Patients book series in reading order

by Rachel Joyce

Ghosts and New Jersey settings recur across E.J. Copperman's mysteries. Seven series sit in the catalogue, led by the Haunted Guesthouse Mysteries, which opened with Night of the Living Deed in 2010, and joined by Jersey Girl, Asperger's Mysteries, Fran and Ken Stein Mystery, Mysterious Detective, Agent To The Paws Mysteries and Haunted Paint Store Mysteries. Copperman has published 32 books, the most recent being Where There's Smoke... (2026).

Dean Koontz, born on July 9, 1945, is an American novelist of suspense thrillers that mix in horror, fantasy, science fiction, mystery and satire. Koontz published early work under pen names including Deanna Dwyer, K. R. Dwyer, Leigh Nichols, David Axton and Brian Coffey. The catalogue holds 164 books, from Star Quest / Doom of the Green Planet (1968) to The Friend of the Family (2026), with A Storm So Bright and Beautiful set for 2027. Jane Hawk, Nameless and Dean Koontz's Frankenstein are Koontz series, and Odd Thomas appears among the characters. Fourteen Koontz hardcovers and sixteen paperbacks reached number one on The New York Times list, and sales top 500 million copies.

Karen Kingsbury is an American Christian novelist, born in Fairfax, Virginia, on June 8, 1963. Kingsbury worked as a sports writer for the Los Angeles Times and later wrote for the Los Angeles Daily News. Missy's Murder (1991), Kingsbury's first book, grew out of a murder story covered as a reporter in Los Angeles. Kingsbury is a #1 New York Times and USA Today bestselling novelist. The catalogue holds 115 titles, running to The Christmas Ring (2025), and the series include Firstborn, Sunrise, Above the Line, Bailey Flanigan, Red Gloves and Forever Faithful. Christian fiction and family life recur among the subjects.

Elizabeth Berg

35 books• 7 series

Elizabeth Berg, born December 2, 1948, is an American novelist and a former registered nurse. Family life and personal change are the core of Berg's character-focused fiction, which the American Library Association has recognized. The catalogue counts 35 books from Family Traditions (1992) and Durable Goods (1993) to Life: A Love Story (2026). Talk Before Sleep, Range of Motion and Open House are early titles, and Mason and Katie Nash are series. Subjects include female friendship, sisters, widows and mothers and daughters.

Medical suspense is Michael Palmer's register, physicians, patients and hospitals, several of them in Boston. The Sisterhood (1982) opens a catalogue of 25 books that runs through Side Effects (1986), Extreme Measures (1991), Silent Treatment (1995) and Miracle Cure (1998) to The First Family in 2018. Dr. Lou Welcome heads the one series, and nothing later than 2018 is catalogued.

F. Paul Wilson

102 books• 26 series

F. Paul Wilson (Francis Paul Wilson, born May 17, 1946) is an American author of horror, adventure, medical thrillers and science fiction, based in Wall, New Jersey. Repairman Jack is the recurring character of novels such as Ground Zero, The Tomb and Fatal Error, and a young adult series follows Jack as a teenager. The Adversary Cycle includes The Keep (1981). Healer (1976) is the first catalogued title. Wilson has won the Prometheus Award, the Bram Stoker Award, the Inkpot Award and the Horror Writers of America Lifetime Achievement Award.

Lurlene McDaniel, born April 5, 1944 in Philadelphia, is an American author of more than 70 young adult books, known for stories of young people facing mortality and chronic illness. McDaniel began writing on the subject as a therapeutic response after a son was diagnosed with juvenile diabetes at age 3. The characters face cancer, diabetes, organ failure and the deaths of loved ones. The catalogue counts 82 books from A Horse for Mandy (1981) to The Girl with the Broken Heart (2018), with series such as One Last Wish, Dawn Rochelle, Angels Trilogy and Angels in Pink. McDaniel graduated from the University of South Florida in Tampa and lives in Chattanooga, Tennessee.

Harry Kraus writes Christian medical suspense, with physicians, patients and heart transplantation among the recurring subjects. The catalogue lists 19 books from Stainless Steal Hearts (1994) to Between the Gods and Men (2016). Kraus's series is Claire McCall. Other titles include Fated Genes (1996), Lethal Mercy (1997) and Breathing Grace (2007). The 16 books with page counts have a median length of 380 pages.

Jodi Picoult

42 books• 7 series

Jodi Picoult is an American writer, born in 1966, whose fiction is described as family saga, often built around moral dilemmas or procedural dramas that set family members against one another. As of 2026 Picoult had published 30 novels and several short stories, and had written several issues of Wonder Woman. Around 40 million copies of Picoult's books are in print in 34 languages, and the New England Bookseller Award for fiction came in 2003. The catalogue holds 42 books, opening with Songs of the Humpback Whale (1992) and including Harvesting the Heart, The Pact, Plain Truth and Salem Falls, alongside plays and graphic novels.

Historical romance and FBI suspense make up Catherine Coulter's two main bodies of work. Regency and medieval romances such as the Sherbrooke Brides and Medieval Song sequences date back to the 1979 debut The Rebel Bride, while the FBI Thriller series and A Brit in the FBI follow government investigator Dillon Savich. Coulter's catalogue runs to 95 books, reaching The Heir of Whitestone in 2026.

Debbie Macomber

245 books• 35 series

Debbie Macomber, born October 22, 1948, is an American author of romance novels and contemporary women's fiction. Six Macomber novels became made-for-TV movies, and the Cedar Cove novels became a television series of the same name, with Macomber serving as executive producer on the adaptations. Macomber won the first fan-voted Quill Award for romance in 2005 and holds a RITA Award and a lifetime achievement award from the Romance Writers of America. The catalogue counts 245 books between Starlight (1983) and A Date with Santa (2026). Series include Heart of Texas, Midnight Sons, Navy, Those Manning Men, Orchard Valley and Angels Everywhere.

Larry McMurtry

48 books• 10 series

Larry McMurtry (Larry Jeff McMurtry, June 3, 1936 to March 25, 2021) was an American novelist, essayist and screenwriter. Most of McMurtry's fiction takes place in the Old West or in contemporary Texas, and the early novels Horseman, Pass By (1961), The Last Picture Show (1966) and Terms of Endearment (1975) trace the decline of small-town Texas life. Screen adaptations of McMurtry's work received 34 Oscar nominations and 13 wins. The catalogue lists 48 books from 1961 to Thalia (2017), including the Lonesome Dove and Berrybender Narratives series and non-fiction.

Terri Blackstock's catalogue holds 78 books published between 1984 and 2021, beginning with Blue Fire (1984), issued under the name Terri Herrington. Recorded subjects place the work in Christian fiction, mystery and detective writing, romantic suspense, and stories of sisters and of mothers and daughters. Series in the listing include Newpointe 911, Sun Coast Chronicles, Cape Refuge and If I Run. Three titles also carry a credit for Tracy Hughes. No new book has been catalogued since Aftermath (2021).

Barbara Delinsky, born Barbara Ruth Greenberg on August 9, 1945, is an American romance novelist with 19 New York Times bestsellers. Delinsky has also used the pen names Bonnie Drake and Billie Douglass, and 1982 titles such as A Time to Love are listed under Douglass. The catalogue counts 96 books from 1981 to Tender Loving Care (2024), starting with Surrender by Moonlight and Passionate Touch. Series include Crosslyn Rise, Blake Sisters and Victoria Lesser, and mothers and daughters recur in the subjects.

Henning Mankell

35 books• 9 series

Kurt Wallander, a police detective in Sweden, is the figure Henning Mankell is known for. Mankell's catalogue holds 35 books, from A Bridge to the Stars (1990) to The Rock Blaster (2020), and takes in the Joel Gustafsson and Linda Wallander sequences, the Fredrik Welin novels, the Sofia Alface books, children's fiction and non-fiction. Faceless Killers (1991) and The Dogs of Riga (1992) are among the early titles.

Lisa Genova writes fiction about neurological illness and the people living with it. Alzheimer's disease, patients and memory head the subject list. Seven titles are catalogued: Still Alice (2007), Left Neglected (2011), Love Anthony (2012), Inside the O'Briens (2015), Every Note Played (2018), the non-fiction Remember: The Science of Memory and the Art of Forgetting (2021) and More or Less Maddy (2025).

The lawyer Ben Kincaid is the recurring character in William Bernhardt's legal mysteries. Primary Justice (1991) is the earliest of 77 catalogued titles, followed by Blind Justice (1992), Deadly Justice (1993) and Perfect Justice (1994), and the listing reaches The Superman Wars (2026). Daniel Pike, Splitsville, Susan Pulaski and the Red Sneaker Writers books are further series. Tulsa, Oklahoma, murder trials and serial murder fill the subject tags.

Chuck Palahniuk

28 books• 6 series

Fight Club (1996) was the first published novel by Chuck Palahniuk and became a film under the same title. Palahniuk, born Charles Michael Palahniuk on February 21, 1962, is an American novelist who calls the work transgressional fiction; the output spans 19 novels, three nonfiction books, two graphic novels, two adult coloring books and short stories. The catalogue lists 29 books, including Invisible Monsters (1999), Survivor (1999), Choke (2001), Lullaby (2002), Diary (2003), Haunted (2004) and Rant (2007), up to Shock Induction (2024), with Galleria due in 2027. Subject headings name satire, horror, humour and disfigured persons, and Fight Club Graphic Novels with Cameron Stewart is a listed series.

Sue Miller, born 29 November 1943, is an American novelist and short story writer and a graduate of Radcliffe College. Miller's books include The Good Mother (1986), Inventing the Abbotts (1987), Family Pictures (1990), While I Was Gone (1999), Lost in the Forest (2005) and Monogamy (2020). The catalogue subjects list domestic fiction, psychological fiction, married people, aging parents and divorced women.

Jacquelyn Mitchard

29 books• 3 series

Jacquelyn Mitchard is an American journalist and novelist who also writes for children. The Deep End of the Ocean (1996) was the first title chosen for Oprah's Book Club, on 17 September 1996. Twenty-nine books are catalogued from Mother Less Child: The Love Story of a Family (1985) to The Birdwatcher (2025), among them The Most Wanted (1998), A Theory of Relativity (2001), Twelve Times Blessed (2003) and children's titles such as Baby Bat's Lullaby (2004). Mitchard's series are Cappadora Family, Midnight Twins and What We Saw at Night. Mitchard teaches creative writing at the Vermont College of Fine Arts.

Mark Haddon, born in Northampton in 1962, is an English novelist whose best known book is The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, published in 2003. Haddon has won the Whitbread Award, the Guardian Prize, a Commonwealth Writers' Prize and the Dolly Gray Children's Literature Award. His catalogue starts much earlier and much younger: picture books from 1988, the comic Agent Z series and the Baby Dinosaurs books all precede the adult fiction. Thirty-one titles span 1988 to 2026, reaching Leaving Home.

Laura Jensen Walker started in humour and Christian writing and moved into mystery. The catalogue holds 27 books published between 1997 and 2026, opening with Dated Jekyll, Married Hyde (1997) and reaching The Postmistress of Pudlington (2026). Thanks for the Mammogram! (2000), Mentalpause (2001) and God Rest Ye Grumpy Scroogeymen (2003) sit in the early humour. Six series follow, among them the Getaway Girls, Phoebe Grant, A Bookish Baker Mystery, A Faith Chapel Mystery, the Nightingale Mystery and the Alphabet Girls Mystery.

The Hours (1998) won Michael Cunningham the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and the PEN/Faulkner Award in 1999, and a 2022 edition pairs it with Mrs. Dalloway. Cunningham, born in 1952, is an American novelist and screenwriter and Professor in the Practice of Creative Writing at Yale University. Golden States (1984) opens the catalogue, with A Home at the End of the World (1990), Flesh and Blood (1995), Specimen Days (2005), By Nightfall (2010) and The Snow Queen (2014) after it. Gay men, male friendship, families, parents and children, and AIDS run through the fiction. Eleven books are catalogued to 2023.

Sports biography accounts for most of Joe Layden's writing. The catalogue opens in 1994 with Thin Ice: The Complete, Uncensored Story of Tonya Harding and 40 Minutes of Hell, and takes in Deion Sanders (1995), Steve Young (1995) and USA Basketball (1996). Basketball, the NBA, football, women athletes and the Olympic Games run through the subjects, much of it written for young readers. 60 titles span 1994 to 2026, reaching In My Darkest Hour (2026), at a median 214 pages.