Jennifer McMahon Books in Order
Explore Jennifer McMahon books in order, with standalone reading order, quick summaries, publication details, and friendly tips on where to start.
Last updated: June 7, 2026
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Publication Order
16 books
Promise Not to Tell
by Jennifer McMahon
2007
Kate Cypher returns to New Canaan, Vermont, to care for her mother, only to find a child's murder echoing the death of her childhood friend Del, the outcast girl everyone called Potato Girl.
Island of Lost Girls
by Jennifer McMahon
2008
Rhonda Farr watches a child vanish with someone in a rabbit suit, then realizes the case is tied to her own lost friend. The present-day search drags old love, guilt, and suspicion into the light.
My Tiki Girl
by Jennifer McMahon
2008
After a crash kills her mother and leaves her scarred, Maggie Keller retreats from her old life. Then Dahlia Wainwright and her strange, tender world pull Maggie into first love, fantasy, and hard choices.
Dismantled
by Jennifer McMahon
2009
In college, Henry, Tess, Winnie, and Suz turned art into dangerous pranks. Years after Suz's death and its cover-up, eerie messages pull Henry and Tess back toward the truth they buried.
Girl in the Woods
by Jennifer McMahon
2009
Four friends spend a reckless summer in a remote Vermont cabin, and one of them dies. Nearly a decade later, guilt, old pranks, and a mysterious postcard threaten to expose what really happened.
Don't Breathe a Word
by Jennifer McMahon
2011
Twelve-year-old Lisa disappears into the Vermont woods after telling her brother about the King of the Fairies. Fifteen years later, Sam and Phoebe face eerie signs that Lisa's old story may not be over.
The One I Left Behind
by Jennifer McMahon
2013
Architect Reggie Dufrane has spent twenty-five years hiding from the summer her mother vanished during a serial killer's spree. When Vera reappears alive, Reggie must untangle old clues before Neptune kills again.
The Winter People
by Jennifer McMahon
2014
In West Hall, Vermont, Ruthie searches for her missing mother and finds the diary of Sara Harrison Shea, a woman murdered in 1908. The deeper Ruthie digs, the closer old grief comes to waking up.
The Night Sister
by Jennifer McMahon
2015
At the decaying Tower Motel in London, Vermont, three girls once found a secret that ended their friendship. Years later, a shocking death and the message '29 Rooms' force two sisters back into the past.
Burntown
by Jennifer McMahon
2017
Eva Sandeski, now living as Necco in Ashford's shadowy underworld, is on the run after her mother's death and her boyfriend's murder. To survive, she must face her family's inventions, secrets, and enemies.
Hannah-Beast
by Jennifer McMahon
2018
Thirty-four years after a Halloween scavenger hunt turned cruel, a local legend named Hannah-Beast still stalks one mother's memory. As trick-or-treat night returns, old guilt starts looking less like memory and more like payback.
The Invited
by Jennifer McMahon
2019
Helen and Nate leave suburbia to build a dream house on rural Vermont land with a violent past. As Helen gathers salvaged materials, the story of Hattie Breckenridge begins to haunt the house itself.
The Drowning Kind
by Jennifer McMahon
2021
After her sister Lexie drowns in their grandmother's pool, Jax returns to the family estate and finds a history of wishes, water, and loss. The pool gives, but it may always take something back.
The Children on the Hill
by Jennifer McMahon
2022
In 1978, Vi and Eric welcome a feral girl into their grandmother's Vermont home and their Monster Club. In 2019, podcaster Lizzy Shelley follows an abduction that may connect to the monsters of her past.
My Darling Girl
by Jennifer McMahon
2023
Alison agrees to bring her dying, estranged mother Mavis into her Vermont home for Christmas. Old abuse resurfaces, strange events begin, and Alison fears something far worse than illness has come with her.
Stay Buried
by Jennifer McMahon
2026
In isolated Boone's Ferry, a 1919 illness and the town knackerman become the root of a grim local legend. In 2016, siblings Ashley and Malcolm inherit property there and start digging into their mother's disappearance.
Where should I start?
If you want her classic small-town suspense: Promise Not to Tell → Island of Lost Girls → Dismantled.
If you want ghostly Vermont horror: The Winter People → The Invited → The Drowning Kind.
If you like family secrets with a supernatural edge: The Night Sister → My Darling Girl → The Children on the Hill.
If you prefer darker crime-driven suspense: The One I Left Behind → Burntown.
If you want something shorter or different: Hannah-Beast → My Tiki Girl.
Author bio
Jennifer McMahon was born in Hartford, Connecticut, in 1968 and grew up in her grandmother's house in suburban Connecticut. The house left a mark. As a kid, she was sure a ghost named Virgil lived in the attic, which feels like a very Jennifer McMahon beginning.
She wrote her first short story in third grade, then kept circling back to words in a more serious way. She came to Vermont for Goddard College, graduated in 1991, and studied poetry in the MFA writing program at Vermont College. A poem grew into a story, then the story started acting like a novel.
Before the books came a lot of regular jobs. McMahon worked as a house painter, farm worker, paste-up artist, pizza delivery driver, homeless shelter staff member, and counselor for adults and children with mental illness. After moving around, she returned to Vermont and lived with her partner, Drea, in a cabin without electricity, running water, or a phone while they built a house.
That was the turn.
Her debut, Promise Not to Tell, arrived in 2007 and set the pattern for many of the books that followed: a small town, a damaged past, and a mystery that may or may not have a ghost at its center. Island of Lost Girls became a New York Times bestseller, while Dismantled pushed into darker friendship, old guilt, and the kind of prank that cannot be undone.
That thread runs through much of her work.
Readers often come to McMahon for the spooky setups, but they tend to stay for the people trying to make sense of grief, family, and secrets they inherited before they understood them. The Winter People digs into mothers, daughters, and a Vermont town full of old disappearances. The Invited turns a do-it-yourself dream house into a haunted-house story, and The Drowning Kind makes a swimming pool feel like a family curse.
Her newer books keep playing with monsters in both ordinary and supernatural forms. The Children on the Hill nods to Frankenstein while following children, memory, and fear across two timelines. My Darling Girl brings horror into the family home at Christmas, when an estranged mother arrives sick, dangerous, and possibly not herself. Her working rule is simple: write what scares her.
After many years in Vermont, McMahon now lives on the Gulf Coast of Florida with Drea. She and Drea have a daughter, Zella. When she is not writing, she spends time looking for haunted places, real ones, imagined ones, and the kind that start as a weird little idea and refuse to leave.
Edited by
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