A Plague On Both Your Houses: (Introducing Matthew Bartholomew) – In 1348, the inhabitants of Cambridge live under the shadow of a terrible pestilence that has ravaged Europe and is travelling relentlessly eastward towards England. Bartholomew is a physician whose unorthodox but effective treatment of his patients frequently draws accusations of heresy from his more traditional colleagues. Besides his practice, Bartholomew is teacher of Medicine at Michaelhouse, part of the fledgling University of Cambridge. And he finds that the sudden and inexplicable death of the Master of Michaelhouse  is something  the University authorities do not want investigated. When three more scholars die in mysterious circumstances, Bartholomew defies the University and begins his own enquiry. His pursuit for the truth leads him into a complex tangle of lies and intrigue, as the Black Death creeps closer to Cambridge.  An Unholy Alliance: Two years after the Black Death has decimated the population of England, a new killer is stalking the streets of Cambridge: a serial killer preying on the women of the small town. Matthew Bartholomew and his companion, the portly monk Brother Michael, must uncover the identity of the killer before he strikes again. Meanwhile, bands of homeless peasants roam the land, shunning lives of virtual slavery in the fields in favour of robbery and violence. The high death rate among priests and monks has left the people vulnerable to sinister cults that have grown up in the wake of the plague. During the course of their investigation, Bartholomew and Brother Michael are compelled to undertake the exhumation of a clerk, eavesdrop on a sinister meeting in an abandoned church, and engage in a hair-raising chase on horseback to save their lives as they close in on an evil coven taking advantage of the despair caused by the plague.