Ann Cleeves Books in Order

Ann Cleeves is a multi-million-copy bestselling British crime writer best known for the Vera Stanhope, Shetland, and Two Rivers series. Raven Black won the Crime Writers’ Association’s Duncan Lawrie Dagger in 2006, and Ann Cleeves received the CWA Diamond Dagger in 2017. Her books been adapted into the television series Vera, Shetland, and The Long Call, and she was appointed OBE in 2022 for services to reading and libraries.

The setting is an important part of her books. On Shetland, Orkney, in Northumberland, or along the North Devon coast, the detective must understand the relationships between the victim and suspects in that specific community to figure out why the crime happened.

This page lists all Ann Cleeves books in order, including the George and Molly Palmer-Jones, Inspector Ramsay, Vera Stanhope, Shetland, Two Rivers, and Jimmy Perez and Willow Reeves series, her standalone novels, short stories, and nonfiction books.

Latest Ann Cleeves Books

George and Molly Palmer-Jones Series (Books in Order)

The George and Molly Palmer-Jones series follows elderly naturalist George Palmer-Jones and his wife Molly. Birdwatching takes them to reserves, islands, and small communities where they notice things they felt they needed to investigate. The books are traditional amateur-sleuth mysteries, and each case stands alone. Ann Cleeves began writing while living with her husband on the tidal island of Hilbre, and George’s birdwatching was inspired directly from that period of her life.

1. A Bird In The Hand, 1986
2. Come Death and High Water, 1987
3. Murder In Paradise, 1988
4. A Prey To Murder, 1989
5. Another Man’s Poison, 1992
6. Sea Fever, 1993
7. The Mill On The Shore, 1994
8. High Island Blues, 1996

Inspector Ramsay Series (Books in Order)

The Inspector Ramsay series follows Inspector Stephen Ramsay as he investigates murders in Northumberland villages and small towns. Ramsay is a quiet and sometimes uncertain detective who has to work through local relationships before people will tell him what happened.

These six novels were published during the 1990s and are separate from the later Vera books, even though both series is also set in Northumberland. All six Inspector Ramsay novels were reissued in new editions beginning in 2024.

1. A Lesson In Dying, 1990
2. Murder In My Backyard, 1991
3. A Day In The Death Of Dorothea Cassidy, 1992
4. Killjoy, 1993
5. The Healers, 1995
6. The Baby Snatcher, 1997

Vera Stanhope Series (Books in Order)

The Vera Stanhope series follows Northumberland-based Detective Inspector Vera Stanhope who usually looks untidy and allows witnesses and suspects to underestimate her. She listens, asks apparently casual questions to make people be less wary of her, and waits until people disclose more than they originally intended. Her team deals with the formal police work while Vera moves among the families and communities involved in the case.

The mysteries are each solved by the end of their book, but Vera’s past and her relationships with her colleagues develop across the books. The Crow Trap is the first novel, although Vera does not enter the story immediately.

Ann Cleeves has announced that there will be one final Vera novel after The Dark Wives, effectively ending the series..

1. The Crow Trap, 1999
2. Telling Tales, 2005
3. Hidden Depths, 2007
4. Silent Voices, 2011
5. The Glass Room, 2012
6. Harbour Street, 2014
7. The Moth Catcher, 2015
8. The Seagull, 2017
9. Frozen, 2020
10. The Darkest Evening, 2020
11. The Woman on the Island, 2022
12. The Rising Tide, 2022
13. The Dark Wives, 2024

Shetland Series (Books in Order)

The Shetland series follows Detective Inspector Jimmy Perez as he investigates various murders happening on the islands. Ferries, weather, and distance affect what the police can do, and since it’s a small community, victims, witnesses, and suspects all know each other.

The eight novels form two four-book arcs: the Four Seasons Quartet and the Four Elements Quartet. Each book has its own mystery, but Perez’s family life and his relationship with Willow Reeves change across the series. Wild Fire completes the Shetland novels. Perez’s story later continues in the Jimmy Perez and Willow Reeves series set in Orkney.

1. Raven Black, 2006
2. White Nights, 2008
3. Red Bones, 2009
4. Blue Lightning, 2010
5. Dead Water, 2013
6. Thin Air, 2014
7. Cold Earth, 2016
8. Too Good To Be True, 2016
9. Wild Fire, 2018
10. Missing in the Snow, 2023

Two Rivers Series (Books in Order)

The Two Rivers series, also called the Detective Matthew Venn series, follows DI Matthew Venn and his team, Jen Rafferty and Ross May, working at the Barnstaple police station in North Devon. Matthew grew up in the Barum Brethren, a strict evangelical community and left it as a young man when he realized he could no longer relate to their faith. After leaving, he was ostracized by his family and the community.

His husband, Jonathan, works at the Woodyard community arts center, and the two strongly support each other, especially when Matthew has to deal with very difficult cases, some of which bring Matthew back among people and institutions that are related to the life he once rejected.

1. The Long Call, 2019
2. The Heron’s Cry, 2021
3. The Girls on the Shore, 2022
4. The Raging Storm, 2023
5. The Dying Light, 2026

Jimmy Perez and Willow Reeves Series (Books in Order)

The Jimmy Perez and Willow Reeves series continues after Wild Fire, when the couple leave Shetland and make a new life with their family in Orkney. The Lonely Man is a short story set around their move, while The Killing Stones is the first full novel in the new series and gives Perez a murder case involving a childhood friend.

The Killing Stones has a mystery that is solved by the end of the book, but the Shetland series explains Jimmy and Willow’s history.

1. The Lonely Man, 2025
2. The Killing Stones, 2025

Standalone Novels

• The Sleeping and the Dead, 2001
• Burial of Ghosts, 2003

Short Story Collections

• Offshore, 2014
• The Starlings and Other Stories, 2015 (edited by Ann Cleeves)

Anthologies

Non-Fiction Books

• Shetland, 2015

Ann Cleeves Biography

Ann Cleeves is one of the UK’s best-known contemporary mystery authors, known for creating Vera Stanhope, Jimmy Perez, and Matthew Venn. Several of her detective series have been adapted for television.
Official website: anncleeves.com

Ann Cleeves was born in Herefordshire, on October 24, 1954. She grew up in Herefordshire and then North Devon, where her father worked as a village schoolteacher. Later studied English at the University of Sussex before leaving university early. She worked several temporary jobs, including child care officer, women’s refuge leader, auxiliary coastguard, and cook at the Fair Isle Bird Observatory, where she met her husband, ornithologist Tim Cleeves. She later returned to college and trained as a probation officer.

She lived with her husband on Hilbre Island in the Dee Estuary, where Tim was working as the reserve warden. During this time, she started writing the George Palmer-Jones series, using the birdwatching world as the background and starting point of her series. Her first novel, A Bird in the Hand, was published in 1986.

The family moved to Northumberland in 1987. The county later became the setting for both the Inspector Ramsay and Vera Stanhope novels. In 2006, Ann Cleeves started the Shetland series with Raven published in 2006. The book won the CWA’s Duncan Lawrie Dagger and brought Jimmy Perez to a much wider readership. She then began the North Devon-set Two Rivers series with The Long Call in 2019, then returned to Perez in The Killing Stones in 2025, moving him and Willow Reeves to Orkney in their own smaller series.

Ann Cleeves has served as a library reader-in-residence, helped establish reading groups in prisons, and supported Reading for Wellbeing in the North East. She received the CWA Diamond Dagger in 2017 and was appointed OBE in 2022 for services to reading and libraries. She lives in Northumberland.

Ann Cleeves Book Adaptations

• The Vera Stanhope series – adapted into the ITV television series Vera (2011-2025)
• The Jimmy Perez novels – adapted into the BBC One television series Shetland (2013-present)
• The Two Rivers series – adapted into the four-part television series The Long Call (2021)

Ann Cleeves Awards and Honors

Awards

• Raven Black – CWA Gold Dagger (2006)
• CWA Diamond Dagger (2017)
• The Long Call – Agatha Award for Best Contemporary Novel (2020)
• Theakston Old Peculier Outstanding Contribution Award (2023)

Nominations and Shortlists

• CWA Dagger in the Library (2003)
• Dead Water – McIlvanney Prize (2013)
• CWA Dagger in the Library (2015)
• Thin Air – McIlvanney Prize (2015)
• The Moth Catcher – Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year (2016)
• Cold Earth – McIlvanney Prize (2017)
• The Seagull -– Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year (2018)
• Wild Fire – Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year (2019)
• The Long Call – Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year (2020)
• The Heron’s Cry – Ned Kelly Award, Best International Crime Novel (2022)
• The Heron’s Cry – Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year (2022)
• The Raging Storm – Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year (2024)
• The Dark Wives – Agatha Award, Best Contemporary Novel (2025)
• The Dark Wives – ITW Award, Best Series Novel (2025)
• Parkrun – Short Story Dagger (2025)

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