S.J. Parris is the pen name of British novelist and journalist Stephanie Merritt, and the author of the Giordano Bruno novels, one of the best-loved Elizabethan spy thriller series in print. Her books take a real Renaissance philosopher, a fugitive from the Inquisition, and set him to work as an agent for Queen Elizabeth I’s spymaster. A second Elizabethan series, led by the intelligencer Sophia de Wolfe, now runs alongside it.
This guide covers every book she has published under both names, in order, with advice on where to begin. If you only want the running order of her main series, go straight to the Giordano Bruno reading order.
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About S.J. Parris
Early Life
Stephanie Merritt was born in 1974 in Surrey, England. She read English at Queens’ College, Cambridge, graduating in 1996, and began reviewing books professionally while she was still a student.
Cambridge is also where she found her future hero. In interviews, she has described first meeting Giordano Bruno while writing a thesis on the influence of occult philosophy on Renaissance literature, and being drawn to a man who was at once philosopher, early scientist, magician, and poet. The idea stayed with her for more than a decade before it became a novel.
Writing Career
Merritt became Deputy Literary Editor of The Observer in 1998 and held the post until 2005, when she turned to writing full-time. Her journalism has appeared in The Times, The Daily Telegraph, The Guardian, and the New Statesman, and she still writes for The Observer and The Guardian. She has also been a judge for the Costa Biography Award, the Orange New Writing Award, and the Perrier Award.
Her first three books came out under her own name: two contemporary novels and a memoir. In 2008, she created the S.J. Parris pseudonym for a historical crime series, and the first Bruno novel followed in 2010. According to her official website, that debut became a New York Times bestseller and the series reached the top ten in the UK and Canada.
Since then, she has alternated between the two names. S.J. Parris writes Elizabethan crime, while Stephanie Merritt has returned with two contemporary psychological thrillers. Her publisher, HarperCollins, states that the Bruno series has sold more than a million copies and that she lives in Surrey with her son.
Why the Pen Name?
The pseudonym is a signpost, not a secret. On her website, Merritt explains that she wanted the historical series marked out as its own kind of story, so that readers who saw the Parris name “would know to expect a historical crime novel.”
That left her own name free for anything else she wanted to write. The split still holds: every Tudor and Renaissance title carries the Parris name, and every contemporary book carries Merritt’s.
Writing Style
Parris writes thrillers in which a murder investigation and a political plot run side by side. Bruno is an outsider everywhere he goes (an Italian in England, a runaway friar wanted by the Inquisition), which gives him a sharp, skeptical view of every court he enters.
Her books are full of real people. Sir Francis Walsingham, Sir Philip Sidney, Sir Francis Drake, Henri III of France, and the Emperor Rudolf II all appear, and the plots hang on recorded events such as the Babington Plot of 1586.
The novels also take ideas seriously. Heresy, secret societies of philosophers, and the price of free thought are part of the plot, not decoration. The pace, though, stays closer to a spy thriller than to a history lecture.
S.J. Parris Series in Reading Order
Parris has two series and a set of companion novellas. Each list below is in publication order.
Giordano Bruno Series
The main series has seven novels, published between 2010 and 2023 and set between 1583 and 1588. Each one contains a complete murder mystery, while Bruno’s work for Walsingham carries on from book to book. For notes on every volume and how the novellas fit in, see the full Giordano Bruno series reading order.
1. Heresy (2010)
Oxford, 1583. Giordano Bruno, a radical thinker on the run from the Inquisition, is recruited by Sir Francis Walsingham and sent to the university to uncover a Catholic conspiracy. When a series of murders unsettles college life, he has to investigate while keeping his real mission hidden.
2. Prophecy (2011)
Autumn 1583. An astrological phenomenon is read as a threat to the throne, and supporters of Mary Stuart are plotting against the Queen. When a young maid of honor is found murdered with occult symbols cut into her flesh, Walsingham sends Bruno to infiltrate the plotters.
3. Sacrilege (2012)
Summer 1584. Sophia Underhill, a woman Bruno once loved, stands accused of murder, and he travels to Canterbury to try to clear her name. What starts as a personal errand leads him towards a conspiracy centered on the cathedral, England’s holiest shrine.
4. Treachery (2014)
August 1585. England is on the brink of war with Spain, and Bruno is in Plymouth, where Sir Francis Drake is preparing an expedition. A murder aboard Drake’s own ship draws Bruno into an investigation among a tense crew and through the town’s dangerous streets.
5. Conspiracy (2016)
Paris, 1585. King Henri III fears a rising led by the Duke of Guise and the Catholic League, and the city is on the brink of violence. Bruno seeks help from an old rival, a priest named Paul Lefèvre, and when the priest is murdered, he is pulled into the intrigues of the French court.
6. Execution (2020)
England, 1586. Bruno brings Walsingham news of a plot by Catholic Englishmen to kill Elizabeth and put Mary, Queen of Scots, on the throne. Walsingham lets the conspiracy run in the hope that Mary will incriminate herself, and sends Bruno undercover among the plotters. The novel is built around the real Babington Plot.
7. Alchemy (2023)
Prague, 1588. Bruno arrives at the court of the Holy Roman Emperor Rudolf II as a spy for Elizabeth, and finds that an alchemist has been murdered. Rival factions and religious tension make the city a dangerous place to ask questions.
Giordano Bruno Novellas
Four shorter stories fill in Bruno’s years in Italy, long before he reaches England. Each stands alone, so they can be read at any point. The Bruno reading order page shows where they sit beside the novels.
1. The Secret Dead (2014)
Naples, 1566. Bruno is eighteen and has just taken his final vows at San Domenico Maggiore. Helping in the infirmary, he witnesses an illicit autopsy on a young woman and begins to suspect that her death was no accident.
2. The Academy of Secrets (2020)
Autumn 1568. Bruno is invited to join a secret society of philosophers led by Giambattista della Porta. Keeping its heretical secrets soon becomes a matter of life or death.
3. A Christmas Requiem (2020)
Winter 1569. Bruno is summoned to Rome by the Pope, who is curious about his talent for memory games. The city turns out to be far more dangerous than the young friar expects.
4. The Dead of Winter (2020)
This is a collection, not a new story. It gathers the three novellas above in one volume, and it is the simplest way to read them together.
5. The Midwinter Martyr (2025)
Venice, 1576. Bruno has fled to Venice with the Inquisition behind him, but the city is no refuge. When an aristocrat is found dead, and his wife arrested, a coded anonymous letter declares her innocent, and Bruno is given the task of finding its author. It came out as an ebook and audiobook in November 2025, with a UK paperback dated 19 November 2026.
Sophia de Wolfe Series
Parris’s second series moves into the last years of Elizabeth’s reign and places a woman at the center. Sophia de Wolfe is a former agent who is drawn back into intelligence work by Robert Cecil, the Queen’s spymaster. Bruno readers have met her before, under a different surname, but the series is written so that new readers can start here.
1. Traitor’s Legacy (2025)
England, 1598. The Queen has named no successor, and the country is uneasy. When a young heiress is found murdered at the theatre, Robert Cecil asks Sophia to investigate, and a cryptic note found on the body points back to her own past as a spy. Among the powerful figures she runs up against is the Earl of Essex, the Queen’s favorite.
2. Rebel’s Gambit (2027)
England, 1601. The body of a Scottish envoy washes up on the banks of the Thames, and Cecil himself is accused of arranging the death. He turns to Sophia to find out quietly what the dead man was doing in London, as the Earl of Essex makes a dangerous play for power. UK retailers list the hardback for 6 May 2027, and it can be pre-ordered now.
Books as Stephanie Merritt
Parris has no standalone historical novels: everything under that name belongs to one of the series above. Her other five books are published under the name Stephanie Merritt and feature modern settings. Four are novels, and one is a memoir.
1. Gaveston (2002)
Her debut is a contemporary novel, not a historical one, despite the title. It reworks the story of Edward II and his favorite in the modern worlds of academia and the London media. Research student Gaby Harvey, the daughter of a media magnate, falls under the spell of the charismatic Piers Gaveston. The novel won a Betty Trask Award.
2. Real (2005)
A fading middle-aged actor and a struggling young playwright are thrown together on a West End play and begin a reckless affair. Merritt was commissioned to write the screenplay.
3. The Devil Within (2008)
This is a memoir, not a novel. Merritt writes candidly about her own experience of depression, from her teenage years into adulthood. It was shortlisted for the Mind Book Award in 2008.
4. While You Sleep (2018)
A psychological thriller with a gothic edge. Zoe Adams takes refuge in a house on a remote Scottish island, a house with a dark history, and is soon troubled by night-time disturbances that she suspects have a living cause.
5. Storm (2022)
A psychological thriller set in a French chateau. Jo Lawless, a widow, is invited to stay by her late husband’s friends. The arrival of an unexpected guest brings old tensions to the surface, and a murder in the night follows.
Where to Start with S.J. Parris
Best First Book
Start with Heresy. It introduces Bruno, a fugitive from the Inquisition, shows how he comes to work for Walsingham, and tells a complete mystery set in Oxford. Everything later in the series builds on it.
If You Want…
The whole story in order: follow the seven novels from Heresy to Alchemy, using the Giordano Bruno reading order as your checklist.
A female lead: begin with Traitor’s Legacy. It opens a new series and can be followed without the Bruno books.
A short taster: try The Dead of Winter, three novellas about the young Bruno in one volume.
A real conspiracy: Execution is built on the Babington Plot. It works best once you know Bruno and Walsingham from the earlier books.
A setting beyond England: Conspiracy takes Bruno to Paris and Alchemy to Prague.
A modern thriller: While You Sleep and Storm, both written as Stephanie Merritt, stand entirely alone.
Books by Time Period
Renaissance Italy (1566 to 1576)
The novellas cover Bruno’s youth. The Secret Dead, The Academy of Secrets, and A Christmas Requiem are set between 1566 and 1569, while he is a young Dominican friar. The Midwinter Martyr finds him in Venice in 1576.
Elizabethan England (1583 to 1586)
Five of the seven Bruno novels take place in England: Heresy in Oxford, Prophecy at Elizabeth’s court, Sacrilege in Canterbury, Treachery in Plymouth, and Execution, set in 1586. These are the years of Catholic plots against the Queen and the approach of war with Spain.
For more fiction from this era, see the Tudor England hub and our list of the best Tudor historical fiction. Readers who prefer the royal court to the spy network should try Philippa Gregory and Alison Weir.
Renaissance Europe (1585 to 1588)
Conspiracy is set in the Paris of Henri III, with the Catholic League threatening the crown. Alchemy moves to Prague and the court of the Emperor Rudolf II.
The End of Elizabeth’s Reign (1598 to 1601)
The Sophia de Wolfe books open in 1598, with the succession unsettled and the Earl of Essex a powerful and ambitious figure at court. The second book reaches 1601.
Contemporary
Everything published under the name Stephanie Merritt is set in the modern world. You can browse other eras on the time periods index.
Popular S.J. Parris Series: Giordano Bruno
The Bruno books are what Parris is known for, and their strength begins with the choice of hero. Giordano Bruno was a real person, born in Nola near Naples in 1548. He entered the Dominican order in 1565, was ordained in 1572, and fled Naples when an indictment was being prepared against him.
He spent the following years moving between the cities and courts of Europe. From April 1583 to October 1585, he lived in England, staying at the French embassy in London and lecturing at Oxford. Later, he taught at Wittenberg and visited the Prague of Rudolf II.
In 1592, he was arrested by the Venetian Inquisition. After a trial that lasted seven years, he was burned at the stake in the Campo de’ Fiori in Rome on 17 February 1600. A monument to him was put up in Rome in 1889.
Was he really a spy? The historian John Bossy argued that Bruno, while living at the embassy, passed information on Catholic conspirators to Walsingham under the name Henry Fagot. It is a theory, not an established fact, but it provides the novels with a foundation in genuine scholarship.
Parris sets her mysteries inside the documented outline of his life. The English novels begin during his recorded stay in the country, and the Prague book follows his actual visit to the city in 1588. The murders are invented, while the politics around them are not.
The reading order page has more on the real Bruno and on each book. For a wider look at how novelists balance fact and invention, see our guide to what makes historical fiction accurate.
Awards and Recognition
Parris has not won the Crime Writers’ Association’s prize for historical crime, but she has been shortlisted three times. The CWA Historical Dagger is given for the best historical crime novel first published in the UK.
- 2010: Heresy shortlisted for the Historical Dagger, which then carried the name of Ellis Peters. The winner that year was Rory Clements.
- 2012: Sacrilege shortlisted for the Historical Dagger.
- 2014: Treachery shortlisted for the Historical Dagger.
As Stephanie Merritt, she has two further honours.
- 2003: Betty Trask Award, for Gaveston.
- 2008: The Devil Within shortlisted for the Mind Book Award.
The prize that shortlisted her debut was named after Ellis Peters, creator of the Brother Cadfael mysteries. A fugitive friar-turned-investigator fits well within that tradition.
Her publisher also bills both Alchemy and Traitor’s Legacy as number one Sunday Times bestsellers.
Writing Schedule and Upcoming Books
Stephanie Merritt is still writing, and her output has been steady: seven Bruno novels between 2010 and 2023, with psychological thrillers and novellas in between. The longest gap in the main series was the four years between Conspiracy (2016) and Execution (2020).
Her most recent release is The Midwinter Martyr, the Venice novella, published in November 2025. Before that came Traitor’s Legacy in May 2025, the first Sophia de Wolfe novel.
The next full-length novel is Rebel’s Gambit, the second Sophia de Wolfe book. UK booksellers list it for 6 May 2027 from Hemlock Press, a HarperCollins imprint.
No eighth Giordano Bruno novel has been announced. Alchemy is set in 1588, and the historical Bruno lived until 1600, so the record leaves plenty of room. For now, the series stands at seven novels and four novellas.
Similar Authors You’ll Enjoy
C.J. Sansom: the closest match. His lawyer, Matthew Shardlake, investigates under Henry VIII, half a century before Bruno reaches England. Start with Dissolution, a murder inquiry at a monastery in 1537, and follow the Shardlake reading order.
Hilary Mantel: for readers who want Tudor power politics without the whodunnit. Wolf Hall follows Thomas Cromwell’s rise at the court of Henry VIII and opens the Wolf Hall trilogy.
Rory Clements: his John Shakespeare novels cover the same ground as Bruno. Shakespeare, the playwright’s brother, is an intelligencer for Walsingham, and Martyr (2009) begins with a murder and a suspected plot against Sir Francis Drake.
Laura Shepherd-Robinson: historical crime with the same interest in politics, set two centuries later. Blood & Sugar (2019) opens in 1781 at Deptford, where Captain Harry Corsham searches for a missing abolitionist friend. In Daughters of Night, Caro Corsham investigates a murder in the Vauxhall Pleasure Gardens.
Umberto Eco: The Name of the Rose is the classic monastic mystery. A Franciscan friar investigates a suspicious death in an Italian abbey in 1327, and the trail leads to the secrets of its library.
Lindsey Davis: a historical detective series set in ancient Rome. The Silver Pigs introduces the informer Marcus Didius Falco in AD 70 and begins the Falco reading order.
Robert Harris: political fiction rooted in real events. Imperium, narrated by Cicero’s secretary Tiro, opens the Cicero trilogy.
For more ideas in the same vein, browse our list of the best historical mystery fiction.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is S.J. Parris’s best book?
Heresy is the best place to begin, and one of her strongest books. It introduces Giordano Bruno, tells the complete story of a mystery in Oxford in 1583, and was shortlisted for the Crime Writers’ Association’s historical crime award in 2010. Sacrilege and Treachery earned the same shortlisting in 2012 and 2014.
In what order should I read S.J. Parris’s books?
Read the seven Giordano Bruno novels in publication order: Heresy, Prophecy, Sacrilege, Treachery, Conspiracy, Execution, and Alchemy. The novellas are set earlier in Bruno’s life and can be read at any point. The Sophia de Wolfe series is separate and starts with Traitor’s Legacy.
Is S.J. Parris the same person as Stephanie Merritt?
Yes. S.J. Parris is the pen name of Stephanie Merritt, a British journalist and novelist born in 1974. She uses the Parris name for her historical crime novels, her own name for her contemporary novels, and her own name for her memoir.
How many Giordano Bruno books are there?
There are seven novels, from Heresy (2010) to Alchemy (2023). There are also four novellas: The Secret Dead, The Academy of Secrets, A Christmas Requiem, and The Midwinter Martyr. The first three are collected in a single volume titled The Dead of Winter.
Was Giordano Bruno a real person?
Yes. Giordano Bruno was an Italian philosopher born in Nola in 1548. He joined the Dominican order, later fled Naples, lived in England from 1583 to 1585, and was burned at the stake in Rome on 17 February 1600.
Are S.J. Parris’s books historically accurate?
The settings, the politics, and many of the characters are real, including Sir Francis Walsingham, Sir Francis Drake, and the Babington Plot of 1586. The murder cases are invented. The idea that Bruno spied for Walsingham comes from a theory advanced by the historian John Bossy and is not an established fact.
What time periods does S.J. Parris write about?
Her historical fiction is set in the second half of the sixteenth century and the early years of the seventeenth century. The Bruno novels run from 1583 to 1588 in England, Paris, and Prague, the novellas go back to Italy between 1566 and 1576, and the Sophia de Wolfe books cover 1598 to 1601. Her books, as Stephanie Merritt, have modern settings.
Who is Sophia de Wolfe?
Sophia de Wolfe is the lead character of S.J. Parris’s second series. She is a former agent who is called back into intelligence work by Robert Cecil, Queen Elizabeth’s spymaster, in 1598. Her first book is Traitor’s Legacy, and her second is Rebel’s Gambit.
Is Traitor’s Legacy a Giordano Bruno book?
No. Traitor’s Legacy is a historical novel by S.J. Parris, but it begins a separate series, led by Sophia de Wolfe, set in 1598. Sophia first appears in the Bruno novels, so the two series share a world, but Traitor’s Legacy can be followed without them.
Are S.J. Parris’s books suitable for younger readers?
They are written for adults. They are murder mysteries set in a violent age, with killings, religious persecution, and political conspiracy. Older teenagers who already read adult historical crime should be comfortable with them.
Have S.J. Parris’s books been adapted for TV or film?
Not yet. In 2016, The Bookseller reported that the production company Urban Myth Films had acquired television rights to the Giordano Bruno novels, for a series to be called Heresy. No adaptation has reached the screen.
Will there be more S.J. Parris books?
Yes. Rebel’s Gambit, the second Sophia de Wolfe novel, is listed by UK booksellers for 6 May 2027. No eighth Giordano Bruno novel has been announced, although the most recent Bruno story, the novella The Midwinter Martyr, appeared in November 2025.
What did Stephanie Merritt write under her own name?
She has published five books as Stephanie Merritt. Gaveston (2002) and Real (2005) are contemporary novels, The Devil Within (2008) is a memoir about depression, and While You Sleep (2018) and Storm (2022) are psychological thrillers.
Conclusion
S.J. Parris found an unusually good detective in the historical record: a brilliant, restless heretic who really did live in Elizabeth’s London and who may have reported to her spymaster. Across seven novels and four novellas, she has followed him from a Naples friary to the courts of Paris and Prague.
Start with Heresy and read forward. If you would like a newer way in, Traitor’s Legacy opens the Sophia de Wolfe series in 1598.
Related Content
- Giordano Bruno Reading Order
- Best Tudor Historical Fiction
- Best Historical Mystery Fiction
- Tudor England Historical Fiction
- C.J. Sansom: Complete Author Guide
- Shardlake Series Reading Order
- Hilary Mantel: Complete Author Guide
- Wolf Hall Trilogy Reading Order