Author: Helen Black

Helen Black is a British novelist and screenwriter whose legal experience informs stories about vulnerable people and the institutions surrounding them. Before writing professionally, she completed a law degree in Hull and practised as a solicitor, including work connected with children in care. Damaged Goods introduces family lawyer Lilly Valentine and begins a six-book sequence that continues with Place of Safety, Dishonour, Blood Rush, Dark Spaces, and Friendless Lane. The series uses criminal cases to examine the divided loyalties of legal practice rather than treating the courtroom as an abstract puzzle. Black later created the Liberty Chapman novels and moved into television, contributing to Grantchester, Joan, and the second series of Jimmy McGovern's Time. She also wrote Life and Death in the Warehouse and created The Wives. Damaged Goods therefore sits at the start of a career in which law, social pressure, and character-driven suspense have remained closely connected across both page and screen.