Author: Wilson, David

True crime

Published on 18 September 2025 by Little, Brown Book Group (Sphere) in the United Kingdom.

Hardback | 432 pages
242 x 168 x 143 | 652g

In this groundbreaking new book from the UK’s leading criminologist, David Wilson explores what our nation’s most lethal murderers reveal about us in a thrilling blend of history and true crime.

Professor David Wilson is renowned for deciphering the hidden motives of murderers and the context in which crimes took place. In A History of Modern Britain in 20 Murders, he zooms out to look at the big picture, examining what multiple murders across a range of eras can tell us about our past…and our present.

Told in Wilson’s absorbing style, this is a fresh look at crimes and points in history we think we know. Ranging from the crimes of Jack the Ripper and the shocking ‘Brides in the Bath’ deaths, to the tragic murders of James Bulger and Sarah Everard, Wilson reveals why some cases particularly resonate with and reverberate through public consciousness, and how they can help us understand Britain’s complex, diverse and ongoing history.

From colonial wars and the end of the empire, to the Blitz, through the swinging sixties, into the nineties all the way to present day, this is a truly fascinating and accessible approach to both history and criminology, always centring the victims, that will leave readers questioning the wider impact of the next murder case that grips Britain.