Reading order
| # | Title | Published | Author | Buy on Amazon |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Knife and Death | 2017 | Jay Gill | Buy |
| 2 | Walk in the Park | 2018 | Jay Gill | Buy |
| 3 | Angels | 2018 | Jay Gill | Buy |
| 4 | Hard Truth | 2018 | Jay Gill | Buy |
| 5 | Inferno | 2019 | Jay Gill | Buy |
| 6 | Killing Shadows | 2020 | Jay Gill | Buy |
| 7 | Don’t Go Home | 2021 | Jay Gill | Buy |
The James Hardy series by Jay Gill is a set of seven crime thrillers following Detective James Hardy as he takes on violent, high-stakes cases. The series begins with Knife and Death (2017), which introduces Hardy and the world he operates in. Each subsequent book brings a new investigation, but Hardy’s personal story runs through the whole series, with the pressure of the job taking its toll over time.
Published between 2017 and 2021, the series grew darker and more complex as it went on. Titles like Hard Truth, Inferno, and Killing Shadows give a sense of the escalating dangers Hardy faces. The final book, Don’t Go Home (2021), brings several threads to a close. Gill later moved to a very different style with his cozy Henry Fleming Investigates series, but the James Hardy books remain his grittier, more intense body of work.