Jeff Crook Books in Order

If you want Dragonlance first: The Rose and the Skull → The Thieves' Guild → Conundrum → Dark Thane
If you want supernatural mystery: The Sleeping and the Dead → The Covenant
If you want lore and game-world texture: Bertrem's Guide to the War of Souls, Volume One → Champions of Ruin
If you want later standalone adventures: Kung-fu Heroes of Destiny → Sinbad and the Sword of the Prophet

Jeff Crook was born in Memphis and raised there, and he has stayed closely tied to the city for most of his life. Before novels, he worked as a technical writer for the United States Postal Service, which is a good reminder that plenty of fiction careers start far from anything that looks literary.

Then writing pulled him back in.

Crook has said that he stopped writing for about two years at one point. What changed was a Dungeons and Dragons game started by some of his wife's old high school friends. He joined in, began creating material for the game, and then started running one himself. That led him back to fiction, and his first professional sales came through Dungeons and Dragons work before he moved into the Dragonlance line.

His first Dragonlance novel, The Rose and the Skull, arrived in March 1999. More books in that shared world followed, including The Thieves' Guild, Conundrum, and Dark Thane. He also contributed short fiction and collaborative work to Dragonlance collections and companion volumes, which makes him a good example of the writer who can step into an established world and still find odd, specific corners to explore.

That matters.

A lot of Crook's fantasy work is interested in systems under strain: knightly orders trying to survive, criminal networks rebuilding after collapse, dwarven politics turning sour, or gnomes trying to find a place in a changing world. Conundrum leans lighter and funnier. Dark Thane goes the other way, into claustrophobic clan politics in Thorbardin. Even when the settings are big and familiar, he tends to zoom in on people caught at the edges of power.

Later, he shifted into crime fiction without dropping the supernatural streak. The Sleeping and the Dead introduces Jackie Lyons, a former Memphis vice detective turned crime photographer who sees the dead. The Covenant continues that mix of ghost story, hardboiled mystery, and very local Memphis atmosphere. Readers who like Crook usually seem to respond to that blend of grit, weirdness, and sympathy for damaged people who keep moving anyway.

He has also worked outside straight fantasy and mystery. Later projects like Kung-fu Heroes of Destiny and Sinbad and the Sword of the Prophet show how comfortable he is borrowing from martial arts fantasy, pulp adventure, and older storytelling traditions. The through line is curiosity. He does not seem especially interested in staying in one box for long.

Crook was also the former editor of Southern Gothic Online and Postcards from Hell, and over the years he published short fiction, poetry, and game material alongside the novels. That mixed background helps explain why his books can feel both genre-aware and slightly off to one side of the usual lane.

He remains closely associated with Memphis, the city where he was born and has long lived. That local grounding gives his work, especially the Jackie Lyons books, an extra bit of texture. Even when he is writing about dragons, thieves, or haunted cameras, there is usually a sense that he likes places with history, trouble, and a few dark corners left unexplained.