The Curious Case Files of Leviticus Gold Books in Order

The Curious Case Files of Leviticus Gold series lets Andy McDermott play in a lighter, more overtly comic corner of crime fiction. Instead of archaeologists or assassins, the lead is a man who has made a career out of being famous for everything and nothing.

Leviticus Gold is a celebrity first and foremost. Over the years he has been a rock star, actor, author, explorer, fashion icon, and professional raconteur. He is rich, overexposed, and very aware of his own image. What he has never been, at least at the start, is a detective. That changes when murder follows him into places that should be glamorous and safe, forcing him to turn his flair for drama and self-promotion toward something more dangerous: solving crimes in which he is entangled.

In Murder on the Orient Excess, Gold is aboard an ultra-luxury flight, a tongue‑in‑cheek nod to classic train mysteries. A passenger is killed mid‑air, the suspect list is short, and all eyes turn toward the most notorious person on the manifest. As the prime suspect and a man with a large ego, Gold cannot just sit back and trust the professionals. The story becomes a locked‑room puzzle at thirty thousand feet, with Leviticus barging into interviews, overinterpreting clues, and slowly realising that clearing his name will take more than charm.

The second story, The Girl With The Dragon 32, digs into his past in a different way. A young charity worker is found dead beside a vintage Dragon 32 home computer, which is running an old treasure-hunt game reportedly written by Gold in the 1980s. When the police come knocking to ask about the game and why someone might die playing it, his curiosity kicks in. The investigation blends nostalgic technology, hidden messages, and modern motives, as Leviticus tries to understand how a half‑forgotten project became the centre of a murder enquiry.

What ties these cases together is tone as much as plot. The Leviticus Gold stories are shorter than McDermott’s novels and read like sharp, self-contained mysteries with a wink to golden‑age crime. There are enclosed settings, finite suspect lists, and clues for the reader to weigh, but also jokes about celebrity culture, social media, and the oddity of being known everywhere you go. Gold himself is vain, impulsive, and often ridiculous, yet there is enough underlying decency to make his efforts to find the truth feel sincere.

The supporting cast—harried detectives, fellow passengers, people who have crossed paths with Leviticus in his many careers—treat him as both a nuisance and an unlikely asset. That tension keeps the stories lively. He is never quite as sharp as he thinks he is, but he does notice things others miss, simply because he is used to looking at himself and the world as a performance.

For readers who enjoy McDermott’s pacing but want something less apocalyptic, The Curious Case Files of Leviticus Gold offers compact mysteries with a comic edge. They are easy to read in a single sitting, require no deep knowledge of his other books, and work well as a playful palate cleanser between the larger Wilde and Chase or Alex Reeve adventures.