Inspector Wexford Books in Order

Kingsmarkham is shaken when a local clergyman is found murdered, a man few people liked and even fewer truly knew. As the case unfolds, small grudges and private shame prove as dangerous as any obvious suspect.

When hidden human remains are uncovered years later, Wexford and Burden are forced to reopen old questions and long-forgotten missing-person files. The investigation exposes quiet bargains and buried shame in the town, just as Wexford edges toward retirement.

An old suspect, Eric Targo, returns to Kingsmarkham and drags Wexford back into a case that has haunted him for years. When another woman is strangled, Wexford is convinced a patient predator is close by, and he can’t afford to be wrong again.

A truffle hunter’s dog digs up a human hand, leading Wexford to a body buried for a decade with almost no trace of how it died. Then a second corpse turns up nearby, and the team has to work backward through time to name the dead and catch the killer.

A case involving a missing child and a death that refuses to look simple pulls Wexford into a tangle of relationships in Kingsmarkham. As he and Burden trace what happened, they uncover a family story built on secrecy and longing.

After unprecedented floods, a search team scours the River Brede and finds no trace of missing siblings Giles and Sophie Dade or their companion Joanna Troy. With the town expecting the worst, Wexford digs into their last days and what someone may still be hiding.

The release of a notorious pedophile puts Kingsmarkham on edge, and vigilante talk is suddenly everywhere. While Wexford works a domestic-violence program and worries about his daughter Sylvia, two major crimes drag the town’s fear into the open.

A proposed by-pass sparks protests in Kingsmarkham, and Dora Wexford throws herself into the movement. Then a young woman’s body is found and people start vanishing, including Dora. Wexford has to keep working while fear and anger turn the town dangerous.

When Melanie Akande, the daughter of Wexford’s new doctor, disappears, the case becomes personal as well as professional. A body is found and assumptions flare, forcing Wexford to confront prejudice while he fights to see what others ignore.

After Sergeant Caleb Martin is killed, Kingsmarkham tries to move on, until a brutal attack leaves a house full of bodies and one traumatized survivor, Daisy Flory. Wexford senses a link between the bloodbath and the earlier murder.

A lighter Kingsmarkham-set tale that steps away from the police station to follow Ginger through a small mystery. It’s a quick read with Rendell’s eye for community life and the odd secrets people keep in quiet streets.

A woman’s body, hidden under filthy velvet, is found in a shopping center car park, and Wexford has only a fleeting clue to go on. Before he can dig deeper he is taken out of action, leaving Burden to solve a case that keeps getting stranger.

A worried wife asks Wexford to look into her missing husband, Rodney Williams, and what seems like a favor becomes a baffling case. When men are attacked and a young woman appears to be the link, Wexford has to untangle desire, fear, and self-deception.

Back from China, Wexford can’t shake the memory of an old woman who seemed to shadow him, and a drowning he never explained. When a fellow traveler is murdered in England, he realizes the answers may lie in what he missed abroad.

Flute virtuoso Sir Manuel Camargue’s death is ruled a misadventure, but Wexford never fully believes it. Nineteen years later his daughter resurfaces as an heiress with a suspicious story, and the reopened case becomes a hunt for identity and motive.

Rhoda Comfrey turns up murdered with almost nothing on her, just keys and cash, and no one who seems to miss her. Wexford has to reconstruct a life with no obvious footprint, and work out who wanted her gone.

Meek, solitary Angela Hathall is strangled in her own bed, and her husband’s calm reaction only deepens the unease. A single palm print is the one flaw in an over-cleaned house, and Wexford refuses to let the case be quietly shelved.

At a festival outside Kingsmarkham, Wexford finds the battered body of Dawn Stonor, a local girl who reinvented herself far from home. The case pulls him into a tangle around the folk singer Zeno Vedast, where loyalties and lies turn deadly.

Ordered to rest in London, Wexford still can't ignore a cemetery murder linked to his nephew’s case. Following the trail draws him into the shadow of a cult and an old scandal, where belief and manipulation can be lethal.

When little Stella Rivers vanishes without a trace, Kingsmarkham is left with dread and unanswered questions. Months later another child disappears, and threatening letters push Wexford and Burden into a race to stop a pattern repeating.

Elizabeth Nightingale is found beaten to death in woods near Kingsmarkham, and her husband insists they had no enemies. Wexford suspects the perfect marriage hid something darker, and every new detail makes the motive feel painfully intimate.

A bizarre car crash leaves a man dead and his daughter supposedly killed, and Wexford waits for the mother to wake and explain. Then a second violent death demands his attention, until the two mysteries start to connect.

Anita Margolis disappears without a body or clear crime, leaving Wexford and Inspector Burden with only an anonymous letter and the name Smith. As they dig into her private life, a missing-person case starts to look like something worse.

Wexford thought the brutal killing of elderly Mrs Primero was an open-and-shut case, until new doubts reopen his first major investigation. With old evidence questioned and the past stirred up again, he has to find what really happened.

Chief Inspector Reginald Wexford is called to the killing of Margaret Parsons, an ordinary woman with no obvious enemies. A cache of books signed only “Doon” points to a hidden relationship, and Wexford must work out who knew her well enough to kill.