Newcastle is a city built for crime fiction. If you’ve walked the Quayside at night or through Jesmond Dene before dawn, if you’ve felt the energy of the Bigg Market or the quietude of the town moor, if you’ve seen one estate attract big investment while another waits patiently for regeneration, you’ll know Newcatle has some corners that are perfect for clandestine meets and hiding a body.

Here are some reads, including a few of my own, that prove the Toon has more bodies buried in its fiction than most cities twice its size.

Bait & Switch (DCI Cooper, Book 9) — B Baskerville

I'm putting this one first because, well, it's mine, and because it's the book I'm proudest of. A young reverend is attacked just off Northumberland Street while the city's attention is fixed on the Fenwick Christmas window reveal. Locations include Northumberland Street, the Ouseburn Valley, the Byker Wall, and Central Station. DCI Erica Cooper launches an undercover opperation to catch a serial predator who leaves no trace. You won’t walk home alone again.

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LJ Ross

LJ Ross needs very little introduction to anyone who reads North East crime fiction. Her DCI Ryan series has sold millions of copies and put Northumbria firmly on the literary map. Her series spans the entire region but a number of books focus on Newcastle’s City Centre. 

Seven Bridges sees someone threatening to blow up the Tyne Bridge, The Moor takes Ryan into a travelling circus with it a troupe of acrobats, magicians, jugglers, and a killer, and The Infirmary, a prequel to the whole series, finds Ryan hunting “the Hacker" in Newcastle during the summer heat of 2014.

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The DCI Cooper Series — B Baskerville

Me again - becuase it’s my blog and why not? Bait & Switch is book nine, but Cooper's relationship with Newcastle runs through the whole series. 

Every September, students flood into Tyneside looking for a university education and a good time. In Rock, Paper, Scissors, something far darker is waiting for some of them. 

Roll The Dice takes Cooper into Newcastle's criminal underworld when the head of crime family is shot in his own home. One suspect is his own son, a man who wasn't born evil, but was made that way.

In The House Always Wins, the mayor of Newcastle is murdered in city’s LGBTQ+ quarter. Was this a political assassination, or does a darker force lurk behind the scenes? The ramifications of the mayor's death quickly ripple far beyond the walls of local government, and soon Newcastle finds itself divided like never before. 

Nicky Black - Valley Park

Nicky Black's Valley Park collection is set on a fictional Newcastle housing estate, and pulls no punches. 

The Prodigal follows Nicola Kelly and a career criminal husband. The Rave, set in ’89 follows a young man on the dole, trying to escape poverty via the underground club scene. And The Flower House features a property developer going toe-to-toe with a reclusive old woman who will do anything to protect the secrets of the estate.

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Colin Youngman - Ryan Jarrod Series

Colin Youngman's Ryan Jarrod series covers Newcastle and beyond. There’s the Quayside in The Girl on the Quay, the university in The Angel Falls and even the local light rail in The Metro. 

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If you've read any of these, or have a Newcastle-set crime novel I've missed, I'd love to hear about it. Newcastle has too many stories for one author alone.