1780. A time when graceful sailing ships plied the waters of the North Sea by day, but engaged lawlessness and subterfuge against His Majesty's excisemen by night. Kate Goldsmith, a young woman from Orford, falls in love with a dashing young sailor, but there is more to him than first appears. When she finds out the truth, she hides it from her family and the respectable miller's son who has come to court her. However, when Jack clashes with the preventive service and finds himself on the run, Kate becomes involved in his escape and unwittingly starts a feud between her two suitors.

Set amongst the marshy waterways, rustling reed beds and windblown heaths of Suffolk, Whispers in the Shingle tells a story of ordinary eighteenth-century folk, whose poverty drove many to a life of crime, encouraged and abetted by those who benefited from it.