Faber to publish the first of a new thriller series by E. A. Jackson
22 October 2025
Faber is to publish the first of a new ‘smart and captivating’ crime thriller series about Bristolian detective Martha Allen.
Faber has just acquired and is publishing Missing, the first book in a new detective thriller series by E. A. Jackson, set in and around Bristol.
Crime editor Lochlann Binney acquired UK & Commonwealth + EU (ex Canada) rights in three titles from Laura Macdougall at United Agents. Faber will publish Missing as a paperback original on 12 March 2026.
Billed as ‘a smart, suspenseful crime thriller for fans of Cara Hunter and Susie Steiner’, Jackson’s latest book explores recently promoted DI Martha Allen, whose career is riding on the case of what has happened to a missing baby.
Your baby is perfect. She sleeps through the night, even in this heat. You’ll keep her cool. Open the window. Anything she needs. Anything.
But when you wake up in the morning, Bella is gone.
DI Martha Allen is furious. Her career hinges on this missing baby case, and her boss and the circling media both want a the case solved quickly – but her key witness is lying.
Allen needs the truth. She’s not going to stop until she gets it. No matter how long it takes.
That detective is watching you.
What have you done? What happened to your baby?
Crime fiction editor Lochlann Binney said:
‘From the very first lines of this book, I knew DI Martha Allen was what I’d been missing (pun kind of intended): a smart older woman who takes no shit, at the top of her career and bored. The surprising and twisty case she stumbles into – a missing baby, a stifling heatwave and a witness telling a crucial lie – is just what she needed. It’s the perfect introduction to a series readers are going to want to come back to again and again.’
Author E. A. Jackson said:
‘Any author would be thrilled to be published by Faber, and my excitement is only increased by knowing I’m going to be working with Lochlann. I intended Martha Allen to be a real, complex woman faced with a complex puzzle, and I’m absolutely delighted that I’m going to get to share her with readers.’
E. A. Jackson was born in Boston, Massachusetts, in 1968. A creative writer from a young age, she’s also worked for three decades as an academic. Her work has appeared in the Times Literary Supplement, the Literary Review and Jewish Currents. She lived for many years in Bristol and now lives in Exeter with four cats.