Val McDermid is a Scottish novelist of crime fiction, best known for her suspense novels featuring Tony Hill and Carol Jordan. Her other characters include lesbian journalist Lindsay Gordon and private investigator Kate Brannigan. McDermid considers her books to fall under the Tartan Noir crime fiction genre.

McDermid’s first novel was Report for Murder in 1987, part of the Lindsay Gordon series. Since ’87, she has written several different novels in all three of her series. Below is a list of Val McDermid’s published works in order of when they were originally released and in chronological order:

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Publication Order of Allie Burns Books

1979 (2021)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
1989 (2022)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price

Publication Order of Inspector Karen Pirie Books

The Distant Echo (2003)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
A Darker Domain (2008)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
The Skeleton Road (2014)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Out of Bounds (2016)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Broken Ground (2018)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Still Life (2020)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Past Lying (2023)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price

Publication Order of Kate Brannigan Books

Dead Beat (1992)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Kick Back (1993)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Crack Down (1994)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Clean Break (1995)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Blue Genes (1996)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Star Struck (1998)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price

Publication Order of Lindsay Gordon Books

Report For Murder (1987)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Common Murder (1989)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Final Edition / Open and Shut / Deadline for Murder (1991)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Union Jack / Conferences Are Murder (1993)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Booked For Murder (1996)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Hostage To Murder (2003)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price

Publication Order of Tony Hill/Carol Jordan Books

The Mermaids Singing (1995)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
The Wire In The Blood (1997)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
The Last Temptation (2002)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
The Torment of Others (2004)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Beneath the Bleeding (2007)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Fever of the Bone (2009)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
The Retribution (2011)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Cross and Burn (2013)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Splinter the Silence (2015)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Insidious Intent (2017)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Footloose (With: Peter James) (2019)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
How the Dead Speak (2019)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price

Publication Order of Standalone Novels

A Place of Execution (1999)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Killing the Shadows (2000)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
The Grave Tattoo (2006)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Trick of the Dark (2010)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
The Vanishing Point (2012)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price

Publication Order of Short Stories/Novellas

Cleanskin (2006)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Life's Too Short (2010)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price

Publication Order of Short Story Collections

Writing on the Wall and Other Stories (1997)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Stranded (2004)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Christmas is Murder (2020)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price

Publication Order of Graphic Novels

Resistance (2021)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price

Publication Order of Picture Books

My Granny Is a Pirate (2012)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price

Publication Order of Non-Fiction Books

A Suitable Job for a Woman (1994)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Forensics: What Bugs, Burns, Prints, DNA and More Tell Us About Crime (2014)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
My Scotland (2019)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price

Publication Order of Austen Project Books

Sense & Sensibility (By: Joanna Trollope) (2013)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Northanger Abbey (2014)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Emma (By: Alexander McCall Smith) (2014)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Eligible (By: Curtis Sittenfeld) (2016)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price

Publication Order of The MatchUp Collection Books

Honor & ... (By: C.J. Box,Sandra Brown) (2017)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Deserves to Be Dead (By: John Sandford,Lisa Jackson) (2017)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Getaway (By: Lisa Scottoline,Nelson DeMille) (2017)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Midnight Flame (By: Christopher Rice,Lara Adrian) (2018)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Short Story (By: Karin Slaughter,Michael Koryta) (2019)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Past Prologue (By: Diana Gabaldon,Steve Berry) (2019)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Faking a Murderer (By: Lee Child,Kathy Reichs) (2019)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Dig Here (By: Charlaine Harris,Andrew Gross) (2019)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Taking the Veil (By: J.A. Jance,Eric Van Lustbader) (2019)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Rambo on Their Minds (By: Gayle Lynds,David Morrell) (2019)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Footloose (With: Peter James) (2019)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price

Publication Order of Murderous Christmas Stories Books

Murder under the Christmas Tree: Ten Classic Crime Stories for the Festive Season (2016)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Murder on Christmas Eve (2017)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
A Very Murderous Christmas: Ten Classic Crime Stories for the Festive Season (2018)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Anthology series.

Publication Order of Anthologies

12 Days: A Modern Twist on The Twelve Days of Christmas(2000)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Naked Came the Phoenix(2001)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
The World's Finest Mystery and Crime Stories 3(2002)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Tart Noir(2003)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Like a Charm(2004)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
The Adventure of the Missing Detective and 19 of the Year's Finest Crime and Mystery Stories(2005)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Magnetic North(2005)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
A Merry Band of Murderers(2006)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Criminal Tendencies(2009)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
The Sounds Of Crime(2010)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
The Library Book(2012)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
The Killer Cookbook(2012)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Inherit the Dead(2013)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
OxCrimes: 27 Killer Stories from the Cream of Crimewriters(2014)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Crime Writers: A Decade of Crime(2016)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Crime Plus Music(2016)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
MatchUp(2017)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Exit Wounds(2019)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Bloody Scotland(2019)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Imagine A Country(2020)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price
Marple: Twelve New Mysteries(2022)Best Hardcover PriceBest Paperback PriceBest Kindle Price

Notes: Final Edition was published as both Open and Shut and Deadline for Murder in the United States. Union Jack was published as Conferences are Murder in the United States. Naked Came the Phoenix is a collaborative novel with contributions by Nevada Barr, Mary Jane Clark, Diana Gabaldon, J.A. Jance, Faye Kellerman, Laurie R. King, Perri O’Shaughnessy, Anne Perry, Nancy Pickard, J.D. Robb, Lisa Scottoline and Marcia Talley. Magnetic North also contains contributions by Neil Astley, Andrew Crumey, Julia Darling, Sean O’Brien and Jacob Polley.

If You Like Val McDermid Books, You’ll Love…

Val McDermid Synopses: A Place of Execution is a standalone novel by Val McDermid. December, 1963: Two children have vanished from the Manchester streets; Myra Hindley and Ian Brady’s criminal careers have begun. Another child goes missing on a cold winter day: Alison Carter, a young girl of thirteen, vanishes from her isolated community, which has little faith in the outside world. It marks the beginning of George Bennett’s most difficult and traumatic case, a young inspector who just got promoted: a murder without a body, an investigation with more dead ends and closed faces than he would have discovered in the anonymity of the inner city, and a result that has reverberated over time. He finally tells his story to journalist Catherine Heathcote after decades, but Bennett unjustly tries to pull the plug just as the book is about to be published. He holds new information that he refuses to share, information that poses a threat to his very existence. The results of Catherine’s forced re-investigation of the past turn the world upside down.

In Killing the Shadows by Val McDermid, a murderer is on the loose who blurs the line between reality and fiction. The authors of crime novels who have made psychological profilers into heroes of the 1990s are his prey. However, this savage is unlike any other. The conventional wisdom regarding the motivations and workings of serial killers is shattered by his bloodlust. And the desperate search for his identity becomes a matter of life and death for one woman.

The Grave Tattoo is a standalone title by Val McDermid. Long-forgotten old wives’ tales take on a chilling new credence when a bizarrely tattooed body is discovered on a hillside in the Lake District after torrential summer rains. Lakelanders have been spreading the rumor that Fletcher Christian orchestrated the massacre on Pitcairn so that he could return home for centuries. He also told his story to William Wordsworth, an old friend and classmate, who turned it into a long narrative poem. Wordsworth kept the poem a secret so that he wouldn’t face the gallows for keeping a fugitive. Jane Gresham, a Wordsworth expert and Lake District native, is driven to determine definitively whether the manuscript ever existed and whether it is still in existence today. However, death relentlessly pursues her as she follows each new lead. Jane finds herself suddenly at the center of a 200-year-old mystery with the potential to endanger lives. A drama of life and death unfolds against the dramatic backdrop of England’s Lake District, with millions of dollars as the ultimate prize.

Order of Books » Authors » Order of Val McDermid Books

4 Responses to “Order of Val McDermid Books”

  1. Marilyn Hollenbaugh: 6 years ago

    Need some help here: OUT OF BOUNDS p.374, “to keep the ASPIDISTRA flying”? My efforts only reveal the plant and Greek “shield”. What is the author’s meaning?

    Reply

    • Sheila Jones: 6 years ago

      Couldn’t find the passage at page 374 in my paperback edition. I’d have to read it in context to try and explain the meaning. Sorry.

      Reply

  2. John Overend: 10 years ago

    I have now read five of her novels and have another four at the ready. I am hooked on her stories.

    Reply

  3. John Overend: 11 years ago

    Read my first Val McDermid novel (Beneath the Bleeding) – will certainly be reading more of her work – first class!

    Reply

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