Jack Hardin Books in Order
Explore Jack Hardin's books in order, with quick summaries, series background, and simple where-to-start tips for Pine Island, Ryan Savage, and more.
Last updated: July 2, 2026
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Publication Order
21 books
Bitter Tide
by Jack Hardin
2018
A worried mother asks Ellie O'Conner to look into trouble surrounding her son, and the request opens a crooked trail through Pine Island. At the same time, an old friend forces Ellie to rethink what she believes about Team 99.
Broken Stern
by Jack Hardin
2018
Former CIA operative Ellie O'Conner comes home to Pine Island, Florida, hoping for a quieter life after years of covert work. A shocking murder drags her into a local investigation, where drugs, lies, and grief are waiting just below the surface.
Shallow Breeze
by Jack Hardin
2018
When a plane loaded with cocaine crashes into a Pine Island pier, Ellie O'Conner's new DEA role becomes a lot more urgent. As she follows the case, family revelations make the search for truth even messier.
Silent Ripple
by Jack Hardin
2018
Before the Pine Island novels begin, Ellie O'Conner is home from Brussels for a little rest with family and friends. Then things start going wrong, and this short prequel offers a first look at the woman behind the series.
Vacant Shore
by Jack Hardin
2018
Ringo is still out there, and Ellie O'Conner cannot let the hunt go, even after leaving the DEA. When an old adversary comes back for revenge, the case widens and forces Ellie toward a dangerous reckoning.
18 Dragons
by Jack Hardin
2019
American covers are blown, a Chinese-backed hacking outfit is in play, and Washington sends Team 99. This short Ellie O'Conner mission opens the series with brisk black-ops action and a global cyber threat.
Breakwater
by Jack Hardin
2019
Ellie O'Conner is finally settling into a quieter life when tragedy hits close to home. A missing girl and a cryptic plea for help pull Ellie and retired DEA veteran Jet Jahner into the same dangerous search.
Lonely Coast
by Jack Hardin
2019
An explosion in downtown Tampa sends Ellie O'Conner and a Homeland Security task force into a high-pressure investigation. The trail leads to Mexico, while trouble at home forces the people she loves to choose between justice and revenge.
Savage Coast
by Jack Hardin
2019
Ryan Savage comes home to Key Largo after a CIA assist, only to find a key federal witness murdered days before trial. As the case turns personal and violent, he digs into a conspiracy that reaches far above street level.
Savage Justice
by Jack Hardin
2019
A death outside Ryan Savage's Miami hotel room looks accidental to everyone except him. Following his instincts, he uncovers a hidden war against elite American operators and a conspiracy that runs deep into government.
The Apostate
by Jack Hardin
2019
After a U.S. embassy is bombed in Amman and an American is kidnapped in Cairo, Team 99 is sent in. The second novella drops Ellie O'Conner's CIA crew into another fast, high-risk international operation.
Savage Fury
by Jack Hardin
2020
A murdered federal agent and a fresh threat against Americans end Ryan Savage's vacation in the Lower Keys. Chasing the plot into South America, he faces a patient enemy and a mission that could spark something much bigger.
Savage Hunt
by Jack Hardin
2020
A plea from a former enemy sends Ryan Savage from the Florida Keys to a swampy Louisiana town that does not want him there. Between a suspicious company, an FBI side case, and a relentless assassin, every lead raises the stakes.
Savage Lie
by Jack Hardin
2020
A retired ICE agent is murdered off Islamorada, and Ryan Savage and Brad start asking questions for the widow he left behind. The trail runs into Central America, where the truth looks less like justice and more like a carefully built lie.
Savage Storm
by Jack Hardin
2020
Ryan Savage is yanked from a training exercise when a federal agent disappears under suspicious circumstances. His search takes him to Cuba, where a simple recovery mission turns into a tangle of deception and a disturbing secret.
Savage Truth
by Jack Hardin
2020
After a quiet day on the water, Ryan Savage comes home to gunfire and an unwanted mystery. The chase runs across south Florida and Saint Lucia, and teams him with Ellie O'Conner to free a father and son.
Savage Blood
by Jack Hardin
2021
A call to Tampa pulls Ryan Savage out of the Florida Keys and into a dangerous clash involving a Russian oligarch and the Kremlin. As he hunts vital intelligence across several countries, the case presses on old questions about his parents' deaths.
Savage Prey
by Jack Hardin
2021
Ryan Savage is sent to Mexico after a senator's daughter and her new husband vanish on their honeymoon. Racing through jungle and conspiracy with a handpicked team, he has to reach them before time runs out.
Savage Recruit
by Jack Hardin
2021
When Ryan Savage's boss, Kathleen Rose, vanishes, the trail leads to an elusive figure known as the Recruit. Chasing proof of life through the Mediterranean underworld, Ryan is forced into risky alliances and painful questions about his own past.
Dark Horizon
by Jack Hardin
2022
Nearly thirty years after a missing teen's body is found on Pine Island, Ellie O'Conner digs into a cold case that refuses to stay buried. Old secrets rise with the remains, and a familiar threat slips back into the shadows.
Savage Greed
by Jack Hardin
2022
Ryan Savage heads to Colorado for a quiet week with an old Army friend and finds only a worried son and a disappearance. His search uncovers hard local secrets, and soon the mountains turn into hostile ground.
Where should I start?
For Ellie's full Pine Island arc: Broken Stern → Shallow Breeze → Bitter Tide → Vacant Shore
For later Pine Island standalones: Breakwater → Lonely Coast → Dark Horizon
For Ryan Savage's federal action: Savage Coast → Savage Justice → Savage Storm
For short black-ops missions: 18 Dragons → The Apostate
Author bio
Jack Hardin writes thrillers full of salt air, hard choices, and people who know how to handle danger. He is an American novelist who lives in Arlington, Texas, with his wife and five children. Even his short bio reads like the opening of one of his books, grounded, mobile, and a little harder edged than average.
He grew up in an Army family, and a large part of his childhood unfolded in Germany. Before the Iron Curtain fell, he traveled around Europe with his family, and at nine years old he walked through Checkpoint Charlie into East Berlin, just a year before the Berlin Wall came down. That kind of early movement shows up later in his fiction, where borders, missions, and shifting loyalties are part of everyday life.
It is not the usual path to writing about covert operators, but it fits.
His public bios also make room for the physical side of his life. Hardin holds a second-degree black belt in Taekwondo, knows his way around a bo staff and nunchucks, and has taught women's self-defense. Those details help explain why the action in his books tends to feel practical. His characters notice exits, body position, distance, and timing. The fights are there to solve problems, not to show off.
Readers first met his fiction in 2018 with Broken Stern, the book that began the Pine Island Coast Florida Suspense series. It introduces Ellie O'Conner, a former CIA operative who comes home to Southwest Florida hoping for quiet and gets pulled into murder, smuggling, and old grief instead. Later books such as Shallow Breeze, Bitter Tide, Vacant Shore, Breakwater, Lonely Coast, and Dark Horizon keep building that world. The first four books form one longer arc, which gives the series a nice mix of momentum and payoff.
Florida suits him.
The Pine Island books show one of Hardin's clearest strengths, setting that does real work. Marinas, bars, fishing towns, backwater channels, and Gulf Coast weather are not just scenery in these novels. They shape the crimes and the mood. Readers who click with Hardin often seem to like that blend of place, pace, and capable leads. Ellie is skilled and dangerous, but she is also tied to home, memory, and the people who knew her before the missions.
He widened the scope with the Ryan Savage books, beginning with Savage Coast. Ryan is a Homeland Security operative with a military background, and that series pushes farther into federal cases, cross-border threats, and international fallout. Savage Justice, Savage Storm, Savage Truth, Savage Recruit, Savage Blood, Savage Prey, and Savage Greed keep Ryan on the move through Florida, the Caribbean, and well beyond. These stories jump from the Keys to places like Cuba, Saint Lucia, Russia, Mexico, and Colorado without losing Ryan's point of view. The scale is bigger, but Hardin keeps the stories anchored in one man's judgment, loyalty, and refusal to back off when a case turns personal.
There is also the shorter Team 99 line, including 18 Dragons and The Apostate. Those novellas follow Ellie on black-ops missions and give readers a quicker look at the covert world behind the Pine Island books. Across all three strands of his work, Hardin keeps returning to a few steady interests, justice, hidden corruption, old wounds, family pressure, and the question of what happens when trained people try to live ordinary lives after seeing too much.
Hardin has said that his Christian faith is the bedrock of his life, and that quiet moral pressure can be felt in the books. He writes about agents, investigators, and operators, but he also writes about conscience, grief, and responsibility. Taken together, his novels offer a pretty clear picture of what he likes to explore, danger on the move, loyalty under strain, and the uneasy place where violence follows people home. That mix of action and conscience is a big part of his lane.
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