Alan Lee Books in Order
Explore Alan Lee books in order, with series guides, quick summaries, and easy starting points for Mackenzie August, Sinatra, and Andie Stackhouse.
Last updated: June 7, 2026
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Publication Order
34 books
The Last Teacher
by Alan Lee
2015
Trying to start over in Virginia, former homicide detective Mackenzie August takes a job as an English instructor and brings only his infant son with him. Peace ends quickly when teachers begin turning up dead outside his classroom.
August Origins
by Alan Lee
2017
Bored with routine private work, ex-LAPD detective Mackenzie August agrees to go undercover as a teacher in Roanoke. His target is a killer tied to a city school and three murdered teenage girls.
The Second Secret
by Alan Lee
2017
Attorney Veronica Summers hires Mackenzie August to find an informant hidden inside a criminal operation. The job pulls Mack into the mafioso world, and deeper into Veronica's orbit, faster than good judgment would recommend.
Aces Full
by Alan Lee
2018
A rich killer has confessed, but Mackenzie August still gets dragged into the fallout when Veronica Summers's fiancé joins the prosecution. As Darren Robbins closes in, an ugly courtroom case spills into the streets.
Flawed Players
by Alan Lee
2018
When respected anesthesiologist Everett Owens is framed for a string of elite burglaries, Mackenzie August starts digging into Roanoke's upper crust. The case exposes dirty secrets and pushes Mack closer to Veronica Summers's most dangerous truths.
Mackenzie August
by Alan Lee
2018
This collection introduces Mackenzie August, the ex-LAPD detective turned Roanoke private eye. Across the first cases, he goes undercover in a school, tangles with the underworld, and uncovers the secrets of the city's powerful families.
Only the Details
by Alan Lee
2018
Mackenzie August should be settling into married life, but Darren Robbins has other plans. Dragged into the Camorra underworld in Naples, Mack has to fight his way home before he loses everything waiting for him in Virginia.
Good Girl
by Alan Lee
2019
Back from Italy and newly married, Mackenzie August expects a quieter stretch. Instead he takes a bizarre case for an amnesiac man who wants his missing dog back, only to learn the animal may lead to a hidden fortune.
The Desecration of All Saints
by Alan Lee
2019
Mackenzie August is hired to quietly investigate a famous priest whose public reputation may be hiding something rotten. What begins as a delicate church inquiry turns into a darker stand-alone mystery about truth, power, and trust.
The Supremacy License
by Alan Lee
2019
Deputy U.S. Marshal Manny Martinez, known as Sinatra, is pulled into a secret task force built for jobs the government cannot touch in daylight. His first mission, hunting the terrorist El Gato, quickly becomes personal.
Wild Card
by Alan Lee
2019
A compromised governor and a high-stakes casino bring Sinatra and Noelle Beck undercover to the poker tables of National Harbor. Manny has to read the room, protect the country, and decide how much he is willing to risk for a crooked client.
Bad Aim
by Alan Lee
2020
Roland Wallace is rich, elderly, and convinced someone is trying to kill him, and the poison in his medicine suggests he is right. Mack joins other private detectives to protect him, but the motive hides close to home.
Paradise Royale
by Alan Lee
2020
Stolen intelligence sends Manny Martinez and Noelle Beck racing through the Caribbean after a traitor. The hunt gets messier when a seductive foreign agent enters the game and Manny starts wondering whether he has finally met his match.
These Mortals
by Alan Lee
2020
Darren Robbins bursts into Mackenzie August's home, takes Ronnie hostage, and demands help finding the wife and son he lost to witness protection. Mack has only days to outmaneuver an old enemy before the threat turns deadly.
Dead Stop
by Alan Lee
2021
Ronnie surprises Mackenzie August with a luxury train trip from Chicago to San Francisco, and Manny comes along for the ride. The vacation ends when crew members vanish and start turning up dead in the snow.
Martinez
by Alan Lee
2021
Manny Martinez thought he had outrun his past until an old friend from his childhood finds him in America. To save the people he loves, he has to face a hitman, old loyalties, and the full cost of being a Martinez.
Sunken Graves
by Alan Lee
2021
Peter Lynch is a powerful attorney who hides his cruelty behind money, status, and a polished public face. When a discharged Green Beret decides to fight back, the result is a dark standalone thriller about buried crimes and dangerous men.
Desert Eagle
by Alan Lee
2022
Manny Martinez and Noelle Beck race to Abu Dhabi after terrorists target an American whose death could damage U.S. relations in the region. On foreign ground, Manny has to trust strangers and choose what sacrifices he can live with.
Dirty Deals
by Alan Lee
2022
Hired to track an escaped convict, Mackenzie August finds a case that makes less sense the longer he works it. The hunt opens onto buried police secrets and forces him to decide what justice should really look like.
Fool For A Client
by Alan Lee
2022
Mackenzie August is used to clients arriving with problems. This time the police are at his door, and he is the one with the problem, because two murders have left him looking guilty.
The Wild South
by Alan Lee
2022
With Atlanta unraveling, the mayor legalizes bounty hunting and turns the city into a modern frontier. Former football star Johnny Young is drawn into the new order alongside a skip-tracer and a felon, and the money is never clean.
Broken Symphony
by Alan Lee
2023
A plea for help from one of Ronnie's tenants pulls Mackenzie August into the search for a missing girl called Lemonade. The trail leads through gangsters, abandoned lives, and a baby who changes the case.
Hell for Leather
by Alan Lee
2023
The first bounty mandate bought only a brief pause, and Atlanta is sliding back into chaos. Johnny Young is pulled into another hunt when a new name appears on the list, one that changes the stakes for everyone.
Hollow Girl
by Alan Lee
2023
Rookie officer Andie Stackhouse wants a future in the FBI, but her first patrol assignment drops her into Creepy Hollow and a missing teen case. What she finds points to a serial killer who soon notices her.
Knock Out / Sergeant Stackhouse
by Alan Lee
2023
Promoted to sergeant, Andie Stackhouse gets a squad of hotheaded rookies and almost no room to make mistakes. When one of her officers goes silent, she stumbles into a cop-killer case and deep departmental corruption.
Kill Society
by Alan Lee
2024
A recon operation goes wrong, an innocent man is shot, and Detective Stackhouse cannot even say who pulled the trigger. Her search for answers uncovers missing children, buried bodies, and a killer who is closing in.
Murder Book
by Alan Lee
2024
On her first day in investigations, Andie Stackhouse is called to a grisly homicide and a second scene that hints an old nemesis is back. She has to juggle the case, her career, and a life that is getting more dangerous by the hour.
Old Guns
by Alan Lee
2024
Mackenzie August does not take trainees, but he bends when a father begs him to look after his reckless son Elijah. Teaching the kid is hard enough, then Mack learns professional killers are already hunting him.
American Woman
by Alan Lee
2025
Off the Florida Keys, Manny and Noelle go undercover as cocaine wholesalers to infiltrate a cartel meeting. They need a sample of a dangerous new product and a clean escape, two things this series rarely makes easy.
Graveyard Beat
by Alan Lee
2025
Demoted back to patrol, Andie Stackhouse reports for her first late shift in years on Halloween night. Paired with a rookie and surrounded by masks, she learns before dawn that some of the most dangerous faces look familiar.
To Have Everything
by Alan Lee
2025
Widow Cecelia Townsend hires Mackenzie August to watch her three grown grandchildren before she decides where her money will go. At the same time, someone keeps trying to kill Sheriff Stackhouse, and both cases feel more connected than they should.
Tough and Lovely
by Alan Lee
2025
After her mother is murdered, eighteen-year-old Sadie September heads into the mountains of West Virginia to hunt the man responsible. Andie Stackhouse and a seasoned bounty hunter join the chase, but grief makes every decision riskier.
Common Tragedy
by Alan Lee
2026
What looks like a double suicide at a neighborhood picnic does not sit right with Mackenzie August, especially because it happened on his own street. His unofficial questions stir up grudges, secrets, and a meddling crime podcaster.
Filthy Rat
by Alan Lee
2026
Where should I start?
If you want the core private-eye series: The Last Teacher → August Origins → The Second Secret
If you want spy action with Manny out front: The Supremacy License → Wild Card → Paradise Royale
If you want a police procedural: Hollow Girl → Knock Out / Sergeant Stackhouse → Murder Book
If you want the near-future dystopian side road: The Wild South → Hell for Leather
Author bio
Alan Lee is a crime writer from Roanoke, Virginia, and that city sits at the heart of much of his fiction. He has said his love of literature began in ninth-grade detention, when reading was the only thing left to do.
That is a pretty good origin story for a mystery writer.
He began publishing with The Last Teacher in 2015, then built out the Mackenzie August novels around a former LAPD homicide detective starting over as a private investigator in Virginia. From there the work widened into a shared world that also includes Manny Martinez, who leads the Sinatra thrillers, and Andie Stackhouse, who anchors The Girl Who Would Be Sheriff books.
Roanoke keeps pulling him back.
Readers who start with August Origins, The Second Secret, or Flawed Players usually stay for the voice as much as the cases. The books move quickly, but they also make room for friendship, family, and the running banter between Mackenzie and Manny. That blend of danger, humor, and loyalty is a big part of why the series has found such a steady audience.
When Lee shifts to Manny in The Supremacy License, Wild Card, and Paradise Royale, the scale gets larger. Those books head into covert missions, casino floors, intelligence work, and international trouble, but they still keep the same brisk pace and character chemistry. The Andie Stackhouse books, starting with Hollow Girl, lean more toward police procedure and serial-killer tension, following a late-start officer who is ambitious enough to keep pushing even when the job keeps hitting back.
He has also written outside that shared setup. Sunken Graves stands on its own as a darker crime novel, while The Wild South opens the Atlanta Burning books and pushes his crime writing into a near-future city in civic freefall. Across the catalog, a few things keep showing up: people trying to start over, institutions under strain, and protagonists who would rather act than sit around feeling sorry for themselves.
Lee writes a lot, and he writes fast. His official author bio says he has sold more than a million books across thirty novels, which helps explain why his backlist grew so quickly. Even with that range, the books tend to feel connected by place, rhythm, and the way he likes to throw ordinary life against sudden violence.
Home still seems to matter. He lives in Roanoke with his wife, three children, and a Boston terrier, and he has described himself as the guy there typing the next novel on an old MacBook Air. That local grounding helps explain why Roanoke in these books feels less like scenery and more like part of the cast.
If you like private eyes with a sense of humor, spy thrillers with momentum, and police stories that stay close to the people doing the work, Alan Lee gives you a lot to explore. The best place to begin depends on whether you want Mackenzie August, Manny Martinez, or Andie Stackhouse first, but whichever door you choose, you end up in the same rough, busy world.
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