The Housewife Assassin Books in Order
Part ofJosie Brown Books in OrderExplore The Housewife Assassin series by Josie Brown, with the books in order, short summaries, series background, and easy where-to-start guidance.
Last updated: June 10, 2026
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Publication Order
26 books
The Housewife Assassin's Handbook
by Josie Brown
2011
Donna Stone looks like a Southern California widow with three children, but after her husband's death she is recruited into black ops. Soon she is juggling carpool, suburban gossip, and a deadly hunt tied to his secret life.
The Housewife Assassin's Guide to Gracious Killing
by Josie Brown
2012
Donna and Jack land in the middle of a nuclear arms summit where someone wants the Russian president dead. Saving a target she does not trust gets messy fast, especially with Carl's betrayal still burning.
The Housewife Assassin's Killer Christmas Tips
by Josie Brown
2012
Christmas cheer is in short supply when Donna and Jack chase a missing cache of heat-seeking missiles. Holiday chaos, family obligations, and a terrorist plot make this a very dangerous season in Hilldale.
The Housewife Assassin's Recipes for Disaster
by Josie Brown
2013
Donna must stop assassination attempts on both parties' top presidential candidates, even though she has every reason to hate one of them. Politics, old grudges, and danger at close range put her bond with Jack to the test.
The Housewife Assassin's Relationship Survival Guide
by Josie Brown
2013
Donna's new mission sends her across London, Paris, and Guantanamo as she dates dangerous men tied to the Quorum. The job might save lives, but it also puts her heart and her future with Jack under pressure.
The Housewife Assassin's Vacation to Die for
by Josie Brown
2013
What should be a getaway turns into a nightmare when Donna and Jack hunt a missing scientist carrying a deadly plague virus. Fantasy island resorts, strange murders, and feral kids make survival anything but relaxing.
The Housewife Assassin's Hollywood Scream Play
by Josie Brown
2014
When Hollywood wants to turn Donna's life into a movie, she and Jack use the production as cover for a mission against the Quorum. Fame, stunts, and dangerous co-stars turn the set into another war zone.
The Housewife Assassin's Hostage Hosting Tips
by Josie Brown
2014
A hotel full of international dignitaries becomes a trap when terrorists take hostages and make demands that hit Donna personally. She has to save the room, the mission, and the people she loves.
The Housewife Assassin's Killer App
by Josie Brown
2014
Donna goes undercover in the tech world to expose a hacker tearing through top-secret intelligence files. Smart devices, greedy CEOs, and a deadly game avatar make this mission feel uncomfortably close to home.
The Housewife Assassin's Tips for Weddings, Weapons, and Warfare
by Josie Brown
2015
Donna and Jack are trying to get married while tracking a terrorist inside the White House. Exchanging vows is hard enough without gunfire, sabotage, and the Quorum crashing the party.
The Housewife Assassin's Deadly Dossier
by Josie Brown
2016
This prequel shifts the spotlight to Jack Craig as he investigates Carl Stone's death and starts falling for Donna. It fills in how Donna was pulled into Acme, and how her life changed forever.
The Housewife Assassin's Garden of Deadly Delights
by Josie Brown
2016
A genetically altered corn crop carrying a brain-eating virus has slipped into the American food chain. Donna's latest case mixes bio-terror, suburban satire, and a race to stop mass panic.
The Housewife Assassin's Ghost Protocol
by Josie Brown
2016
Evidence makes it look as if Donna's own black-ops group is tied to a string of planned attacks, and the president shuts Acme down. Donna and Jack disappear underground to find the real traitors before the country pays the price.
The Housewife Assassin's Husband Hunting Hints
by Josie Brown
2016
To save Jack from torture and execution, Donna agrees to pose as a traitor and work as a double agent for the Quorum. The gamble could save her husband, but it may destroy everything else.
The Housewife Assassin's Terrorist TV Guide
by Josie Brown
2016
Donna and Jack join a reality show in Hilldale to hunt a sleeper threat hiding in plain sight. Being filmed around the clock would be bad enough without murder, family stress, and terrorism in the mix.
The Housewife Assassin's Greatest Hits
by Josie Brown
2017
Donna's life hangs by a thread, and in a coma she faces the ghosts of people she loved, lost, and killed. The result is part reckoning, part dark adventure, and deeply personal for the whole series.
The Housewife Assassin Gets Lucky
by Josie Brown
2018
A dead young woman in a London club throws Lucky O'Toole and Donna Stone Craig into the same investigation. To solve the murder and decode missing intel, the two sharp operators have to learn to trust each other fast.
The Housewife Assassin's Fourth Estate Sale
by Josie Brown
2018
Donna and Jack infiltrate a giant media company to stop a foreign effort to sabotage the American president and manipulate U.S. politics. Newsrooms, broadcasts, and propaganda become weapons.
The Housewife Assassin's Horrorscope
by Josie Brown
2018
Twelve suspects, twelve zodiac signs, and a doomsday plot point Donna and Jack toward a possible world war. To stop it, the Acme team must decode a trail of clues before treason reaches the highest levels.
The Housewife Assassin's Assassination Vacation Planner
by Josie Brown
2020
Donna and Jack race across the globe to prevent the murders of seven world leaders. It is a fast-moving international mission with almost no time, and plenty of ways for everything to go very wrong.
The Housewife Assassin's White House Keeping Seal of Approval
by Josie Brown
2020
Now serving as a senior White House security adviser, Donna hunts a foreign saboteur embedded close to power. Clearing Jack's name means stopping election interference before it reshapes the country.
The Housewife Assassin's Antisocial Media Tips
by Josie Brown
2022
Donna and Jack go undercover as instant internet celebrities at a live-streamed influencer junket. Their job is to expose who is leaking U.S. secrets before the whole spectacle turns into a terrorist target.
The Housewife Assassin's Manners, Missiles, and Mayhem
by Josie Brown
2022
Donna, Jack, and the Acme team crisscross the country to stop embedded Russian operatives from sabotaging the U.S. missile grid. It is a road-trip thriller with spy games, rising tension, and very little room for error.
The Housewife Assassin's Deep State Deep Fake Bake-Off
by Josie Brown
2024
Thanksgiving turns chaotic when a terrorist attack weaponizes cell phones and turns air travel into a disaster zone. Donna and Jack's crowded holiday gathering becomes the center of an international emergency.
The Housewife Assassin's Underwater Assets
by Josie Brown
2024
Donna and Jack finally get a vacation, then promptly find a corpse and a plot to concentrate the world's wealth under one powerful consortium. Sun, surf, and murder make a bad combination.
The Housewife Assassin's Doomsday Diary
by Josie Brown
2025
Donna goes deep undercover to stop Russian operatives embedded in Congress and the White House from killing presidential candidates and crashing the global economy. Even success may trigger something worse.
Series background & context
The Housewife Assassin series starts with a deliciously simple idea, what if the woman handling carpool, nosy neighbors, and suburban expectations was also the deadliest person in the room. Brown builds the books around Donna Stone, a mother whose ordinary-looking life in Hilldale hides a very dangerous second profession.
That split life is the whole game.
Donna's world is full of school events, neighborhood politics, family strain, and the kind of social performance that thrives in wealthy Southern California enclaves. Brown uses that polished backdrop well. The domestic scenes are not filler. They are part of the fun, because Donna is always moving between PTA-level nonsense and genuinely high-stakes covert work.
The ongoing story turns on secrets, especially the ones left behind by Carl Stone, Donna's husband, whose death and hidden life set everything in motion. Jack Craig becomes Donna's partner in every sense, mission leader, fellow operative, and eventually the person she trusts most when trust is usually a bad bet. Around them is Acme, a black-ops outfit full of capable allies, and Quorum, the recurring enemy that keeps pushing the series toward bigger and more personal showdowns.
The books are busy with action, but they are also very invested in family.
Donna's children are not pushed to the edges of the story. They grow older, ask harder questions, and make Donna's choices feel heavier. One of the pleasures of reading the series in order is watching how the family changes while the missions get stranger, riskier, and more politically charged.
Brown's tone is a big part of the appeal. These novels mix spy thriller momentum with romantic suspense and a strong streak of satire. Media freak-outs, election meddling, tech paranoia, reality television, and public hypocrisy all become fuel for the plots. The books know the modern world is absurd, and they make good use of that.
Still, the series is not only a joke machine. Underneath the wisecracks are stories about betrayal, recovery, loyalty, and building a new life after the old one blows apart. Donna is funny, but she is also tired, stubborn, protective, and capable of real hurt.
If that sounds like your kind of combination, this series delivers. Expect dangerous missions, sharp reversals, and a heroine who can host a party, read a room, and neutralize a threat, sometimes in that order.
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