World War I Books in Order

Anne Perry's World War I series follows the Reavley family from the assassination at Sarajevo in 1914 through the Armistice in November 1918. There is one book for each year of the war, and each combines a mystery plot with the strain that war places on families, friendships, faith, and ordinary decency.

The Reavleys are scattered across the conflict.

Joseph Reavley is an Anglican clergyman who becomes an army chaplain in Flanders. He tries to offer comfort in the trenches while facing the daily reality of injury, grief, and fear. His sister Hannah remains tied to the naval world through her husband, while their brother Matthew works in intelligence and cannot safely share what he knows. Their younger sister Judith drives ambulances on the Western Front.

The series begins in No Graves As Yet, when the siblings' parents die in what appears to be an accident but may be linked to a dangerous political secret. That mystery becomes an ongoing thread. As Europe enters war, the Reavleys keep uncovering crimes involving espionage, sabotage, betrayal, and the people who profit from chaos.

The settings shift between Britain, France, Belgium, military hospitals, ships, intelligence offices, and the front lines. Perry does not treat the war as a backdrop for uncomplicated heroics. The books are concerned with exhaustion, propaganda, shell shock, class divisions, loss, and the awkward moral compromises made in the name of victory.

Even so, they are not only bleak. The Reavleys keep finding small reasons to help one another and strangers, whether that means protecting a vulnerable person, pursuing justice, or simply refusing to become numb. Joseph's struggle to hold on to faith gives the series a quiet emotional through line.

Read the five novels in order: No Graves As Yet, Shoulder the Sky, Angels in the Gloom, At Some Disputed Barricade, and We Shall Not Sleep. The central mystery and the family's wartime lives build steadily across all five books.