Brenda Novak Books in Order

Brenda Novak is an American author of romantic suspense and contemporary romance who has published more than 80 novels. She is a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author, an eight-time RITA Award nominee, and the winner of the International Thriller Writers Silver Bullet Award. Her books have sold more than 12 million copies and have been translated into twenty languages. Alongside her darker suspense series, she also writes small-town contemporary romance and family drama novels.

This page lists all Brenda Novak books in order, including her series, Whiskey Creek, Silver Springs, the Evelyn Talbot Chronicles, The Last Stand, Stillwater, Bulletproof, Dundee Idaho, Fairham Island, Coyote Canyon, Department 6 Hired Guns, One Perfect Summer, and 9 Months Later, and her standalone novels, historical romances, novellas, short story anthologies, and non-fiction.

Latest Brenda Novak Books

Meet Me in Italy, April 2026

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Dundee Idaho Series (Books in Order)

The Dundee, Idaho series follows different residents of the small fictional town of Dundee, Idaho through romantic suspense stories involving secrets, second chances, and small-town entanglements. Each book focuses on a new couple but has the same community setting, so they can be read as standalones. The series was Brenda Novak’s first connected series and originally published under different titles; the books have since been rereleased with new covers and updated titles.

Reading Order

  1. That One Night, 2002 (also titled A Baby of Her Own)
  2. Falling For You, 2003 (also titled A Husband of Her Own)
  3. First Love, Second Chance, 2004 (also titled A Family of Her Own)
  4. Say You Love Me, 2004 also titled A Home of Her Own)
  5. Meant for You, 2005 (also titled Stranger in Town)
  6. Finding You, 2005 (also titled Big Girls Don’t Cry)
  7. The Other Woman, 2006 (also titled Just the Two of Us)
  8. Coulda Been A Cowboy, 2007 (also titled The More I Love You)
  9. A Dundee Christmas, 2017

Stillwater Trilogy (Books in Order)

The Stillwater Trilogy follows Grace Montgomery, a woman living under the shadow of the town’s preacher’s disappearance who returns home to the small Mississippi town of Stillwater to confront her hidden past. The three books are closely connected romantic suspense novels that build on each other through an ongoing investigation. While the books can be read as standalones, the main mystery that keeps them as a series is worth following through each next book.

Reading Order

  1. Dead Silence, 2006
  2. Dead Giveaway, 2007
  3. Dead Right, 2007

The Last Stand Series (Books in Order)

The Last Stand series follows a group of women in Sacramento who meet at a victim’s charity organization in order to help and give justice to those the system failed, including victims of kidnapping, stalking, and even murder. Each book is centered on a different agent. This is a darker romantic suspense series compared to other Brenda Novak books.

Reading Order

  1. Trust Me, 2008
  2. Stop Me, 2008
  3. Watch Me, 2008
  4. The Perfect Couple, 2009
  5. The Perfect Liar, 2009
  6. The Perfect Murder, 2009

Department 6 Hired Guns Trilogy (Books in Order)

The Department 6 Hired Guns trilogy follows a team of ex-law enforcement operatives in the town of Paradise, Arizona, who work at a private security firm. They take on assignments that are outside of the scope of the local police and can be quite dangerous to touch.

Reading Order

  1. White Heat, 2010
  2. Body Heat, 2010
  3. Killer Heat, 2010

Bulletproof Trilogy (Books in Order)

The Bulletproof trilogy follows Virgil Skinner, a man wrongly imprisoned who, after exoneration, finds that the prison gang he joined to survive is not willing to let him go. The books are set between Crescent City, California and a small fictional Montana town. The secondary character Rex McCready, aka Pretty Boy, from this trilogy gets his own story in the Whiskey Creek series novel The Heart of Christmas.

Reading Order

  1. Inside, 2011
  2. In Seconds, 2011
  3. In Close, 2011

Whiskey Creek Series (Books in Order)

The Whiskey Creek series follows several characters in Whiskey Creek, a fictional Gold Country town in California, which is loosely modeled on the area near Sacramento where gold was discovered in 1848. Each book focuses on a different couple from the same small town. The series starts with the novella When We Touch.

Reading Order

  1. When We Touch, 2012
  2. When Lightning Strikes, 2012
  3. When Snow Falls, 2012
  4. When Summer Comes, 2013
  5. Home to Whiskey Creek, 2013
  6. Take Me Home for Christmas, 2013
  7. Come Home to Me, 2014
  8. The Heart of Christmas, 2014
  9. This Heart of Mine, 2015
  10. A Winter Wedding, 2015
  11. Discovering You, 2016
  12. Home for the Holidays, 2021 (bonus story in Debbie Macomber’s Seaside Springtime)
  13. Tying the Knot, 2024

Fairham Island Series (Books in Order)

The Fairham Island series is set on a small fictional island off the coast of South Carolina and follows the the Lazarow siblings who one by one return to the family known for a very controlling mother. They discover dark secrets, such as a disappeared sister. The Secret Sister and The Secrets She Kept are directly connected and should be read in order because the second picks up immediately where the first leaves off.

Reading Order

  1. The Secret Sister, 2015
  2. The Secrets She Kept, 2016

The Evelyn Talbot Chronicles Series (Books in Order)

The Evelyn Talbot Chronicles follows Dr. Evelyn Talbot, a psychiatrist who founded Hanover House, a maximum-security facility in the remote Alaskan town of Hilltop. There Evelyn studies some of the world’s most dangerous serial killers, a research that is personal to her: at sixteen she was tortured and left for dead by her boyfriend, Jasper Moore, and she has spent her adult life trying to understand what drives psychopathic behavior. While the series is psychological thriller, it also has a romantic subplot involving Sergeant Amarok, the local state trooper. The series starts with the prequel novella Hanover House and continues with four full-length novels.

Reading Order

  1. Hanover House, 2015
  2. Her Darkest Nightmare, 2016
  3. Hello Again, 2017
  4. Face Off, 2018
  5. Blindspot, 2019

Silver Springs Series (Books in Order)

The Silver Springs series follows different residents and newcomers to Silver Springs, a beautiful fictional small town in Southern California, which is loosely modeled on Ojai. Each book centers on a new couple, and it often involves people that try to rebuild their lives after difficult circumstances, many of which are connected to the New Horizons Boys Ranch, a school for at-risk teens. This is a contemporary romance series.

Reading Order

  1. Finding Our Forever, 2017
  2. No One but You, 2017
  3. Until You Loved Me, 2017
  4. Right Where We Belong, 2017
  5. Unforgettable You, 2019
  6. Christmas in Silver Springs, 2019
  7. A California Christmas, 2020
  8. Home for the Holidays, 2020
  9. When I Found You, 2021
  10. Keep Me Warm at Christmas, 2021

Coyote Canyon Series (Books in Order)

The Coyote Canyon series is set in the fictional small town of Coyote Canyon, Montana, following different strong women who find love and success in business and their lives while dealing with local challenges. This is a contemporary romance trilogy.

Reading Order

  1. Talulah’s Back in Town, 2023
  2. The Talk of Coyote Canyon, 2023
  3. The Messy Life of Jane Tanner, 2024

One Perfect Summer Series (Books in Order)

The One Perfect Summer series begins with the novel One Perfect Summer, in which three half-sisters connected through a DNA testing service meet for the first time and spend a summer together at a lake cabin. The companion novella Pieces of Perfect continues their story.

Reading Order

  1. One Perfect Summer, 2020
  2. Pieces of Perfect, 2025

9 Months Later Series (Books in Order)

The 9 Months Later series is an earlier connected romance series featuring books around the theme of unexpected pregnancies and the relationships that follow. That One Night is also part of the Dundee Idaho series.

Reading Order

Standalone Novels

Short Story Collections and Anthologies

Children’s Books

Non-Fiction Books

Brenda Novak Biography

Brenda Novak author

Brenda Novak is an American author whose has novels in various genres, including romantic suspense, contemporary romance, and historical romance. She has published more than 80 novels since her debut in 1999 and has sold over 12 million copies worldwide, with translations into twenty languages.
Official website: brendanovak.com

Brenda Novak was born in 1964 in Vernal, Utah, in the United States. As a child, she moved with her family to Arizona. he abandoned an academic scholarship to Brigham Young University at age twenty to get married and start a family. Next she found a job in commercial real estate to become a loan officer.

Her writing career began after she discovered that her daycare provider was drugging her children. After she decided to work from home, so she could keep a direct eye on her children, she spent five years learning the craft before selling her first novel, Of Noble Birth, to HarperCollins.

Thus, she continued writing for Harlequin before transitioning to mainstream publishers. Over the years, she built a back catalog that has numerous small-town romance series, psychological thrillers, and historical fiction. Her darkest series, the Evelyn Talbot Chronicles, which is set at a maximum-security Alaskan facility for serial killers, is often compared to Criminal Minds, and it earned starred reviews from Booklist. In addition to fiction, she authored Brenda Novak’s Every Occasion Cookbook, to help diabetes research.

Brenda Novak is currently living with her husband and five children in Sacramento where, besides writing, she also helps diabetes research by raising money for Juvenile Diabetes Research, since her youngest son, Tad, has diabetes as well.

Brenda Novak lives in Sacramento, California with her husband Ted and her children. She also runs Brenda Novak for the Cure, an annual charity fundraiser for diabetes research that has raised over $2.6 million to date, since her youngest son, Tad, was diagnosed with diabetes as well.

Brenda Novak Awards and Honors

Awards

  • Cold Feet – Smoky Mountain Lorie Award, Gayle Wilson Award of Excellence, Lories Award (2004)
  • A Home of Her Own – Gayle Wilson Award of Excellence (2004)
  • A Family of Her Own – Bookseller’s Best Award, Wordweaving’s Award of Excellence, (2004)
  • Stranger in Town – Write Touch Readers’ Award, Award of Excellence, Lories Award, Aspen Gold Award, Laurel Wreath Award (2005)
  • Every Waking Moment – Winter Rose Award (2005)
  • Dead Silence – Gayle Wilson Award of Excellence, Bookbuyer’s Best Award (Best Book Overall) (2006)
  • Dead Giveaway – Colorado Romance Writers Award of Excellence in Romantic Suspense (2007)
  • Trust Me – Golden Quill Award (2009)
  • White Heat – Reader’s Crown Award (2010)
  • Body Heat – Bookseller’s Best Award (2010)
  • Inside – Golden Quill Award (2011)
  • Through the Smoke – National Reader’s Choice Award (2013)

Nominations and Shortlists

  • Stop Me – RITA Award, Best Romantic Suspense (2008)
  • Body Heat – RITA Award (2010)
  • Home to Whiskey Creek – RITA Award (2014)
  • Blind Spot – Suspense Magazine Awards (2014)
  • A Matter of Grave Concern – RITA Award, Historical Romantic Mystery/Suspense (2015)
  • The Secret Sister – RITA Award, Single Title Romantic Mystery/Suspense (2016)
  • Her Darkest Nightmare – RITA Award, Single Title Romantic Suspense (2017)
  • Before We Were Strangers – RITA Award, Thriller (2019)
  • Blind Spot – Suspense Magazine Award, Best Romantic Suspense (2019)

Edited by

Marika

Founder of Mystery Sequels, a reference site focused on listing mystery and thriller books in the correct reading order. I maintain and update the site’s bibliographies as new titles are released, ensuring accuracy and consistency across author and series pages.

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3 Comments

  1. I love all Brenda Novaks books which have been free to read on my I pad. The last few books I started have all been stopped about 60 pages into it.

    What is happening I can’t understand what the message is for doing that. I really miss reading her books but not being able to read the whole book is the worst thing I have come up while reading. Help please.🙏 I’m

  2. Please write a sequel to One Perfect Summer. There has to be more to this story

    1. I second the request for a follow up. One perfect summer was a great book but I’d love a follow up. The book was going so strong with love interests for all 3 sisters and then they all just dropped off toward the end. That was disappointing. It was going strong and then in the end it was as if you’d already burned thru your allotted 400 or so pages so you quickly and loosely tied things up in the last 50. This was a bummer and it really left us hanging. Like what were the results of her brother’s DNA test. I was really hoping it was gonna show her brother was also adopted so Lorelei would have a brother. As wonderful of parents as serenity had, I was hoping you’d write a chapter or at least a few lines where they brought the other two girls into the fold to provide Lorelei a set of parents she desperately needed. The storyline with finn was so strong and then bam, nothing. It just petered off. Same with Davis, nothing. I’d love to have a sequel that brings all these guys and gals back to the two houses for another summer where you unfold their happily ever afters. What happened to Mark and Francine, did they stick together or did she wisen up and dump his arse too. I really wanted finn and Lorelei to get together in the end. That was the most disappointing part of this book. You focused so heavily on their growing bond and then just seemed to drop it. There’s so much there that was left unfinished in my eyes. I think you have enough material and lose ends to be able to make a kick arse sequel. Please do a follow up.
      Sincerely, your fan

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