Russell James

Author Information
Russell James's Latest Book

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  • Bibliography:
    66 Books (2 Series)
  • First Book:
    October 1990
  • Latest Book:
    October 2023
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Full Series List in Order

Croome Victorian

1 - After She Drowned (Jan-2018)
2 - The Captain's Ward (Mar-2019)
3 - Man's Estate (Mar-2020)

A Kathy West National Park Adventure

1 - Claws (May-2019)
2 - Dragons of Kilauea (Oct-2020)

Book List in Order: 66 titles

  • Underground

    'Britain seen through a gun-sight,' said the Literary Review.He's underground, under fire and under pressure.For several years he has been lying low, buried in the urban decay of south-east London, waiting to be called. Now his enemies have smoked hi...

  • Payback

    After ten years away, ex-boxer Floyd Carter comes back for his brother’s funeral, and to decide what’s to be done with his other brother, the lumbering Ludo whose mental age is barely twelve. But if Ludo knows anything it is that Albie’s death ...

  • Slaughter Music

    Determined to become the right-hand man of London mobster Al Kazan, Tim Hawk is delighted to be put in charge of Kazan's young new bride, just as a full-scale mob war begins to undermine Kazan's criminal empire...

  • Count Me Out

    Relentless with suspense, dark with menace, this is the gripping story of two brothers on the edge of disaster. When Scott takes part in an armored van robbery and disappears, he is pursued by the very nasty criminals who set it up-and who hope to ge...

  • Oh No, Not My Baby

    James has a way with characters. Few are precisely what they seem, and our desire to learn who they really are and what actually happened makes this one a page-turner" - Booklist. It should have been a dream come true. Nick Chance fancied her at scho...

  • Painting in the Dark

    At the center of James' intriguingly constructed plot are British-born octogenarian Sidonie Keene and her artist sister, Naomi, who moved in the most elite circles of 1930s German society, regularly socializing with Hitler and other high-level Nazis....

  • The Annex

    If you thought the bloodthirsty Jacobean tragedy, The Changeling, could not be made any more shocking, you haven’t read this version, written by the man Ian Rankin called ‘The Godfather of British Noir’. James cuts to the quick " and in doing...

  • Pick Any Title

    James is one of the UK's finest genre writers." - Booklist. "When it comes to a great story, brilliantly written, Russell James is up there with the very best." - The Guardian. Set in the U.S. and London, Pick Any Title is the new mystery/suspense th...

  • No One Gets Hurt

    One of the UK's finest genre writers."-Booklist. When a young woman is gruesomely murdered, her friend and fellow reporter Kirsty Rice feels bound to investigate. Just as she enters the murky world of call girls, porn, and internet sex, she discovers...



  • Undercover Marshal

    The town of Dry Acres is under the oppression of a crooked alliance between outlaw Mark Grayson and his protector, Mayor and Sheriff Henry Binalt. When the local newspaper editor, Gil Radford, is murdered before he can expose the corruption, his niec...

  • Requiem for a Daughter

    First in the Tom Fortune and Abi Wilde series.In a quiet London street, a gunman holds his little child as hostage until, after a dramatic police siege, the smoke clears to reveal a sickening outcome and Firearms Officer Abi Wilde is suspended. As if...

  • The London Sextet

    An original collection of six stories from the writer Ian Rankin called ‘The Godfather of British Noir’. James is ‘surely the best of Britain’s darker crime writers’ said London’s Times, and although the Encyclopaedia of Modern Crime Fic...

  • Dark Inspiration

  • My Bullet Sweetly Sings

    ""When beauty's the prizeWhat mortal fears dying?"Tim Hawk plans his assassinations well, rehearsing them with cool detachment, and his professionalism makes him a rising star in Kazan's gang. Hawk's only other interest, an unexpected l"...

  • Brace Yourself

    Betrayal and murder at a country house shooting party. When this story appeared in a characteristically yellow and black Victor Gollancz anthology, 'Crime Yellow', the Times review picked it out as ‘a splendid country house shocker from Russell Jam...

  • The Break

    Paul’s life is ordinary, until the night he stops his car to take a walk, Stumbling into " and hoping to avoid " a domestic affray, he finds himself the reluctant guardian to a homeless young woman and her shabbily-dressed child. It’s late....

  • Terri's Tales

    From one of Britain’s masters of crime writing, here are two stories to whet your appetite, presented here in bargain-price format. The first, A Piece of Cake, has been anthologised several times already, and tells of the night Terri waited at home...

  • The Exhibitionists

    'On the night Parliament burnt down, a child was conceived out of wedlock, a baby was abandoned, and another thrown into the Thames.' The year is 1834 and J.M.W. Turner is sketching Parliament burn. Unnoticed, a hackney cab drives past, the passenger...

  • Vensus Has People!

    Captain Austyn Parsons commands the Aphrodite 3, a methane extraction ship orbiting Venus. But this trip proves less than mundane as flying creatures are sucked through the collection hoses and clog up the vents leading to the ship. This leads Parson...



  • Lost

    From one of Britain’s masters of crime writing, here are two stories to whet your appetite, presented in bargain-price format. The title story, Lost, introduces the only detective to be given a lead role in a Russell James story (a beguiling charac...

  • Touch and Go

  • Sacrifice

  • Rafael's Gold

    Will the film crew discover sunken gold? Will the film star lose to her rival? If they find gold, who will be left alive to share it? Alongside the story of their quest is a tale from the Spanish Armada itself, a tale of love and tragedy, revealed...

  • Black Magic

    In this magic shop the magic is real. And the trick is on you. Citrus Glade is a dying town that needs new businesses, but the one that just opened is doing much more harm than good. Stranger Lyle Miller’s magic shop seems to only stock what it...

  • Island Girl

    In 1851, Harrison Bartlett boards the brigantine Enchantress, escaping to the East Indies from the painful memory of his late wife. His ship sinks in a Pacific storm. The sole survivor, he washes ashore on a deserted volcanic island. Struggling to su...

  • Exit 39

    An up-to-the-minute tragicomedy narrated into an iPhone by Crosby Ravensworth, a 35-year-old executive too busy to scatter his father’s ashes, or to sort out the dysfunctional family he has left behind, or even to decide which of the four women in ...

  • Deeper Into Darkness

    Russell James returns with a second collection of thirteen horrific short stories. • A mysterious pinball machine arrives at the mansion of an aging porn king. He finds that this gift has itself a gift to give. Accepting both may be his last mistak...

  • Dark Vengeance

    Will the blood of innocents release the evil trapped at Galaxy Farm? A coven of witches has moved into the tiny town near Galaxy Farm. They know about the evil entity that lies trapped there, and they hope to resurrect it and set it free to renew...

  • Blood Red Roses

    The spirits of the dead cry for justice. In the waning days of the Civil War, orphaned teen Jebediah Abernathy has been indentured to one of the most notorious plantations in Mississippi, Beechwood. Ramses, the sadistic overseer, rules completely...



  • The Newly Discovered Diaries of Doctor Kristal

    A black comedy set in the Swinging Sixties (1963-4) and revealed through the diaries of a doctor " 35 years old and still a virgin " whose curious obsessions drive him to start murdering his patients.Doctor Kristal is picky, pedantic and super-su...

  • Stories I Can't Tell

  • Dreamwalker

  • Naked

    Mitchell from my swim team moved in next door and he and his two brothers can't keep their pants on. Mom always told me it's shameful not to keep covered up, but how can I follow Mom's orders when they want me to join them, exposing my willy to entir...

  • Naked at Camp Freedom

    I can't believe this new kid Xander. Forced to bunk with each other at Camp Freedom while surrounded by fifty other boys who are all a couple years older, Xander hits me with the strangest question: "Do you like me?" What does he mean by that? Betwee...

  • Naked Series: 3 Book Bundle

    The entire Naked series in one book. A fantastic collection of three stories, revealing inner thoughts of three different boys coming face-to-face with the scary prospect of being naked.

    Part One: Naked a Camp Freedom Mitchell’s Story

  • The Naked Club

    As if finding a hidden fort in the woods behind my house wasn't cool enough, I discover my favorite friend Mitchell, who recently moved away, lives just on the other side of the woods. Things get interesting when my cousin Ryder convinces me to make ...

  • Q Island

    "I loved the story so much that I'm eagerly waiting to read more from him. I now have a new favorite book I'll read over and over again." (Five Stars, A Night Owl Top Pick) -Night Owl Reviews on Dark Inspiration "A surreal thrill ride of a read Very...

  • Special Delivery*

    When the mail must get through, leave it to a kangaroo.Meet Roopert - an irresistible little kangaroo - whose adventures delivering the mail almost end in disaster. Only Roopert's best friend Amelia the beetle will give Roopert any chance of deliveri...

  • Naked and Unsupervised

    I don't get it. I ask a couple simple questions: “What is sex?” and “What is jacking off?” And I get riddle involving a jimmy-john, a yahoo, and screaming for Jesus. I guess it's my fault for asking Uncle Dax in the first place. Now, I have t...



  • Naked Painted Bodies

    Do I want to go to Hunter’s sleepover birthday party? With an older sister has gorgeous as Danielle sleeping in the same house, likely barely dressed in a nearby bedroom " heck yeah I do! But the night gets interesting when Hunter’s younger bro...

  • Forever Out of Time

    Acclaimed author Russell James delivers nine fantastic time travel short stories: • A psychologist tries to cure an agoraphobic patient of his belief that passing through doorways accelerates time. Can he do it before a construction project brings ...

  • Outer Rim

    Six thrilling stories of life at the galaxy's edge including an Eddie Kane adventure. - Alien telepaths join with humans in a desperate battle against an encroaching empire. - A teen schemes to join her mother at an orbiting artists' colony. - The se...

  • Mother Naked

    A dark comedy about hypocrisy. For Ruth’s 100th birthday the family gathers in a remote hotel. They deplore her scandalous past " but might they have worse secrets of their own? Ruth worked at the Windmill in her youth and behind her back is crit...

  • Marissa Anselmo and the City Beneath the Sea

    At sixteen, Marissa Anselmo discovers she has a choice. She can live a life above the water or beneath it. Thousands of years ago, sorcerers separated two warring Mediterranean peoples, teleporting satyrs into northern Europe, and submerging the huma...

  • Return to Q Island

    Millions long to break out of quarantine. One man needs to break in. The paleovirus has swept Long Island, turning residents into psychotic killers. A government quarantine traps Patrick in Connecticut, separated from his mother and pregnant sister o...

  • Cavern of the Damned

    Broke and desperate, paleontologist Grant Coleman gets the chance of a lifetime exploring a long-sealed cave, the fabled home of gigantic creatures. NPS Ranger McKinley Stinson discovers a rancher's prize bull has been butchered by an airborne killer...

  • After She Drowned

    Croome Victorian - 1

    Passions stir in Victorian England. It is 1891, and in the small country town of Croome where the local lead mine is losing money, the year begins with a tragic drowning.Recently arrived in Croome the new vicar, Matthew Rolfe, has escaped the traged...

  • Monsters In The Clouds

    Paleontologist Grant Coleman and activist Janaina Silva are recruited by Thana Katsoros for a top secret expedition, one in search of a live Apatosaurus on a plateau deep in the Amazonian rain forest. But their plane crashes short of their destinatio...

  • The Curse of the Viper King

    Paleontologist Grant Coleman and environmentalist Janaina Silva, lost in the Amazon rain forest, discover an isolated logging camp, and the chance to hitch a ride back to civilization. But the workers uncover a fossil of a giant snake, almost fifteen...



  • The Playing Card Killer

    "A masterfully crafted, horrifically powerful story. Expect the unexpected in this deliciously twisted tale." - Cemetery DanceBrian Sheridan may be losing his mind.Asleep, he’s plagued by dreams of murder, women strangled with a red velvet rope the...

  • The Captain's Ward

    Croome Victorian - 2

    Coming of age in Victorian England.In 1887, twelve-year-old orphan Lucy Richards is taken secretly into the care of a half-pay captain in an isolated farmhouse several miles from the small town of Croome. Lucy’s mother founded hospitals in India an...

  • Claws

    A Kathy West National Park Adventure - 1

    National Park Service Rangers Kathy West and Nathan Toland are the only ones stationed at Fort Jefferson, a restored Civil War fort sixty miles off Key West, Florida. Two overnight campers go missing, but before the rangers can investigate, shady Hom...

  • Talking With Timothy

    Author Russell James went to the local animal shelter to pick out a cat.A cat picked him out instead.Timothy, an orange tabby, came home to join his new sister Mallory. He brought a sense of superiority, a feeling of entitlement, a vendetta against a...

  • Man's Estate

    Croome Victorian - 3

    In late Victorian England, two fathers must choose between daughters and sons.Man’s Estate, the third in the Croome saga, takes place in 1893 when the story splits between lives in the growing town of Croome and the quite different life in the ...

  • The Portal

    Three hundred years ago, on an isolated island in Long Island Sound, Satan tried to open a doorway to Hell. Now he's returned to finish the task.A black speedboat arrives at the small island community of Stone Harbor. Its mysterious passenger, Joey O...

  • Dragons of Kilauea

    A Kathy West National Park Adventure - 2

    The tranquil forests of Hawaii's Volcanoes National Park hide a dangerous secret. For centuries, fire-breathing dragons have slumbered in the bowels of the volcano Kilauea. But acts of inexplicable arson and horrific murders around the island appear ...

  • Farallon Island

    Nate Thalmann wants to escape his life as a Prohibition Era bootlegger. He moves with his pregnant wife Alice to the Farallon Island lighthouse, situated on a rocky islet twenty-seven miles off the California coast. Joining three other keepers and th...

  • She Had To Die

    After five years she’s back: the girl Nick Chance fell for at school. She went on to university, while he stayed in Bristol and tried to make a career in rock groups. Now he plays sax in a jazz/rock group, Blue Delta, due to play for the first ...

  • Lambs Among Wolves

    Evil may soon consume mankind, if the demons have their way.After the death of her father, young Cyndi Fisher travels to Paris to meet the grandfather she never knew. That man turns out to be Father Jack Cahill, a renegade exorcist who was unaware he...

  • Mammoth Island

    As paleontologist Grant Coleman waits to board a plane for a much-needed Hawaiian vacation, thugs knock him out and kidnap him. He awakens on a cargo aircraft in flight to find he's an unwilling member of an expedition to a secret Arctic location cal...

  • Demon Dagger

    A Demon Hunter with a gift that becomes a curse. A Demon that hunts the hunter. A thrilling tale of darkness and vengeance for fans of the TV series 'Supernatural'."A thrilling game of supernatural cat and mouse." - Publishers Weekly"A fast-paced thr...

  • Atoll X

    Billionaire Parker Rothman is building a resort on a private island in the South Pacific. He's uncovered marine fossils during construction and offers paleontologist Grant Coleman the opportunity to come catalog them. The offer includes all expenses ...

  • Generation Omega

    In a world where children are forbidden, one couple will not comply...The human race is dying.In the near future, genetic mutation causes everyone born after a certain date to mature into psychopaths. Massacres plague the nation. For the safety of al...

  • Dust and Bones

  • Desolation Canyon

    It seems like the perfect trip when paleontologist Grant Coleman joins a geology professor and an anthropologist to explore an unmapped canyon far out in the Utah desert. The sponsor's team leader promises Grant he can take home all the fossils he fi...

  • Under the Skeleton Flag

    It is 1718 and Doctor Baxter Whitcomb decides to leave his medical practice in London for the challenge and adventure of practicing in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. But while crossing the ocean, his ship is boarded by pirates. And not just any pirate...

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Russell James has published 66 books.

Russell James does not have a new book coming out soon. The latest book, Under the Skeleton Flag, was published in October 2023.

The first book by Russell James, Underground, was published in October 1990.

Yes. Russell James has 2 series.
Author Series
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