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The VERA books in order:

The Crow Trap
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The Crow Trap Telling Tales
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Telling Tales Hidden Depths
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Hidden Depths Silent Voices
More about Silent Voices The Glass Room
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The Glass Room Harbour Street
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Harbour Street The Moth Catcher
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The Moth Catcher The Seagull
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The Seagull The Darkest Evening
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The Darkest Evening The Rising Tide More about
The Rising Tide The Dark Wives More about
The Dark Wives

A very VERA New Year!

ITV have announced the details of season 14 for the hit crime drama based on Ann Cleeves' unorthodox but brilliantly perceptive Detective Chief Inspector Vera Stanhope, played to perfection by Brenda Vlethyn. The good news is that there isn't long to wait: it will air at the very beginning of the New Year. The bad news is, as previously announced, that series 14 consists of only two episodes, and that with them VERA< comes to an end.

The series finishes in style: the first episode, Inside will be shown on New Year's Day, Wednesday 1st January at 8pm on ITV1. Then the very next day, on Thursday 2nd January (also at 8pm on ITV1) Brenda Blethyn gives her farewell performance as Vera in The Dark Wives. The ITV synopsis says: "The final episode brings Vera back to a familiar place when a body is found at the foot of legendary local stones The Dark Wives. With memories of childhood in the background, Vera must work hard to uncover the mystery of why a bright young student would be violently attacked and left so far from home," and promises: "This poignant episode weaves together past and present and makes for a compelling and emotional farewell."

It's a sad farewell for all concerned. Brenda Blethyn said, when she announced her retirement from the rrôle, "Working on VERA has been a joy from beginning to end and I'm sad to be saying Cheerio But I am so proud of our achievements over the last fourteen years.

"I'll be forever grateful to the wonderful Ann Cleeves who created Vera, and to Elaine Collins who saw fit to cast me in the role. The producers, dream cast and crew have been fabulous and I'm going to miss them, but I won't forget their huge talent, the camaraderie, laughter or kindness we shared..." Ann returned the compliment, tweeting: "Of course, I'm sad Vera is coming to an end, but what a ride it's been! Thanks so much to the magnificent @BrendaBlethyn and the team."

There will be one last treat as we say "Farewell Pet," to Vera: an accompanying documentary will air on Friday, January 3.

If thats still not enough for you, all the previous episodes of VERA. are available to watch on ITVx. Better still, you can meet the original Vera by reading the books! Start at the beginning, with The Crow Trap; or start with the latest, The Dark Wives - yes, like the tv drama (only different).

A local myth. A deadly threat. And Vera

The Dark Wives - UK edition

Vera Stanhope returns to her beloved hills to solve a suspenseful mystery in acclaimed crime writer Ann Cleeves' eleventh VERA novel. The Dark Wives, on sale now.

A man's body is found in the early morning light by a local dog walker in the park outside Rosebank, a care home for troubled teens in the coastal village of Longwater. The victim is Josh, a staff member, who was due to work the previous night but never showed up.

DI Vera Stanhope is called out to investigate the death. Her only clue in this, her eleventh case. is the disappearance of one of the home's residents, fourteen year old Chloe Spence; Vera can't bring herself to believe that a teenager is responsible for the murder - but even she can't dismiss the possibility.

Vera, Joe and new team member Rosie Bell, are soon embroiled in the case, which takes Vera back to her beloved Northumberland hills, and when a second connected body is found near the Three Dark Wives monument in the wilds of the Northumberland countryside, superstition and folklore begin to collide with fact. Vera knows she has to find Chloe to get to the truth, and the dark secrets in their community that may be far more dangerous than she could have ever believed possible.

More about The Dark Wives.


"I do love Vera!"

Val McDermid

"If you like the TV series, you're in for a treat - because the atmospheric but realistic books are even better."

Leicester Mercury

"... one of the most appealing fictional detectives to emerge since Andy Dalziel got into his stride..."

Martin Edwards, Spinetingler Magazine

"... although she is lonely, obsessed with her job and over fond of a beer, Vera is one of the few fictional detectives who seems not only like a real person, but one capable of conducting a murder enquiry. Ann Cleeves brings the same skill to all her characterisations in this highly impressive story."

Jake Kerridge, Daily Telegraph


The Starlings and Other Stories

A Taste of Vera

Just can't get enough of Vera? If you've read all the novels, and watched all the TV dramas, have you read the short stories?

Ann's contribution to The Starlings and Other Stories (which she has also edited), is the title story, The Starlings, featuring DI Vera Stanhope. For this collection of twelve short stories, Ann invited each of her fellow members of Murder Squad writers' group to join her, with an accomplice, in writing a short story inspired by the dramatic photography of Pembrokeshire-based author David Wilson. The Starlings and Other Stories is published by Graffeg.

Ann has previously used short stories as an opportunity to explore Vera's past: The Habit of Silence, one of Ann's contributions to Best Eaten Cold, the second anthology of stories from Ann and her colleagues in the Murder Squad, reveals something more about Vera Stanhope, the woman she is now and the past that made her. The Woman on the Island, now available as a Kindle single, was originally published as Hector's Other Woman in Guilty Consciences, the new anthology from the prestigious Crime Writers' Association, and is now reissued in Ann's short story collection, Offshore.

Read more about these and all Ann Cleeves's short stories.

VERA's case files

All 13 previous series of TV's crime drama VERA are now available to fans in both the UK and the US. They have been widely broadcast; VERA was nominated for an Edgar Award, for Dark Road, the first episode of series 6 (an original screenplay by Martha Hillier). VERA was ranked sixth best TV series of all time in a recent poll. In February 2019 it won the Judges' Award at the Royal Television Society NE Awards in Gateshead.

Use the links to order your choice of DVD from Amazon; look out for them in the shops - and in the UK all episodes of VERA are now available to stream on itvX. Elsewhere, you can sign up for Britbox, and watch the whole story, from the beginning.

Series 10, the DVD

VERA is filmed at locations from across Northumberland and Tyneside: if the scenery gives you an urge to visit Northumberland, you can read what Ann has to say about the county here. The Guardian also published Ann's short guide to Vera's Northumberland.

Vera's Facebook pageYou can also keep up with the show through its page on Facebook!