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Val McDermid

12 books

Books by Val McDermid

Broken ground by Val McDermid (2018)

When a body is discovered in the remote depths of the Highlands, DCI Karen Pirie finds herself in the right place at the right time. Unearthed with someone's long-buried inheritance, the victim seems to belong to the distant past - until new evidence suggests otherwise, and Karen is called in to unravel a case where nothing is as it seems. It's not long before an overheard conversation draws Karen into the heart of a different case, however - a shocking crime she thought she'd already prevented. As she inches closer to the twisted truths at the centre of these murders, it becomes clear that she's dealing with a version of justice terrifyingly different to her own.

Insidious Intent by Val McDermid (2017)

"In Insidious Intent, Tony and Carol are on the hunt for a serial killer who forces the duo to confront their most haunting moral dilemma so far. In the north of England, single women are beginning to disappear from weddings. A pattern soon becomes clear: someone is crashing the festivities and luring the women away--only to leave the victims' bodies in their own burned-out cars in remote locations. Tony and Carol are called upon to investigate--but this may be the toughest case they've ever had to face"--

Splinter the silence by Val McDermid (2015)

"Is it violence if it's virtual? The outspoken women targeted by the increasingly cruel Internet trolls and bullies would probably say so. For some of them, the torrents of bile and vicious threats prove too much. They begin to silence themselves in a series of high-profile suicides. Or do they? Tony Hill isn't convinced. But he's the only one. Former cop Carol Jordan is too busy messing up her life to care. Until she gets an unexpected second chance. Now it's game on, and the stakes have never been higher" --

The Skeleton Road by Val McDermid (2014)

"In the center of historic Edinburgh, builders are preparing to convert a disused Victorian Gothic building into luxury flats. They are understandably surprised to find skeletal remains hidden in a high pinnacle that hasn't been touched by maintenance for years. But who do the bones belong to, and how did they get there? Could the eccentric British pastime of free climbing the outside of buildings play a role? Enter cold case detective Karen Pirie, who gets to work trying to establish the corpse's identity. And when it turns out that the bones may be from as far away as former Yugoslavia, Karen will need to dig deeper than she ever imagined into the tragic history of the Balkans: to war crimes and their consequences, and ultimately to the notion of what justice is and who serves it"--

Cross and Burn (Tony Hill / Carol Jordan) by Val McDermid (2013)

Someone is brutally killing women. Women who bear a striking resemblance to former DCI Carol Jordan. The connection is too strong to ignore and soon psychological profiler Tony Hill finds himself dangerously close to the investigation, just as the killer is closing in on his next target. This is a killer like no other, hell-bent on inflicting the most severe and grotesque punishment on his prey. As the case becomes ever-more complex and boundaries begin to blur, Tony and Carol must work together once more to try and save the victims, and themselves.

The vanishing point by Val McDermid (2012)

When a dying reality television star's child is snatched at an international airport, ghost writer and guardian Stephanie Harker assists the FBI's search while investigating the family's past to discover a motive for the abduction.

The retribution by Val McDermid (2011)

Jacko Vance is an ex-celebrity and sociopath whose brilliance and utter lack of remorse have never left Tony's mind in the ten years since his imprisonment. Now Jacko has escaped from prison, and he is focused on wreaking revenge on Tony and Carol for his years spent in prison.

Fever of the Bone by Val McDermid (2009)

Meet Tony Hill's most twisted adversary - a killer with a shopping list of victims, a killer unmoved by youth and innocence, a killer driven by the most perverted desires ... When teenager Jennifer Maidment's murdered and mutilated body is discovered, it is clear that there is a dangerous psychopath on the loose. But it's not long before Tony and DCI Carol Jordan realise it's just the start of a brutal and ruthless campaign targeting an apparently unconnected group of young people. Their chameleon-like killer is chatting with them online, pretending to share their interests and beliefs - and then luring them to their deaths. But just when Tony should be at the heart of the hunt, he's pushed to the margins by Carol's cost-cutting boss and replaced by a dangerously inexperienced profiler. Struggling with the newly awakened ghosts of his own past and desperate for distraction in his work, Tony battles to find the answers that will give him personal and professional satisfaction in his most nerve-shattering investigation yet. Psychologically gripping and relentlessly paced, 'Fever of the Bone' is the perfect introduction for those who have not yet discovered the damaged but brilliant criminal profiler Tony Hill and DCI Carol Jordan, best known from ITV's award-winning 'Wire in the Blood'.

A darker domain by Val McDermid (2008)

Twenty-five years ago, the daughter of Scotland's richest man and her baby son were kidnapped and held to ransom. But Catriona Grant ended up dead and little Adam's fate is still unknown. When a new clue is discovered in a deserted Tuscan villa -- along with grisly evidence of a recent murder -- cold case expert DI Karen Pirie is assigned to follow the trail. She's already working a case from the same year. During the Miners' Strike of 1984, pit worker Mick Prentice vanished. He was presumed to have broken ranks and fled south with other 'scabs'! but Karen finds that the reported events of that night don't add up. Where did he really go? And is there a link to the Grant mystery?

Beneath the Bleeding by Val McDermid (2007)

Tony Hill, criminal profiler and hero of TV's Wire in the Blood, is back in a terrifying psychological thriller from bestselling author Val McDermidA city is mourning. Bradfield Victoria's star midfielder has been murdered, bizarrely poisoned in an apparently motiveless killing. Then a bomb blast rips through the football stadium. Dozens lie dead, many more injured. Is it a terrorist attack or a vendetta against the Vics? Or something even more sinister? As he lies in a hospital bed, psychologist and profiler Dr Tony Hill struggles to make sense of the fragments of information he manages to gather. But his customary ally, DCI Carol Jordan, is being pushed to the margins of the investigation by intelligence services determined to prove themselves indispensable. It wouldn't be so bad if Tony and Carol could agree about who they're looking for. But even their relationship has its dislocations and dark places. Beneath the Bleeding sets Tony and Carol at odds as they have never been before, forcing them to ask questions of themselves they would never have imagined possible.

The Grave Tattoo by Val McDermid (2006)

When torrential summer rains uncover a bizarrely tattooed body on a Lake District hillside, old wives' tales also come swirling to the surface. For centuries Lakelanders have whispered that Fletcher Christian staged the massacre on Pitcairn so that he could return home. And there he told his story to an old friend and schoolmate, William Wordsworth, who turned it into a long narrative poem - a poem that remained hidden lest it expose Wordsworth to the gallows for harbouring a fugitive. Wordsworth specialist Jane Gresham, herself a native of the Lake District, feels compelled to discover once and for all whether the manuscript ever existed - and whether it still exists today.