Neil Broadfoot Books in Order

For Edinburgh-set crime with a reporter and a detective: Falling Fast → The Storm → All the Devils
For darker, harder-hitting suspense: No Man's Land → No Place to Die → The Point of No Return
If you want more Connor Fraser once you're hooked: No Quarter Given → Violent Ends → Unmarked Graves → Exit Wounds

Neil Broadfoot grew up in Eskbank, just south of Edinburgh, and the feel of modern Scotland runs right through his fiction. His novels move through city streets, political offices, police stations, and quiet places where trouble has a way of finding people anyway. They read like the work of someone who pays close attention to how people talk, work, and hide things.

Before the novels, he spent around fifteen years in journalism, working on local and national newspapers, including The Scotsman, Scotland on Sunday, and the Evening News. He covered major stories of the day, and that background shows on the page. His crime fiction cares about deadlines, sources, official spin, and the gap between what happened and what people are willing to say happened.

Writing seems to have grown alongside that day job rather than arriving as a dramatic career switch. People who knew him then have described him working away at short stories in the lulls between editions, and Broadfoot has said he often begins with a strong opening image and then investigates the story as he goes. It is a very reporter-like way to build a thriller.

That method suits his debut, Falling Fast, which opens with a woman plunging from Edinburgh's Scott Monument and introduces reporter Doug McGregor and DS Susie Drummond. The book was shortlisted for the Dundee International Book Prize and for the Deanston Scottish Crime Book of the Year Award. It was a strong first step, and it set out a lot of what Broadfoot does well, pace, pressure, sharp turns, and characters who get into situations that keep getting worse.

He didn't stop there.

The Storm and All the Devils pushed the McGregor and Drummond books further into the overlap between journalism, policing, and political danger. Readers who click with these novels tend to like the friction between Doug and Susie as much as the cases themselves. They are allies, but not easy ones, and Broadfoot gets plenty of tension out of that.

He then shifted to Stirling and built a second series around Connor Fraser, a close protection specialist and former Police Service of Northern Ireland officer. No Man's Land launched that run, and later books such as The Point of No Return, Violent Ends, Unmarked Graves, and Exit Wounds helped turn Fraser into a durable Broadfoot hero, tough, practical, damaged, and rarely allowed a quiet life. No Man's Land was longlisted for the McIlvanney Prize.

Place matters here.

Edinburgh in the McGregor and Drummond books feels political, crowded, and watchful. Stirling in the Connor Fraser novels feels older, rougher around the edges, and sometimes oddly exposed, as if history is standing just behind the next door. Across both series, Broadfoot keeps returning to power, loyalty, public image, violence, and the cost of pulling at secrets that other people need to stay buried. He is also one quarter of Four Blokes In Search of a Plot, a live writing event where crime writers build stories from audience suggestions, which fits the restless energy of the books.

These days he works in communications as well as writing, and he lives in Fife with his family. He has spoken about writing at night, after the rest of the day has had its say, which feels right for a novelist so drawn to pressure and momentum. His books have the snap of deadline writing, but also the steadiness of someone who knows exactly how a good story keeps you moving.