Cumbria Crime Books in Order

Cumbria Crime gives DI Zoe Finch a second act. After the Birmingham-based Zoe Finch books, Zoe moves north with her partner, DI Carl Whaley, when he takes a job in Cumbria. She is not thrilled about leaving her old team, her city, or the familiar ground she fought so hard to understand.

A new county means a new kind of pressure.

The series, co-written by Rachel McLean and Joel Hames, focuses on western Cumbria rather than the postcard version of the Lake District. Workington, Whitehaven, the Solway coast, old mining areas, industrial sites, beaches, ports, fell routes, and isolated rural spaces all shape the cases. The setting matters because it gives Zoe beauty and bleakness in the same place.

In The Harbour, Zoe starts a new job, meets a new team, and is thrown straight into murder. Later books take her into disputes around mining, fell running, burning barns, frozen lakes, human trafficking, the Port of Workington, and organised crime. The ongoing arc brings her into conflict with local criminal networks and with people inside policing who may not want the truth exposed.

Zoe’s personal life is just as unsettled. Carl’s work investigating corrupt officers can clash with her own murder cases. Her son Nicholas is growing up and pulling away. Her reputation from Birmingham follows her, sometimes helping, sometimes getting in the way. She has experience, but she is still an outsider.

The tone is straight police procedural with a strong series arc. Each book has its own case, while the wider fight against organised crime and corruption builds over time. New readers can start with The Harbour, but the series has extra weight if you already know Zoe from Deadly Wishes and the Birmingham books.