DI Kim Stone Books in Order: How to read Angela Marsons’s series?

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Written by the British author of crime fiction Angela Marsons, DI Kim Stone is the main protagonist in this crime series that was at first digitally published. The success led to a publishing deal with Bonnier Publishing Fiction for a total of 17 books!

Set in the Black Country in the West Midlands, the series follows the dark and violent investigations of Detective Kim Stone and her team from the Halesowen Police Station.

How to read the DI Kim Stone Series in Order?

Every entry in the DI Kim Stone book series works as a standalone story, but the lives of the different characters evolve from one novel to the other.

  1. First BloodPrequel novel originally published after Child’s Play. When the body of a young man is found beheaded and staked to the ground in a secluded woodland area of the Clent Hills, Kim Stone and her new squad rush to the crime scene. Searching the victim’s home, Kim finds a little girl’s bedroom and a hidden laptop, but where is the child? And why does the man’s own sister seem relieved that he’s dead? As Kim begins to unearth the shocking truth about the victim, a disturbing resemblance is spotted with the recent murder of a man found beneath the staircase of Redland Hall with multiple stab wounds.
  2. Silent Scream – Years later, a headmistress is found brutally strangled, the first in a spate of gruesome murders that shock the Black Country. But when human remains are discovered at a former children’s home, disturbing secrets are also unearthed. Detective Kim Stone fast realizes she’s on the hunt for a twisted individual whose killing spree spans decades.
  3. Evil Games – When a rapist is found mutilated in a brutal attack, Detective Kim Stone and her team are called in to bring a swift resolution. But, as more vengeful killings come to light, it soon becomes clear that there is someone far more sinister at work. With the investigation quickly gathering momentum, Kim finds herself exposed to great danger and in the sights of a lethal individual undertaking their own twisted experiment.
  1. Lost Girls – When nine-year-old best friends Charlie and Amy disappear, two families are plunged into a living nightmare. A text message confirms the unthinkable; that the girls are the victims of a terrifying kidnapping. And when a second text message pits the two families against each other for the life of their children, the clock starts ticking for Detective Kim Stone and the squad.
  2. Play Dead – Westerley research facility is not for the faint-hearted. A ‘body farm’ investigating human decomposition, its inhabitants are corpses in various states of decay. But when Detective Kim Stone and her team discover the fresh body of a young woman, it seems a killer has discovered the perfect cover to bury their crime.
  3. Blood Lines – A victim killed with a single, precise stab to the heart appears at first glance to be a robbery gone wrong. A caring, upstanding social worker lost to a senseless act of violence. But for Detective Kim Stone, something doesn’t add up.
  1. Dead Souls – When a collection of human bones is unearthed during a routine archaeological dig, a Black Country field suddenly becomes a complex crime scene for Detective Kim Stone. As the bones are sorted, it becomes clear that the grave contains more than one victim. The bodies hint at unimaginable horror, bearing the markings of bullet holes and animal traps.
  2. Broken Bones – The murder of a young prostitute and a baby found abandoned on the same winter night signals the start of a disturbing investigation for Detective Kim Stone – one which brings her face to face with someone from her own horrific childhood. As three more sex workers in the Black Country are murdered in quick succession, each death more violent than the last, Kim and her team realize that the initial killing was no one-off frenzied attack, but a twisted serial killer preying on the vulnerable.
  3. Dying Truth – When teenager Sadie Winter jumps from the roof of her school, her death is ruled as suicide – a final devastating act from a troubled girl. But then the broken body of a young boy is discovered at the same school and it’s clear to Detective Kim Stone that these deaths are not tragic accidents.
  1. Fatal Promise – When the body of a doctor is discovered brutally murdered in local woodland, Detective Kim Stone is shocked to discover the victim is Gordon Cordell – a man linked to a previous case she worked on involving the death of a young schoolgirl. Gordon has a chequered past, but who would want him dead?
  2. Dead Memories – On the fourth floor of Chaucer House, two teenagers are found chained to a radiator. The boy is dead but the girl is alive. For Detective Kim Stone every detail of the scene mirrors her own terrifying experience with her brother Mikey when they lived in the same tower block thirty years ago. When the bodies of a middle-aged couple are discovered in a burnt-out car, Kim can’t ignore the chilling similarity to the death of Erica and Keith – the only loving parents Kim had ever known.
  3. Child’s Play – Late one summer evening, Detective Kim Stone arrives at Haden Hill Park to the scene of a horrific crime: a woman in her sixties tied to a swing with barbed wire and an X carved into the back of her neck. The victim, Belinda Evans, was a retired college Professor of Child Psychology. As Kim and her team search her home, they find an overnight bag packed and begin to unravel a complex relationship between Belinda and her sister Veronica.
  1. Killing Mind – When Detective Kim Stone is called to the home of Samantha Brown, she finds the young woman lying in bed with her throat cut and a knife in her hand. With no sign of forced entry or struggle, Kim rules her death as a tragic suicide. But a visit to Samantha’s parents rings alarm bells for Kim – there’s something they’re not telling her. And, when she spots a clue in a photograph, Kim realizes she’s made a huge mistake. Samantha didn’t take her own life, she was murdered.
  2. Deadly Cry – In a busy shopping center, a little girl clutches a teddy bear, clinging to it in the absence of her mother, Katrina. Hours later, Katrina’s body is discovered in an abandoned building. For Detective Kim Stone, it looks like a quick, functional kill. But Kim’s instincts tell her there’s more to this senseless murder than meets the eye. What was the motive for killing a young mother out shopping with her child?
  3. Twisted Lies – When the lifeless body of a man is found on an industrial estate, Detective Kim Stone arrives on the scene and discovers he’s been tortured in the worst way imaginable. But as she breaks the devastating news to the victim’s wife, Diane Phipps, Kim can’t help feeling that something isn’t quite right about the woman’s reaction. Twenty-four hours later, the victim’s family disappears into thin air.
  1. Stolen Ones – One August afternoon, eight-year-old Grace Lennard skips into the garden of the childcare center she attends and vanishes into thin air. Rushing to the scene of Grace’s disappearance, Detective Kim Stone finds a chilling piece of evidence: the engraved heart bracelet belonging to Melody Jones – the little girl who was taken from a playground exactly twenty-five years ago. Hours before, Steven Harte had walked into Halesowen police station and confessed to having information that would lead Kim to Melody. And he told Kim she’d have a more urgent problem to deal with first. Now Kim must play Steven’s twisted game if she’s to find Grace alive.
  2. Six Graves – When Detective Kim Stone rushes to the scene of a house fire, she’s shocked to discover it’s claimed the lives of two teenage children and their parents. But this tragedy is not quite as it seems. Each body is marked by a gunshot wound and the mother, Helen Daynes, is holding the gun. The case sparks painful childhood memories for Kim who suffered at the hands of her own abusive mother, but it just makes her more determined to uncover the truth. As Kim untangles Helen’s past, she finds a history of clinical depression. But did it drive Helen to murder her loved ones?
  3. Hidden Scars – When a nineteen-year-old boy, Jamie Mills, is found hanging from a tree in a local park, his death is ruled a suicide. Detective Kim Stone’s instincts tell her something isn’t right – but it’s not her investigation and her temporary replacement is too busy waiting for the next big case to be asking the right questions.
  1. Deadly Fate – Late one evening, as the final church bell rings out, Sandra Deakin’s cold and lifeless body is found in the overgrown graveyard with multiple stab wounds. When Detective Kim Stone rushes to the scene, the violence of the attack convinces her that this murder was deeply personal. What could have caused such hate?
  2. Bad Blood – When Detective Kim Stone races to the crime scene, there is no body waiting for her: the paramedics are desperately trying to save the victim’s life. But there is something very strange about the way the man was found, his arms raised above his head, his legs spread apart. When he dies on the way to the hospital, Kim is certain she’s on the hunt for a killer… but all evidence at the scene has been destroyed.

If you like our article about the DI Kim Stone reading order, don’t forget to bookmark it! For the fans of Rachel Abbott, Val McDermid, and Mark Billingham.

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