Reading order
| # | Title | Published | Author | Buy on Amazon |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Heartman | 2014 | M.P. Wright | Buy |
| 2 | Wendell Patin’s Pork Pie | 2014 | M.P. Wright | Buy |
| 3 | Standing In The Shadows With The Ghost Of Emmett Till | 2016 | M.P. Wright | Buy |
| 4 | All Through The Night | 2016 | M.P. Wright | Buy |
| 5 | Restless Coffins | 2018 | M.P. Wright | Buy |
| 6 | A Sinner’s Prayer | 2019 | M.P. Wright | Buy |
| 7 | A Traitor to His Blood | 2021 | M.P. Wright | Buy |
The Detective J.T. Ellington series by M.P. Wright follows a Black British private investigator working in 1960s Bristol. Heartman (2014) introduces Ellington and the world he moves through: a city where Caribbean immigrants face hostility and suspicion, and where the police are not always allies. Wendell Patin’s Pork Pie (2014) arrived the same year, and the evocative title is typical of the series’ approach to naming its stories.
Standing In The Shadows With The Ghost Of Emmett Till (2016) signals how directly the series engages with racial history, referencing the American civil rights era alongside the British experience. All Through The Night (2016), Restless Coffins (2018), A Sinner’s Prayer (2019), and A Traitor to His Blood (2021) continue to build the world around Ellington, with each case drawing him deeper into the tensions of his time and place. The seven books form a sustained portrait of one man’s work in a society that would often prefer to ignore both his cases and his community.