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Benny Cooperman Books in Order

Part ofHoward Engel Books in Order

See the Benny Cooperman books in order by Howard Engel, with quick summaries, series background, reading help, and an easy guide to where to start.

Last updated: July 4, 2026

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Benny Cooperman books in publication order

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13 books

1

The Suicide Murders

by Howard Engel

1980

Myrna Yates thinks her husband is having an affair, but Benny's routine snooping leads instead to an apparent suicide. The details do not add up, and Benny stumbles into blackmail, corruption, and more deaths.

2

The Ransom Game

by Howard Engel

1981

Muriel Falkirk wants Benny to find Johnny Rosa, an ex-con tied to a long-ago kidnapping and missing ransom money. Soon Benny is caught in a scramble where too many people want the cash, and somebody is ready to kill for it.

3

Murder on Location

by Howard Engel

1982

A missing-wife case takes Benny to Niagara Falls, where a movie crew has turned the place into a spectacle. Then murder strikes, and show-business glamour gives way to old grudges and real danger.

4

Murder Sees the Light

by Howard Engel

1985

Benny heads into the Ontario wilderness to keep an eye on a controversial evangelist hiding at a lodge. When a local guide is found dead, the quiet retreat turns into a tense and isolated murder case.

5

A City Called July

by Howard Engel

1986

Benny is asked to look for a vanished lawyer who has cheated members of Grantham's Jewish community. The search pulls him into mob ties, local grudges, and the uneasy life of the city around him.

6

A Victim Must Be Found

by Howard Engel

1988

Hotelier Pambos Kiriakis hires Benny to recover a missing list of borrowed artworks, then is murdered before the matter is settled. Benny follows the trail through Grantham's wealthy and connected, where art and motive mix badly.

7

Dead And Buried

by Howard Engel

1990

A widow asks Benny to reinvestigate her truck-driver husband's supposedly accidental death. What he finds points toward suspicious testimony, toxic dumping, and danger inside a well-protected company.

8

There Was an Old Woman

by Howard Engel

1993

When the caretaker of Benny's building asks him to look into Lizzy Oldridge's death, the case seems sad but simple. It quickly opens into a knot of trusts, dirty politics, and local secrets nobody wants aired.

9

Getting Away With Murder

by Howard Engel

1996

Crime boss Abram Wise wants Benny to find out who is trying to kill him. The investigation drags Benny into old family wounds, buried injustice, and a case where the past is anything but finished.

10

The Cooperman Variations

by Howard Engel

2001

An old college crush asks Benny to protect her after another woman is shot in her place. Undercover inside a television network, he finds power games, tangled inheritances, and more than one reason for murder.

11

Memory Book

by Howard Engel

2005

Benny wakes in a Toronto hospital after a brutal head injury, unable to read properly and struggling to hold onto memory. Using a notebook and help from Anna, he tries to piece together the case that nearly killed him.

12

East of Suez

by Howard Engel

2008

Still dealing with memory problems, Benny Cooperman heads to the tropical city of Murinam to look for a missing old friend. The search leads him into a sunlit maze of locals, secrets, and sudden death.

13

The Whole Megillah

by Howard Engel

2012

While visiting Toronto, Benny Cooperman agrees to help a rare-books dealer recover a stolen ancient Jewish manuscript. Then the client turns up dead, and a simple theft becomes a sharper, stranger mystery.

Benny Cooperman books in chronological order

  1. Book cover for "The Suicide Murders"

    The Suicide Murders

    by Howard Engel

    1980Benny Cooperman, Book 1
  2. Book cover for "The Ransom Game"

    The Ransom Game

    by Howard Engel

    1981Benny Cooperman, Book 2
  3. Book cover for "Murder on Location"

    Murder on Location

    by Howard Engel

    1982Benny Cooperman, Book 3
  4. Book cover for "Murder Sees the Light"

    Murder Sees the Light

    by Howard Engel

    1985Benny Cooperman, Book 4
  5. Book cover for "A City Called July"

    A City Called July

    by Howard Engel

    1986Benny Cooperman, Book 5
  6. Book cover for "A Victim Must Be Found"

    A Victim Must Be Found

    by Howard Engel

    1988Benny Cooperman, Book 6
  7. Book cover for "Dead And Buried"

    Dead And Buried

    by Howard Engel

    1990Benny Cooperman, Book 7
  8. Book cover for "There Was an Old Woman"

    There Was an Old Woman

    by Howard Engel

    1993Benny Cooperman, Book 8
  9. Book cover for "Getting Away With Murder"

    Getting Away With Murder

    by Howard Engel

    1996Benny Cooperman, Book 9
  10. Book cover for "The Cooperman Variations"

    The Cooperman Variations

    by Howard Engel

    2001Benny Cooperman, Book 10
  11. Book cover for "Memory Book"

    Memory Book

    by Howard Engel

    2005Benny Cooperman, Book 11
  12. Book cover for "East of Suez"

    East of Suez

    by Howard Engel

    2008Benny Cooperman, Book 12
  13. Book cover for "The Whole Megillah"

    The Whole Megillah

    by Howard Engel

    2012Benny Cooperman, Book 13

Series background & context

The Benny Cooperman books follow a private investigator who works out of Grantham, Ontario, a fictional city that closely resembles St. Catharines and the Niagara region. That setting matters a lot. These are not sleek big-city thrillers. They are mysteries rooted in side streets, modest offices, local grudges, family history, and the feeling that everybody knows somebody who knows something.

Benny himself is the real draw. He is Jewish, intelligent, underpowered in every physical sense, and never mistaken for a hard man. He does not carry a gun. He dislikes violence. He worries about money, gets pushed around more than he would like, and keeps showing up anyway. Engel once described him as soft-boiled rather than hard-boiled, and that fits. Benny solves things by staying curious longer than everyone else.

That is the engine of the series.

Many of the cases begin in a way that sounds almost small enough to brush off. A wife thinks her husband is cheating. A man has gone missing. Someone wants a list found, a manuscript recovered, or a death looked at twice. Then Benny starts tugging at the loose thread, and a local problem opens into something older and messier, old corruption, old resentments, family secrets, political rot, or the kind of greed that thrives when a town prefers not to look too closely.

The books also build a strong sense of Benny's world. Grantham is full of recurring pressures and relationships, his parents, the police, his clients, and later Anna Abraham, whose presence gives the series a warmer emotional center. Engel likes odd side characters, shabby offices, and conversations that drift just enough to feel human before landing on something important. The humor is dry, but it is everywhere.

The tone stays inviting even when the crimes get dark. These are mysteries for readers who like wit, atmosphere, and character as much as plot. The books can be twisty, but they never lose sight of the fact that Benny is a decent man trying to keep his balance in a world that is usually one step more complicated than he expected.

The later novels add another layer. After Howard Engel's own stroke, he gave Benny a related struggle in Memory Book and then carried some of that changed perspective into East of Suez. Those books still work as mysteries, but they also show what the series does best, turning a detective story into something personal without losing its humor.

Two Benny Cooperman novels, The Suicide Murders and Murder Sees the Light, were adapted for television, which makes sense. Benny is good company. That is the thread running through all of these books.

Edited by

Richard Reis

Software engineer whose passion for tracking book recommendations from podcasts inspired the creation of MRB.

Anurag Ramdasan

Lead investor at 3one4 Capital whose startup expertise and love for books helped shaped MRB and its growth.

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