Top Five bestseller for ONE OF US IS DEAD by Peter James

ONE OF US IS DEAD, the 20th instalment of Peter James’ internationally bestselling Roy Grace series, has jumped straight to Number 3 in the UK bestsellers list after only five days on sale. ONE OF US IS DEAD was the second-highest new entry in the bestsellers list with a volume sales increase of 13% against the same period last year. ONE OF US IS DEAD is published by Pan Macmillan in the UK and the US.

In ONE OF US IS DEAD, Detective Superintendent Roy Grace finds out just how dangerous a dead man can be… When James Taylor arrives late for a funeral, he has to stand at the back of the small church. But, as the service progresses, Taylor notices a man six rows in front of him. At first he thinks he must be mistaken, but the more he looks at the man, the more convinced Taylor becomes that this is his old schoolfriend Rufus Rorke. Except it couldn’t be him, could it? Because two years ago Taylor attended Rufus Rorke’s funeral. He even delivered Rufus’s eulogy. On the other side of Brighton, at Police HQ, Detective Superintendent Roy Grace has been alerted to a number of suspicious deaths that he can’t get out of his mind. But how are they linked? And could they possibly be connected to Rufus Rorke?

The ONE OF US IS DEAD publication tour saw Peter carry out book signings, Q&As and radio interviews across the UK, along with a spectacular book launch on Brighton Pier. Peter was also a Special Guest at Harrogate Festival in July, co-headlined Bloody Scotland in September with Elly Griffiths, and will be appearing at Chiltern Kills Festival, Murder One Festival and Fatal Shore in October.

ONE OF US IS DEAD joins Peter’s many other chart successes this year: the paperback edition of STOP THEM DEAD flew straight to Number 2 in the bestseller list on publication in April, and THEY THOUGHT I WAS DEAD, the much-anticipated standalone revealing the mystery of Sandy Grace’s disappearance, was an instant Number 1 bestseller on publication in May. The paperback edition of THEY THOUGHT I WAS DEAD is out on 7th November 2024.

Fans of the Roy Grace book series – and all crime fans alike –  can also tune in to series four of GRACE on ITVX, starring John Simm and Richie Campbell. Recently announced, the much-loved tv series will return for series five in 2025, featuring four feature-length episodes.

About Peter James
Peter James is the international bestselling author of many award-winning novels. Peter writes both thriller standalones and the hugely popular Brighton-set Roy Grace series. The opening episode of GRACE, based on the first Roy Grace novel, DEAD SIMPLE, was broadcast in March 2021 with John Simm starring in the lead role as the tenacious detective. It was a TV Pick of the Day across all the major UK newspapers, appeared on ITV 1’s prime Sunday night slot and viewing figures quickly reached more than 8.8 million, with glowing reviews. The fourth series aired in Autumn 2024 and the fifth series will be broadcast in 2025.

Peter’s books have been translated into thirty-eight languages, with worldwide sales of over twenty-three million copies and his Detective Superintendent Roy Grace series, set in Brighton, has given him 20 Sunday Times Number Ones. In 2015 WH Smith customers voted him the Greatest Crime Author of All Time and in 2016 he was awarded the coveted CWA Diamond Dagger, a lifetime achievement award for sustained excellence. In 2018 he received a Specsavers Honorary Platinum Bestseller Award and in 2024 he won four Silver Nielsen Bestseller Awards. Peter James has also written two books based on true crime stories, with former senior detective Graham Bartlett.

Successful nationwide tours of the stage plays of THE PERFECT MURDER (2014), DEAD SIMPLE (2015,) NOT DEAD ENOUGH (2017), THE HOUSE ON COLD HILL (2019), LOOKING GOOD DEAD (2021) and WISH YOU WERE DEAD (2023) have packed theatres in dozens of British cities, and garnered magnificent reviews. His stage shows to date have grossed over £17 million at the box office. PICTURE YOU DEAD begins touring in 2025 and tickets can be purchased here. Several of his works are optioned for film.

Peter took part in the launch podcast of the Queen’s Reading Room in January 2024, having had the Grace series featured on the Royal Reading Room previously. He appeared on the podcast again in June 2024, where he was named one of Her Majesty’s favourite crime writers and Roy Grace her favourite fictional detective!

Praise for ONE OF US IS DEAD
‘Another just-one-more-page-thriller.’ – Anna Bonet, i newspaper, ‘The best new books to read in September 2024’

‘All hail the Queen’s favourite detective as the indefatigable Peter James returns with the 20th Roy Grace mystery… Grace’s instincts are as sharp as ever, but can he outsmart Anthony and complete the rest of the murderous jigsaw? His adage that it’s the mistakes that criminals make that bring about their downfall will be tested to the limit in a climax aboard a light aircraft high over the Channel. That royal warrant should be on its way any day now.’ - The Times, ‘New Thrillers for September’ 

‘DS Roy Grace returns in the twentieth gripping instalment in Peter James’ bestselling series, as links to a man supposedly dead and buried start cropping up in an ongoing investigation into a series of suspicious deaths.’ – Waterstones, ‘September’s Best Books’

Praise for Peter James
‘If you have never read Peter James’ crime thriller series about the Sussex detective Roy Grace, I would highly recommend you give it a try.’ – Queen Camilla, Press and Journal

‘Peter James is one of the most fiendishly clever crime fiction plotters.’ – The Daily Mail

‘Roy Grace ... is fast becoming one of the more memorable coppers in modern crime fiction ... A first class police procedural.’ – The Times

‘James just gets better and better and deserves the success he has achieved with this first-class series.’ – Independent on Sunday

‘Peter James is one of the best crime writers in the business’ – Karin Slaughter

‘Probably the closest we’ll get to a British Stephen King’ – The Financial Times

‘Peter James is one of the most fiendishly clever crime fiction plotters’ – The Daily Mail

‘In uncertain times, I always tend to fall back on old, familiar favourites, so I’ll be reading Peter James’ Roy Grace series. They are thrillers with enough drama to keep you guessing. Reading a well-crafted mystery gives me a sense of accomplishment – almost as if I’ve solved everything myself!’ – Emma Shacklock, Books Editor, Women & Home Magazine

‘Peter James is one of the best crime writers in the business’ – Lee Child

‘A master plotter.’ – The Bookseller

‘James has been compared with Stephen King, but in many ways he's better’ – Daily Express

‘This compulsive horror story is a tale of the search for immortality . . . I cannot remember when I last read a novel I enjoyed so much’ – Sunday Telegraph

‘A thought-provoking menacer that’s completely technological and genuinely frightening about the power of future communications’ – Time Out

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TIEPOLO BLUE by James Cahill selected by Her Majesty Queen Camilla for Series Sixteen of The Queen’s Reading Room

We are delighted to announce that Her Majesty Queen Camilla has selected James Cahill’s debut novel TIEPOLO BLUE as one of her books for Season Sixteen of The Queen’s Reading Room, a charity and online book club that works ‘to celebrate and promote the power and benefits of reading and is on a mission to help more people find and connect with books which enrich their lives.’

The Queen’s Reading Room will be sharing James’ insights into the book, exclusive content and Queen Camilla’s own personal words of recommendation for the book on their Instagram page and on their website from 22 November until the 5 of December. TIEPOLO BLUE follows recent selections including Robert Harris’ ARCHANGEL, THE HOUSE OF DOORS by Tan Twan Eng and the E.F. Benson classic MAPP AND LUCIA, as well as fellow Blake Friedmann author Peter James, featured for his GRACE series of novels in December 2021, and later described by Queen Camilla as the writer of her favourite fictional detective. Alongside TIEPOLO BLUE, Season 16 will also include YOU ARE HERE by David Nicholls, LES MISÉRABLES by Victor Hugo and THE HARE WITH AMBER EYES by Edmund de Waal.

James Cahill’s debut novel TIEPOLO BLUE was published by Sceptre in Summer 2022 and shortlisted for the Authors’ Club Best First Novel Award. It was later named one of the Best Books of 2022 by the BBC, and was widely acclaimed by readers and critics alike. The Evening Standard wrote: ‘This divine debut from art critic and academic James Cahill is the smart, sexy read you need in 2022… Not only an addictive page-turner, Cahill’s book taps into the tensions and suspicions between generations that feels incredibly relevant for our testy times.’

James Cahill’s second novel, THE VIOLET HOUR, will be published by Sceptre in February 2025.

Set in Cambridge, 1994, TIEPOLO BLUE follows Professor Don Lamb, a revered art historian at the height of his powers, consumed by the book he is writing about the skies of the Venetian master Tiepolo. However, Don’s academic brilliance belies a deep inexperience of life and love.

When an explosive piece of contemporary art is installed on the lawn of his college, it sets in motion Don’s abrupt departure from Cambridge to take up a role at a south London museum. There he befriends Ben, a young artist who draws him into the anarchic 1990s British art scene and the nightlife of Soho.

Over the course of one long, hot summer, Don glimpses a liberating new existence. But his epiphany is also a moment of self-reckoning, as his oldest friendship – and his own unexamined past – are revealed to him in a devastating new light. As Don’s life unravels, he suffers a fall from grace that that shatters his world into pieces.

Image: Darren Wheeler

About James Cahill

James Cahill was born in London. Over the past decade, he has worked in the art world and academia, combining writing and research with a role at a leading contemporary art gallery. He is currently a Research Fellow in Classics at King’s College London. His writing on art has appeared in publications including The Burlington Magazine, The Times Literary Supplement, the Los Angeles Review of Books, and The London Review of Books. He was the lead author and consulting editor of FLYING TOO CLOSE TO THE SUN (Phaidon, 2018), a survey of classical myth in art from antiquity to the present day. He was the co-curator of ‘The Classical Now’, an exhibition at King’s College London (March-April 2018), examining the relationships between ancient, modern and contemporary art.

Praise for TIEPOLO BLUE

‘Beautifully captures disorientation, tenderness and heat without tipping into excess…an electric new novel written by an author skilled in the evocation of vertiginous, heightened emotion.’ – Michael Donkor, The Guardian, ‘Book of the Day’

‘[An] arresting debut novel… [the prose] has a masterly attention to (especially visual) detail and in an irresistibly propulsive, almost swaggering style.’ – Literary Review

‘Simply magnificent…TIEPOLO BLUE really has blown me away: the gorgeous phrase-making; the sure-footed pacing; the (re-)immersion in a world I know, or knew, in a way that is both hard-edged with historical detail and almost hallucinatory.’ – Robert Douglas-Fairhurst, author and former Man Booker judge

‘The spirit of E.M. Forster is alive and well in James Cahill.’ – Edmund White

‘This is the best novel I have read for ages. It is so beautifully written, not a false note in any sentence. [Cahill’s] presentation of the agonising clash of aesthetics, of culture, of generations… it’s just masterly… It all grips you like a thriller. My heart was constantly in my throat as I read… [There is] so much to enjoy, to contemplate, to wonder at, and to be lost in.’ – Stephen Fry

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THE TUMBLING GIRL by Bridget Walsh on 2024 HWA Debut Crown Award longlist

THE TUMBLING GIRL, the first title in Bridget Walsh’s vivid Variety Palace Mystery series, has been longlisted for the 2024 HWA Debut Crown Award.

The HWA Awards celebrate the best historical writing, fiction and non-fiction and its ability to engage, illuminate, entertain and inform legions of readers. To be considered, the bulk of the narrative of the work submitted must take place at least thirty-five years prior to publication. There are three awards – the HWA Gold Crown (for writers already published), the HWA Non-fiction Crown and the HWA Debut Crown. Previous winners of the HWA Debut Crown Award include THE SECRET DIARIES OF CHARLES IGNATIUS SANCHO by Paterson Joseph and THE SPIRIT ENGINEER by AJ West.

The other titles on this year’s Debut Crown Award longlist are as follows: THE OTHER SIDE OF MRS WOOD by Lucy Barker; THE GOLDEN GATE by Amy Chua; LEEWARD by Katie Daysh; COLOURS OF SIENA by Judith May Evans; THE MAIDEN by Kate Foster; THE PAINTER’S DAUGHTER by Emily Howes; ALL US SINNERS by Katy Massey; OUR HIDEOUS PROGENY by C. E. McGill; THE WITCHING TIDE by Margaret Meyer; THE BEHOLDERS by Hester Musson and THE REVELS by Stacey Thomas.

THE TUMBLING GIRL sees an unlikely duo – ex-actress Minnie Ward and private detective Albert Easterbrook – team up to solve a grisly spate of murders in Victorian London. It was first published by Gallic Books in May 2023, and prior to publication it won the UEA Little, Brown Award for Crime Fiction. It was also shortlisted for the 2024 Crime Writers’ Association (CWA) ILP John Creasey (New Blood) Dagger and reached No. 1 in the US Amazon Kindle New Historical Thriller Chart.

THE INNOCENTS, the sequel to THE TUMBLING GIRL, was published by Gallic Books earlier this year to great acclaim (with The Financial Times describing it as ‘historical crime fiction at its most beguiling’) and Bridget is currently working on the next in the series, THE SPIRIT GUIDE. The latter sees Minnie and Albert uncovering the dark secrets behind a female-only spiritualist group that purports to help its members commune with deceased loved ones.

 

About Bridget Walsh

Bridget Walsh lives in Norwich. She has a PhD in ‘Murder in the Victorian Domestic Sphere’ and an MA in Creative Writing from the University of East Anglia.

 Praise for THE TUMBLING GIRL

‘Bridget Walsh’s THE TUMBLING GIRL is the first in what promises to be an entertaining series of historical mysteries… a narrative that neatly weds historical detail and quiet wit.’ – Nick Rennison, The Sunday Times, ‘The best historical fiction books of May 2023’

‘Ms. Walsh does a splendid job depicting Minnie’s flea-bitten yet appealing theatrical world and Albert’s monied yet treacherous milieu.’ – Tom Nolan, Wall Street Journal

‘Walsh impresses in this series launch featuring an unlikely pair of investigators in 1876 London… diligent research pays off in spades here, and her rich and nuanced portrayal of the period will leave readers feeling like they’re on the soggy streets of London. Imogen Robertson readers will be eager for a sequel to this un-put-downable mystery.’ – Publishers Weekly, Starred Review and a ‘Books of the Week’ pick

‘Walsh resurrects the culture and crimes of Victoriana without cliché or condescension, but with warmth, wit, remarkable texture and rare authority.’ – Tom Benn

‘A brilliantly written page-turner. A bravura performance tumbling us into a compelling mystery in a vivid, richly imagined world. You can smell the greasepaint and hear the roar of the crowd on every page.’ – Imogen Robertson

 

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Julian Stockwin bids farewell to the million-copy selling KYDD series with 27th entry ADMIRAL

Author Picture: Allan House

Julian Stockwin, author of the Golden Age of Sail-set KYDD novels, which have charted the rise of Thomas Kydd from conscripted sailor to decorated Admiral in Nelson’s navy, has announced that the series will come to an end after more than twenty years with the latest novel ADMIRAL. This 27th and final novel in the series will be published in the UK by Hodder and Stoughton on 10 October 2024, with an American edition following on 7 January 2025.

“Since I was a young boy I read the great sea novelists – Forester, O’Brian and many others and the sea fever set in. At 15 I enlisted in the Royal Navy. I rose through the ranks and served in the Royal Australian Navy in the Far East, Antarctic waters and the South Seas. I was active in rescuing survivors at the collision of HMAS Melbourne and HMAS Voyager, Australia's largest peacetime naval disaster. Eventually on return to Britain I became a Lieutenant Commander in the Royal Naval Reserve. Much later, my wife Kathy suggested I try turning my experiences at sea into novel form.

It had to be Nelson’s Navy I’d write about. I was particularly inspired by the stories of those couple of hundred common seamen who became officers and thereby turned themselves into gentlemen. Some became captains of their own ships; even more remarkably, some became admirals. How could it be so? Just what kind of men were they? So, the story of Kydd, a conscripted man who rose to admiral, was born…

Kydd has taken Kathy and me around the world on location research – Australia, United States, Canada, Europe and more... We have lived with a parallel universe of Kydd, Renzi, Persephone, Cecilia, Stirk and all the other characters for over 20 years! They had become very real to us and we would discuss them as we would real friends. When I pushed the ‘send’ button to deliver the manuscript of ADMIRAL to Hodder I think both Kathy and I held back a tear, not of regret, but sadness at the passing of something that had become so much a part of our being. But life moves on and one of the lessons I have learned is that you cannot force something beyond a natural conclusion.” – Julian Stockwin

Since the first book in the series, KYDD, appeared in 2001, the series has sold over 1.25 million copies in all formats, including translated editions in six languages, with Hodder and Stoughton leading the way as the UK publisher of the series for all 23 years of its existence. In addition, the series regularly appears in the top 3% of all library borrowings, with a quarter of a million in the last five years according to Public Lending Right statistics.

Oliver Johnson, Julian’s editor, comments: ‘Julian’s novels have stood out for their unmatched authenticity, drama, action, nuanced characterisation, an inimitable capture of naval jargon and historical detail. Having been the series editor, and a serial fan, the news that Kydd’s story was ending came as a profound jolt. But what a book to end with. A triumph!’

‘Julian Stockwin’s brilliant storytelling has brought Thomas Kydd and his comrades and adversaries to such vivid life in this classic series, now spanning more than two decades,’ added Isobel Dixon, Julian’s agent at Blake Friedmann. ‘I remember so clearly when the late great Carole Blake (Julian’s first agent) was so captivated by the young hero Kydd, and I have been so honoured to be part of the continuing adventure since. ADMIRAL is indeed a very fine and fitting conclusion – and though it’s with a bit of a pang and a lump in the throat, I take great pleasure in thinking of the treat that Kydd followers have ahead of them, and all that new readers have yet to discover.’

ADMIRAL is the twenty seventh and last of the adventures of Captain Sir Thomas Kydd, whose story began in the year 1793 and tells for the first time in fiction how a pressed man through his bravery and ingenuity progresses to the quarterdeck of his own ship, and here, in the final book of the series, the command of a fleet with an admiral's pennant.

April 1814: Napoleon is deposed and exiled after defeat by a resurgent allied collation. Saddled with huge war debts, the British government has no choice but to place many of its naval ships in reserve. Captain Sir Thomas Kydd is one of the lucky officers not to be put on half pay. Instead, in the realisation of his life's ambition, he is offered an admiral's flag, but the station is West Africa and with it comes anti-slavery operations set in fever-ridden swamps. Despite the obvious dangers and hardships, Kydd readies for sea with his beloved Thunderer as his flagship.

But before he can set sail comes the electrifying news – the tyrant has escaped from Elba and is marching on Paris, the citizens flocking to join him. Napoleon's invasion fleet is still in being and if the French navy declares for him they can sail from the ports now free of blockade and make the invasion of England a reality. What's more, the entire Channel Fleet has been stood down, its ships in various stages of repair.

There's one man in active service who happens to be on the spot – Admiral Sir Thomas Kydd. With frantic haste he's appointed temporary commander-in-chief to sail with all the men-o'-war that can be scraped together to stand athwart the French. Waterloo is coming but before then Kydd must use all his legendary subterfuge and daring to save England from her peril.

About Julian Stockwin

Julian Stockwin is the greatest living author of historical naval fiction, creator of the Thomas Kydd novels, a series of 27 volumes in which Kydd rises through the decks and his adventures take him around the world.  Atmospheric, page-turning narrative, rich with action and great characterisation, this is the first series to highlight the common seaman in the greatest age of fighting sail.

At 14 Stockwin joined a tough sea-training school, followed by the Royal Navy, transferring to the Royal Australian Navy when his family emigrated.  He saw active service in the Far East, the Antarctic, the South Seas and Vietnam, and was on board the Melbourne at the time of its disastrous peace time collision with the Voyager.  Later he worked for NATO on the strategic deployment of merchant shipping.

Stockwin is also author of two novels in the Moments of History series, depicting important turning points in history. The first, THE SILK TREE, tells the dramatic story of how the secret of silk was brought from China to the West. This was followed by POWDER OF DEATH, which shows how the nature of warfare was changed forever by the discovery of gunpowder.  

Praise for Julian Stockwin and the KYDD series

‘Very readable and enjoyable. I recommend that you go out, beg, borrow or buy, and enjoy.’ – Bernard Cornwell

‘For me, there is nothing like the British nautical battles of Horatio Nelson in the early 19th century. He led them to enormous sea victories like the battles of the Nile, Copenhagen and most famously, Trafalgar. Stockwin really knows early British navy lore, with masts, spars, rigging, sails, cannons, frigates, and ships of the line. In Thomas Kydd, the author has a created a wonderful daring-do British commander. Kydd knows his job as captain standing proudly on the deck of his ship of the line. He’s never out-thought or outmaneuvered. Exciting stuff!’ – Mel Brooks, The New York Times

‘The preeminent living historical naval fiction writer on either side of the Atlantic.’ – Quarterdeck

‘In his hands the sea story will continue to entrance readers across the world.’ – The Guardian

‘Vivid descriptions of life on board ship, getting those ships up limited navigable channels to avoid the many bars and mud flats of the River Plate, and the politics of the various factions of those on land all keep the reader glued to the pages. A book to be enjoyed.’ – Historical Novel Society, Editor’s Choice

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Head of Zeus snaps up lakeside romance by debut author Cristina Wolf

Aubrie Artiano, Editorial Director at Head of Zeus, has acquired World English rights in HOW TO WRITE A ROM-COM and a currently untitled novel by Cristina Wolf from Sian Ellis-Martin at Blake Friedmann Literary Agency. HOW TO WRITE A ROM-COM will be published on the Aria imprint in May 2025, with the second book following in May 2026.

Lucy Bowen has had enough of romance. After multiple failed relationships and an extreme lack of Prince Charmings lining up to date her, she’s given up on the idea altogether… except she can’t really do that because she works for NYC’s biggest romance publisher, Heartwarming.

When Heartwarming’s bestselling author Ruby Jones threatens to leave due to dwindling sales, Lucy is sent on a research trip to a tiny lakeside town by her interfering boss. Lucy reluctantly agrees to a month-long trip to the middle of nowhere for the possibility of promotion. But if she messes up, her whole career will be on the line. Before she can say ‘cliché’, Lucy finds herself living an actual small-town romance, complete with a quirky cast of characters and some undeniable chemistry between her and the town hunk, Liam…

As Lucy’s secret mission nears its end, she’s faced with some important decisions: should she tell Liam the truth about why she’s really there? Does she really want to go back to the city? And, might she finally have found love…?

Cristina Wolf said ‘Words can truly not express how excited I am to be working with Aubrie Artiano and the Head of Zeus team on my contemporary romance series. I am incredibly grateful to my agent, Sian Ellis-Martin for quite literally making my dreams come true. As a passionate romance reader, I wrote HOW TO WRITE A ROM-COM as a love letter to my favorite genre, and I hope that shines through on every page.’

Aubrie Artiano said ‘Cristina’s writing is heartfelt, with characters that are flawed, funny, and deeply relatable. This book reads like Virgin River meets How to Lose a Guy in Ten Days.’

Sian Ellis-Martin said ‘I’m so pleased that HOW TO WRITE A ROM-COM found its home with Aubrie and the Aria team at Head of Zeus. Working with Cristina is a dream and I can’t wait for readers to fall in love with her writing and Lucy and Liam’s story just like I have.’

 

About Cristina Wolf

Writing and reading has been a passion of Cristina’s from the beginning. After graduating from Marist College with a double major in Business and English, Cristina pursued a career in the publishing industry while earning her Master of Science in Publishing from New York University. Cristina has experience working at literary agencies and as an editorial assistant at a publishing house. Finding life in NYC a bit different than she expected, Cristina returned to her native New Jersey where she earned her Master in Teaching from Monmouth University. She now shares her love of books with her students as a middle school English teacher.

Other than working or writing, Cristina loves spending time with her dogs, Zoey and Winnie, exercising on her Peloton, laying on her hammock with a good book, and planning her next trip to Disney World.

 

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