Most read Police Procedural books

A murder inside the Louvre pulls symbologist Robert Langdon into an overnight chase across Paris and London, chasing a trail of clues hidden in the works of Leonardo da Vinci.

• mystery box

Grieving widower Tom Kennedy moves to Featherbank with his young son Jake for a fresh start, unaware the town was once hunted by a child-killer known as the Whisper Man, who lured victims by whispering at their windows. When a boy goes missing and Jake hears whispers of his own, the old nightmare stirs again.

• multiple povs

A probationary constable bound for a desk job takes a statement from a ghost, and is pulled into London's magical police branch. Peter Grant must learn wizardry while chasing brutal, motiveless attacks and a feud between two river gods.

• mentor figure
• fish out of water
• found family

Investigator Aaron Falk returns to his drought-stricken hometown for the funeral of a childhood friend who apparently murdered his family before killing himself. As Falk digs in, the case reopens a 20-year-old death that drove him away. A tense, atmospheric Australian outback mystery—book one of the Aaron Falk series.

• dual timeline

A bento shop worker's quiet life is upended when her abusive ex-husband returns, and her neighbor, a mathematics teacher, steps in to cover for her.

• mystery box
• sacrifice

A foreign student is found dead in Besźel, and Inspector Borlú expects a routine case. Then the trail crosses into Ul Qoma, a city that shares his streets and that he has been trained never to see, under the watch of Breach.

• mystery box
• morally grey
• betrayal

Twenty years ago, Rob Ryan was the only survivor of a trio of children who vanished into the woods. He returned with no memory of the event, only the trauma. Now a detective, a new murder in the same woods forces him to confront his buried past. He and his partner must solve the current crime, hoping it will finally reveal what happened to him all those years ago.

• reluctant hero
• dual timeline
• unreliable narrator

A body sealed in a Hollywood drainage pipe turns personal when LAPD detective Harry Bosch recognizes the victim as a fellow Vietnam "tunnel rat." Refusing to accept an easy overdose ruling, Bosch traces the death to an audacious underground bank heist — an investigation that pairs him with FBI agent Eleanor Wish and puts him in the crosshairs of his own department. The Edgar-winning debut that launched Michael Connelly's Harry Bosch series.

• anti hero
• morally grey
• betrayal

A chilling serial killer is stalking Boston, leaving a trail of ritualistic violence in their wake. Detective Jane Rizzoli and her partner Thomas Moore are racing against time to stop the murders. Their investigation points to a doctor with a hidden past, who may be the killer's next target – or know more than she's letting on.

• revenge
• secret identity

Old, wealthy, and bedridden, Simeon Lee summons his estranged sons and their wives to the family seat at Gorston Hall for Christmas.

• betrayal
• revenge
• family saga
• locked room

A killer is burning victims in the Lake District's stone circles, and when Poe's name turns up on the third body, the suspended detective is pulled back in alongside socially awkward analyst Tilly Bradshaw.

The concluding volume of J.D. Barker's 4MK Thriller trilogy. When Anson Bishop, prime suspect in the notorious Four Monkey Killer murders, walks in and surrenders, he tells a story that upends the entire investigation — and forces Detective Sam Porter to confront a past he had deliberately buried. Bodies surface hundreds of miles apart in Chicago and South Carolina, each marked with the words "Father, forgive me."

• multiple povs
• dual timeline
• unreliable narrator
• epistolary

Oslo inspector Harry Hole is sent to Sydney to watch a murder inquiry, not lead it. When the killing of a young Norwegian woman turns into a serial hunt, his drinking and his defiance put the case and himself at risk.

• fish out of water
• reluctant hero

A girl missing for three weeks is found under the ice of a lagoon that froze before she vanished, dressed in the clothes of another girl. Suspended Detective Sam Porter chases the Four Monkey Killer's mother to New Orleans while his partners race to find the second girl.

• multiple povs
• morally grey

يستيقظ نوح الألفي، ضابط المباحث الجنائية في قصر النيل الذي يرى أرواح الموتى، على رائحة قوية تقوده إلى نصف ليمونة عصرها ضيف غير متوقع. هكذا يكتشف حقيقة جديدة عن نفسه، لكن القضية هذه المرة تقلب الأدوار: صديقه قطز المحمدي يجد نفسه أمام أصعب تحقيق في مسيرته، وعليه أن يخوضه وحده لأن نوح نفسه هو الضحية. الجزء الخامس من سلسلة «تحقيقات نوح الألفي» للكاتبة ميرنا المهدي.

When the first snow falls in Oslo, a woman vanishes, leaving behind a chilling snowman and a trail of terror. Detective Harry Hole, already battling his own demons, finds himself drawn into a disturbing investigation as he suspects a serial killer is not only active but targeting him personally. This dark mystery plunges Hole into a race against time to catch a killer before they strike again.

• anti hero
• reluctant hero
• morally grey

Detective Alex Cross faces his most challenging case yet when a young girl is kidnapped and a family is murdered. The killer, who calls himself the Son of Lindbergh, is a master manipulator who has eluded the authorities. Cross must race against time to prevent further tragedy.

When a Norwegian diplomat is found dead in a Bangkok brothel, Inspector Harry Hole is sent to Thailand to manage the fallout. What starts as a cover-up quickly spirals into a complex investigation as Harry uncovers a dark underbelly of crime. He finds himself navigating a dangerous world of opium dens and go-go bars, determined to find the truth behind the murder, even if no one wants him to.

• fish out of water
• reluctant hero

A rookie FBI agent with Haden's syndrome — one of the millions "locked in" by a global virus, only able to act through robotic surrogates — partners with a hard-nosed veteran to solve a murder that unravels into a conspiracy against the entire Haden community.

• mystery box

A forensic pathologist in the Louisiana bayou hunts a killer performing medical experiments on his victims, and finds herself drawn into a dangerous cat-and-mouse game.

• multiple povs

Bestselling writer Kunihiko Hidaka is found dead in his home office, hours before he and his wife were to leave Japan for Vancouver. His friend Osamu Nonoguchi, a children's author, soon confesses, but Detective Kyoichiro Kaga, who once taught alongside him, cannot find a motive and refuses to close the case. The story alternates between Nonoguchi and Kaga as each tries to outwit the other, uncovering a history between the two writers.

• unreliable narrator
• betrayal
• multiple povs

Detective Harry Bosch killed the serial killer known as the Dollmaker, but now a civil trial and a fresh corpse suggest he shot the wrong man. As he defends his reputation in a high-stakes courtroom battle, Bosch must return to the streets of Los Angeles to find the real predator. This investigation forces him to confront his own methods and the thin line between justice and vengeance.

• morally grey
• anti hero

Mickey Haller operates his law practice from the back seat of his Lincoln Town Car, a mobile office navigating the Los Angeles legal scene. He's known for taking on a wide range of clients, often brokering deals outside the courtroom. When a high-profile case lands in his lap, it seems like a career-making opportunity, but it quickly pulls him into a dangerous conspiracy where his own life is on the line.

• morally grey
• survival

A brilliant criminalist, confined by his own physical limitations, is drawn back into a deadly game of cat and mouse. He must decipher the chilling clues left by a serial killer known as the Bone Collector before more lives are lost. With his sharp-witted partner, he races against time through the dark streets of New York City.

• reluctant hero
• quest

LAPD Detective Harry Bosch is pulled into a complex drug trafficking case that stretches from the streets of Los Angeles all the way to Mexico. He must use all his skills to navigate the dangerous territory and bring the criminals to justice.

On the day Camilla is set to return to work after maternity leave, her husband Luke vanishes, leaving behind only a cryptic note. Hours later, she watches the news in horror as a hostage situation unfolds in London, and the police identify Luke not as a victim, but as the gunman. With the authorities closing in, Camilla realizes she is the only one who can decode her husband's final message and uncover the truth behind his sudden descent into violence.

• dual timeline
• multiple povs
• betrayal

In the remote Alaskan town of Deadhart, a fifteen-year-old boy is found dead, his throat torn out and his body drained of blood. Suspicion falls immediately on the Colony — a reclusive group of vampires who have lived on the town's fringes for generations, and who were blamed for a nearly identical killing twenty-five years earlier. Detective Barbara Atkins arrives from the Forensic Vampyr Anthropology Department to determine whether the Colony is truly responsible or being scapegoated. In a world where vampire colonies are protected by law — and can only be culled if proven a threat to human life — the stakes of her verdict are enormous. Teaming up with Jenson Tucker, the town's disgraced former sheriff, Atkins works against mounting hostility, old grievances, and a rising body count. As a brutal storm threatens to cut Deadhart off from the outside world, the tension between the townspeople and the Colony edges toward violence. C.J. Tudor reworks vampire mythology into a taut, atmospheric murder mystery about prejudice, fear of the outsider, and who the real monsters are.

Returning to England after years of police service abroad, Luke Fitzwilliam shares a train compartment with a talkative elderly woman bound for Scotland Yard.

• revenge
• betrayal
• mystery box
• morally grey

A Parisian cop and an American jazz musician wake up handcuffed to each other on a bench in Central Park. Neither has any memory of the night before, and their last recollections place them on opposite sides of the Atlantic. Now, this unlikely pair must piece together a bizarre and dangerous puzzle to discover how they are connected. The truth behind their lost night is far more sinister than they could ever imagine.

• forced proximity
• mystery box

Three friends, bound by a childhood trauma, find their lives irrevocably intertwined when a brutal murder brings them back together decades later. A detective, an ex-convict, and a man consumed by his past must confront the devastating consequences of their shared history. This is a story about the enduring, and sometimes destructive, power of loyalty and loss.

• morally grey
• revenge
• betrayal