1963. Despite being a poor sailor, Donald had ambitions to win the round-the-world Golden Globe Race. The Teignmouth man was declared the victor, but went missing from his craft before returning home.
The well-stocked boat was subsequently found to be harbouring two mysterious log books which revealed an amazing deception.
From earlier in the 1900s comes the account of two murders, far apart distance-wise, but apparently linked by the fact that both victims had had one hand from their wristwatch removed, together with their left shoe. The mystery remains unsolved.
A house in Torquay was the scene of an experience like 'something from hell' for three young men in the early part of the same century. What they experienced when they decided to enter a derelict building called Castel-a-Mare left them terrified. Was it the legacy of a murderous doctor who killed both his wife and his maid or was the doctor an innocent victim?
The house was eventually pulled down, but the reader is left wondering whether the site is still haunted by its disturbing past.
The 17th century smuggler William Oatway's home — Chambercombe Manor near Ilfracombe — is the location of ghostly appearances. In 1865 a secret room was discovered in the house, inside which the skeleton of a young woman lay on a four-poster bed.
No-one knows the identity of the body or why it was concealed, although it may have been the smuggler's daughter. But residents and visitors of the house have reported hearing laboured footsteps, as of a person carrying a corpse, climbing up a ghostly set of stairs.
The Oxenham family of South Tawton has been plagued by a strange curse since the 1600s. The form of a white-breasted bird is said to hover over family members, boding imminent death. The most tragic encounter, affecting Sir James Oxenham and his daughter Margaret, is described by the author, seeming to prove the verity of the curse, or 'fetch'.
'Devon Tales of Mystery and Murder' is published by Countryside Books, price £7.95, and is available from all local booksellers.