Stephanie Merritt Books in Order

Research student Gaby Harvey is drawn to the aloof and attractive Piers Gaveston despite sensing danger. As he advances through London's media world, their involvement exposes the destructive intersection of desire, obsession and the power surrounding her influential family.

Fading actor Greg and struggling playwright Sally meet while working on a West End production. Their reckless affair seems to promise escape from disappointing lives, until a shocking discovery forces them to confront the realities behind their romantic fantasies.

Stephanie Merritt recounts her experience of depression despite professional success, motherhood and family support. Drawing on her own changing moods and struggle to find help, she examines love, isolation and self-medication alongside the difficulty of making others understand.

Bruno, exiled Italian monk and daring philosopher, arrives at Oxford in 1583, officially to debate the Copernican universe. Secretly spying for Elizabeth I, he is drawn into a series of gruesome murders and a hidden Catholic plot against the crown.

Autumn 1583, London seethes with rumours that an ominous planetary alignment foretells Queen Elizabeth's death. When a maid of honour is found murdered with occult symbols carved into her skin, Bruno must infiltrate treacherous circles at court before prophecy turns to disaster.

In 1584 Bruno is shocked to discover that the figure shadowing him through London is Sophia Underhill, the woman he once loved and who now stands accused of killing her husband. Following her to Canterbury, he uncovers fresh murders and secrets tied to Thomas Becket's lost shrine.

Set in Naples in 1566, this prequel novella finds eighteen year old Giordano Bruno newly vowed to the Dominican Order. When he helps with a forbidden autopsy on a young woman, he suspects murder and must choose between protecting his future or exposing the truth.

As England edges toward war with Spain in 1585, Bruno travels to Plymouth with Sir Philip Sidney and joins Sir Francis Drake's fleet. A suspicious death aboard ship pulls him into the port's underworld, where tracking a killer exposes a conspiracy that could endanger the realm.

In 1585 Paris, King Henry III fears his kingdom will fracture as Catholic League agitators challenge his rule. Bruno is summoned to investigate a string of deaths linked to the royal succession, forcing him to navigate brutal street politics and a dangerous alliance with English exiles.

Seeking refuge from a failing marriage, Zoe Adams rents a house on a remote Scottish island. Strange nighttime disturbances and the property's history of mysterious deaths leave her questioning whether she faces supernatural forces or a very human threat.

England, 1586. Bruno returns with evidence that a band of young Catholic gentlemen plan to assassinate Elizabeth and free Mary, Queen of Scots. Working inside the Babington plot, he must juggle Walsingham's ruthless strategy with his own conscience as bodies begin to fall.

This collection gathers three early Bruno adventures, charting his years as a questioning young friar and fledgling investigator in Italy. Across murders, forbidden experiments and winter bound intrigues, he learns how dangerous the pursuit of knowledge can be in a world ruled by fear.

In Prague in 1588, Giordano Bruno encounters Emperor Rudolf’s alchemists and their search for immortality. A chemist’s murder leads to an imperial investigation, forcing Elizabeth’s spy to navigate court rivalries and religious divisions while searching for the killer.

Fleeing the Inquisition in 1576, Giordano Bruno reaches Venice and encounters the murder of an aristocrat whose wife is accused. An anonymous coded letter claims her innocence, drawing him toward a hidden writer and powerful interests suppressing the truth.

Grieving widow Jo Lawless joins her husband's oldest friends for a weekend at a French chateau. An unexpected guest exposes buried tensions, and a horrifying discovery turns the gathering into a murder investigation with further danger approaching.