He came to prominence with his series set in the reign of Henry VIII in the 16th century, whose main character is the hunchback lawyer Matthew Shardlake. Shardlake works on commission initially from Thomas Cromwell in Dissolution and Dark Fire, Archbishop Thomas Cranmer in Sovereign and Revelation and Queen Catherine Parr in Heartstone.

He has also written Winter in Madrid, a thriller set in Spain in 1940 in the aftermath of the Spanish Civil War.

Dark Fire won the 2005 Ellis Peters Historical Dagger, awarded by the Crime Writers' Association (CWA). Sansom himself was "Very Highly Commended" in the 2007 CWA Dagger in the Library award, for the Shardlake series.

Matthew Shardlake Series

Other Novels

Reviews

• Schoolboy rivalries in the Spanish civil war A review of Winter in Madrid, in Telegraph, 26.2.2006
• A wherry across the Thames A review of Dark Fire, by Stella Duffy, in The Guardian, 6.11.2004
• Spanish Civil War, stripped of Hemingway's romance A review of Winter in Madrid, by Katherine Bailey, in The Philadelphia Enquirer, 20.1.2008
• Revelation A review of "Revelation", by Christina Hardyment, in Times Online, 29.3.2008
• Romanttinen vakoojatarina A review of Finnish translated Winter in Madrid, by Jari Olavi Hiltunen, in Opettaja 21.5.2010