Alan parks
Agent: Isobel Dixon
Assistant: Finlay Charlesworth
Alan was born in Scotland and attended The University of Glasgow where he was awarded a M.A. in Moral Philosophy. He still lives and works in the city that is so vividly depicted in the 1970s setting of his Harry McCoy thrillers, and in his WWII series opener GUNNER.
He was Creative Director at London Records in the mid 1990’s, then at Warner Music, where he created ground-breaking campaigns for artists including All Saints, New Order, The Streets, Gnarls Barclay and Cee Lo Green. His debut novel BLOODY JANUARY propelled him onto the international literary crime fiction scene immediately and his work has been sold in many languages and recognised by critics and prize judges alike.
BLOODY JANUARY was shortlisted for the Grand Prix de Littérature Policière; FEBRUARY’S SON was nominated for an Edgar Award; BOBBY MARCH WILL LIVE FOREVER won the 2022 Edgar Award for Paperback Original, the 2023 Prix Mystère de la Critique and was shortlisted for the Macavity Award for Best Mystery Novel as well as being a The Times ‘Best Book of the Year’ pick; THE APRIL DEAD was shortlisted for the McIlvanney Prize for Scottish Crime Book of the Year in 2021, which MAY GOD FORGIVE won in 2022. MAY GOD FORGIVE was also shortlisted for the 2023 CWA Ian Fleming Steel Dagger Award and longlisted for the 2023 Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year Award. His work is translated into ten languages and film/TV rights have been optioned.
Alan’s new historical crime-and-espionage series began with GUNNER, set in WWII Glasgow (but moving on to New York, the Highlands, Copenhagen and southern Europe subsequently), starring war-wounded half-Danish ex-cop Joseph Gunner. GUNNER was published by John Murray under the Baskerville imprint in 2025, with an American edition published by Pegasus Books in 2026. It was shortlisted for the CWA Historical Dagger award and Fiction Book of the Year prize at Scotland’s National Book Awards, and longlisted for both the McIlvanney Prize and the Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year Award, and was a James Bond Book Club selection. DECEPTION was published in the UK in July 2026, followed in the US in September 2026, with Book 3 TRAITOR to come in the Summer 2027. The series has attracted rave reviews and sold to France, Holland, Italy and Spain as well.
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DECEPTION
UK, Baskerville Press, 2026
New York, December 1941. Joseph Gunner, former soldier, is off the front lines and on the streets of New York, tasked with helping tip America into World War II.
Working for a section of the British Secret Service, Gunner spends his days covertly encouraging pro-war sentiment through planted news stories, radio broadcasts, and even blackmail.
But when a honeytrap mission with a prominent US politician goes wrong and the young woman involved is found dead, Gunner realises he has a target on his back. Who silenced her? Who knew their plan? And who has betrayed Gunner?
As he investigates, Gunner is plunged into the secretive world of Nazis in America, the NYPD, and the mobs of New York, as the body count quickly stacks up. With world events accelerating, Gunner finds himself in a race against time before he becomes the next victim, where he’ll soon uncover a conspiracy that goes beyond what he thought was possible.
GUNNER
UK, Baskerville Press, 2025
March, 1941. Joseph Gunner is back on the streets of Glasgow after being wounded on the front lines in France.
Keeping the pain in his leg at bay with the help of morphine, Gunner, a former detective, is hoping to keep his head down as the Luftwaffe begin bombing Glasgow.
But when he runs into his old boss Drummond, he is persuaded to help examine a body found in the wreckage. When the body turns out to be that of a German, mutilated to disguise his identity, Gunner reluctantly agrees to investigate.
As Gunner begins to hunt for the truth he runs into old flames, bitter enemies, before finding himself embroiled in a high-level conspiracy that reaches far beyond his hometown of Glasgow.
Partly inspired by the true story of Rudolph Hess's secret mission to broker appeasement with Britain during WWII, Gunner is an atmospheric and addictive new thriller from one of Britain's best-loved writers.
TO DIE IN JUNE
UK, Canongate, 2023
A woman enters a Glasgow police station to report her son missing, but no record can be found of the boy. When Detective Harry McCoy, seconded from the cop shop across town, discovers the family is part of the cultish Church of Christ's Suffering, he suspects there is more to Michael's disappearance than meets the eye.
Meanwhile reports arrive of a string of poisonings of down-and-outs across the city. The dead are men who few barely notice, let alone care about — but, as McCoy is painfully aware, among this desperate community is his own father.
Even as McCoy searches for the missing boy, he must conceal from his colleagues the real reason for his presence — to investigate corruption in the station. Some folk pray for justice. Detective Harry McCoy hasn't got time to wait.
MAY GOD FORGIVE
Crime, 384 pages
Canongate, April 2022
Glasgow is a city in mourning. An arson attack on a hairdresser's has left five dead. Tempers are frayed and sentiments running high.
When three youths are charged the city goes wild. A crowd gathers outside the courthouse but as the police drive the young men to prison, the van is rammed by a truck, and the men are grabbed and bundled into a car. The next day, the body of one of them is dumped in the city centre. A note has been sent to the newspaper: one down, two to go.
Detective Harry McCoy has twenty-four hours to find the kidnapped boys before they all turn up dead, and it is going to mean taking down some of Glasgow's most powerful people to do it . . .