John Gardner

John Gardner was one of the highly reputed authors from The United Kingdom, who liked to write crime fiction, mystery, and thriller novels. He is particularly well known for taking over the Jame Bond series after the death of its creator, Ian Fleming. He made numerous contributions to the series and is considered as the prolific author among all those who have worked on this series.

The best place to start is the Boysie Oakes series, the earliest of John Gardner's multi-book series: it opens with The Liquidator (1964) and runs to 11 books across 1964–1975, ending with A Killer for a Song (1975). John Gardner's other series stand alone, so they can be read in any order.

John Gardner has 78 books catalogued in this guide, published between 1964 and 2022. 63 of them belong to 7 named series — the largest being the Boysie Oakes series with 11 books — and 15 are standalone titles, collections or anthologies.

Read each series in publication order — the numbered entries in each series follow the year each book first appeared. John Gardner's series do not depend on one another, so they can be started in any order; by start date they are Boysie Oakes (1964–1975, 11 books), Derek Torry (1969–1976, 2 books) and Professor Moriarty (1974–2008, 3 books), plus 3 more.

This guide splits John Gardner's 78 books into 7 named series and 15 titles that stand alone or appear only in collections: Boysie Oakes (11 books, 1964–1975); Detective Sergeant Suzie Mountford (5 books, 2002–2007); Herbie Kruger (5 books, 1979–1995); Professor Moriarty (3 books, 1974–2008); Railton Family (3 books, 1985–1989), plus 2 further series.