Kerry Buchanan Books In Order

Publication Order of Harvey and Birch Books

Publication Order of Anthologies

Kerry Buchanan
Kerry Buchanan is a veterinarian that retired when her arthritis left her unable to carry out her duties. She trained as a veterinary surgeon at Cambridge University Veterinary School, which were six happy years of her life. She went on to work in practice before her forced early retirement.

Since retiring, she has designed leukemia patient databases, taught ICT to people that were convinced that their computers would explode right in their face should they hit the wrong key, researched high pressure food processing, and ran her own livery business.

She cares for her dad, who has dementia, and is often the source of her inspiration. It was the news of her dad’s diagnosis, in March of 2014, that was the trigger to her writing career. Before that, she had written nothing since her school days, however that spring she sat down at her kitchen table with her husband’s iPad and started typing.

Over the next six weeks, she wrote the first draft of a 130,000 word fantasy novel, called “The Blacksmith’s Apprentice”, which she never really sought to get published yet. It was a lot like turning on a tap. She’s been typing ever since, with her arthritic fingers complaining very loudly.

Before too long, she was seeing her stories published and win some prizes. A number of them were bought by Kraxon Magazine, however others have found markets internationally. Kerry enjoys writing short stories, being that she is a full time carer for somebody with dementia, it makes her time slots usually interrupted and short.

Short stories work rather well with this stop-start method of working. Kerry is able to pump out a thousand word short story in over thirty minutes and have it refined and ready to submit in just a few more sessions. Short fiction does pay well, assuming you send them to the right markets, however her heart’s always been in writing novels.

During the summer of 2017, she wrote a crime novel, inspired by Brian McGilloway. Then she sat on it until 2020. Kerry went to a crime writing workshop, ran by Steve Cavanagh, who was kind enough to read it and give her feedback for a tiny excerpt of writing for all the attendees, and he said to submit it for publication. Without such a boost, Kerry doubts if she’d ever had enough confidence to send it out to anybody, because she was no crime writer. She wrote historical fiction and fantasy, not gore and blood.

Turns out that Kerry’s a crime writer after all. She sent it to just Joffe Books, many of whose authors she also enjoys reading. To her delight and surprise, Emma, their Managing Editor, emailed her back almost instantly to say they were certainly interested, and just a couple of weeks later, she was signed up with them for a three book contract.

She lives on a farm among the drumlins of County Down in Northern Ireland, surrounded by all sorts of animals, both the two- and four-legged kind. The views from every one of the windows provides her with inspiration for her stories which is the reason, she claims, for her productivity.

Kerry has been lucky enough to win an ACNI SIAP award in the year 2019, and then a second one during the summer of 2020.

Her short stories have been widely published, including The Armada Tree, which won Kraxon Magazine’s Story of the Year Award in 2019.

“Knife Edge” is the first novel in the “Detectives Harvey & Birch Mystery” series and was released in the year 2021. Nic always hated going clubbing. She just went out that night because she had promised a friend. She wakes up, bound and naked in some abandoned cottage out in the middle of nowhere. Dappled light pours throw the dirty window. Her body’s covered in cuts, and across the room her friend groans in pain. This shadow passes the window, which means he’s returned.

He picks up a knife and starts cutting on her friend. In that instant of bloody frenzy, Nic wrenches free and takes off. She is safe at last, however this is only the start. Detectives Aaron Birch and Asha Harvey show up at the scene a few hours later. There isn’t anybody, nor are there any signs of the murderer. It is as though none of it ever happened. You think you know how it ends? Well, think again.

This book is incredibly fast paced and readers found themselves devouring chapter after chapter. It is sure to get your pulse racing, as it is filled with some massive twists, and is sure to shock you right to the core until the very end. It isn’t often that a debut is as well written as this one. Fans of the book found themselves being wholly riveted right from the very start of the book, and when they weren’t reading it, they were wishing they were.

“Small Bones” is the second novel in the “Detectives Harvey & Birch Mystery” series and was released in the year 2021. If you cannot trust your dad or the cops, then who can you trust?

Sue Hearn is planting a herb garden on the site of her grandpa’s old greenhouse. She has spent the morning digging up all kinds of odds and ends already. However she never expected this grisly find. It is a skull. Could it be the remains of Monica, her mom, who went missing thirty something years ago?

Sue’s dad, who is in the hospital with dementia, insinuates that there was a police officer that was involved in her mom’s disappearance. However can he really be trusted? So now Detectives Asha Harvey and Aaron Birch may be looking for a crooked cop. While digging deeper into the past, Asha and Sue discover secrets so dangerous it’s going to put everyone’s lives in danger.

This one is even better than the first, and had readers gripped right at the start. And by the end, they were hoping there would be more books to come in this incredible series.

One Response to “Kerry Buchanan”

1. Pat Bennett: 2 years ago

   Very well written. Smart writing with lots of suspense.

   Reply