Prisoners book series in reading order

by Alexandra Bracken

by Patrick Lee

Stephen King

223 books• 25 series

Horror fiction is the field most closely tied to Stephen King, an American author born on September 21, 1947, and nicknamed the "King of Horror". King's work also reaches into suspense, crime, science fiction, fantasy and mystery, and includes roughly 200 short stories, most later gathered in collections. Carrie (1974) was the debut that set King in horror; Different Seasons (1982), four novellas in one volume, marked the first major step outside it. The catalogue lists 223 books from 1971 to 2026, starting with The Blue Air Compressor, a short story, and reaching Other Worlds Than These (2026). Series on file include Holly Gibney, the Bill Hodges Trilogy, Green Mile, Shining and Talisman.

Jeffrey Archer

63 books• 11 series

Jeffrey Archer's 63 catalogued books cover novels, short stories, plays, children's books and prison diaries. The list opens with Not a Penny More, Not a Penny Less (1976) and reaches Adam and Eve in 2026. The Clifton Chronicles, Kane and Abel and the Detective William Warwick novels are the main series; families, social class and English history supply the material.

Ann Aguirre, born on 27 August 1970, is an American writer of speculative fiction across urban fantasy, romantic science fiction and post-apocalyptic dystopian young adult fiction. Apocalyptic paranormal romance appears under the shared name Ellen Connor with Carrie Lofty, and paranormal romantic suspense under the name Ava Gray. The catalogue lists 160 books, from Grimspace (2008) and Wanderlust (2008) to The Hocus Pocus Handbook (2026). Series include Sirantha Jax, Razorland, Corine Solomon and Ars Numina, plus Ava Gray series such as Alpha Billionaire and Valkov Bratva. Subjects include interstellar travel and women astronauts.

Alexandra Bracken

17 books• 5 series

Alexandra Bracken is an American author, born in 1987, known for The Darkest Minds and Passenger series. The catalogue lists 17 books from Brightly Woven (2010) to Immortal Rose (2026). The Darkest Minds (2012), Never Fade (2013) and In The After Light (2014) are among the early titles, and Passenger (2016) and Wayfarer (2017) follow. Other series are Prosper Redding and Silver in the Bone. Subjects include psychic ability, time travel, fantasy and science fiction.

Sarah J. Maas, born March 5, 1986, is an American fantasy author known for three series: Throne of Glass, A Court of Thorns and Roses and Crescent City. The catalogue holds 45 books dated 2012 to 2027, starting in 2012 with The Assassin and the Pirate Lord and Throne of Glass, then Crown of Midnight in 2013. A Court of Splintered Harmony (2026) is the newest release, and A Court of Forgotten Melody is scheduled for 2027. Subjects across the books include fairies, assassins, magic, courts and courtiers, and romance. By 2024 Maas had sold more than 75 million copies, with translations in 40 languages.

John Grisham

65 books• 11 series

Legal thrillers are the core of John Grisham's work. Grisham is an American writer, lawyer and former politician, born in 1955, who studied at Mississippi State University and took a law degree from the University of Mississippi in 1981. The catalogue holds 65 books, running from A Time to Kill (1989) through The Firm, The Pelican Brief and The Client to Shaken (2026). Series include Jake Brigance, Mitch McDeere, Camino Island, Rogue Lawyer and Theodore Boone. The American Academy of Achievement credits Grisham with 37 consecutive number-one fiction bestsellers and 300 million copies sold.

Christmas stories, Christian fiction and romance make up most of Richard Paul Evans's catalogue, which also turns to science fiction, electricity and Tourette syndrome as subjects. Evans's 64 titles open with The Christmas Box (1993) and take in the Michael Vey books, the Walk series, the Locket Trilogy, the Christmas Box, Noel and Mistletoe collections and the Broken Road novels. Mercy's Child is the most recent title, and publication continues into 2026.

Elmore Leonard

65 books• 12 series

Elmore Leonard (October 11, 1925 to August 20, 2013) was an American novelist, short story writer and screenwriter. Leonard began with Westerns in the 1950s and moved on to crime fiction and suspense, and many of those books were filmed. The story "Three-Ten to Yuma" became the film 3:10 to Yuma (1957), which was remade in 2007. Anthony Lane, a British journalist, called Leonard one of the best crime writers in the land. Get Shorty, Rum Punch, Out of Sight, Glitz and LaBrava rank among Leonard's best-known works. The catalogue lists 65 titles starting with The Bounty Hunters (1953), plus series featuring Raylan Givens, Chili Palmer, Jack Foley and Carl Webster.

Kurt Vonnegut

66 books• 11 series

Kurt Vonnegut (November 11, 1922 – April 11, 2007) was an American novelist known for satire and dark humour. Over fifty years Vonnegut published fourteen novels, three short-story collections, five plays and five nonfiction works, and more writing appeared after 2007. The catalogue begins with the story Report on the Barnhouse Effect (1950) and includes Player Piano (1952), The Sirens of Titan (1959) and Cat's Cradle (1960), running to Love, Kurt: The Vonnegut Love Letters, 1941-1945 (2020). Raised in Indianapolis, Vonnegut left Cornell University in January 1943 to join the U.S. Army, and Army training included mechanical engineering studies at the Carnegie Institute of Technology and the University of Tennessee.

Betsy Brannon Green writes mystery and romantic suspense from a Latter-day Saint perspective, with Mormon characters and communities at the centre. Green's 22 catalogued books, published between 2001 and 2015, include the Haggerty Mystery series plus the Kennedy Killingsworth, Duty, Eureka and Proceed With Caution runs and a set of standalone novels. Undercover operations, kidnapping and police investigation drive the plots. Hearts in Hiding (2001) opens the catalogue and Puzzle Pieces (2015) is the last catalogued title.

Oscar Wilde

57 books

Oscar Wilde (1854-1900) was an Irish author, poet and playwright. Wilde worked through several literary styles in the 1880s before becoming one of London's most popular and influential dramatists of the early 1890s, and stood as a central figure in the Aestheticism movement of the late nineteenth century. The Gothic novel The Picture of Dorian Gray (1890), the epigrams, the plays and the bedtime stories for children form the best-known work, alongside a criminal conviction in 1895 for gross indecency. The catalogue holds 57 titles from Ravenna (1878) onward, spanning poetry, drama, fairy tales, short stories and correspondence.

Donald Eugene Pendleton (December 12, 1927 to October 23, 1995) was an American author of fiction and non-fiction who created Mack Bolan, a character with hundreds of millions of copies sold since a 1969 debut. From 1980, other authors wrote the Bolan books under the Pendleton name, at first with Pendleton's editorial guidance. Pendleton also wrote six Joe Copp, Private Eye novels and six Ashton Ford, Psychic Detective novels. Early titles include The Insatiables (1967), War Against the Mafia (1969) and Miami Massacre (1970).

Lou Prophet, Sheriff Ben Stillman and Gideon Hawk are among the named figures in the westerns of Peter Brandvold, whose subject headings also cover outlaws, sheriffs, bounty hunters, revenge and frontier life. The catalogue counts 86 books from Once a Marshal (1998) to Finn and the Spirit Wolves (2026). Blood Mountain (1999), Dakota Kill (2000), Once a Lawman (2000) and Once Hell Freezes Over (2001) are early titles. Series include Lou Prophet, Sheriff Ben Stillman, Rogue Lawman, Bloody Joe Mannion, .45-Caliber, Rusty Spurr, Bush Riders, Lonnie Gentry, Tom Navarro and Bear Haskell: U.S. Deputy Marshal.

Thomas Keneally

66 books• 4 series

Thomas Keneally, born 7 October 1935, is an Australian novelist, playwright, essayist and actor. Schindler's Ark, a historical novel about Oskar Schindler's rescue of Jews during the Holocaust, won the 1982 Booker Prize and became the basis for Steven Spielberg's 1993 film Schindler's List. The catalogue holds 66 titles, including Bring Larks And Heroes (1967), The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith (1972) and Gossip from the Forest (1975), plus the Monsarrat Mystery series. Subjects include Australia, Aboriginal Australians, penal colonies and both world wars.

Three novels make up Stuart Turton's catalogue. Turton is an English author and journalist, born in 1980. The first appeared in 2018 as The 7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle, also published as The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle, and took the Costa Book Award for First Novel that year. The Devil and the Dark Water followed in 2020, and The Last Murder at the End of the World (2024) reached number one on the Sunday Times list. Historical mystery, ocean travel, prisoners and the occult run through the subject headings. Turton's books have sold more than a million copies across the United States and United Kingdom.