If you like your mysteries dark with a touch of horror, then the FBI Special Agent Pendergast series written by Preston & Child is for you. What took me so long to discover this 22-book series?Wow! Amazing thrillers written a touch above other mysteries with bits of horror and the supernatural that find me even making a list of words to look up and I have a good vocabulary. Intrigue, weird situations, and some monsters, both human and other-worldly.
** Book series in Order.
** ADDED: Interesting additional stories I've just spotted: **
* FaceOff - Edited by David Baldacci - (2014) Famous characters face-off against each other in various short stories - * An interesting pairing: R.L Stine's evil ventriloquist, Slappy, vs. Agent Aloysius Pendergast. (Ordered this one.)* Aloysius X.L. Pendergast: A Mysterious Profile (2022, 37 pages, Mysterious Press) - History of the Preston & Child partnership, how Pendergast came to be, background, etc.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
I'm reading out of order (of course!), but it doesn't seem to matter too much. Some of the books are in sets so I'll be reading those together.
The series starts with Relic where murders at a natural history museum exhibit of South American objects and weird religious fetishes can't be done by a human. And aren't. (Interesting settings though I wasn't as crazy about this one.) Book 2 Reliquary continues the hunt for the monster so read these two together. (*Goodreads links: books 1-9)
The first book I read in the series was The Cabinet of Dr. Leng (#21), a creepy serial killer, time-travel novel. Fascinating! I love finding a long series to read and this is a good one!
**UPDATE: Yes, still reading, and one book gets stranger than the next! haaa! Oh! I only have books 5-9 left to read! Luckily, they have a couple other series I can look into, one with the curator from the museum.
Just finished: #4, Still Life With Crows. Talk about weeeeirddddd!! (But good!)
------------------------------------------------------------
The 22 book series list in order (plus a new prequel): (I'll link these as I read them and mark with * for myself.) I'm going to add a short description to remind myself of what they're about. It's hard to tell the number order in the books.
* 1 Relic - a creepy museum exhibit and a mysterious (not of this world) murderer (Books 1 and 2 are a set.)
* 2 Reliquary - The hunt for the murdering Museum Beast deepens and continues as Pendergast and team search Manhattan's labyrinth of sewer tunnels.
----
* 3 The Cabinet of Curiosities - (2002) Listed as one of NPR's best books ever. A charnel house with 36 mutilated corpses is discoverd underneath New York City - and identical killings have begun. - Wow! An early look at Pendergast's odd family history, links to Leng's fantastical experiments, and some super creepy results. This one explains a lot (and it's probably best to read these early ones in order.) This one was exceptional. It really is amazing that Pendergast not only has strength of will but almost super-human abilities at times to survive the worst possible things. But as a reader, you easily suspend belief and root for him as he's really a gripping character!
* 4 Still Life With Crows - (2003) Freaky, freaky, so weird, but good! A monster is loose in a small Kansas town leaving strange patterns - and mutilated bodies - in the corn. Unfortunately, a dog is killed and another is injured, luckily mostly off-screen. And you'll skip - as I did - the explanations of the processes at the small town's turkey processing plant. Pendergast is there "unofficially," of course, to investigate these most bizarre, and frankly, gross killings, and is then temporarily barred by FBI higher-ups. In the meantime, his temporary "assistant," a lonely, misfit girl, Corrie Swanson, (in later books she shows up again), is lured to the mines by a misguided idea of finding the monster or clues behind the killings. The killer is a super-strange one - and the reasons why that are explained later uncovered later make perfect sense in a truly twisted way. But the best explanation for the why's of the murders are given in a couple amazing paragraphs at the end that tie it all together. This is one imaginative, strange, twisted read that gives a look into the horrors (albeit exaggerated) of how the human psyche can become deranged. An excellent book!
5 Brimstone (Books 5-7 make up the Diogenes Trilogy about a twisted criminal - Pendergast's brother, Diogenes.)
6 Dance of Death (Books 6-7 should be read in sequence per authors' note.)
7 The Book of the Dead
----
8 Wheel of Darkness
9 Cemetery Dance
---
* 10 Fever Dream (2010) (Books 10-12 make up the Helen Triology concerning Pendergast's late wife Helen) - Twelve years later, Agent Pendergast discovers his beloved wife's death wasn't an accident. It was murder. And it's a murder somehow linked to the famous painter Audobon, conspiracies, age-old deceptions, birds and avian flu, and family secrets. * 11 Cold Vengeance (2011) - I can't get enough of this series! Just when you think he's gone... but no, Agent Pendergast is like a cat with more than nine lives. There're some fights in the moors as he chases his evil brother-in-law, he faces death - again! - and then there's the question of Helen, his dear wife whom he thinks is still alive. An unexpected twist on that one and then Constance is again in danger... But there's more! This is a cliffhanger book so continue the story in Book 12. Glad I read that ahead so I didn't read this trio out of order (with Fever Dream first). On to Two Graves next. Enjoying this series so much!!
* 12 Next: Two Graves (2012) - Plenty of secrets, past and present revealed in this one as Pendergast learns more about his wife's unexpected past, his formerly secret son, Alban, and a link to the twisted hotel killings. Add in Nazis and a trip to Brazil to top if off, though there was too much military fighting in this one for me. But seeing Constance's story explained and her back at home made the read somewhat worth it.
-----
* 13 White Fire (2013) - Sherlock Holmes & A. Conan Doyle, historic silver rush mines, killings of miners by a mysterious grizzly... We'll see what the killings are really about! (I'm sure there will be monsters! * WARNING: A dog is killed, which almost put me off this one.) * 14 Blue Labyrinth - (2014) A mystery and the death of an enemy close to him leads Pendergast on the hunt for answers as he's stalked by dark secrets in his own family history. Strange science, deep secrets and a thrill a minute with some almost too much to believe. But suspend belief on this one. Definitely one of the best in what I've read so far in the series!
* 15 Crimson Shore (2015) - Did all the witches escape the Salem Witch Trials, and did some relocate secretly to the seaside village of Exmouth, Mass.? Witches, horrible demons, and terrible secrets threaten the lives of Pendergast and his mentee Constance Greene. Then as you think it done, it breaks off to another horror leading to... sigh... a cliffhanger. * Continues in Book 16.
* 16 The Obsidian Chamber (2016) - Continues from Book 15. (Getting back to this one since I had to finish Blue Labyrinth first.) Creepy one! Despite the crazy trip Proctor is sent on as a diversion, which is almost unbelievable, this is a good one. Pendergast's evil brother tries to become more "human"; is it real?- with odd Constance the center of his seeming new life. Interesting twists in this one.
* 17 City of Endless Night - A string of gruesome murders has Agent Pendergast and Lt. D'Agosta investigating what may be a serial killer. But the headless bodies are piling up with no answer. Pendergast almost loses his own head in this one and faces a great personal tragedy. Then there is that truly weird, memorable ending! Gripping!
* 18 Verses for the Dead - Pendergast and partner Coldmoon investigate Miami Beach murders where the victim's heart is cut out. Not real gory as you might think but it has an interesting conclusion and reasons for the gruesome murders.
* 19 Crooked River (2020) - Special Agent Pendergast is asked to investigate when dozens of shoes wash up on Sanibel beach--with a severed foot inside each. Intrigued by what this means... * Intriguing - and aggravating. The story is good but Pendergast's blunders in this one have a woman suffering what is almost his fate as to what caused people to lose their feet. (Don't want to give the 'secret' away!) And he kind of thinks his $ will ease his guilt. And another dog is killed - right at the beginning. So, I liked the story but mixed feelings on this one.
* 20 Bloodless (2021) - Is a vampire stalking Savannah? (Good one! Might be my favorite so far despite mutated insects that make your skin crawl. ha!) Strange goings-on with links to alternate universes, AI, computers, and monsters, plus a link to DB Cooper's 1970s unsolved bank robbery and skyjacking.
* 21 The Cabinet of Dr. Leng - I read this one first and wow! Pendergast's protege Constance Greene goes back to the 1800s to prevent the deaths of her siblings and find a creepy serial killer. Great time travel! (Beware it ends on a cliffhanger and continues in book 22.)
* 22 Angel of Vengeance - Constance Greene returns to the past to face the serial killer while Pendergast's brother re-appears with his own agenda. Some interesting twists in this one. * 23 New Prequel: Pendergast: The Beginning (Jan. 2026) Pendergast's first case reveals his unorthodox style as he and his partner investigate ritual murders by a serial killer. (Finished this one in a couple days. Yikes. He's an odd bird. And this is a dark one, dealing with medical experiments, ESP, and the brain, among other things.)
* Note: Site uses Amazon affiliate links that may offer some compensation to blog owner.
