Gangs book series in reading order

by Enid Blyton

by Bill James

River Boy won Tim Bowler the 1997 Carnegie Medal from CILIP, the award for the year's best children's book by a British subject. Bowler, born 14 November 1953, writes for teenagers and young adults, and the Sunday Telegraph named him a master of the psychological thriller. His 25 catalogued books run from Midget (1994) to Game Changer (2015), with Dragon's Rock, Storm Catchers, Starseeker and Blood on Snow along the way. Grief, gangs, kidnapping and fathers and sons are recurring subjects.

Harlan Ellison

91 books• 6 series

Harlan Ellison (May 27, 1934 – June 28, 2018) was an American writer associated with New Wave speculative fiction and known for an outspoken, combative personality. Ellison's output ran past 1,700 pieces, spanning short stories, novellas, screenplays, comic-book scripts, teleplays and essays, plus criticism of literature, film, television and print. The catalogue lists 91 titles from The Deadly Streets (1958) to Greatest Hits (2024), including Web of the City (1958), Gentleman Junkie (1961) and Ellison Wonderland (1962). Subjects span science fiction, fantasy, horror and short stories, and the series listed are Brain Movies, Dream Corridor and Vic and Blood.

Philip Pullman

51 books• 10 series

Philip Pullman's catalogue covers fantasy and children's adventure, with detective stories, fairy tales and graphic novels alongside. His Dark Materials and The Book of Dust are the sequences it is built around, joined by the Sally Lockhart mysteries, the New Cut Gang, the Canongate Myths and The Adventures of John Blake. Sixty-five catalogued titles run from The Haunted Storm (1972) through The Ruby in the Smoke (1985) to The Rose Field in 2025.

William Wallace Johnstone, October 28, 1938 to February 8, 2004, was an American author of westerns, horror and survivalist fiction. The Devil's Kiss opened the run in 1981, followed by The Last of the Dog Team (1981), Out of the Ashes (1983) and Anarchy in the Ashes (1984). Series filed under the name include Ashes, First Mountain Man, Smoke Jensen, Last Gunfighter, Blood Bond and Duff MacCallister, and subjects include outlaws, frontier and pioneer life, revenge and Texas. The catalogue carries 544 titles under the Johnstone name dated 1981 to 2026, well past the 2004 death date, and 400 of them carry a William W. Johnstone credit.

Eve Bunting, born Eve Bolton, was a Northern Irish-born American writer of more than 250 books who lived from December 19, 1928, to October 1, 2023. Bunting wrote fiction and non-fiction, mainly novels for children and young adults, and also wrote the text of picture books. Many of the books are set in Northern Ireland, where Bunting grew up, while others range in subject from Thanksgiving to riots in Los Angeles. The Two Giants (1971) was Bunting's first book. Series in the catalogue include Frog and Friends, Horse Stories, Dinosaur Machines and Pirate Captain's Daughter, and subjects include animals, horses, stories in rhyme and mystery stories.

Bill James was the main pen name of Allan James Tucker, a Welsh novelist born 15 August 1929 and died 17 June 2023. Tucker reported for the Daily Mirror and other newspapers after RAF service, lived in South Wales, and also published as David Craig and Judith Jones. Most of the Bill James output is the Harpur and Iles series, which sets Detective Chief Superintendent Colin Harpur against Assistant Chief Constable Desmond Iles in an unnamed coastal city in south-western England, with a shifting cast on both sides of the law. His catalogue holds 73 titles from 1966 to 2022.

K’wan Foye writes urban and street fiction. New York settings, street life, gangs, organized crime, the drug trade and revenge all appear in the recorded subjects. The catalogue holds 52 books from Gangsta (2003) to Troubleman (2026), with Hood Rat, Animal and Fix named in the character records. Hood Rat, Fix, Gangsta, Hoodlum, Purple City Tales, Black Lotus and Reluctant King are the series listed. Six further names appear on one book each, among them 50 Cent, Victor L. Martin and Darrell King.

Lynne Ewing is an American screenwriter and young adult novelist with 24 books catalogued from 1996 to 2014. Daughters of the Moon, Sons of the Dark and Sisters of Isis are her three series, which draw on the supernatural, demonology and Egyptian mythology. Drive-By (1996), her debut, won the 1999 Arizona Young Readers Award. Party Girl, the follow-up, was filmed as Living the Life. Ewing's work has appeared in seven languages.

Brenda Novak is an American author of historical romance, contemporary romance and romantic suspense, born in 1964 in Vernal, Utah. The catalogue lists 87 books, opening with Of Noble Birth (1999) and reaching Meet Me in Italy (2026). Early titles include Baby Business (2000), Snow Baby (2000) and Dear Maggie (2001). Series on the author page include the Hanover Chronicles/Evelyn Talbot Chronicles, Bulletproof, the Stillwater Trilogy, Dept 6 Hired Guns, Coyote Canyon and Fairham Island. Whiskey Creek, Silver Springs and Dundee, Idaho appear in the character listing, and subject tags cover missing persons, murder investigation and single mothers.

Beverly Jenkins

60 books• 11 series

Beverly Jenkins writes historical and contemporary romance with a focus on 19th-century African American life. Born in Detroit in 1951, Jenkins was nominated for an NAACP Image Award in 2013, and in 1999 the African American Literature Book Club named her among the top 50 favourite African American writers of the 20th century. The catalogue holds 60 books from Night Song (1994) to Calling All Blessings (2025), including the Blessings, Old West, Le Veq Family and Grayson Family series. Recorded subjects include mail order brides, Kansas, and city and town life.

S.E. Hinton

9 books

The Outsiders (1967) is the book S.E. Hinton is known for, and it opens a short catalogue of nine titles. That Was Then, This Is Now (1971), Rumble Fish (1975) and Tex (1979) follow, all built on teenagers, gangs, friendship and family. Hinton also wrote children's books and, later, Hawkes Harbor (2004) and Some of Tim's Stories (2007). Books run short, 159 pages at the median.

Enid Blyton

957 books• 42 series

Enid Blyton (11 August 1897 to 28 November 1968) was an English children's writer and one of the best-selling authors of children's literature, with more than 600 million copies sold and translations into ninety languages. Blyton wrote on education, natural history, fantasy, mystery and biblical stories. Noddy, the Famous Five, the Secret Seven, the Five Find-Outers and Malory Towers are the best-remembered Blyton books, and St Clare's, Mary Mouse and Toyland Stories are also listed. The catalogue opens with The Enid Blyton Book of Fairies (1924), and The Naughtiest Girl in the School (1930) and The Adventures of the Wishing-Chair (1937) follow. Titles dated after Blyton's death also appear, up to Stories of Wonders and Wishes (2023).

Graham Greene

80 books• 3 series

Graham Greene (Henry Graham Greene, 2 October 1904 to 3 April 1991) was an English novelist and journalist. Greene gained an early reputation for two kinds of book: serious Catholic novels and thrillers, which Greene called entertainments. Across 67 years of writing, including more than 25 novels, the work examined the conflicting moral and political questions of the modern world. The catalogue begins with Babbling April (1925), then The Man Within (1929), Stamboul Train (1932), It's a Battlefield (1934) and A Gun for Sale (1936). Greene was shortlisted for the Nobel Prize in Literature several times. Subjects include travel, drama, England and Catholics.

Marie Lu

29 books• 11 series

Marie Lu, born Xiwei Lu on 11 July 1984, is an American author of young adult science fiction and fantasy. The Legend series, set in a dystopian and militarised future, is Lu's best known work, alongside Young Elites, Warcross and Batman: Nightwalker in the DC Icons line. The catalogue lists 30 books from Legend (2011) to Rebel (2026), with Silver Dawn listed for 2027. Skyhunter, Stars and Smoke and New Alchemists are further series. Subjects include resistance to government, plague, fugitives, soldiers and the supernatural.

Chloe Gong

12 books• 4 series

Chloe Gong, born in 1998, is a New Zealand novelist working mainly in young adult fantasy and historical fiction. Gong's debut, These Violent Delights (2020), reached the New York Times bestseller list and opened a series set among gangs in China; Foul Lady Fortune, Flesh and False Gods and Coldwire followed. Forbes named Gong to its 30 Under 30 list in 2024. Twelve catalogued books run to Eyes of Kings (2026).

Jerry Spinelli

37 books• 5 series

Jerry Spinelli writes children's novels about adolescence and early adulthood. Maniac Magee (1990), Stargirl and Wringer are the best known of them. The 37 catalogued books start with Space Station Seventh Grade (1982) and end with Dead Wednesday (2023), and the series strands include Stargirl, School Daze, Fourth Grade Rats and the Tooter Tales. Schools, friendship, family life and conduct recur as subjects, and the median book runs 176 pages.

Simone Elkeles

13 books• 4 series

Teen romance is Simone Elkeles's form. Perfect Chemistry (2008) took the 2010 RITA Award for Best Young Adult Romance, and its sequel Rules of Attraction (2010) reached both the New York Times and USA Today bestseller lists. Three series hold most of the 13 catalogued books: Perfect Chemistry, How to Ruin and Leaving Paradise. Mexican American and Jewish identity, family problems and school life recur. The catalogue has stood still since The Party King in 2023.

Sigmund Brouwer, born in 1959, is a Canadian author writing for children, young adults and adults, with more than 100 titles and four million books in print. Dead Man's Switch won the 2015 Arthur Ellis Award for best Canadian young adult mystery, and Shock Wave won the same award in 2025. Thief of Glory, a novel for adults, was named Book of the Year at the Christy Awards and also won an Alberta Readers Choice Award. The Last Disciple, co-authored with Hank Hanegraaff, was featured in Time magazine. The catalogue holds 162 books from Lost Beneath Manhattan (1990) to A Dangerous Game (2026), across series such as Accidental Detectives, Mars Diaries, Winds of Light, Lightning on Ice, Cyberquest and Robot Wars.

Nick Oldham writes police procedurals. Henry Christie is the recurring detective across a catalogue of 39 books published between 1996 and 2026, from A Time For Justice (1996) to Death at the Castle Gates (2026). Steve Flynn and Jessica Raker lead two further series, and standalone novels sit beside them. Murder investigation, crime, ex-police officers and English settings are the subject headings, and One Dead Witness (1998), The Last Big Job (1999), Backlash (2001) and Psycho Alley (2006) fall in the earlier stretch. The median book runs 224 pages.

Lisa Maxwell's catalogue divides across three series and nearly thirty years. The Last Magician books take in magic, gangs and time travel, running from The Last Magician (2017) through The Devil's Thief, The Serpent's Curse and The Shattered City. The Sweet Unrest series turns to vodou and ghosts, and a Horse series began with The Berserker's Horse in 1995. Ten books are catalogued, the most recent Keeper of the Rend in 2024.

Kevin Barry

9 books

Kevin Barry is an Irish writer of three short story collections and four novels. City of Bohane (2011) won the 2013 International Dublin Literary Award, Beatlebone (2015) took the 2015 Goldsmiths Prize, and Night Boat to Tangier (2019) was longlisted for the Booker Prize. The catalogue lists nine titles in all, including There Are Little Kingdoms (2007), Dark Lies the Island (2012), That Old Country Music (2021), The Heart in Winter (2024) and The Cave (2025). Barry also edits Winter Papers, an arts and culture annual.

Jan and Stan Berenstain wrote picture books about the Berenstain Bears. The run begins with The Big Honey Hunt (1962) and reaches 400 titles by The Berenstain Bears: Father's Day Blessings (2018). Family life, school, brothers and sisters, scouting, Christmas and Christian life supply the recurring subjects, and many of the books are told in rhyme. A median length of 32 pages places them with early readers. Publication peaked in the 1990s and the catalogue is likely complete.

Walter Dean Myers (born Walter Milton Myers; August 12, 1937 - July 1, 2014) was an American writer known above all for young adult literature. Myers was born in Martinsburg, West Virginia, grew up in Harlem, and turned to writing after a hard childhood, with encouragement from teachers. Myers wrote more than 100 books, picture books and nonfiction among them, and won the Coretta Scott King Award five times. Fallen Angels (1988) ranks among the most frequently challenged books in the U.S. for adult language and realistic depiction of the Vietnam War. The catalogue lists 123 books starting with The Dancers (1972), including Fast Sam, Cool Clyde, and Stuff (1975) and The Young Landlords (1979).

Wensley Clarkson is an English true crime writer, biographer and television producer, born in 1956. The catalogue holds 74 books dated 1991 to 2021, from Dog eat dog (1991) to Serial Killers of Russia (2021). Murderers, organised crime, serial murder and female offenders are the standing subjects, with case studies of British crime running through the list. Clarkson also published a biography of Quentin Tarantino in 1995. Books average 288 pages, and the 2000s were the peak decade.