Tracy Gardner Books in Order

Tracy Gardner grew up in the Detroit area as the daughter of two teachers, in a household where books, learning, and imagination had a natural place. She is a mother of three, and her Michigan roots show up in the lakeshore towns, local businesses, and close family circles that appear throughout much of her fiction.

Writing started early. Gardner has described making up stories about cats and bunnies in elementary school, then moving on to poems and song lyrics as a teenager. The habit stuck, even when writing had to fit around work, family, and the usual messiness of life.

Her day job has given her a very different kind of window into people. A registered nurse, Gardner began her career in Detroit hospital units before moving into visiting and home-health nursing. That work requires patience, sharp observation, and the ability to walk into a new situation ready to listen, all useful skills for a writer building a mystery.

She kept making room for the page.

In her forties, Gardner wrote a manuscript that she has said became a form of therapy. She also wrote through plenty of second-guessing, the kind that makes every line of dialogue feel suspect. But she kept going, and that persistence led to the mystery novels now published under her own name.

Her 2019 novel Out of the Picture introduced Savanna Shepherd, a former art authenticator who returns to her Lake Michigan hometown after a difficult breakup. The Shepherd Sisters books follow Savanna, her sisters Skylar and Sydney, and their knack for finding trouble around Carson. Art, community events, dogs, family loyalties, and slow-building romance all have a place alongside the crimes.

Gardner also created the Avery Ayers Antique Mystery series, beginning with Ruby Red Herring. Avery runs an antiques appraisal business, so rare gems, paintings, old objects, and questions of authenticity are never merely decorative. Ruby Red Herring was selected for a New York Public Library Best 100 Books list and became a finalist for the 2022 Mary Higgins Clark Award.

Art, family, and a good dog are never far away.

Alongside her mysteries, Gardner writes women's and book-club fiction as Jess Sinclair. Her debut under that name, What We Could Have Been, follows a woman returning to a Florida fishing town and trying to repair old relationships. The novel won 2024 Storytrade Awards in the Women's Fiction and USA Southeast Fiction categories, showing another side of Gardner's interest in friendship, homecomings, and people figuring out what comes next.

Gardner lives with her husband, rescue dogs, and rescue cats, and keeps one foot in Michigan and another near Florida's Gulf Coast. She has also made her preferences clear: live music, baked goods, and dependable girlfriends make life better. Her books tend to agree.