DOVER 1940. Canadian journalist Jessica Marshall is reporting from a town on the brink of the expected German invasion. But her story never makes it into the paper...
Louis Renard, an intelligent, damaged man and onetime Scotland Yard murder detective, is recuperating from wounds received in the Dunkirk invasion, working in Dover's barely functioning police station.
When a dancer is found murdered in a secret underground bunker, Renard refuses to turn a blind eye, and Jessica smells a scoop. As the mystery deepens, Renard begins to dig deeper into the background of the murdered woman, while Jessica Marshall is lured further into a dangerous scheme, just as the threat from the looming invasion gets closer...
...as well as awaiting the seemingly inevitable invasion by the Nazis, police inspector Louis Renard is also having to deal with murder and treachery amongst his fellow countrymen. Murky and frightening, this book will take you to the dark heart of a wartime Britain we rarely see.
— BARBARA NADEL
Venice Noir 2025 - save the dates!
Venice Noir is coming... save the dates. November 14-16 2025 in two of Venice's most extraordinary locations.
Baptiste
The official prequel to the hit television show France, 1976. Baptiste is an intelligent but somewhat naive detective, sent to work in Clermiers, a town filled with corruption. A girl goes missing, presumed dead after bloody clothes are found close to an illicit party near an abandoned chateau. Baptiste believes
The Borgia Portrait
Book Two in the Venice Mysteries series A noble family, a legendary painting, a cursed palazzo. When Arnold Clover is recruited by Lizzie Hawker to help her look into her family inheritance, he cannot begin to guess the journey he is about to embark on. Lizzie's mother, an
The Medici Murders
Book One in the Venice Mysteries series Venice is a city full of secrets. For hundreds of years it has been the scene of scandal, intrigue and murderous rivalries. And it remains so today. 1548, Lorenzino de Medici, himself a murderer and a man few will miss, is assassinated by
The Garden of Angels
A TIMES BEST THRILLER OF THE YEAR 2022 When a Jewish classmate is attacked by bullies, fifteen-year-old Nico just watches - earning him a week's suspension and a typed, yellowing manuscript from his frail Nonno Paolo. A history lesson, his grandfather says, and a secret he must keep
The Amsterdam series
Four crime mysteries set in the canals and dark alleys of one of the world's most fascinating cities. Now available as Kindle exclusives in ebook and print worldwide. Praise for the Pieter Vos series... ‘It is rare to find an author whose works seem entirely original. Hewson’s
A chat with Page One
I sat down for a natter with the nice people at Page One about my long and occasionally odd writing career. You can listen for free here https://www.writegear.co.uk/podcast/e218-david-hewson
The long slow death of ‘social media’
A couple of days ago I was on the bus from Piazzale Roma to Marco Polo airport. In front of me were a young couple, gleefully passing between them an iPad of the photos they’d taken in Venice over the previous few days. It was all so public those
Venice in January
Just spend a delightful week in Venice talking about this year's Venice Noir festival for one thing. And yes it will be big, so look out for some news and dates for events next November, with some familiar international names and panels in both English and Italian. January
Bye bye Twitter... the Nazi salute really seals it for me
I joined Twitter in 2007 when it was tiny and no one knew what it was for. Over the last eighteen years it's provided me with lots of interesting friends, countless fascinating facts and threads, free advice from helpful strangers and the odd nutcase who needed to be
Fishbourne Literary Festival April 5, 2025
I'll be opening the festival in the beautiful setting of Fishbourne Church in Sussex on Saturday morning at 10 am. It's quite a programme, with a great range of authors. Hope to see some of you there. I'll be talking about the background to
We don’t need another hero
I'm wary of heroes, modern ones anyway. The classical type are fine. They’re flawed, miserable, doomed creatures, nothing like the too-perfect marionettes you meet on occasion today. If you’re thinking about writing about one of the latter – you know the kind, great teeth, perfect hair, indefatigable,
Revising a manuscript – three strikes and you’re out
You’ve been wanting to finish that book for ages. Finally, you’ve just typed the last page. Yippee! Now what? Do you reveal your MS to the world, or at least an agent or editor you’d like to woo? No. By which I mean NO! The key to
The shaky start to my semi-illustrious career
Thirty years ago I was sitting in business class on a JAL flight from London to Tokyo, a glass of champagne in hand, a fat stack of three hundred or so A4 printout pages on the table in front of me. They amounted to the latest and, I’d decided,
Pick a name, any name
How do you decide what your characters in your story are called? Carefully, I hope. If your book works, that choice will live with you for years. My stories usually take place in foreign countries and often with local characters. My first published book, finished thirty years ago this year,
Now on Bluesky...
Like lots of other people I've grown disheartened by the state of Twitter (not calling it X). I've been there since 2007 and made lots of interesting contacts and read many fascinating posts. But... well, we all know what's happening. I won't
The story behind When The Germans Come
My latest tale may come as a bit of surprise to readers. It’s set not in Italy but a few miles from my home in England. In the town of Dover, a funny place that’s always sat at the edge of the country it seems to me, misunderstood,
When The Germans Come
Dover, 1940 and as well as awaiting the seemingly inevitable invasion by the Nazis, police inspector Louis Renard is also having to deal with murder and treachery amongst his fellow countrymen. Murky and frightening, this book will take you to the dark heart of a wartime Britain we rarely see.
The Killing
“This must have been a daunting task, especially since Hewson had never even visited Denmark before embarking on this Herculean task. The result is a very fine novel, which is more of a re-imagining of the original story than a carbon copy – and with the bonus of a brand new
Carnival for the Dead
In Venice the past was more reticent. Beyond the tourist sights, San Marco and the Rialto, it lurked in the shadows, seeping out of the cracked stones like blood from ancient wounds, as if death itself was one more sly performance captured beneath the bright, all-seeing light of the lagoon.
Lucifer's Shadow
Complex, beautiful, suspenseful, Lucifer’s Shadow was David Hewson’s tantalising and rewarding novel first novel set in Italy, now republished with a new introduction by the author. Previously republished in some markets as The Cemetery of Secrets. When Daniel Forster, a young Englishman, arrives in Venice for a summer
A Chat with Robin Saikia
Long-term resident Robin Saikia is the author of Drink and Think Venice, a unique insight into the city he’s made his home. I was lucky to stop by at his home in San Marco today for a chat about many things Venetian… including his preferred kind of spritz. Which
Philip Gwynne Jones, the accidental novelist
In the space of a few short years, Philip Gwynne Jones has become the most prolific British writer based in Venice, writing about the city. Apologies for calling him English in this interview… he is, of course, Welsh! I had the chance to talk to him one sunny, chilly February
Robin Saikia's Drink and Think Venice
There are lots of conventional tourist guides to Venice. Robin Saikia’s Drink & Think Venice, just out from Blue Guide, is not one of them. Let’s be honest. Whatever particular flavour of conventional guidebook you choose, what you get is pretty much the same info regurgitated in different
Gregory Dowling on The Lover of No Fixed Abode
In Venice I've been lucky enough to spend time with Gregory Dowling, author of the Alvise Marangon novels and translator of a Venetian classic, The Lover of No Fixed Abode, now available for the first time in English from Bitter Lemon Press. Gregory is a fascinating chap, Professor
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