DI Nick Dixon Books in Order: How to read Damien Boyd’s series?

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This series is coming from British author Damien Boyd who is using his experience as a solicitor to write crime stories featuring DI Nick Dixon. Nick Dixon is a diabetic Detective Inspector in the Avon and Somerset Police attached to Bridgwater CID who drives an old Land Rover and lives in a rented cottage in Brent Knoll. He graduated from university with a degree in law and had gone on to qualify as a solicitor, but instead opted for a career in the police.

How to read the DI Nick Dixon Series in Order?

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

  1. As The Crow Flies – Rock climbers can’t afford to make careless mistakes. But Detective Inspector Nick Dixon’s former climbing partner, Jake Fayter, died doing just that. Or so it seems. Dixon suspects foul play, but his only leads are unreliable accounts of something odd happening in Cheddar Gorge seconds before Jake fell. The more Dixon learns about Jake’s life, the more he realizes that Jake hadn’t been quite the man he remembered…and a lot of people could have wanted him dead.
  2. Head In The Sand – The discovery of a severed head in a golf course bunker triggers a frantic race to find a serial killer that brings the town of Burnham-on-Sea to a standstill. A connection is made with a series of unsolved murders harking back to the 1970s, and Detective Inspector Nick Dixon finds himself caught in a race against time that takes him the length and breadth of the country.
  3. Kickback – A trainee jockey has been kicked to death by an aggressive stallion at the local stables. Deemed an accidental death, the case is closed. But when the jockey’s brother returns from active service, he sparks an armed siege, demanding the investigation be re-opened and the truth uncovered. Still recovering from the physical and mental scars of his last case, Detective Inspector Nick Dixon is dragged deep into a murky world of betting scams and murder, where people will do anything to keep their secrets.
  1. Swansong – Isobel Swan, a sixth-form student, has been murdered. First, her ring finger is severed, then her throat is cut. With the investigation going nowhere fast, Detective Inspector Nick Dixon is sent undercover as a trainee teacher in Isobel’s boarding school. But to find the killer, he must first confront his inner demons and lay to rest the ghosts lurking in his own past. If he can…
  2. Dead Level – In the early hours of Christmas Eve, the wife of parliamentary candidate Tom Perry is brutally murdered in an apparent burglary gone wrong. With the by-election campaign about to start in earnest and the festive season in full swing, torrential rain brings with it flood warnings on the Somerset Levels. Suspended on full pay and transferred to the cold case unit, Detective Inspector Nick Dixon is languishing on the sidelines as the investigation into Elizabeth Perry’s murder unravels and the floodwaters rise.
  3. Death Sentence – The body of an elderly man is found in an abandoned World War Two pillbox beside the Bridgwater and Taunton Canal. With no obvious motive and no credible suspect, DI Nick Dixon starts digging into the victim’s past. The more he digs, the deeper Dixon is drawn into a case that takes him from the cave systems beneath rural Somerset to the heart of government and threatens to expose a military cover-up at the highest level.
  1. Heads or Tails – A man has been mutilated and left to drown on the incoming tide, handcuffed in his van. With the murder bearing a striking resemblance to a string of sadistic killings carried out with surgical precision in 1990s gangland Manchester, it can mean only one thing: the killer is back. Transferred to the Major Investigation Team, DI Nick Dixon is assigned a new partner and sent to Manchester. Meanwhile, the gruesome murders in Somerset continue.
  2. Dead Lock – Early on a cold Somerset morning, ten year old Alesha Daniels is reported missing by her father, a violent alcoholic. Her mother, a known drug addict, is found unconscious, but it’s her mother’s boyfriend the police are keen to trace. As the hunt for Alesha gathers pace, a second local girl is taken, plunging another family into the depths of despair. Cutting short his holiday, DI Nick Dixon races home to join the Major Investigation Team, but no sooner has he identified a network of local suspects than they begin to show up dead.
  3. Beyond the Point – DI Nick Dixon is on the hunt for a vicious serial killer, following a trail of fingerprints and DNA across west Somerset. When the body of a young woman is found on the building site of a nuclear power station, work grinds to a halt. The body bears all the hallmarks of yet another random murder at the hands of the escaped killer. Then Dixon finds a motive.
  1. Down Among the Dead – When a badly decomposed body is discovered during an archaeological dig on the Sedgemoor battlefield, Avon and Somerset police are notified immediately. The remains are recent, and Detective Chief Inspector Peter Lewis knows exactly who they have found. A single stab wound from a curved blade implicates convicted serial killer Daniel Parker, who Lewis arrested fifteen years ago. With Parker’s appeal hearing imminent, Lewis comes under intense pressure to pin this new murder on him quickly and quietly. It’s an open and shut case-and Lewis should know-so why then does he insist on assigning it to DI Nick Dixon?
  2. Dying Inside – Newly promoted DCI Nick Dixon is stuck behind a desk when the peace of the Somerset countryside is shattered by a spate of sheep killings. Dixon recognizes a sinister pattern: the animals have all been slaughtered with a crossbow, the power increasing with each kill. It seems whoever is responsible is practicing, but for what?
  3. Carnival Blues – Detective Chief Inspector Nick Dixon arrives late for Bridgwater’s winter carnival. He’s come to see the squibbing, the traditional firework display that brings the town’s November festivities to a dramatic close. But when the squib of Avalon Carnival Club president Richard Webb is lit, it explodes, engulfing him in flames. Dixon knows he’s just witnessed a killer making a very public statement. And he can’t help feeling it’s only the beginning.
  1. Death Message – A routine missing person enquiry takes a grisly turn when a young couple drag a box containing human remains out of a Somerset river. The victim was a surveillance expert investigating an exaggerated injury claim-a murder with an obvious motive, until a police officer is implicated and suspended. Still brooding after his recent brush with police Professional Standards, Detective Chief Inspector Nick Dixon is on extended leave, helping his pregnant fiancée, Detective Sergeant Jane Winter, fight for her place on the major investigation team.
  2. From the Ashes – A retired teacher is found dead in her Somerset home on a cold January night. At first glance, it is a routine unexplained death and a simple referral to the coroner, until a neighbour reports an unscheduled visit from an occupational therapist an hour before the body was discovered. Detective Chief Inspector Nick Dixon is convinced the elderly woman has been strangled—a cause of death confirmed by the pathologist—and a murder investigation is launched.

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