Murder book series in reading order

by Joanne Fluke

by Cleo Coyle

by Emily Brightwell

by Leslie Meier

by Donna Andrews

by Ngaio Marsh

by Kathleen Ernst

by Jenn McKinlay

by Carolyn Haines

by Parnell Hall

by Anne Perry

by Cynthia Harrod-Eagles

by Kate Ellis

by Laura Levine

by Elizabeth J. Duncan

by Kathy Reichs

by Tasha Alexander

by Kate Collins

by Faye Kellerman

by Mary Stanton

by Annelise Ryan

by Donis Casey

by James Patterson

by Ann Cleeves

by C.S. Harris

by Jane Casey

by Peter Tremayne

by Colin Dexter

by Scott Pratt

by Frances Brody

by G.M. Malliet

by Estelle Ryan

by Laurien Berenson

by Rita Mae Brown

by Susanna Gregory

by Karin Fossum

by Alyssa Maxwell

by Jeanne M. Dams

by Barbara Nadel

by Deborah Crombie

James Patterson

510 books• 73 series

James Patterson, born on March 22, 1947, is an American writer whose catalogue here holds 514 books published from 1976 to 2027. The run opens with The Thomas Berryman Number (1976), and Along Came a Spider (1992) and Kiss the Girls (1995) follow later. Alex Cross, Michael Bennett, Maximum Ride, Daniel X, Witch & Wizard, NYPD Red, Private, Middle School and the Women's Murder Club are among the Patterson series, alongside standalone thrillers, non-fiction and romance. Marshall Karp shares the credit on 5 of the books. Patterson's sales exceed 425 million copies, and Patterson was the first person to sell one million e-books. Forbes ranked Patterson the highest-paid author in 2016, for a third year running, and the National Book Foundation gave Patterson the Literarian Award in November 2015. 27 Stars is scheduled for 2027.

Heather Graham is the name under which Heather Graham Pozzessere, an American writer born on 15 March 1953, publishes mainly romance fiction; Shannon Drake is a further pen name. Graham's work has been published in about 25 languages, with more than 75 million copies printed. The catalogue records 311 books from Tender Taming (1983) to Destiny Rising (2026). Krewe of Hunters, Harrison Investigation, Cafferty & Quinn, Alliance Vampires, Keepers: L.A., New York Confidential and Finnegan Connection are among the Graham series. Subjects span historical, paranormal, contemporary and suspense romance.

Ann Rule

37 books• 3 series

Ann Rule's books are true crime: case studies of murders, murderers, homicide investigations and the trials that followed. The catalogue holds 37 titles, opening with The Stranger Beside Me (1980) and taking in Lust Killer, The I-5 Killer, Small Sacrifices and the Crime Files line of collections. Lying in Wait and Other True Cases is the last entry, and the catalogue is listed as likely complete.

Cozy mysteries with a trade attached are Jenn McKinlay's speciality: a library, a cupcake bakery, a hat shop and a resale business each anchor a series. The catalogue reaches 69 titles between 2002 and 2026, including contemporary romance in the Bluff Point and Museum of Literature books and the Decoupage mysteries written as Lucy Lawrence. Stuck on Murder (2009) and Sprinkle with Murder (2010) start the main cozy runs, and Booking for Trouble is the most recent title.

Agatha Christie

290 books• 18 series

Agatha Christie (1890-1976) was an English writer of detective fiction, the author of 66 detective novels and 14 short-story collections. Three sleuths anchor the work. Hercule Poirot first appears in The Mysterious Affair at Styles (1920), Tommy and Tuppence in The Secret Adversary (1922) and Miss Marple in The Murder at the Vicarage (1930). The catalogue also carries Superintendent Battle, Harley Quin and Parker Pyne stories, standalone novels, plays and non-fiction, with many short stories listed individually. Christie was born Agatha Miller and published under her first married name.

Nora Roberts

279 books• 37 series

Nora Roberts, born Eleanor Marie Robertson on October 10, 1950, is an American writer of romance under that name. As J. D. Robb, Roberts writes police procedurals with science-fiction elements, and has also published as Jill March and, in the UK, as Sarah Hardesty. This listing carries 280 Roberts books, opening with Irish Thoroughbred (1981); The Missing is scheduled for 2027. Series on the page include the In Death Universe, the MacGregors, Night Tales, the Calhoun Women, the Chesapeake Bay Saga, Irish Hearts and the O'Hurleys.

Joanne Fluke is the pen name of Joanne Fischmann, an American writer born Joanne Gibson around 1943 in Swanville, Minnesota. Fluke is chiefly known for the Hannah Swensen cozy mysteries about a small-town baker, and six Hallmark Channel films draw on that series. The catalogue counts 64 books between 1980 and 2024, opening with The Stepchild (1980), The Other Child (1983) and Winter Chill (1984); the newest entry is Pumpkin Chiffon Pie Murder (2024). Other pen names include Jo Gibson, Chris Hunter and Kathryn Kirkwood.

Laura Childs writes cozy mysteries in three series: the Tea Shop Mysteries, with Theodosia Browning in Charleston, South Carolina, the Scrapbooking Mysteries and the Cackleberry Club Mysteries. Death by Darjeeling (2001) opens the catalogue, which holds 56 books and reaches Death at a Firefly Tea. Buttermint Bomb is scheduled for 2027.

Ann Cleeves

52 books• 10 series

Ann Cleeves is a British crime writer, born in 1954, with 52 catalogued books spanning 1986 to 2026. The run opens with A Bird in the Hand (1986) and reaches The Dying Light in 2026. Cleeves wrote the Vera Stanhope, Jimmy Perez and Matthew Venn series, and all three have been adapted for television. Raven Black, the first Jimmy Perez novel, won the Duncan Lawrie Dagger in 2006. Other series listings include Palmer-Jones, Inspector Ramsay, Matthew Venn / Two Rivers and Willow Reeves & Jimmy Perez. Subjects include police procedurals, women detectives, England and Scotland.

Cozy mysteries filled Sheila Connolly's list: the Orchard Mysteries around apple growing, the Museum Mysteries in Philadelphia, the County Cork books in Ireland, a Victorian Village series and the Relatively Dead novels. One Bad Apple (2008) opens 51 catalogued books, which end at Fatal Roots in 2020, with the early glassblowing titles written as Sarah Atwell.

M. William Phelps, born in 1967, is an American crime writer and investigative journalist who also works as a podcaster and television presenter. True crime is the bulk of the work: murder case studies, homicide investigation and serial murderers, women among them. Forty-five books run from Perfect Poison (2003) to They Came For Blood (2026), including Murder In The Heartland (2006), I'll Be Watching You (2008) and Cruel Death (2009). Phelps also wrote Nathan Hale (2008) and the Tom Callahan series.

Anne Perry

111 books• 14 series

Anne Perry (28 October 1938 – 10 April 2023), born Juliet Marion Hulme, was a British writer of historical detective fiction. Perry wrote the Thomas and Charlotte Pitt novels and the William Monk series. In 1994 it became public that Perry, at fifteen, had been convicted in 1954 in Christchurch, New Zealand, of murdering Honorah Parker, mother of Perry's friend Pauline Parker; after a five-year sentence, Perry took a new name and returned to the United Kingdom. The catalogue holds 111 Perry books, opening with The Cater Street Hangman (1979) and reaching Death Times Seven (2026). Other series include Daniel Pitt, Elena Standish, Timepiece and Tathea.

Kate Carlisle writes mystery and detective fiction with women sleuths. Catalogue subjects add rare books, women bookbinders, conservation and restoration, murder, crime and man-woman relationships, and name Brooklyn Wainwright as a recurring fictional character. The 35 catalogued books span 2009 to 2024, from Homicide in Hardcover (2009) to The Knife Before Christmas (2024), with If Books Could Kill (2009), Murder under Cover (2011) and One Book in the Grave (2012) along the way. Bibliophile Mystery, Fixer-Upper Mystery, Island Paradise Duet and MacLaren's Pride are the series credited to Carlisle.

R.L. Stine

589 books• 64 series

Robert Lawrence Stine, born October 8, 1943, is an American novelist who writes horror fiction for children. Goosebumps, the series Stine created, sold more than 400 million copies in 35 languages and grew into a franchise of two television series, video games, comics and two feature films. Fear Street, Stine's horror sequence for teenagers, passed 80 million copies and was adapted for film. Stine has been called the Stephen King of children's literature. The listing runs to 590 titles, from How to Be Funny (1978), published as Jovial Bob Stine, to How to Train Your Dummy, scheduled for 2027.

Ngaio Marsh

38 books• 3 series

Inspector Roderick Alleyn of the English police carries almost all of Ngaio Marsh's detective fiction. 38 catalogued books run from A Man Lay Dead (1934) to Money in the Morgue, taking in Enter a Murderer (1935), The Nursing Home Murder (1935), Death in Ecstasy (1936), Vintage Murder (1937) and Artists in Crime (1938). Marsh also published short stories and non-fiction. The catalogue is likely complete.

Two cozy mystery series account for most of Cleo Coyle's work: the Coffeehouse Mysteries, in which the coffeehouse manager Clare Cosi investigates murders, and the Haunted Bookshop Mysteries, which put a bookseller alongside a ghost. On What Grounds (2003) opens the catalogue of 32 titles, which reaches Eat, Drink, and Get Buried. Coyle titles run to coffee puns, among them Through the Grinder, Latte Trouble and Murder Most Frothy.

Maggie Sefton writes mystery and detective fiction. Kelly Flynn is the figure recorded for the Knitting Mysteries, and knitting, knitters, murder and Colorado all appear among the listed subjects. The catalogue holds 26 books, from Abilene Gambler (1995) to Dyeing Up Loose Ends (2018), and the run is marked likely complete. Molly Malone Mystery, Real Estate Mysteries and the Widow and the Rogue Mysteries also carry the Sefton name. Ellery Adams, Kate Collins, Leann Sweeney and Lorraine Bartlett are each credited alongside Sefton on two of the listed titles.

Mary Higgins Clark

62 books• 8 series

Mary Higgins Clark, born Mary Theresa Eleanor Higgins, was an American suspense novelist who lived from December 24, 1927 to January 31, 2020. Where Are the Children? (1975) was the debut suspense novel, and by 2015 that book was in its 75th printing. Each of Clark's 51 books was a bestseller in the United States and in European countries. The catalogue starts with Aspire to the Heavens / Mount Vernon Love Story (1968) and reaches It Had to Be You (2024). Alvirah and Willy are recurring characters, and Under Suspicion is a Clark series. Clark worked as a secretary, a copy editor and for one year a Pan-American Airlines flight attendant, and short stories supplemented the family income.

Peter May

33 books• 5 series

Peter May, born 20 December 1951, is a Scottish novelist, crime writer and television screenwriter. The Blackhouse won the U.S. Barry Award for Crime Novel of the Year and France's Cezam Prix Litteraire, and The Lewis Man took Le Telegramme's Grand Prix des Lecteurs. Entry Island won two awards in 2014, and May received France's Grand Prix de Litterature Policiere in 2025. Sales exceed twelve million copies. The catalogue lists 33 books, from The Reporter (1978) to The Black Loch (2024), with the China Thrillers, the Enzo Files and the Lewis Tetralogy among the series.

Martin Edwards is a crime writer who took a first in law at Balliol College, Oxford, trained as a solicitor in Leeds, moved to Liverpool on qualifying in 1980 and became a partner at Mace and Jones in 1984. Harry Devlin, Lake District Mysteries and Rachel Savernake are the series. Edwards belongs to the Murder Squad collective, chairs the nominations sub-committee for the CWA Diamond Dagger and became Archivist of the Crime Writers Association in 2007. Miss Winter in the Library with a Knife (2025) is the newest title.

Kate Ellis writes police procedurals in which archaeology recurs alongside murder investigation. Wesley Peterson heads the main series, opening with The Merchant's House (1998), and Joe Plantagenet and Inspector Albert Lincoln lead two more. Forty-four catalogued books reach The Chapel of Bones (2026), at a median length of 346 pages. England, police work and archaeologists recur as subjects.

Sally Spencer writes English police procedurals, and the catalogue holds 66 books from Salt of the Earth (1994) to The Final Beat of the Drum (2023). Chief Inspector Charlie Woodend, DCI Monika Paniatowski and Inspector Sam Blackstone are the recurring detectives. Spencer's series also include the Marston Trilogy, Jennie Redhead Mystery and Detective Sam Brody Thriller, alongside standalone novels. The Salton Killings (1998) and Murder at Swann's Lake (1999) are among the earlier titles. No new Spencer title has appeared since 2023.

Dogs run through most of Linda O Johnston's work. The Kendra Ballantyne, Pet-Sitter mysteries pair pet-sitting with murder investigation, and the Pet Rescue, Barkery & Biscuits, Shelter of Secrets and K-9 Ranch Rescue series continue on that ground, while the Alpha Force books sit in Harlequin's paranormal line. Women lawyers, dog owners and rescue work recur as subjects. Eighty-two titles are catalogued, from a 1988 short story to Canine Refuge (2025), at a median length of 288 pages.

Joyce & Jim Lavene is a writing partnership credited with 67 books between 1999 and 2016, the catalogue opening with A Time for Love (1999). Subjects include mystery and detective fiction, murder investigation, sheriffs and North Carolina. Mystery series by Joyce & Jim Lavene include Sharyn Howard, Peggy Lee Garden Mysteries, A Renaissance Faire Mystery, Missing Pieces Mystery, Retired Witches Mysteries, Pie Shop Mysteries and Pet Psychic Mystery. Romance also appears among the subjects, and a non-fiction line sits alongside the novels. Putting on the Witch (2016) is the newest title, and the catalogue is marked likely complete.