Max Allan Collins Books in Order

Private eye Mike Hammer vows to avenge the slow, cruel murder of his war buddy Jack Williams by killing the culprit in exactly the same way. His hunt drags him through New York’s nightclubs, clinics, and mob hangouts, where every ally might be a liar.

After Mike Hammer gives a down-on-her-luck redhead enough cash to escape the streets, she turns up dead in an apparent hit and run. Convinced it is murder, Hammer tears into a prostitution and blackmail ring that stretches from waterfront dives to high society.

Hammer wakes up in a hotel room with a hangover, a dead war buddy on the floor, and his own gun as the supposed suicide weapon. Stripped of his licenses, he digs into a modeling agency and blackmail racket that powerful people will kill to protect.

Shaken after a judge calls him a killer, Hammer wanders a rainy Manhattan bridge and stumbles into a woman’s death and a stranger’s murder. The trail leads to Communist cells, political fronts, and a conspiracy that turns his personal crisis into a Cold War battlefield.

In a seedy bar on a stormy night, a desperate man kisses his baby goodbye, walks into the street, and is gunned down. Hammer shoots back, then takes responsibility for the child and launches a relentless hunt for the men behind the killing.

Speeding home from Albany, Hammer almost runs down a terrified hitchhiker, then is run off the road by killers who torture and murder her. His investigation uncovers a tangle of mobsters, spies, and stolen atomic secrets that make this one of his most explosive cases.

Seven years after Velda vanished on a case, Hammer is a drunken derelict pulled off the streets to hear a dying man’s confession: Velda is alive and in deadly danger. To save her, he has to sober up and face a Soviet assassin known only as the Dragon.

Picking up after *The Girl Hunters*, Hammer spirits Velda out of hiding and discovers she has been sheltering a runaway young woman. Protecting the girl from her murderous stepfather throws Hammer and Velda into a decades-old robbery mystery and a hunt for a faceless schemer called the Snake.

A routine bodyguard job turns into a nightmare when the teenage son of Hammer’s wealthy client disappears. The kidnapping ties back to a fourteen-year-old crime and a killer whose warped motives make him one of the most venomous foes Hammer has ever faced.

Hammer hears a child’s scream in the night and finds a terrified boy beside the whipped, murdered body of a model. As similarly brutal killings mount, he dives into fashion houses, hidden clubs, and an underground circle where jaded elites pay to watch women die.

A dying friend’s phone call pulls Hammer into the shabby death of a small-time pickpocket. Under the cheap suit and alleyway violence he uncovers a deeper plot, where political players and faceless bureaucrats are ready to write off innocent lives as acceptable losses.

Veteran thief Nolan wants to retire, but the Chicago Mafia still has a longstanding claim on his life. A proposed truce requires him to rob a bank, relying on inexperienced accomplices while anticipating a possible double-cross.

Nolan believes his money is safe until the antique dealer holding it is murdered and the entire fortune disappears. The theft throws him back into conflict with the mob, forcing him to navigate betrayals to recover his cash.

This collection brings together Bait Money and Blood Money, the first two Nolan novels. A professional thief's attempt to settle an old Mafia dispute leads to a bank robbery, stolen proceeds, and another dangerous round of criminal double-dealing.

Hitman Quarry completes an assignment in a shabby river town, then realizes he has been manipulated. To discover who used him and why, the hired killer must investigate the very murder he was paid to commit.

Quarry follows another contract killer from Florida to the Midwest as part of his campaign against fellow assassins. An illegal casino and a dangerous female opponent complicate his plans, mixing professional rivalry with a risky personal attraction.

After Quarry's employer leaves the business, a rival seeks control and puts the assassin in danger. Information Quarry possesses becomes a valuable weapon, while a woman at a swimming pool is drawn into the resulting struggle.

A film production becomes a lethal trap when cast and crew discover they are confined with a serial killer. Quarry must navigate the murders surrounding an adult-movie set, where ordinary professional danger gives way to an unpredictable threat.

Nolan abandons criminal retirement for a job that promises both money and a chance to settle a score. With his young associate Jon involved, the veteran thief must contend with troublesome rivals and an unexpected skyjacker.

Retired thief Nolan is running a restaurant when the president of a bank he once robbed threatens him with blackmail. Ordered to rob the same bank again, Nolan also faces a woman's scheme to make him a murder suspect.

A sniper kills a mob-connected businessman, and Nolan is drawn into the family's search for revenge. The retired thief must untangle the vendetta and identify the gunman before conflicting criminal interests turn him into another casualty.

Nolan and his occasional partner Jon become targets for Julie, a woman who treats murder as a solution to every problem. She hires outside killers to eliminate them, prepared to finish the job herself if they fail.

Mallory helps a frightened woman escape a violent man at an Iowa bus station, then learns she has died in a suspicious accident. Similarities to another death and possible official interference draw him into a dangerous local investigation.

Delivering meals to elderly residents leads aspiring mystery writer Mallory to discover a brutal killing in his Iowa hometown. He investigates burglars turned murderers despite the sheriff's opposition, while an old romantic attachment threatens to distract him.

Honest Chicago policeman Nate Heller refuses to participate in corruption and leaves the force to become a private investigator. With Al Capone among his first clients, Heller finds that surviving Prohibition-era politics and organized crime is his immediate priority.

At a Chicago mystery convention, Mallory finds his literary mentor Roscoe Kane dead in a hotel bathtub. Rejecting the verdict of an accidental drunken death, he investigates rival authors, family resentments, and publishing disputes to seek justice.

Private detective Nate Heller searches Chicago for John Dillinger in 1934, then questions the official account of the outlaw's death. His investigation takes him onto Depression-era backroads and into the company of notorious criminals with further schemes underway.

Mallory investigates an old school friend's apparent suicide in their small Iowa town. Tracing Ginnie Mullens's life from youthful rebellion to business success reveals connections to gambling and drug trafficking that some acquaintances would rather keep hidden.

Graduate journalism student Crane doubts that his fiancée killed herself, especially after learning of similar deaths among chemical-factory employees. Working with an environmental investigator, he probes a New Jersey company's activities and becomes a target for those protecting it.

Mallory attends a staged mystery weekend at a snowbound New York hotel and witnesses what appears to be an actual murder. When a disliked critic's body is found, the fictional game becomes a real investigation among stranded guests.

Nate Heller returns from Guadalcanal with a wound that sent him home and traumatic memories he cannot fully recover. In Chicago and Hollywood, renewed involvement with Frank Nitti and mob efforts to control film unions creates fresh violence.

Nolan's legitimate life as a shopping-mall restaurateur collapses when an old criminal associate kidnaps his girlfriend. Forced to plan a robbery of the entire mall, Nolan must also locate Sherry before a captor who eliminates witnesses kills her.

With Prohibition behind him, Eliot Ness arrives in Depression-era Cleveland to confront entrenched police corruption. A hidden network controls vice, gambling, and racketeering, while politicians, colleagues, and personal complications obstruct his efforts to expose its powerful leader.

Eliot Ness pursues Cleveland's notorious torso murderer, whose killings have terrorized the city for two years. Working undercover with limited support, Ness risks his reputation and safety in a hunt for a killer who leaves dismembered bodies but few clues.

A friend asks fugitive Nolan to investigate his daughter's apparent suicide during an LSD trip. Returning close to Chicago exposes Nolan to the gang that wants him dead, while drugs, musicians, and criminal connections complicate the young woman's final days.

In 1946, Nate Heller investigates an attack on his gambling-business client James Ragen. The case draws him from Chicago toward Las Vegas, where Bugsy Siegel, Virginia Hill, and the beginnings of the Flamingo Hotel entangle him in mob ambitions.

Retired and married, Quarry refuses a million-dollar offer to assassinate a presidential candidate. Turning down such a contract brings dangerous consequences, forcing the former hitman to protect his new life against people accustomed to buying death.

During Cleveland's sweltering summer of 1937, Eliot Ness confronts racketeers who dominate the city's labor unions. Breaking their hold requires evidence and cooperation from intimidated victims, placing the lawman in conflict with entrenched criminal leaders.

This anthology blends erotic attraction with horror, gathering stories in which desire, obsession, and intimacy lead toward danger. Its varied tales explore the disturbing territory between ordinary human appetites and supernatural or psychologically unsettling threats.

Hammer walks into his office to find Velda unconscious on the floor, a mobster butchered in his chair, and a note from a killer signed “Penta.” With the DA, FBI, CIA, and the Mafia all crowding in, Hammer has to find out who really owns the corpse on his carpet.

Dick Tracy is plagued by nightmares while a scientist develops technology intended to control and share dreams. When that research becomes a tool for murder, the detective must confront a killer whose attacks reach victims in their sleep.

During World War II, Dick Tracy joins naval intelligence and confronts a Nazi sabotage operation involving familiar criminals. The threat reaches a weapons plant and the people closest to him, combining wartime espionage with his continuing battle against organized crime.

Six stories place Chicago private detective Nate Heller inside fictionalized investigations of real unsolved crimes from the 1930s and 1940s. The collection combines historical figures, criminal intrigue, and cases involving suspicious deaths, kidnapping, and a notorious serial murderer.

This anthology gathers erotic horror stories where desire, obsession, and the supernatural keep colliding. Yvonne Navarro curates tales that aim for both heat and unease.

A successful kidnapping investigation earns Nate Heller a reputation that brings him into the search for Charles Lindbergh's missing baby. Pursuing uncertain witnesses and questionable intermediaries, the detective explores the conflicting leads surrounding one of America's most famous crimes.

This two-novel Nolan collection reunites Hard Cash and Scratch Fever. A forced return to a previously robbed bank places Nolan and partner Jon in an embezzler's scheme, while a murderous woman and enemies from their past threaten survival.

Dick Tracy and Tess Trueheart plan a televised wedding, but a hired sniper disrupts the ceremony. When murder follows among the new television network's personalities, Tracy must solve the crime while trying to complete their long-delayed marriage.

Chicago mobster Louie Carboni is accustomed to gang violence, but a series of decapitated college professors presents an unfamiliar threat. This horror story follows the unsettling connection between organized crime and a killer known as the Mangler.

Another volume of erotic horror, this collection mixes sensual tension with monsters, danger, and dark twists. It is built for readers who like their horror intimate and unsettling.

Secret Service agent Frank Horrigan remains haunted by his failure to save President Kennedy. When a dangerous new opponent threatens another president, Horrigan must confront both the prospective assassin and the fear of repeating his past failure.

In 1938 Cleveland, Eliot Ness investigates a gang's violent takeover of the numbers racket. Threats against rivals and the killing of informants make gathering evidence difficult, forcing him to seek help from a compromised officer with useful connections.

Nate Heller is hired in wartime Nassau to investigate a millionaire's son-in-law, but his employer is soon murdered. Asked to clear the accused husband, Heller confronts political interference and powerful figures determined to control the case's outcome.

The fourth Hot Blood anthology gathers fourteen erotic horror stories, including work by Max Allan Collins, Jack Ketchum, Lucy Taylor, and Edward Lee. The collection combines sexual tension with disturbing suspense and gruesome tales from several horror writers.

Gambler Bret Maverick needs another three thousand dollars to enter a high-stakes poker game in St. Louis. This novelization follows his effort to assemble the stake, turning his pursuit of a seat at the table into an adventure.

Artist Nora Chaney’s party hypnosis produces memories of a young woman murdered years earlier. When dreams begin predicting the same killer’s current crimes, she joins an investigative reporter to discover whether her visions reveal a past life.

Private investigator Nathan Heller is hired to examine threats against Louisiana politician Huey Long. Political corruption and an assassination draw him into conflicting accounts of the killing, raising questions about who actually fired the fatal shot.

Nineteen stories combine erotic desire with horror in this anthology edited by Jeff Gelb and Michael Garrett. With an introduction by Brinke Stevens, the collection includes contributions by Bentley Little, Ronald Kelly, Edward Lee, and other writers.

After melting icecaps submerge the Earth, scattered survivors inhabit a world dominated by water. A stranger aboard an unusual sailing vessel enters their desperate existence, carrying something to trade in this novelization of the science-fiction adventure film.

Jack Wolff returns to a resort he visited as a child, confident that nobody will recognize him. A brutal murder attracts police attention as the predatory visitor turns his interest toward a vulnerable teenage girl.

Still recovering from bullet wounds and presumed dead by many who knew him, Hammer returns to New York and to an old army buddy on his deathbed. The friend whispers one last secret, pointing Hammer toward a hidden cache of Mafia billions that every hood and fed in town wants.

Nathan Heller assists Clarence Darrow in a sensational Hawaii murder case arising from allegations against a Navy officer’s wife. His investigation confronts racial hostility, official corruption, and conflicting evidence in a territory divided over justice and political control.

An explosion traps survivors in a damaged commuter tunnel beneath the Hudson River. Former emergency rescue specialist Kit Latura attempts to reach them, facing toxic air and dwindling options as he searches for a way to bring them out.

This erotic horror anthology brings together stories by writers including Jack Ketchum, Edward Lee, Graham Masterton, and Lucy Taylor. Its collection of short fiction explores the intersection of sexual desire, fear, and disturbing encounters with danger.

Terrorists seize the president’s aircraft with his family and dozens of other passengers aboard. As they threaten executions every thirty minutes, Washington’s refusal to negotiate turns the hijacking into an urgent struggle to save the hostages.

Frank Lucas builds a heroin empire in Harlem, challenging Mafia control and exploiting a corrupt system. Detective Richie Roberts pursues the operation in this film novelization, bringing the drug kingpin’s rise into conflict with a determined investigation.

This installment of the Hot Blood anthology series combines erotic desire with unsettling horror. Stories by Joyce Carol Oates, Lawrence Block, Ramsey Campbell, and other contributors explore dangerous pleasures, dark impulses, and encounters that can turn deadly.

Sixteen erotic horror stories explore desire’s dangerous consequences, including fantasy-fulfilling cheerleaders, an establishment steeped in old debauchery, and rival wives competing over sexual conquests. The anthology brings varied authors together around intimacy, temptation, and disturbing outcomes.

Nathan Heller is hired by publisher George Putnam to protect Amelia Earhart and investigate threatening letters. His difficult relationship with the celebrated aviator grows more intimate as the case draws him toward the mystery surrounding her final flight.

Seventeen authors contribute erotic horror stories about the darker sides of human and supernatural desire. Encounters in bars, gyms, and piercing shops turn sinister, while amateur filmmakers discover that the alluring creature they record is dangerously deceptive.

Mob enforcer Michael O’Sullivan’s son witnesses a killing, exposing the family to a brutal reprisal. Father and child flee together, pursuing vengeance while struggling with loyalty, moral compromise, and the influence of violence on their relationship.

United States Marshal Sam Gerard works with the CIA to pursue a former agent seeking revenge for their mistakes. The hunt brings federal law enforcement into conflict with a fugitive determined to make his former associates pay.

This illustrated collection presents Gil Elvgren’s pin-up artwork, documenting the images associated with his reputation as a leading cheesecake illustrator. Its visual selection recalls the popularity of his painted women among American servicemen during the Second World War.

A companion to the first Elvgren Girls collection, this art book presents more work by Gil Elvgren. Its selection focuses on the illustrator’s combination of familiar girl-next-door appeal and the idealized allure characteristic of his pin-up paintings.

This illustrated collection looks at risqué calendar imagery from the 1920s and 1930s. The selected depictions of women trace a form of popular commercial illustration that preceded the poster models and magazine cover girls of later decades.

In 1949, Nathan Heller investigates Secretary of Defense James Forrestal’s fear that government insiders are watching him. Work for columnist Drew Pearson complicates the assignment, drawing Heller into Washington intrigue and questions about secrets beyond ordinary political rivalry.

Joyce Lackey makes a Faustian bargain to recover her youth, but the arrangement offers no easy escape. This thriller follows the dangerous consequences of her pursuit of renewal as the promise of transformation leads into increasingly troubling territory.

This Artist Archives volume gathers fourteen examples of vintage pin-up illustration with an introduction by Max Allan Collins. Its selection includes artwork by Roy Best, Billy DeVorss, Jules Erbit, and other painters associated with commercial glamour imagery.

Adventurer Rick O’Connell guides librarian Evelyn’s expedition to a lost Egyptian city. What promises to be an extraordinary archaeological discovery instead awakens an ancient evil, turning their desert journey into a struggle against a menace returned from the grave.

Mystery writer Jacques Futrelle investigates a passenger’s death inside a locked Titanic cabin. Conducting his inquiry discreetly among first-class travelers, he uncovers hidden motives while the liner’s voyage continues toward disaster and a killer remains aboard.

This art collection presents the pin-up women associated with illustrator Alberto Vargas. The selected images recall the Varga Girls’ place in American popular culture and their wartime appeal to servicemen during the years of the Second World War.

This second Varga Girls volume presents another selection of Alberto Vargas’s pin-up art in the Artist Archives series. Fourteen reproduced illustrations are accompanied by introductory text from Max Allan Collins, offering a compact survey of the artist’s imagery.

A vanished passenger and a suspected bomb threat prompt mystery writer Leslie Charteris to investigate aboard the Hindenburg. Discovering links to Nazi surveillance, he searches for a killer while fearing a wider plot against the airship.

This first annual anthology collects mystery, crime, and suspense short fiction selected from the preceding year. Edited by Ed Gorman, the volume offers varied approaches to the genre, including a contribution from historical mystery novelist Anne Perry.

The second annual anthology of mystery and suspense fiction selects established and emerging writers from American and international publications. Alongside the stories, it contains year-end reports on crime writing and fandom, plus coverage of the 2000 short-story Edgar Awards.

American sailors disguise their submarine to capture an Enigma machine from a damaged German U-boat. When their own vessel is destroyed, the survivors must navigate the crippled enemy submarine through waters where both sides could attack them.

Nathan Heller discovers Elizabeth Short’s mutilated body in Los Angeles and recognizes a woman he once dated. His private connection to the Black Dahlia victim threatens his marriage and business as he investigates the notorious murder.

This collection examines advertising illustrations depicting idealized Native American women in the early and mid-twentieth century. Max Allan Collins’s introduction places the imagery in its commercial context and discusses the use of white models for these portrayals.

Nathan Heller investigates fictional interpretations of real unsolved crimes in this story collection. Encounters involving Marilyn Monroe, Eliot Ness, and actress Thelma Todd place the private detective among notable figures while linking historical mysteries to his changing career.

Fourteen reproduced artworks explore nude imagery within vintage pin-up illustration. Featuring paintings by artists including Gil Elvgren and Rolf Armstrong, this Artist Archives volume presents examples selected for their artistic qualities and significance within commercial glamour art.

This Artist Archives collection presents fourteen full-page color plates featuring pirate and gypsy-themed pin-up imagery. Works by Edward Eggleston and other commercial illustrators appear alongside an essay by Max Allan Collins discussing the collected art.

This Artist Archives volume presents fourteen examples of vintage pin-up artwork alongside introductory text by Max Allan Collins. The compact illustrated collection places commercial glamour painting within a series devoted to reproductions from the history of popular illustration.

Max Allan Collins surveys detective fiction’s development from early investigators to Hammett, Chandler, and Macdonald. Illustrated examples broaden the discussion to comics, radio, television, and film noir, tracing the genre’s narrative traditions and changing visual identity.

Rick and Evelyn O’Connell’s latest excavation uncovers a key to a lost oasis and an ancient army. The revived Imhotep pursues the same power, forcing the family into a race that endangers their son and humanity.

Edgar Rice Burroughs and his son investigate a singer’s murder in Honolulu shortly before the attack on Pearl Harbor. Her connections to military officers and suspected spies raise questions beyond the apparent explanation of romantic jealousy.

Marine Joe Enders is assigned to protect Navajo code talker Ben Yahzee during the battle for Saipan. A secret order to kill him rather than let the code be captured complicates their developing friendship and Enders’s duty.

After escaping Manticore, genetically engineered teenager Max survives among thieves in a devastated Los Angeles. Encounters with fellow escapees and a mysterious television report draw her toward Seattle, where answers about her past may await.

In 1950 Chicago, private detective Nate Heller becomes entangled in a federal investigation into organized crime. When former policeman Bill Drury is murdered, Heller must navigate mob connections and political pressure to uncover what happened.

This collection presents fourteen full-page color reproductions of cowgirl pin-up art, accompanied by an introduction from Max Allan Collins. Western costumes and settings provide the theme for a selection of vintage glamour illustrations.

A murder investigation leads Nick Stokes and Catherine Willows back to a case from fifteen years earlier. As Gil Grissom's forensic team examines an execution-style killing, federal interest complicates the search for connections between the crimes.