Ben H. Winters Books In Order – Complete List

Ben H. Winters is an American author with several dystopian thriller novels, novellas, and short stories, as well as a few scary books for kids. His most popular works are the Last Policeman trilogy.

Here are the Ben H. Winters books for his dystopian series and the standalone novels, including his short story collections, and anthologies.

Latest Ben H. Winters Books

Ben H. Winters Books In Order – Complete List
Big Time, 2024

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The Last Policeman Trilogy in Order of Publication

  1. The Last Policeman, 2012
  2. Countdown City, 2013
  3. World Of Trouble, 2014

Quirk Classics Books in Publication Order

  1. Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters, 2009
  2. Android Karenina, 2010

The Apocalypse Triptych Anthology Books in Publication Order

short story anthology series written with many authors

Literally Disturbed Books Tales in Order of Publication

Collections and Anthologies in Order of Publication

Worst Case Scenario Pocket Guide Books in Publication Order

aka The Worst Case Scenario Survival Handbook

Plays in Order of Publication

Standalone Novels in Order of Publication

Non-Fiction Books

Ben H. Winters Biography – About the Author

Ben H Winters author

New York Times bestselling author Ben H. Winters, full name Benjamin Allen H Winters was born in 1997 in Maryland, U.S, where he also grew up, in suburban Maryland. He attended college in Washington University in St. Louis from where he graduated in 1998, and currently, he lives in Los Angeles with his wife and 3 children, and dogs.

His first novel was a take on a classic, Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters, published in 2009 by Querk Books (same publishers who brought to us Pride and Prejudice and Zombies).

His most popular work to date is the Last Policeman trilogy, published in 2012, a pre-apocalyptic dystopian crime mystery series about our main character, Henri Palace, a policeman who chooses to solve crimes even when the world is about to be wiped out in just a few short months.

Written at a time when the dystopian apocalyptic genre was (and still is) at its peak, the whole series soon became a classic with Henri Palace being the cult figure everyone looked up to at the time of despair which brought only the worst out in people.

Another popular Ben H. Winter’s novel is called Underground Airlines, a standalone mystery featured in an alternate reality where the American Civil War never happened.

The Last Policeman by ben H Winters

The Last Policeman trilogy is an awesome police procedural series that I think deserves a separate review. Written by author Ben H Winters, this series is a bit difficult to classify. It is indeed a police procedural, noir mystery in fact, but with an apocalyptic setting – namely pre-apocalyptic.

I felt that since the setting features quite strongly in these books, I should add it to the post-apocalyptic genre simply because pre-apocalyptic books are rather rare and I hope I am forgiven for adding it to a larger genre encompassing everything “apocalyptic” in terms of mysteries happening around those times.

The premise of the trilogy is rather interesting: the world is ending due to an impending asteroid collision in just 6 months from now on. Detective Hank Palace living in New Hampshire has a dilemma on his hands.

What’s the point in solving murders if we’re all going to die anyway? Should he walk away from his job simply because the world is ending, or should he try to keep his part of the world as free of crime as possible, for as long as possible?

The first book of the Last Policeman trilogy hooked me in right away. While it is not explicitly mentioned until almost half of the book, we have an idea of the world ending quite soon pretty much right from the start.

The world is ending and most people have quit their job going onto doing their own things that they wanted to do but couldn’t, they leave their families, going on retreats, sailing, rediscovering themselves, and whatnot.

We get a sense of the screwed up world immediately from the first pages, and the more we advance with the story the clearer that becomes. The world is upside down, except the last policeman.

Detective Hank Palace is a young policeman (being on the force no longer than 6 months since the news about the end of the world has broken), has been only recently advanced to the detective status (not in the way he had always dreamed of, of course) and he is on a case.

Hank might be pretty much the only detective on a case right now. Most policemen quit the force already, and the few that are still at the police station do everything but their job.

And of course, when Hank Palace announces to the rest of them that he will solve the murder case, his words are met with all sorts of reactions: from disbelieve to downright laughter or simply a shake of the head.

In this firstbook in the series, the background noise is of the impending world ending (in just a few months), however, the atmosphere is not yet very serious, and the author focuses more on the actual detective work than the serious catastrophe that awaits all.

I really enjoyed reading this novel and I kept thinking throughout if an asteroid were really to wipe the planet Earth from existence, what would I do in the remaining months?

The second novel in the Last Policeman trilogy by the author is more austere, it already has a much more serious atmosphere than the first one. The ending is near, there are less than 3 months left. While a few months earlier people started to depart from their normal lives, now the seriousness of the whole thing started to really hit home.

Crime is on the rampage, police does nothing to stop it, there are various groups that are plotting and scheming about the government hiding the truth about the fact that a nuke would indeed be able to divert the path of the asteroid to other places in the universe, and general paranoia starts to set in.

The police force as we know it no longer exists, the crime task force has been disbanded and Hank no longer has a job. And still, amidst all this, when his old nanny asks him to find his missing husband (which in itself is nothing strange, people disappearing, simply taking off or dying is a very normal thing in this pre-apocalyptic world), he takes on the job, even knowing that his chances of finding the guy are close to nil.

To be honest, I was a bit troubled by this second book. I did love it, don’t get me wrong. However it disturbed something in me, I found myself thinking about all sorts of weird and dark thoughts that I usually don’t have. Also, I found Hank’s reaction to everything a bit weird. He is really the last policeman as he doesn’t seem to be troubled as much by the nonsense of it all as all the other people are.

He is on a mission and wants to bring it to a conclusion, no matter what. Maybe it’s his way of coping with the world ending soon.

February 2024 saw the release of Tracker, a TV series based on the Colter Shaw character featured in The Never Game by Jeffery Deaver. The TV show was developed by Ben H. Winters, who serves as serve as showrunner along with Hilary Weisman Graham. In the first season, episode 1 and 7 were written specifically by Ben.

The author has also recently completed his own ‘reading the books in order’ project, specifically reading all 26 novels by the author John Le Carré. Early 2024 he managed to complete this decade-long ambitious project.

Also, 2024 will see the publication of a new 3-issue comic book series titled Benjamin published by Oni Press. The series will later be also released as a graphic novella.

Should we read the Ben H Winters book in order? Oh, I definitely agree that yes, we should read it in order. Afterall, for his popular trilogy, it’s just a matter of 3 books, and there is a clear and definitive countdown from now to the world’s end. As for the author’s standalone novels, they can be read in any order you choose.

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