http://www.amazon.com/Upright-James-Blakiston-Series-ebook/dp/B00CZ5E7XO
The first in a five book series that grew out of the author's love for
the part of England where he grew up and his family's centuries old
roots there. James Blakiston, transferred from a pleasant life in the
south to the austere north by a family disaster, finds the people and
their ways challenging—dress, manners, weather, the religious
atmosphere and the language used are all different from anything he
has known in his preceding twenty-four years of life. He would have
enough on his plate without Reuben Cooper's cottage burning to the
ground and his remains being found in the ashes. The hole in his head
says that he was murdered. Blakiston sets himself to find the killer,
with not a clue how to go about it. There is as yet no Scotland Yard,
no police force, no detectives and Blakiston has to make the rules for
himself. As if all that were not enough, he falls hopelessly in love
with Kate Greener. But how can a man of his class contemplate union
with a labourer's daughter? This much is clear: if he wants Kate
without marriage, he will have to force her—and that he will not,
cannot do. Kate knows how he feels about her—anyone who watched him
would know how he feels about her—and this spirited girl is not
without her wiles. The title, A Just and Upright Man, is taken from
the Book of Job—and no-one could blame Blakiston if he felt that Job's
woes were being revisited on him.