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DCI Boyd Books in Order

Part ofAlex Scarrow Books in Order

Browse the DCI Boyd books by Alex Scarrow in order, with case-by-case summaries, series background, and a simple guide to where to start reading.

Last updated: July 1, 2026

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DCI Boyd books in publication order

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15 books

1

A Burning Truth

by Alex Scarrow

2021

When a fire kills a famous old politician in Hastings, Boyd is faced with a long list of suspects. Family grudges, old loyalties, and public image all get in the way of the truth.

2

Old Bones New Bones

by Alex Scarrow

2021

A skeleton found beside an A-road reopens the case of a killer believed dead for decades. Boyd soon suspects there are more bodies waiting to be found, and more than one lie buried with them.

3

Silent Tide

by Alex Scarrow

2021

DCI Bill Boyd's first Hastings case begins with a drifting yacht and two bodies in the Channel. The deeper he digs, the more a digital trail pulls the danger toward his own daughter.

4

The Last Train

by Alex Scarrow

2021

Boyd boards the last train home expecting an ordinary journey and ends up at the center of a sensational case. What happened on that carriage is tangled up with a far darker story than the headlines first suggest.

5

Argyle House

by Alex Scarrow

2022

When a body turns up in a notorious housing block, Boyd sends his team into a building full of anger, neglect, and suspicion. It soon looks as if almost anyone there could have been the real target.

6

Gone to Ground

by Alex Scarrow

2022

Club doorman Jay Turner overhears a murder plot and is suddenly wanted by both the police and a killer with money to burn. Boyd must keep him alive long enough to prove who is really being hunted.

7

The Safe Place

by Alex Scarrow

2022

Work on an old Martello tower uncovers human remains in a flooded basement. As Boyd's team digs into local myths and the tower's real past, the investigation turns far more disturbing than a ghost story.

8

The Archive

by Alex Scarrow

2023

With Boyd recovering and the department stretched thin, DC Okeke takes on a hanging, a house fire, and an old woman's death. The cases link up in unsettling ways and wake a secret left buried for sixty years.

9

The Lock Up

by Alex Scarrow

2023

A storage auction uncovers three dismembered bodies inside a single unit. While the police fear a serial killer, Boyd suspects the explanation may be stranger, and more tangled, than it first appears.

10

A Monster Among Us

by Alex Scarrow

2024

Okeke gets a desperate call about a troubled thirteen-year-old girl who says a monster is coming for her. What starts as a welfare concern turns into a race toward something very real and very dangerous.

11

The Vanishing

by Alex Scarrow

2024

A middle-aged woman disappears in broad daylight on a busy Hastings street. At first it looks ordinary, but as questions mount around her husband, Boyd and Okeke begin to suspect they are hunting a murder.

12

A Guardian Angel

by Alex Scarrow

2025

A fire in Hastings' historic net huts reveals mummified remains hidden inside. Boyd is determined to give the dead a name, but the case reaches into old wounds and unexpected connections.

13

The Fool

by Alex Scarrow

2025

With the Hastings CID stretched thin, the focus shifts to Jay Turner in Florida. A cash-in-hand private job for a British businessman looks easy money, until Jay realizes he may be badly out of his depth.

14
New

Let's Play

by Alex Scarrow

2026

The fourteenth DCI Boyd novel continues Alex Scarrow's Hastings crime series. Full plot details were still scarce when this page was updated.

15

The Good Doctor

by Alex Scarrow

2027

An upcoming DCI Boyd novel from Alex Scarrow. Plot details had not been widely released when this page was updated.

DCI Boyd books in chronological order

  1. Book cover for "Silent Tide"

    Silent Tide

    by Alex Scarrow

    2021DCI Boyd, Book 1
  2. Book cover for "Old Bones New Bones"

    Old Bones New Bones

    by Alex Scarrow

    2021DCI Boyd, Book 2
  3. Book cover for "A Burning Truth"

    A Burning Truth

    by Alex Scarrow

    2021DCI Boyd, Book 3
  4. Book cover for "The Last Train"

    The Last Train

    by Alex Scarrow

    2021DCI Boyd, Book 4
  5. Book cover for "The Safe Place"

    The Safe Place

    by Alex Scarrow

    2022DCI Boyd, Book 5
  6. Book cover for "Gone to Ground"

    Gone to Ground

    by Alex Scarrow

    2022DCI Boyd, Book 6
  7. Book cover for "Argyle House"

    Argyle House

    by Alex Scarrow

    2022DCI Boyd, Book 7
  8. Book cover for "The Lock Up"

    The Lock Up

    by Alex Scarrow

    2023DCI Boyd, Book 8
  9. Book cover for "The Archive"

    The Archive

    by Alex Scarrow

    2023DCI Boyd, Book 9
  10. Book cover for "A Monster Among Us"

    A Monster Among Us

    by Alex Scarrow

    2024DCI Boyd, Book 10
  11. Book cover for "The Vanishing"

    The Vanishing

    by Alex Scarrow

    2024DCI Boyd, Book 11
  12. Book cover for "The Fool"

    The Fool

    by Alex Scarrow

    2025DCI Boyd, Book 12
  13. Book cover for "A Guardian Angel"

    A Guardian Angel

    by Alex Scarrow

    2025DCI Boyd, Book 13
  14. Book cover for "Let's Play"

    Let's Play

    by Alex Scarrow

    2026DCI Boyd, Book 14
  15. Book cover for "The Good Doctor"

    The Good Doctor

    by Alex Scarrow

    2027DCI Boyd, Book 15

Series background & context

The DCI Boyd books are Alex Scarrow's crime series, and they are built around a detective who feels solid from the start. Bill Boyd arrives in Hastings after relocating from London and takes up a role with East Sussex CID. He is not written as a flashy genius or a wreck held together by bad habits. He is steady, compassionate, sharp, and very aware that every case begins with somebody's worst day.

That tone matters.

Hastings is a big part of the appeal. Scarrow uses the town and the wider Sussex coast well, not as postcard scenery, but as a place with cramped streets, old grudges, forgotten corners, and layers of history sitting right under modern life. Fishing huts, towers, storage units, trains, neglected housing blocks, coastal waters, and roadside lay-bys all become useful story ground. The setting gives the books a specific texture that helps them stand apart from more anonymous police procedurals.

Boyd also has a good team around him, and the series works because those relationships keep developing. Colleagues like Samantha Okeke and Steven Minter do more than help solve puzzles. They give the books continuity, friction, and warmth. Personal lives spill into the edges of the job, sometimes quietly and sometimes not, which means the series rewards reading in order even though each individual case has its own beginning and end.

The cases themselves vary nicely. One book opens with bodies on a drifting yacht, another with old bones beside a road, another with human remains found in a Martello tower basement or inside a storage unit. Some stories lean more procedural, others edge closer to thriller territory, but Scarrow usually keeps one foot planted in the patient business of police work. Interviews, local knowledge, overlooked details, and slow-building suspicion matter as much as shock reveals.

There is also a humane streak running through the series. Boyd is often trying not just to catch the right person, but to understand the life behind the case, the victim who has been reduced to evidence, the family story that warped into violence, the mistake that opened the door to something worse. That keeps the books from feeling mechanical, even when the plots are twisty.

If you want crime novels with a clear sense of place, a dependable lead, and a steady run of smart, readable cases, DCI Boyd is a very easy series to settle into. These books move quickly, but they do not rush past the human side of the work. That balance is a big part of why they are so moreish.

Edited by

Richard Reis

Software engineer whose passion for tracking book recommendations from podcasts inspired the creation of MRB.

Anurag Ramdasan

Lead investor at 3one4 Capital whose startup expertise and love for books helped shaped MRB and its growth.

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