Deze serie volgt het leven van Frank Elder, een voormalige politieagent uit Nottingham die zich terugtrekt in het rustige kustplaatsje Cornwall. Ondanks dat hij een vredig leven zoekt, trekken zijn verleden en een aanhoudende drang naar gerechtigheid hem voortdurend naar nieuwe onderzoeken. De verhalen combineren meeslepend detectivewerk met diepgaande karakterstudies en een reflectieve kijk op ouder worden en nalatenschap.
Following his wife's betrayal and his own retirement from the force, Detective Inspector Elder has fled as far as it is possible to go in England without running out of land. But he is haunted by the past and in particular by the unsolved disappearance of 16-year-old Susan Blacklock back in 1988.
When the take-down of a violent criminal goes badly wrong, something doesn't feel right to Detective Sergeant Maddy Birch, and her uneasiness is compounded by her belief that someone is following her home.
Called once again out of retirement when his ex-wife asks for his help in locating a friend's missing sister, former cop Frank Elder uncovers disturbing secrets about the woman's sexual life before discovering her dead at home.
When his estranged daughter Katherine appears on his doorstep, ex-Detective Frank Elder knows that something is wrong. Katherine has long been troubled, and Elder has always felt powerless to help her. But now she has begun to self-destruct. The breakdown of her affair with a controversial artist has sent her into a tailspin that culminates in murder. And as Elder struggles to protect his daughter and prove her innocence, the terrors of the past threaten them both once more...