Peter Dickinson Books in Order

Detective James Pibble enters a London household whose unfamiliar culture makes every apparent clue difficult to interpret. Understanding the people living there becomes essential to untangling a mystery that challenges the assumptions of a conventional police investigation.

In an England gripped by a mysterious hatred of machinery, Geoffrey and his sister flee accusations of witchcraft. Discovering that France remains unaffected sends them back across the Channel to uncover the force responsible for their country’s transformation.

Detective James Pibble investigates a servant’s apparent suicide at an English country house transformed into a tourist attraction. Two retired war heroes run the estate, where staged traditions and resident lions complicate his search for the truth.

Margaret and Jonathan discover an injured American investigator in an England where knowledge of machinery invites persecution. Helping him escape means defying their community and risking their lives in a country overwhelmed by the mysterious Changes.

Separated from her parents as England erupts into panic and hostility toward technology, Nicky Gore joins a group of Sikhs fleeing London. Together they seek a safe home and struggle to establish peaceful relations with suspicious neighbors.

Summoned to a remote Hebridean island, James Pibble investigates the disappearance of an elderly scientist’s memoirs. A religious community’s determination to keep the scientist there turns the missing manuscript into a more troubling mystery.

Emma stays with her unruly Scottish cousins beside a private loch rumored to contain a monster. Exploring in an early submarine reveals the truth, leaving the children to decide whether to profit from their discovery or protect it.

Children with an unusual condition appear withdrawn yet possess powers of thought transference. Investigating the foundation treating them, former detective Jimmy Pibble uncovers people willing to use fraud, arson, and murder to exploit those abilities.

A Byzantine slave boy ventures into Hun territory to rescue a kidnapped girl, taking the household's trained bear with him. Its dancing provides a welcome that helps him navigate dangerous encounters far from the city he knows.

The poorest prince in the world hopes to marry the Princess of Persia, but winning her requires extraordinary help. Persuading the Iron Lion of Ferdustan to join his quest sets this illustrated fairy tale in motion.

Semi-retired detective James Pibble travels to a Greek island with his wife, expecting a holiday. A wealthy resident's request for protection from assassination draws him back into professional danger beneath the apparent ease of the Mediterranean setting.

Davy Price inherits the ability to perceive other people's thoughts and discovers that his family faces danger. Understanding what his unusual gift reveals becomes essential as he tries to protect the people closest to him.

An English researcher studies communication with a chimpanzee in an Arab kingdom embracing modern technology. When a hijacked plane arrives and a murder follows, the animal becomes the only witness capable of identifying what happened.

Stories, poems, facts, and imagined episodes explore the relationships between chance, luck, and destiny. A retelling of Oedipus links this varied collection, which also considers magic as an attempt to overcome life's unpredictable events.

While renovating her London boardinghouse, Lydia discovers a corpse beneath the floorboards. Her tenants, the exiled government of a Baltic country, become entangled in a mystery that turns domestic repairs into an encounter with Cold War espionage.

In an alternative British monarchy, King Victor's family contends with budget problems and awkward public duties. Palace pranks turn deadly and increasingly target teenage Princess Louise, suggesting someone wants one of the family's many secrets exposed.

Temple trainee Tron has grown up devoted to the rituals sustaining his ancient kingdom's gods. Interrupting the sacrifice of a blue hawk puts him in mortal danger and forces him to question the priests who control his world.

Two brothers search for their missing grandfather after his ghost-hunting investigation takes him underground. An abandoned mine conceals a revolutionary headquarters, turning their effort to find him into a dangerous encounter with political conspirators.

Researcher David Foxe travels to a remote Caribbean island to conduct experiments on rats. He becomes caught in an unfamiliar maze of political intrigue, corruption, and voodoo that makes his own position increasingly resemble that of his subjects.

A mischievous modern witch creates a string of surreal adventures in this illustrated nonsense fantasy. The story follows Hepzibah through unpredictable magical twists, bringing the spontaneity of a tale told to young children into print.

Living listlessly in a comfortable nursing home, retired detective James Pibble discovers a body on its water tower. Earlier suspicious deaths and a mysterious visitor revive his sense of purpose as he investigates blackmail and escalating violence.

Peter Dickinson combines imagined natural history with scientific speculation to consider how dragons might have existed and flown. Illustrated by Wayne Anderson, the book examines legendary creatures through a playful mixture of fantasy, biology, and physical explanation.

Familiar Old Testament stories are retold through the voices of imagined witnesses and storytellers. Each narrator speaks from a particular culture and set of beliefs, revealing why these ancient events matter to the people recounting them.

During Britain's 1926 General Strike, Oxford student Tom Hankey volunteers to drive a train and finds himself ambushed. Torn between two women and opposing political worlds, he is drawn into forces far darker than a student adventure.

An affluent children's opera group in West London becomes a target for South American guerrillas. Held hostage during their shared creative work, the children and adults must navigate fear, political demands, and the human relationships inside the siege.

A crime committed during one of the Countess of Snailwood's glittering 1930s gatherings remains unresolved for forty years. The last survivor of that circle must revisit the mystery, confronting the disturbing legacy behind its glamorous social world.

Sixteen-year-old Barry reluctantly accepts that young Pinkie possesses a genuine healing gift. Watching the sessions organized by her ambitious stepfather, he begins to suspect that her remarkable ability is being used against her will.

Recollections of childhood become pieces in a mystery whose meaning shifts as distant events and recent discoveries meet. Peter Dickinson explores how time and later knowledge reshape the stories people believe about their own past.

A call from the past interrupts romantic novelist Lady Margaret's successful later life. Revisiting the magazine work and love affair that transformed her youth reveals that a tragedy she thought settled may have been murder.

On his final night at a tropical holiday retreat, a boy dreams that an enormous cold is turning the island into a frozen wasteland. Restoring its warmth becomes a task that only he can undertake.

A man in an apparently empty shop gives James a box containing nothing. The gift transports him to the Dump, a strange world of transformed rubbish and intelligent rats, where familiar discarded things take on unexpected lives.

Filmmaker Nigel Jackland returns to Nigeria with his mother's 1923 diary, seeking to understand her life as a colonial official's wife. A military coup complicates his project as her account reveals a troubling intervention in local affairs.

A gardener's struggle with moles unfolds in an illustrated book built around a hole cut through its pages. As the story progresses, the same opening takes on a different purpose in each successive scene.

Thirteen-year-old Eva wakes from a long coma to discover that doctors have saved her mind inside a chimpanzee’s body. Adjusting to an unfamiliar existence forces her to reconsider her human relationships and her place among the animals.

Imprisoned beneath a stone, Merlin dreams of a medieval world populated by magical creatures and ordinary people facing extraordinary dangers. Nine connected tales unfold within the sleeping wizard’s imagination, exploring the uneasy boundaries between enchantment and human desire.

Celebrated actor Adrian Waring remains haunted by events at his wealthy uncle’s home during the Second World War. An amateur production of The Tempest, a possible inheritance, and a hanging conceal a truth he has carried for decades.

Princess Louise becomes interested in a mysterious elderly woman living at Hampton Court. Unaware that kidnappers are targeting her infant son, she follows a puzzle that draws royal domestic life into a dangerous political conspiracy.

Boy soldier Paul Kagomi struggles to survive the fighting in Nagala, where rival forces compete for power. As violence moves from the bush into impoverished towns, his dependence on his gun shapes his uncertain search for safety and freedom.

Divorced grandmother Poppy Tasker notices a stranger watching her young grandson at a London playground. When the man is found murdered and another death follows, she must understand the danger drawing her family into a disturbing mystery.

A prehistoric girl’s ingenuity changes the lives of her tribe, while a modern girl joins her paleontologist father at an African excavation. Their parallel stories connect an important fossil discovery with questions about human intelligence and survival.

An elderly clock repairer returns to the elaborate town-hall timepiece his grandfather built nearly a century earlier. Inside its workings he discovers a community of intelligent mice, revealing an unexpected world hidden within a familiar public landmark.

Letta knows little about the small Balkan country her parents left behind. When communism collapses, her grandfather becomes a symbol of its independence movement, drawing the family into a struggle shaped by national legend and political upheaval.

Decades after Gerry Grantworth died in a gas-filled room at the Vereker mansion, Lucy and Paul compare their memories. Their accounts of love affairs, wartime events, and family secrets gradually reshape their understanding of the mysterious death.

Danielle believes her pet whippet Chuck could one day save the universe, although Chuck is frightened of almost everything. Their adventures follow a devoted girl and an anxious dog whose very different views of the world keep colliding.

Keith discovers that two girls who look identical have never met, yet share troubling memories and dreams. Their mystery anchors a collection of four stories in which ordinary experiences open onto unsettling possibilities and hidden dangers.

An elderly woman nearing death searches her memories for the truth about a treasured possession with a dangerous past. Understanding its history becomes essential to settling the mysteries of her life and choosing how that life will end.

As the ancient magic protecting her valley weakens, Tilja joins a small expedition into a dangerous empire to find its legendary savior. Her apparent lack of magical ability may prove the group’s strongest defense against hostile sorcerers.

Driven from their Moonhawk tribe, Suth, Noli, Ko, and Mana search prehistoric Africa for a place of food and safety. Each child brings different strengths to a journey threatened by harsh landscapes, dangerous animals, and unfamiliar people.

After losing his family in a fire, Alfredo goes to live with his mysterious uncle near Mount Etna. Discovering the sorcerer’s plans for magical salamanders forces the boy to use his own powers against both human cruelty and volcanic danger.

Gavin’s beloved grandfather is hospitalized after a severe stroke, leaving the boy desperate to reach him. A model boat and stories of magical seal-people offer Gavin a way to imagine overcoming the silence separating them.

Saranja, Maja, and Ribek leave their endangered valley to seek the long-absent Ropemaker. Their journey reveals that the magicians entrusted with protecting the empire have become a corrupt collective power, making their mission more urgent than they imagined.

Peter Dickinson gathers poems drawn from personal experiences, family occasions, and decades of writing. Published for his eightieth birthday, the collection also includes playful verse for children and selections from his years working at Punch.

Ambassador’s son Nigel befriends Princess Taeela in a remote country divided by clan rivalries. When a coup threatens her life, the pair must escape the palace and seek allies in the mountains while navigating a nation in turmoil.

A visiting Indian scientist arrives in a Britain where green-skinned Celts endure institutional persecution. After violence destroys his hosts’ household, he joins an underground resistance whose struggle for racial equality places him against the powerful defenders of segregation.