Books like The Edinburgh Detective — picked by fans

I grew up reading murder mysteries and watching old black-and-white films on television. As a teenager, I couldn’t get enough of Agatha Christie, Raymond Chandler, and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, and I loved challenging myself to solve the mystery before the end of the book, sometimes successfully, sometimes not. 

One thing I noticed in reading the classics is that LGBTQ+ people were either completely absent or used for comic relief or tragic effect. I wanted to change that with my stories, showing that they can be compelling protagonists, solving murders and sometimes finding love.

I grew up in Edinburgh, an amazingly atmospheric city riddled with tales of murder, mayhem, and spooky happenings. As a child, I spent many hours wandering around the closes, alleys, and graveyards. When at University, my Master's Thesis was on the influence of City Improvement on Crime in Victorian Dundee. The subject reawakened my interest in the subject and led directly to me writing a series of nonfiction Victorian crime books. These books led to me writing the Detective Watters fictional series, based mainly in Dundee. 

I grew up in Edinburgh, an amazingly atmospheric city riddled with tales of murder, mayhem, and spooky happenings. As a child, I spent many hours wandering around the closes, alleys, and graveyards. When at University, my Master's Thesis was on the influence of City Improvement on Crime in Victorian Dundee. The subject reawakened my interest in the subject and led directly to me writing a series of nonfiction Victorian crime books. These books led to me writing the Detective Watters fictional series, based mainly in Dundee. 

I grew up in Edinburgh, an amazingly atmospheric city riddled with tales of murder, mayhem, and spooky happenings. As a child, I spent many hours wandering around the closes, alleys, and graveyards. When at University, my Master's Thesis was on the influence of City Improvement on Crime in Victorian Dundee. The subject reawakened my interest in the subject and led directly to me writing a series of nonfiction Victorian crime books. These books led to me writing the Detective Watters fictional series, based mainly in Dundee. 

My fascination with crime fiction has come from reading about it. I have no idea how many novels I have read focused on baddies and the catching of them, but it’s numbering now in the many hundreds. I think the fact that a crime novel can incorporate elements of all other genres – horror, history, romance, the supernatural, etc. are what make them so appealing and add to the joy of writing them. Untangling the threads that make up a crime novel is very satisfying. Maybe in another reality, I would be a detective – I love that idea, but for now, in this bit of the multiverse, I’ll just carry on making them up.  

I’ve been fascinated by crime ever since I was a junior reporter working on a daily newspaper and covered a huge number of court cases. I’ve written all my working life and turned to crime writing after reaching the final of a UK TV channel’s Search for a New Crime Writer competition. I’ve built up contacts within the police force during my career which has enabled me to write Storm Deaths, the first in a series of police procedural crime novels. I’ve seen so many films and TV shows that don’t follow the proper procedure, so I ensure that all my writing is as authentic as possible. 

I like to write characters and situations that readers relate to and find reassurance from. Laughter comes from shared experiences of frustration and mistakes, it reassures us that we are normal and not alone, giving us a big hug when feeling overwhelmed or down. I love the healing power of comedy and use it in all my work. Reading how other authors use comedy improves my writing and expands my viewpoint. I also perform comedy with a mixture of storytelling, standup, and belly dancing, I learn from the audience's reaction and feedback, which not only feeds into my novels but makes me feel like a million dollars.

While one-off stories are fantastic, I love that children's series lets readers return to trusted characters. Series allow children to see a wider arc of character development and decision-making—often imperfect and in transition—when they are trying to figure out how to identify and connect with the world themselves. That shared experience over time is why I only write series myself—to let kids evolve alongside their favorite characters.

I’m fascinated by stories from the past. I worked for many years in museums and heritage, telling Scotland’s stories through exhibitions and nonfiction publications, but I was always drawn to the question best answered through historical fiction – what did that feel like? Well-researched historical fiction can take us right into the lives of people who lived through the dramatic events we read about in academic books. I found that each of the novels on my list transported me to a different time and place, and I hope you enjoy them, too.

I was asked in my final year at university, to choose between my degree and my dog. I’d kept a little Yorkshire terrier hidden in my Cambridge rooms for two years before he was discovered and he’d been lovely company as I plugged away at my reading there. I'm pretty confident that I'm the only student who has ever kept a dog at Trinity College. Because of the impact Lassie made on me as a child, I’ve always longed for a collie and now have space for one. He’s called Cedric and is as human and sentient as I. The first book I wrote was about a dog with the loyalty of all the dogs in the world, and with the love of all the dogs in the world.