When a bomb explodes in the office of London's most unusual police unit, it claims the life of its oldest detective, Arthur Bryant. As his surviving partner John May searches for clues to the bomber's identity, he finds his investigation taking him back to the day the detectives first met as young men in 1940.

Returning to the Victoria Cross pub hours after witnessing the murder of a woman, Detective Arthur Bryant is stunned to discover that the pub itself has vanished and the street around it has mysteriously aged, and calls in the Peculiar Crimes Unit to track down a killer who is stalking London's oldest watering holes.

"The brilliant duo of Arthur Bryant and John May uncover a nefarious plot behind the seemingly innocuous death of an old lady--and when the case leads them to the London Bridge, it all comes down on the Peculiar Crimes Unit. Ninety-one-year-old Alice Hoffman died alone in her top-floor flat. Social services say she slipped through the cracks in a failing system. But detectives Arthur Bryant and John May of the Peculiar Crimes Unit have their suspicions....