Foggy Moskowitz Books in Order

Foggy Moskowitz is not the usual mystery hero, which is a big part of the fun. When the series opens, he is a former Brooklyn car thief who has landed in Florida and somehow ended up working for Child Protective Services in Fry's Bay. He is clever, fast on his feet, and still knows plenty about crime, but he is also trying, in his crooked and deeply personal way, to become useful.

He is a criminal trying to earn his way back into the world.

That gives the series its shape. Foggy is not a cop, not a classic private eye, and not exactly respectable. He gets pulled into cases because children are in danger, vulnerable people are being ignored, or somebody desperate knows he will actually keep going when the officials stop. He may begin with a missing newborn, a frightened girl, or a body in the water, but the trail usually widens fast into something bigger and meaner.

Florida matters here as much as Foggy does. These books are set in the mid-1970s, and DePoy uses the place well: beach towns, bars, back roads, hospitals, swamps, and Seminole land all feel like active parts of the story. The recurring presence of John Horse, a Seminole mystic and guide of sorts, adds another layer. The novels are interested in crime and corruption, but also in the older stories and loyalties that sit underneath official versions of the truth.

Across the series, the stakes stay close to the ground even when the conspiracies grow. In Cold Florida, Foggy is chasing a missing infant who needs medicine to survive. In Three Shot Burst, he shelters a young girl after she kills a man and becomes the target of powerful people. Icepick brings him into a case involving missing women, old ties to Brooklyn, and children looking for their mother. In Sidewalk Saint, he is hunting for an eleven-year-old girl whose memory has made her dangerous to criminals. By Sammy Two Shoes, he is back in New York, where friendship and old loyalties pull him into murder.

These books are funny until they aren't.

That balance is the series' real signature. Foggy talks like a man who has seen too much and still finds room to wisecrack, but the stories never forget that the people at the center are often scared, poor, grieving, or trapped. The tone can swing from oddball banter to sudden violence, then back again. If you like crime novels with heart, strange side characters, and a hero who is both decent and a little dangerous, this is probably DePoy's best place to meet him.

Start with Cold Florida and read in order. The books stand on their own, but the pleasure grows as Foggy's history, habits, and circle of allies start to build.