Brenda English
Brenda English has published 3 books. The recommended reading order starts with Corruption Of Faith (1997).
Brenda English is a mystery novelist who brings a journalist's eye for detail and truth to her gripping fiction. Best known for her Sutton McPhee series, English crafts stories that blend personal tragedy with the dark underbelly of institutions we're taught to trust. Her background in news reporting, communications, and media relations gives her crime fiction an authentic, investigative edge that keeps readers turning pages late into the night.
English made her debut in 1997 with Corruption of Faith, introducing readers to Washington news reporter Sutton McPhee—a protagonist forced to investigate her own sister's murder when police leads run cold. The novel plunges into a shadowy world where religious faith masks corruption, blackmail, and deadly secrets. A Florida resident, English continues to explore the tension between public facades and private sins in her mystery writing, delivering suspense that feels ripped from the headlines.
Shelf & Shadows
Order of Sutton McPhee Books
Corruption of Justice
TagsmysterycrimeDescriptionIt's summertime in the nation's capital, and everyone seems to have fled the capital and its suburbs to escape the heat. Washington News reporter Sutton McPhee is struggling to find a decent story on her Fairfax County police beat. Even Sutton isn't prepared, however, when the young police officer who took her on a less-than-exciting ride-along is found shot to death in his apartment. The subsequent discovery of a body in a public park, where they had responded to a public drunkenness call, sets off Sutton's alarms and sends her looking for connections between the two murders. Her search for answers will take her from the corridors of power in Washington to her long-ago life as a reporter and wife in Florida. It also puts Sutton in the killer's crosshairs - someplace she has been before - but this time she isn't there alone. This time police detective Noah Lansing, her new romantic interest, is targeted right along with her, and it's up to Sutton to see to it that his 5-year-old son doesn't become an orphan.Publication date1999Rating—Print length—Language—Publisher—Corruption of Power
TagsmysterycrimeDescriptionA top Senate aide has turned up dead from a drug overdose, her nude body found wrapped in a sheet in the Washington, D.C., suburbs. It doesn't require the reporting acumen of Washington News reporter Sutton McPhee to figure out someone else was involved. But Sutton – who now covers the Fairfax County police, after having risked her own life to solve her sister's murder – is all over it because she knows this new case has all the signs of a Washington scandal in the making. Even as Sutton works her sources, follows her reporter's instincts, and clashes with a new detective assigned to the case, police are called to the scene of another high-profile death: the murder of the wheelchair-bound wife of a Fairfax County Supervisor. It isn't long before Sutton's instincts tell her the two cases are somehow related – and Sutton won't stop until she knows exactly what that connection is. But even Sutton is shocked as she begins to learn just how high and how far the connections go, and just how much power can corrupt.Publication date1998Rating—Print length—Language—Publisher—Ad (mid-series)Corruption Of Faith
TagsmysterycrimeDescriptionThe private life of journalist Sutton McPhee is plunged straight into the headlines when her younger sister Cara is found murdered in a bank parking lot. Cara was a church secretary without an enemy in the world--and the police are baffled by the case. But when Sutton learns that Cara's death may be linked to her church congregation, she won't stop until she solves the case.Publication date1997Rating—Print length—Language—Publisher—
We verified the reading order for Brenda English's books by cross-referencing official publication dates, ISBN databases, and publisher catalogs.
Last verified: February 2026
Shelf & Shadows. (…). “Brenda English Books in Order.” Retrieved …, from https://shelfandshadows.com/authors/brenda-english