Brad Thor Books In Order – Complete List – Scot Harvath Series
New York Times bestselling author Brad Thor is known for his popular Scot Harvath thriller series. He also wrote short stories and a book in a separate series, but they are all in the same universe.
Here are the Brad Thor books in order of publication, which also coincide with the chronological order of events in the books.
Do note that some readers consider The Athena Project part of a separate series (including only one book), while others consider it part of the main Scot Harvath series. I tend to side with the first group since Scot and his team are not really featured in the book.
Latest Brad Thor Books
Scot Harvath Books in Publication Order
Scot Harvath is an ex-Navy SEAL Secret Service agent who later would become a covert counterterrorism agent.
- The Lions of Lucerne (#1), 2002
- Path of the Assassin (#2), 2003
- State of the Union (#3), 2004
- Blowback (#4), 2005
- Takedown (#5), 2006
- The First Commandment (#6), 2007
- The Last Patriot (#7), 2008
- The Apostle (#8), 2009
- Foreign Influence (#9), 2010
- Full Black (#10), 2011
- Black List (#12), 2012
- Free Fall (#11.5), 2013
- Hidden Order ( #12), 2013
- Epilogue II (#12.5), 2013
- Act of War (#13), 2014
- Code of Conduct (#14), 2015
- The Athens Solution (#14.5), 2015
- Foreign Agent (#15), 2016
- Use of Force (#16), 2017
- Spymaster (#17), 2018
- Backlash (#18), 2019
- Near Dark (#19), 2020
- Black Ice (#20), 2021
- Rising Tiger (#21), 2022
- Dead Fall (#22), 2023
- Shadow of Doubt (#23), 2024
Scot Harvath Short Stories and Novellas in Order of Publication
- Free Fal, 2013
- Epilogue II, 2013
- The Athens Solution, 2015
The Athena Project Books in Publication Order
- The Athena Project, 2014
Series Brad Thor Contributed To
Thriller: Stories to Keep You Up All Night
- The Athens Solution, 2015
Anthologies and Short Story Collections
- Thriller: Stories to Keep You Up All Night, 2006 (edited by James Patterson)
Brad Thor Biography – About the Author
Brad Thor is a popular American author, the #1 New York Times bestselling author for several of his spy thriller novels, and the character of Scot Harvath is well known among lovers of the thriller genre. His first novel, The Lions of Lucerne (book #1 in Scot Harvath’s series), was published in 2002 and it was also the first novel I’ve read by the author. I got hooked on his style right away.
The author was born in 1969 in Chicago, Illinois, where he also grew up. He attended the Sacred Heart Schools and then the Francis W. Parker School, where he was classmates with actors like Billy Zane and Anne Heche, following which he enrolled at the University of Southern California studying writing under author T.C. Boyle. He initially enrolled for a business major, but soon he switched to creative writing and film production when he realized that he would never love to work as a manager for some company. He graduated cum laude with a Bachelor of Arts degree.
While he always wanted to become a writer, he only started to pursue his dream some 30 years of his life because, as he mentioned in an interview, he was always afraid of failing.
Before he started writing novels, Brad Thor was the producer, writer, and host of the Public Television travel series, Traveling Lite. He just finished the second season and got married. On their honeymoon, his wife asked him what would be the one thing he regretted on his deathbed on never having it done. And this is when he realized that he wanted to write books.
Many critics have called Brad Thor ‘the master of thrillers’ and with good reason. He is mentioned along with names such as Robert Ludlum, and his books have been published pretty much all over the world.
I guess it is no wonder that the author knows so much about politics, espionage and similar topics, having worked at the Department of Homeland Security’s Analytic Red Cell Unit, and being a member of the Alexandrian Defense Group.
He gives regularly lectures to law enforcement organizations on over-the-horizon/future threats, and to several other organizations that involve national security and defense.
For his novels, Brad Thor does thorough research. For example, to write the book The Apostle, in 2008 he shadowed in Afghanistan a Black-Ops team at work.
His book The Last Patriot was banned in Saudi Arabia as it was called “Islamophobic.”
In addition to writing books, Brad Thor often appears in TV talk-shows on CNN, Fox, PBS and other channels to discuss of terrorism and how they relate to his books and to real life.
For each year of his career, there is one Brad Thor book. The author writes one book per year, which some readers say it’s not fast enough. However, considering that book authors take 2-3 years to write a single novel, I’d say Brad Thor is pretty darn fast with releasing his books.
So far, there have been over 15 million Brad Thor books sold, and the author is often placed along with Vince Flynn as one of the biggest names in the political thriller genre.
Scot Harvath is the popular Navy Seal-turned-intelligence operative, who will feature in the first movie adaptation of The Lions of Lucerne, which, if all goes well, will be directed by Louis Leterrier, who is best known for his work on the Transporter 1 and 2. In addition, the rights to The Athena Project have been bought by Warner Brothers, so at some point, we should see some developments in that arena as well.
Reading the Brad Thor books in order is easy, as it only includes his Scot Harvath thriller series. However, as the Scot Harvath series has close to 30 books so far, it would be useful to organize the series in proper reading order, as it is a distinct continuity to the books in the series.
As an interesting side-note about the author, in 2020, Brad Thor briefly announced his candidacy in the US President election, but soon he canceled his bid and became an independent party instead.
Brad Thor Book Adaptations to Movie or TV Series
The Scot Harvath books are being adapted into a TV series by Steven Lightfoot (who also did Shantaram, Behind Her Eyes, and The Punisher). The deal came together in 2023, just before the WGA strike.
Brad Thor Awards and Nominations
- The Last Patriot – nominated for the ITW Thriller Award in the Best Thriller Of The Year category in 2009
- Blowback – voted and included in the Top 100 “Killer Thrillers” by the National Public Radio (NPR) audience in 2010.
- Backlash – nominated for the Barry Awards in the Best Thriller category in 2020
Any potential movie updates?
Not a movie, but a potential TV series adaptation, which I’m particularly excited about!
Okay, don’t want to bring spoilers, but what happens to Misha, the Russian president’s son at the end of Backlash? It is not made clear. Maybe that is intentional.
Good work …… Over the years I have finished reading Fredrick Forsyth ,Sidney Sheldon, Robert Ludlum ,Michael Crichton Jeffrey Archer etc etc….. then stopped thrillers because of lack of writers….Now found Brad Thor ….i hope I will not be disappointed ..
I love Brad!!!!!!
Love Scott, made mistake and read Code of Conduct
first, (made mistake with dragon tattoo also, was not going to ruin the experience)
Am now at number 9, I lose more sleep cause I can’t put down his books,
Keep up the good work!!!!!:)))))
The book :Full Black” left the ending which I thought would bring a sequel to it. If I am right, what is the name of the next book? Thank you. I enjoy all of Brad’s books.
I fell in love with Brad Thor’s books while I was looking for new authors to read. I have read all the books of Sidney Sheldon, Phillip Margolin, Jeffrey Archer and Erich Segal and other female authors so I went to the bookstore to look for new authors. I’m grateful I found him. Truly his book are good reads.
I have read nine of Brad Thor books about Scott Harvarth. Eight if them kept me totally engrossed. Act Of War was a great disappointment in that Mr. Thor seemed to hurry through to the end without the development of characters and situations I enjoyed in the other books. I will read the ones I haven’t read yet and hope they are as good as the others.
Thank you.
Thanks for the sequence, I truly love these books, I think I have read them all.
OH thank you Damon and Brad Thor books. I did the same thing as Damon – read the books out of order and got REALLY frustrated! As any list grows and matures, so does the author (hopefully). I think it’s imperative to follow in sequence. (Call me anal-retentive.) I’ve started over and am really following Scot and his career as well as Brad and his growing maturity, Creativity, story ideas, etc. WOW!
Thanks for your time and all the help. I hate reading any series out of order. I started reading Thor a long time ago. Think I started with #6. Read a few more and lost interest. Started reading again after I found your site and started with #1. Thanks again.
Love , Love Brad Thor books about Scott , can’t wait for next one . Started the series from #1 my brother introduced me to Brads books ????