After extending the Jessica Daniel series through to a minimum of nine books in April, Pan Macmillan will also publish two more crime books written by me.

This means that I am now contracted to Macmillan for a whopping 14 books, including the Jessica series, the Silver Blackthorn young adult/fantasy trilogy and these two.

I’m not exactly sure on scheduling yet, though at least one of them will be out in 2014.

The first is a spin-off from Playing with Fire (Jessica Daniel book five). It involves the private investigator, Andrew Hunter, who slightly got in Jessica’s way. It is completely standalone, with no need to have read anything I’ve written before.

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SOMETHING WICKED (ANDREW HUNTER 1)

Nicholas Carr disappeared on his 18th birthday and the world has moved on. His girlfriend has gone to university, his friends have got jobs, the police have other things to look into.
   But his father, Richard, is still stuck on the three fingers the police dug up from a sodden Manchester wood. What happened to Nicholas on the night he disappeared and why did he never come home?
   Private investigator Andrew Hunter is Nicholas’s last hope – but Andrew has his own problems too. There’s something about his brilliant assistant, Jenny, that isn’t quite right: her old teacher called it Empathy Deficit Disorder but perhaps it’s not just other people she struggles to feel for?

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The second book is also a standalone crime novel, set in Manchester. As per the Jessica and Silver Blackthorn series, it will be produced as an audio by AudioGo.

DOWN AMONG THE DEAD MEN

‘I’m going to do you a favour: I’m going to tell you my name and then I’m going to give you thirty seconds to turn and run. If any of you are still here after those thirty seconds, then we’re going to have a problem.’