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Chris CC Humphreys Books in Order

Browse Chris C.C. Humphreys books in order, with quick summaries, series guides, and where to start with his historical fiction, mysteries, and fantasy.

Last updated: July 3, 2026

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17 books

The French Executioner

by Chris CC Humphreys

2001

Jean Rombaud comes to England expecting only to behead Anne Boleyn. Instead her final request sends him across Europe with a forbidden relic, hunted by enemies and trapped between duty, fear, and an oath he cannot shake.

Blood Ties

by Chris CC Humphreys

2002

Nearly twenty years after Anne Boleyn's death, her missing hand is still a weapon in European politics. As the Inquisition closes in, Jean Rombaud and his son Gianni are drawn into a bitter conflict of faith, family, and survival.

The Curse of Anne Boleyn

by Chris CC Humphreys

2002

Years after Anne Boleyn's execution, the queen's missing hand becomes the center of a dangerous Catholic plot. Aging executioner Jean Rombaud and his estranged son are pulled toward the relic, and toward each other, with deadly consequences.

Jack Absolute

by Chris CC Humphreys

2003

As the American Revolution rages, charming soldier and spy Jack Absolute rides straight into duels, intrigue, and disaster. His wit keeps him alive, but war, loyalty, and love make every escape harder than the last.

The Blooding of Jack Absolute

by Chris CC Humphreys

2004

This prequel follows Jack from rough beginnings in Cornwall and riotous school days in London to war in Canada. Duels, wilderness survival, and his first real killing shape the rogue he will become.

Absolute Honor

by Chris CC Humphreys

2006

Coming home from war, Jack Absolute hopes for reward and romance, but instead finds himself accused of treason. A plot against King George and the shadows of Jacobite politics force him back into danger.

The Fetch

by Chris CC Humphreys

2006

Fifteen-year-old Sky discovers his dead grandfather's hidden journal and runestones, then is pulled into a world of doubles, nightmares, and ancient magic. What begins as curiosity quickly becomes a fight for his own identity.

Vendetta

by Chris CC Humphreys

2007

To save Kristin from their murderous grandfather, Sky travels to Corsica and into the life of a fierce ancestress in the 1500s. Family blood feuds and dream-hunting magic make the second Runestone book darker and bigger.

Possession

by Chris CC Humphreys

2008

Sky and Kristin know their grandfather Sigurd must be stopped, but he can leap into human and animal bodies at will. Their only hope lies in the past, with an accused witch and a witchfinder who may teach them too much.

Vlad

by Chris CC Humphreys

2008

Humphreys reimagines Vlad Dracula as a man, not just a legend. Caught between faith, love, Ottoman power, and his own brutal instincts, Vlad fights to hold Wallachia and define himself before others do it for him.

A Place Called Armageddon

by Chris CC Humphreys

2011

In 1453, Sultan Mehmed drives toward Constantinople with a vast army and terrifying new artillery. Humphreys turns the fall of Byzantium into a sweeping siege novel about ambition, loyalty, and survival at the end of an age.

The Hunt of the Unicorn

by Chris CC Humphreys

2011

On a school trip, Elayne is summoned through the Unicorn Tapestries into Goloth, land of fabulous beasts. To save a unicorn and perhaps her cancer-stricken father, she must keep an ancient promise and face a tyrant king.

Shakespeare's Rebel

by Chris CC Humphreys

2013

Swordsman John Lawley wants his family, the Globe, and a quieter life. Instead he is dragged into the orbit of the Earl of Essex, war in Ireland, court intrigue, and the dangerous politics surrounding Hamlet.

Plague

by Chris CC Humphreys

2014

In plague-ridden London, highwayman William Coke stumbles on a coach full of murder victims and becomes the prime suspect. To clear his name, he must join forces with thief-taker Pitman and actress Sarah Chalker to catch the real killer.

Fire

by Chris CC Humphreys

2016

In 1666, William Coke, Pitman, and actress Sarah Chalker race to stop Fifth Monarchist fanatics and a possible surviving killer. Then the Great Fire turns London itself into the deadliest trap of all.

The Hunt of the Dragon

by Chris CC Humphreys

2016

Elayne is pulled back from New York to Goloth when monsters surface and her father crosses over. Civil war, vanished unicorns, and a waking dragon force her to fight for both worlds.

Chasing the Wind

by Chris CC Humphreys

2018

Aviatrix Roxy Loewen falls for fellow pilot Jocco Zomack while running guns into Ethiopia, then gets pulled into a dangerous hunt for a stolen Bruegel. From Spain to Berlin to the Hindenburg, Nazis and old enemies close in fast.

Recommended by:

Diana Gabaldon

Where should I start?

If you want Tudor intrigue: The French ExecutionerBlood Ties
If you want swashbuckling war adventure: The Blooding of Jack AbsoluteJack AbsoluteAbsolute Honor
If you want dark Restoration thrillers: PlagueFire
If you want YA rune magic and time travel: The FetchVendettaPossession
If you want a fast standalone: Chasing the Wind

Author bio

Chris C.C. Humphreys was born in Toronto and spent his early childhood in Los Angeles before growing up in the United Kingdom. He came from a family where acting and writing were ordinary parts of life, so it makes sense that he ended up doing both.

Acting came first.

He built a career on stage and screen, playing big roles, writing plays, and working as a fight choreographer as well as an actor. He has said that, as an actor, he first learned to tell other people's stories, and you can feel that training in his fiction, which loves strong scenes, sharp dialogue, and the physical reality of a sword fight or a desperate escape.

The move into novels seems to have happened gradually rather than as one dramatic leap. After plays came prose, and after years spent inside historical costumes and dramatic conflicts, he started writing the kinds of books that let him use all of that energy on the page. He later earned an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of British Columbia, adding formal study to a working life that was already full of performance and storytelling.

His first novel, The French Executioner, announced a lot of what readers now expect from him. It takes a famous historical moment, Anne Boleyn's execution, and looks at it sideways, through the eyes of the man ordered to carry it out. Readers who like that book usually respond to the pace, the moral tension, and the way the history feels lived in rather than politely displayed.

He kept stretching in different directions. The Jack Absolute books bring in a witty soldier-spy and a lot of eighteenth-century swagger. Vlad takes the Dracula legend and strips it back to a brutal human story. A Place Called Armageddon turns the fall of Constantinople into a large-scale siege novel, while Plague and Fire plunge into Restoration London with murder, fanaticism, and disaster pressing in from all sides.

He is not only a historical novelist, though history is clearly one of his great engines.

Under his own name he has also written fantasy, including The Runestone Saga and the later The Hunt of the Unicorn books. Those novels bring in runes, doubles, time travel, and fabulous beasts, but they still carry the same things that power his historical fiction, family tension, high stakes, vivid settings, and characters forced to make hard choices quickly.

Across all of it, certain patterns keep showing up. Humphreys likes people caught at pressure points in history, war, plague, rebellion, religious fear, political collapse. He is drawn to outsiders, performers, soldiers, and survivors, and he writes them with a sense that courage and recklessness are often very close cousins. Readers often come to his books for the action, then stay for the conflicted characters and the feeling that the past is moving under their feet.

In recent years he has been based in British Columbia, and he has also narrated audiobooks, taught workshops, and kept moving between page and performance. That mix suits him. His novels feel written by someone who still enjoys stepping into costume, walking old streets, and asking what story might be waiting there.

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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