Novels

• Zennor in Darkness (McKitterick Prize 1994)
• Burning Bright (1994)
• A Spell of Winter (Orange Prize 1996)
• Talking to the Dead (1996)
• Your Blue-Eyed Boy (1998)
• With your Crooked Heart (1999)
• The Siege (2001) (Shortlisted for the Whitbread Novel of the Year Award; shortlisted for the Orange Prize 2002)
• Mourning Ruby (2003)
• House of Orphans (2006)
• Counting the Stars (2008)
• The Betrayal (2010) (ISBN 978-1905490592)

Short stories

• Love of Fat Men (1997)
• Ice Cream (2001)
• Rose, 1944 (2005)

Books for Teens

• Zillah and Me!
• The Lilac Tree (first published as Zillah and Me) (2004)
• The Seal Cove (first published as The Zillah Rebellion) (2004)
• The Silver Bead (2004)
• The Ingo tetralogy
• Ingo (2005)
• The Tide Knot (2006)
• The Deep (2007)
• The Crossing of Ingo (2008)

Children's books

• Going to Egypt (1992)
• In the Money (1995)
• Go Fox (1996)
• Fatal Error (1996)
• Amina's Blanket (1996)
• Clyde's Leopard (1998)
• Great-Grandma's Dancing Dress (1998)
• Brother Brother, Sister Sister (1999)
• Aliens Don't Eat Bacon Sandwiches (2000)
• Tara's Tree House (2003)
• The Allie Books (1997-2000)
• The Ugly Duckling (2001)

Poetry

• The Apple Fall (1983)
• The Sea Skater (1986)
• The Raw Garden (1988)
• Short Days, Long Nights (1991)
• Recovering a Body (1994)
• Secrets (1994)
• Bestiary (1997)
• Out of the Blue (2001)
• Glad of these times (2006)