Deborah Crombie Books in Order
See all Deborah Crombie books in order, with Duncan Kincaid/Gemma James reading guide, story summaries, series background, and ideas on where to start.
Last updated: January 16, 2026
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Publication Order
19 books
A Killing of Innocents
by Deborah Crombie
2023
Trainee doctor Sasha Johnson collapses in Russell Square after a seemingly random knife attack. Working with a knife crime task force, Kincaid and Gemma trace her hidden connections through hospitals, flatmates, and family until a second stabbing reveals a stalker moving far closer to home than they feared.
A Bitter Feast
by Deborah Crombie
2019
Invited to a country weekend at Melody Talbot's family estate in the Cotswolds, Kincaid and Gemma are swept into a fatal crash outside a village pub. As a celebrity chef's death leads to more killings, they probe simmering rivalries in both Viv Holland's kitchen and the elegant house above.
Garden of Lamentations
by Deborah Crombie
2017
A young nanny is found dead in a locked Notting Hill garden, drawing Gemma into the complicated lives of its privileged residents. At the same time, Kincaid quietly investigates disturbing deaths within the police, as both cases hint at a conspiracy that could endanger their family.
To Dwell in Darkness
by Deborah Crombie
2014
Recently transferred to Camden, Kincaid confronts the aftermath of a fiery attack at St Pancras station when a protest smoke bomb becomes something far more lethal. Untangling activist networks, missing witnesses, and troubling orders from above, he and Gemma face threats to both public safety and their own careers.
The Sound of Broken Glass
by Deborah Crombie
2013
In London's Crystal Palace neighborhood, a barrister is found strangled in a shabby hotel, soon followed by a second, identical killing. As Gemma and Melody investigate, the case loops back to a teenage guitarist and a widow whose choices years earlier shattered more than one life.
No Mark Upon Her
by Deborah Crombie
2011
Detective and Olympic rowing hopeful Rebecca Meredith never returns from a solo training row on the Thames. Called to Henley, Kincaid and Gemma navigate the brutal world of elite sport and police politics, where ambition, jealousy, and buried accusations create dangerous currents.
Necessary as Blood
by Deborah Crombie
2009
Artist and young mother Sandra Gilles vanishes from London's East End, leaving her toddler behind. When her lawyer husband is murdered, Gemma and Kincaid delve into Brick Lane's galleries, markets, and immigrant communities to protect the missing couple's child and unmask a ruthless killer.
Where Memories Lie
by Deborah Crombie
2008
When a diamond brooch stolen from refugee Erika Rosenthal decades ago resurfaces at a London auction house, Gemma agrees to help trace it. A clerk's hit and run death and an unsolved postwar murder force Gemma and Kincaid to confront what the war left behind.
Water Like a Stone
by Deborah Crombie
2007
Hoping for a quiet Christmas with his family in Cheshire, Kincaid instead faces a mummified infant discovered in a barn wall and the recent drowning of a local boy. Canal life, old grievances, and buried crimes converge on the Shropshire Union waterways.
In a Dark House
by Deborah Crombie
2004
A warehouse fire on the South Bank reveals a murdered woman, a missing hospital administrator, and a kidnapped child. Working parallel leads through fire scenes, hospitals, and a shelter for abused women, Kincaid and Gemma uncover an arson spree hiding something far more personal.
Now May You Weep
by Deborah Crombie
2003
Gemma's weekend cooking course in the Scottish Highlands turns dark when a local chef is murdered near a historic distillery. As family feuds, old affairs, and village loyalties surface, she must clear her friend's name before suspicion hardens into a wrongful charge.
And Justice There Is None
by Deborah Crombie
2002
Newly promoted Inspector Gemma James leads the inquiry into the stabbing of Dawn Arrowood, a pregnant antiques dealer's wife in Notting Hill. When the crime mirrors an earlier unsolved killing, Gemma and Kincaid follow a trail through Portobello Road that tests both their partnership and sense of justice.
A Finer End
by Deborah Crombie
2001
A series of eerie events in Glastonbury, from automatic writing to unsettling visions, draws Kincaid and Gemma to architect Jack Montfort's ancient city. As spiritual messages turn deadly, they must separate genuine faith and history from manipulation, fear, and murder.
Kissed a Sad Goodbye
by Deborah Crombie
1999
When tea heiress Annabelle Hammond is found strangled in an East London park, Kincaid and Gemma trace her lovers, her powerful family, and a wartime evacuee story rooted in the Isle of Dogs. Long buried choices still drive jealousy, loyalty, and present day violence.
Dreaming of the Bones
by Deborah Crombie
1997
Kincaid's ex wife asks him to revisit the supposed suicide of Cambridge poet Lydia Brooke, a case closed five years earlier. What begins as a favor turns into a labyrinth of literary rivalries, old betrayals, and a fresh murder that tears open Kincaid and Gemma's personal lives.
Mourn Not Your Dead
by Deborah Crombie
1996
A high ranking but widely hated police commander is found bludgeoned to death in his Surrey village home. As Kincaid and Gemma probe his tangled past and the villagers' grudges, their own uneasy relationship collides with a case built on resentment and abuse of power.
Leave the Grave Green
by Deborah Crombie
1996
The drowning of charming but troubled Connor Swann eerily echoes the earlier death of his wife's gifted brother. Investigating the powerful Asherton family, Kincaid and Gemma uncover rivalries, buried resentments, and a past tragedy that refuses to stay in the grave.
All Shall Be Well
by Deborah Crombie
1994
When Kincaid's terminally ill neighbor Jasmine Dent dies in her sleep, it looks like a peaceful suicide. Small inconsistencies and her private journals instead suggest murder, drawing Kincaid and Gemma into a quiet London mystery about old loyalties and hidden guilt.
A Share in Death
by Deborah Crombie
1993
On holiday at a Yorkshire time share, Superintendent Duncan Kincaid's rest ends when a fellow guest is found dead in the whirlpool. Surrounded by strangers with secrets and dismissed by the local police, he quietly investigates before another attack comes.
Where should I start?
If you're new to Deborah Crombie: A Share in Death → All Shall Be Well → Leave the Grave Green
If you want a deep emotional entry point: Dreaming of the Bones → Mourn Not Your Dead → Kissed a Sad Goodbye
If you enjoy character driven police procedurals: Necessary as Blood → No Mark Upon Her → The Sound of Broken Glass
If you prefer the most recent novels: To Dwell in Darkness → Garden of Lamentations → A Bitter Feast → A Killing of Innocents
Author bio
Deborah Crombie was born in Dallas, Texas, and grew up just to the north in Richardson, a suburb that still shapes the way she writes about family and community. From the start she was a voracious reader, taught to read by her grandmother, Lillian Dozier, a retired teacher, when she was four.
Her parents, Charlie and Mary Darden, encouraged books even when school itself did not always hold her attention. After a rocky adolescence that included leaving high school at sixteen, she circled back, finished her studies, and eventually earned a biology degree from Austin College in Sherman.
Science did not keep her from stories for long.
Crombie worked in advertising and newspapers, sharpening an eye for detail and dialogue, and attended the Rice University Publishing Program to learn how books move from manuscript to finished volume. After college she traveled to Britain, a trip that gave her a lifelong attachment to England's cities, villages, and weather.
That attachment turned into real life when she immigrated to the United Kingdom with her first husband, Peter Crombie, a Scot. They lived first in Edinburgh and later in the cathedral city of Chester, years that gave her the feel of British streets, pubs, and police stations from the inside.
Back in Texas, settled again in Dallas, she began turning that experience into fiction. A holiday in Yorkshire sparked the idea for a modern country house mystery set in a time share resort, which became A Share in Death, the novel that introduced Scotland Yard superintendent Duncan Kincaid and his sergeant, Gemma James. Published in 1993, it went on to earn both Agatha and Macavity nominations for best first novel.
From there the series grew steadily, following Kincaid and Gemma through complex cases and an evolving relationship. With Dreaming of the Bones, set among Cambridge writers and ghosts from the twentieth century, Crombie won the Macavity Award for best novel, received an Edgar nomination, and saw the book named a New York Times notable title and one of the century's standout mysteries. Later books such as Where Memories Lie and Necessary as Blood also picked up honors while deepening the lives of her detectives and their circle of family and friends.
Readers come to her novels for the puzzles, but they stay for the people and places. Crombie writes about modern London and the British countryside in grounded detail, whether she is sending Kincaid and Gemma to the canals of Cheshire in Water Like a Stone, into the world of Olympic rowing on the Thames in No Mark Upon Her, or through the back streets of Crystal Palace in The Sound of Broken Glass.
More recent books push the pair into even wider territory. To Dwell in Darkness centers on a devastating attack at St Pancras station and questions inside the police, Garden of Lamentations braids a Notting Hill nanny's murder with corruption at the highest levels, and A Bitter Feast and A Killing of Innocents explore fine dining kitchens, country weekends, and London knife crime while Kincaid and Gemma juggle a busy blended family.
Although her fiction rarely leaves the United Kingdom, Crombie herself has made a home back in North Texas. She lives in a restored 1905 Craftsman bungalow in McKinney with her husband, Rick Wilson, two German shepherds, and two cats, and travels to England several times a year to walk the streets she writes about.
Across nineteen Duncan Kincaid and Gemma James novels, she has built a world where crime fiction, everyday family life, and a deep love of place all sit comfortably at the same table.
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