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Pan snares Ann Cleeves’ latest thriller
Pan Macmillan has signed Ann Cleeves’ latest thriller, The Killing Stones, featuring a Neolithic stone bearing ancient inscriptions used as a murder weapon.
Vicki Mellor, publishing director at Pan, and Lucy Hale, managing director, acquired world English-language, excluding US, rights for The Killing Stones direct from the author.
US rights have sold to Catherine Richards, editorial director at Minotaur Books, an imprint of St Martin’s Publishing Group.
The new novel will be published by Pan Macmillan on 7th October 2025 as part of a global Macmillan publication. The Killing Stones sees the return of detective Jimmy Perez, who last appeared in Wild Fire, the last book in Cleeves’ bestselling Shetland series.
Ahead of the new hardback, Pan Macmillan will be reissuing Raven Black in the summer, the first novel to feature Perez, which won the Crime Writers’ Association Gold Dagger award when it was published in 2006.
Pan Macmillan has published Cleeves’ novels since 1992 and many of her bestselling series have been adapted for TV, with Vera entering its 14th and final series and Shetland now in its ninth series.
Readers will rejoin Perez and his partner Willow, who are now living in Orkney, when the death of a childhood friend forces Perez into a deeply personal investigation. The publisher said: “When a violent storm descends upon Orkney, the body of Archie Stout is left in its wake. An unusual murder weapon, a Neolithic stone bearing ancient inscriptions, is found discarded nearby.
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“Detective Jimmy Perez, no stranger to the complexity of human nature and the darkness it can harbour, is soon on the scene. He counted Archie as a childhood friend, so this case is more personal than most. Here, in these ancient lands where history runs deep, Perez must discern the truth from legend before a desperate killer strikes again.”
Cleeves, who is based in Northumberland, said: “’I’m delighted to be heading north again, and to be spending more time with Jimmy Perez and Willow Reeves. This time, I’m exploring their new home in the beautiful islands of Orkney.”
Pan Books’ editorial director Alex Saunders, who is Cleeves’ UK editor at Pan, said: “A new novel from Ann Cleeves is always an exciting proposition but the fact that 2025 will see the return of Jimmy Perez is on another level. Readers around the world were introduced to Jimmy back in 2006, and that series went from strength to strength for 12 years when the final book in the Shetland series, Wild Fire, was published.
“Along the way Douglas Henshall immortalised Jimmy in the globally successful BBC adaptation and we all thought that would be the last time readers would follow Perez on an investigation, until now. The Killing Stones is an incredible crime novel from an author at the height of her powers, welcoming back one of her most beloved characters and it will be a massive title for us next autumn.”
Cleeves has written more than 35 novels, and in 2017 was awarded the highest accolade in crime writing, the CWA Diamond Dagger. She is also an advocate for reading to improve health and wellbeing and supporting access to books. In 2021, her Reading for Wellbeing project launched with local authorities across the North East. In 2022 she was awarded an OBE for her services to reading and libraries.
