Charles Williams Books in Order

With her husband in jail, Joy moves onto her in-laws' failing farm and brings trouble with her. As floodwater rises and Sewell escapes custody, the family's strained loyalties are pushed to the breaking point.

Deputy sheriff Jack Marshall meets Doris on a lonely river island and becomes obsessed with taking her away from her brutal life. Desire, corruption, and a desperate escape plan push the story toward violence.

Down on his luck, Lee Scarborough is lured into stealing embezzled cash from a dead man's widow. Between Diana James and the dangerous Madelon Butler, he finds himself trapped between two women and one very bad plan.

When Mike Belen crosses paths with his ex-wife Cathy, he gets pulled into an elaborate payback scheme. Long cons, double-crosses, and old attraction keep shifting the ground until nobody knows who is using whom.

A drifter spots an easy bank score in a small Texas town and thinks he can finally get ahead. But once lust, greed, and divided loyalties enter the plan, the job turns mean and deadly.

Reno arrives from Peru to find his sister jailed for murder in a sweltering Gulf Coast town. To clear her name, he has to dig through local corruption, swampy danger, and the secrets surrounding the man her husband came looking for.

A drifting yacht stuffed with cash points back to salvage diver Bill Manning and a treasure hunt off the Yucatan. What began as a chance at easy money turns into a dangerous mix of greed, gangsters, and desire.

A car crash ends John Harlan's football career and leaves him ripe for bad ideas. When an insurance investigator convinces him a wealthy widow has something to hide, the two men launch a blackmail scheme that goes badly wrong.

Young Billy comes from the racetrack to Uncle Sagamore's Texas farm and lands in a wild summer of bootleggers, gangsters, and Choo-Choo Caroline. When Caroline disappears wearing almost nothing, Sagamore turns the search into a business opportunity.

Third mate Russell Foley runs when a detective he fought with turns up stabbed to death. Hunted by police and unable to explain himself, he has to keep moving long enough to find the real killer.

A wreck strands drifter Bill Chatham in a river town where everybody thinks motel owner Georgia Langton killed her husband. When new threats turn violent, Chatham is pulled into a tense mystery with no safe side.

On the run in Fort Lauderdale, Jerry Forbes is recruited by the clever and dangerous Marian Forsyth for a strange heist. If he can pass for a rich man named Harris Chapman, they might steal a fortune, if she doesn't use him first.

Billy and his father are still staying on Uncle Sagamore's farm when Blossom County election season turns into open warfare. With moonshine, sheriffs, and dirty tricks everywhere, Sagamore treats politics like another backwoods hustle.

Charter captain John Ingram returns from Nassau under suspicion and agrees to help a wealthy widow recover her stolen yacht. The search sends him across beautiful water and straight into smuggling, lust, and murder.

After bringing a newly bought ketch back from Panama, a sailor finds himself trapped by two deaths, one at sea and one on land. With gangsters and investigators closing in, he has to solve the mystery before it destroys him.

In a small backwoods town, John Warren hears the shots that mark the death of a handsome local man. Rumors soon tie the murder to Warren's wife, and gossip, jealousy, and old grudges turn the whole town dangerous.

John and Rae Ingram rescue a castaway in the middle of the Pacific, then realize his story does not add up. What follows is a claustrophobic battle for survival, with a stolen yacht, a trapped wife, and nowhere to run.

In this offbeat comic caper, adventurer Lawrence Colby gets pulled into a tangle of smugglers, kidnappers, and a missing ghostwriter. Set between London and France, it is a lighter Charles Williams novel, full of fast talk and increasingly chaotic crime.

Harry Goddard survives the sinking of his sloop in the Pacific, only to be pulled aboard a tramp freighter with troubles of its own. As he recovers, he uncovers a deadly conspiracy that makes the open sea look almost safe.

After Gunnar Romstead is murdered in a bleak California town, his son Eric comes looking for answers. The trail leads toward a heroin shipment and stolen cash, and the truth about his father may be the hardest thing to face.