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Nathan Hale Books in Order

Browse Nathan Hale books in order, with quick summaries, Hazardous Tales reading order, stand-alone comics, series background, and easy tips on where to start.

Last updated: June 30, 2026

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19 books

The Devil You Know

by Nathan Hale

2005

The Fell family wants rid of the little devil causing trouble in their house, so a neat and helpful replacement seems perfect. Hale turns the old saying into a mischievous picture book about choosing the wrong fix.

The Twelve Bots of Christmas

by Nathan Hale

2005

Hale rewires the old holiday song into a robot-filled read-aloud starring Robo-Santa and a parade of mechanical gifts. It is a playful picture book packed with gadget jokes, bright art, and Christmas cheer.

Yellowbelly and Plum Go to School

by Nathan Hale

2007

Yellowbelly heads to school with his beloved stuffed friend Plum, and panic sets in when Plum goes missing on the playground. It is a sweet, funny picture book about first-day nerves, friendship, and reunion.

Big Bad Ironclad!

by Nathan Hale

2012

This volume follows the Civil War race to build ironclad warships, centering on the USS Monitor and the CSS Virginia. Hale turns naval engineering, military strategy, and Lincoln-era politics into a fast, easy-to-follow showdown.

One Dead Spy

by Nathan Hale

2012

Minutes from execution, Revolutionary War spy Nathan Hale starts telling the story of America's fight for independence. The frame is funny, but the history is real, full of close calls, bold plans, and battlefield chaos.

Donner Dinner Party

by Nathan Hale

2013

A wagon party takes a shortcut to California in 1846 and walks straight into disaster. Hale tells the Donner story with dark humor and care, focusing on the freezing, hunger, and impossible choices that followed.

Treaties, Trenches, Mud, and Blood

by Nathan Hale

2014

World War I comes into focus through alliances, trench warfare, new weapons, and staggering human cost. Hale makes a confusing global conflict easier to follow without losing its mud, fear, and scale.

The Underground Abductor

by Nathan Hale

2015

Born Araminta Ross, Harriet Tubman escapes slavery and then keeps risking her life to lead others to freedom. Hale follows her childhood, escape, and Underground Railroad missions in a tense, accessible biography.

Alamo All-Stars

by Nathan Hale

2017

This book digs into the Texas Revolution, asking who fought at the Alamo and why the battle mattered. Jim Bowie, Davy Crockett, Sam Houston, and Santa Anna all enter a messy, violent fight over Texas.

One Trick Pony

by Nathan Hale

2017

In a ruined future overrun by alien blobs that devour technology, Strata and her brother are cut off from their caravan. Their best chance is a rare robot pony that may be more important than it looks.

Raid of No Return

by Nathan Hale

2017

After Pearl Harbor, American pilots volunteer for the dangerous Doolittle Raid on Japan. Hale tracks the planning, the launch, and the desperate aftermath, including crash landings, capture, and help from Chinese civilians.

Lafayette!

by Nathan Hale

2018

Gilbert du Motier leaves French privilege behind to join the American Revolution as the Marquis de Lafayette. The book follows his rise, his bond with George Washington, and the risks behind his legend.

Apocalypse Taco

by Nathan Hale

2019

A late-night taco run goes very wrong when Axl, Ivan, and Sid bring home food that seems alive. Soon the world around them starts warping, and the trio has to outrun a growing sci-fi nightmare.

Major Impossible

by Nathan Hale

2019

One-armed explorer John Wesley Powell leads ten men and four boats into the Grand Canyon in 1869. What starts as science and adventure turns into a brutal fight against rapids, hunger, and the unknown.

Blades of Freedom

by Nathan Hale

2020

Hale connects the Haitian Revolution to Napoleon and the Louisiana Purchase in one sweeping volume. Leaders like Toussaint Louverture and Jean-Jacques Dessalines drive a story about slavery, revolt, and world-changing consequences.

Cold War Correspondent

by Nathan Hale

2021

Reporter Marguerite Higgins races into the Korean War and fights to stay on the front lines after the Army tries to push her out. It is part war history, part portrait of a stubborn journalist chasing the story.

Let's Make History!

by Nathan Hale

2022

Part activity book and part comics workshop, this companion invites kids to draw, write, research, and build their own history comics. The prompts, puzzles, and mini-lessons make it feel like a hands-on Hazardous Tale.

Above the Trenches

by Nathan Hale

2023

This installment follows the Lafayette Escadrille, American volunteer pilots flying for France in World War I. Hale covers training, aerial combat, and the deadly glamour of the first fighter aces.

Bones and Berserkers

by Nathan Hale

2025

Instead of one long campaign, Hale serves up thirteen eerie tales from American history, folklore, and unexplained terror. Ghosts, omens, legends, and violent real events make this the creepiest entry in the series.

Where should I start?

For the core Hazardous Tales experience: One Dead SpyBig Bad Ironclad!Donner Dinner Party
If you want one unforgettable real-life hero: The Underground AbductorLafayette!
If you like survival and exploration: Donner Dinner PartyMajor ImpossibleAbove the Trenches
If you want his sci-fi side: One Trick PonyApocalypse Taco
If you want something hands-on: Let's Make History!

Author bio

Nathan Hale grew up in Sundance, Utah, the child of ski instructors. His family did not have a TV, so evenings often meant listening to his father read fantasy stories aloud. He has also talked about long hours on ski lifts as a kid, with plenty of time to daydream. That mix of mountain quiet, boredom, and imagination feels like an early version of the books he would later make.

He was drawing from the start.

Hale studied illustration at Cornish College of the Arts in Seattle. His first job after school was painting a display for a dinosaur museum, and that led to years of work in natural history museums. He painted scientific murals and exhibits, sometimes traveling for the job and working inside museum dioramas. That background stayed with him. Even when his books get silly, there is usually a real affection for maps, machinery, animals, costumes, and the little visual facts that make a scene feel lived in.

Comics came a little later. Hale's first major step into graphic novels was illustrating Rapunzel's Revenge, followed by Calamity Jack. Those books showed how well his art could carry motion, jokes, and character at once. They also helped move him toward the kind of work he is now best known for, stories he both writes and draws himself.

That path led to Nathan Hale's Hazardous Tales, the graphic history series that put his name in front of a huge audience of young readers. It begins with One Dead Spy, where the Revolutionary War spy Nathan Hale, the author's historical namesake, becomes a storyteller at the gallows. From there the series jumps across wars, expeditions, uprisings, and disasters. The tone is unusual on purpose: funny, gruesome, curious, and packed with research. The series reached bestseller lists and picked up Eisner nominations, which is not a bad outcome for books that spend so much time with mud, cannon fire, and bad decisions.

He likes history when it behaves like a wild story.

Across the series, Hale keeps returning to people who took enormous risks or got trapped inside events much bigger than themselves. You can see that in Big Bad Ironclad!, with its race to build Civil War warships, The Underground Abductor, with Harriet Tubman's repeated journeys back into danger, and Major Impossible, about John Wesley Powell's brutal trip through the Grand Canyon. Later books like Cold War Correspondent and Above the Trenches keep the same interest alive. Hale is drawn to nerve, chaos, invention, and the part of history that never quite turns neat.

He has never stayed in one lane. Outside the history books, he wrote and illustrated the science fiction graphic novels One Trick Pony and Apocalypse Taco, which swap classrooms and battlefields for aliens, mutant food, and the end of the world. Younger readers may know him from picture books like The Twelve Bots of Christmas and Yellowbelly and Plum Go to School. He also created Let's Make History!, an activity book that turns his love of comics, research, and visual storytelling into prompts and exercises for kids.

Hale lives in Utah with his family. He is also known as an enthusiastic Lego collector, which somehow makes perfect sense. His books have a builder's energy to them. They are carefully put together, but they still leave room for jokes, weirdness, and the occasional glorious mess. That balance is a big part of why readers stick with him. He can make a trench map funny, a robot pony heroic, and a page of real history feel like an invitation rather than homework.

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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