Tom Gabriel Books in Order
Part ofTim Ellis Books in OrderSee the Tom Gabriel books by Tim Ellis in order, with short summaries, series background, and help choosing where to begin this moody PI series.
Last updated: July 4, 2026
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Tom Gabriel books in publication order
5 books
Footprints of the Dead
by Tim Ellis
2012
Retired Tom Gabriel is pulled back into the world when a mother asks him to find her missing daughter, Mercy, an investigative journalist who vanished while looking into missing children. He takes cub reporter Rae with him and starts asking dangerous questions.
Whispers of the Dead
by Tim Ellis
2014
Now licensed as a PI, Tom Gabriel takes on the search for a missing husband and finds that every answer makes less sense than the last. Rae is working a John Doe case of her own and angers people with real power to hide the truth.
Souls of the Dead
by Tim Ellis
2015
Tom Gabriel goes back to Staten Island to find out who killed a bag lady named Horty, only to find a sniper on his trail. At the same time, Rae uncovers clues to a string of abductions stretching back fifty years.
Games of the Dead
by Tim Ellis
2018
Tom Gabriel is asked to explain mysterious Ellis Island postcards, help solve a locked-room disappearance at the St. Augustine Lighthouse, and look into missing children in Colorado. When Rae disappears too, the case becomes painfully personal.
Rage of the Dead
by Tim Ellis
2018
As Rae investigates rising crime in St. Augustine, a caller promises he is going to kill her. Tom takes on an apparent suicide, then finds both of his daughters in terrible danger and has to move fast on several fronts at once.
Tom Gabriel books in chronological order
Footprints of the Dead
by Tim Ellis
2012Tom Gabriel, Book 1
Whispers of the Dead
by Tim Ellis
2014Tom Gabriel, Book 2
Souls of the Dead
by Tim Ellis
2015Tom Gabriel, Book 3
Games of the Dead
by Tim Ellis
2018Tom Gabriel, Book 4
Rage of the Dead
by Tim Ellis
2018Tom Gabriel, Book 5
Series background & context
Tom Gabriel is one of Tim Ellis's more melancholy leads. When the series opens in Footprints of the Dead, Tom thinks he is finished. He is retired, worn down, and still haunted by the death of his wife, Carrie. Then Gretchen Hebb asks him to find her missing daughter, Mercy, an investigative journalist who vanished while looking into missing children. Tom starts asking questions, and just like that, retirement is over.
The series is set mainly in and around St. Augustine, Florida, but it is not rooted to one street or one police station. Tom is a private investigator, and his cases pull him across state lines, into old crimes, locked-room disappearances, journalistic investigations, and family trouble that keeps becoming part of the job. A lot of the stories also give real weight to Rae, the young reporter who first gets pulled into Tom's orbit and soon becomes essential to the books.
This is a PI series, but it is also a family saga.
Tom's daughters, especially Sara and Misty, matter to the emotional shape of the books. Their crises are not side decorations. They change the stakes, complicate Tom's choices, and make the series feel more personal than a standard missing-person mystery. In Rage of the Dead, for example, Tom is not just working a suspicious death. He is also dealing with threats aimed at the people he loves most.
The mood is part of the draw. These books can feel lonely, humid, and slightly haunted even when nothing supernatural is happening. Old houses, coastlines, grave secrets, and people who have spent years hiding what they know all suit Tom's battered voice and tired persistence. Ellis also likes to give him more than one mystery at once, so the books build outward rather than moving in a straight line.
Readers who want neat procedural order may prefer the police series. Tom Gabriel is messier, sadder, and more private. It is about what happens when a man who would like to stop caring discovers he still cannot walk away.
If that sounds like your kind of crime fiction, start with Footprints of the Dead and stay with Tom as the cases, and his personal costs, deepen.
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