History’s Hidden Horrors, Resurrected

Missing, Murder Suspected: A True Crime Trilogy

A lost masterpiece of true crime, meticulously curated for a new generation. Missing, Murder Suspected unveils three haunting cases from 1920s–1940s Britain: a fiancée buried in a poultry farm, a doctor’s sinister secret sealed in his townhouse, and a fireman’s wartime fury concealed in a sack. Authored by Austin Stone and revived by his son, Edmund (Ed) J.A. Stone, this trilogy blends forensic precision with gripping storytelling, reconstructing each case with chilling authenticity.

These are not just crime stories—they are human tragedies resurrected from the depths of history. Justice wavers, motives unravel, and the past refuses to stay buried.

Read the cases that history forgot.

About the Book

Missing, Murder Suspected: A True Crime Trilogy

Beneath the polite facade of 20th-century Britain, dark secrets festered. Missing, Murder Suspected breathes life into three disturbing true crime cases, meticulously reconstructed from courtroom whispers, yellowed letters, and the cold precision of forensic reports.

Austin Stone’s storytelling is unflinching, stripping away speculation and rumor to expose raw, unsettling truth. His son, Edmund, has masterfully preserved and curated his father’s final work, ensuring each case unfolds with the eerie precision of a detective’s casebook.

  • The first, “Love and Hate amongst the Chickens,” was publicly known as ‘The Chicken Run Murder’ of 1924, where John Norman Thorne murdered his fiance, Elsie Cameron.
  • A House of Horror“: Also based on the true crime known as “The Buck Ruxton Jig-Saw Murders” of 1935. This crime involved the double murders by Dr. Buck Ruxton of his wife Isabella and her nursemaid Mary Rogerson.
  • The third, “Four Sacks for a Shroud,” is about the ‘Luton Sack Murder’ of 1943, where, during WW2, a London fireman, Bertie Manton, was driven into a killing rage by his wife, Rene.

These stories are not fiction—they are the echoes of real lives fractured by crime and fate. Missing, Murder Suspected invites you to witness the fragile line between justice and uncertainty.

About Book

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About the Author

Austin Stone (1904–1979)

Austin Stone didn’t just write about crime—he dissected it. A master of true crime narrative, his works pulse with the tension of real-life cases, revealing the cracks in human morality. Orphaned young by the Spanish Flu and shuffled through boarding schools and naval relatives, Stone’s fascination with the criminal mind took root early.

By his early thirties, Austin became a well known crime novelist and BBC playwright, earning acclaim for his starkly realistic narratives. He was a researcher as much as a writer, sifting through court transcripts, autopsy reports, and witness testimonies to reconstruct crimes with near-forensic detail. His final work, Missing, Murder Suspected, was rescued from obscurity by his son Edmund, ensuring his legacy of truth-seeking lives on.

To read Stone is to stand at the crime scene, to feel the weight of a judge’s gavel, and to question the very fabric of justice.

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For questions comments and media enquiries, please submit the form below and Ed Stone, the son of Austin Stone and editor of Missing, Murder Suspected, will get back to you soon. Thank you!

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