John Harvey

Born in December 1938 in Tufnell Park (North London), the prolific British crime fiction writer John Harvey became famous for his jazz-influenced novels Charlie Resnick. He is the author of more than 100 books, which were published under different names, as well as poetry and scripts for TV and radio. During his childhood his father, who was working in the clerical section of Shell Mex, used to take him to a bookshop in Kentish Town, in order to buy copies of Biggles.

The best place to start is the Apache series, the earliest of John Harvey's multi-book series: it opens with The First Death (1974) and runs to 27 books across 1974–1984, ending with Debt of Blood (1984). John Harvey's other series stand alone, so they can be read in any order.

John Harvey has 240 books catalogued in this guide, published between 1974 and 2025. 211 of them belong to 18 named series — the largest being the Apache series with 27 books — and 29 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 Harvey's series do not depend on one another, so they can be started in any order; by start date they are Apache (1974–1984, 27 books), Herne The Hunter (1976–1984, 24 books) and Scott Mitchell (1976–1977, 4 books), plus 13 more.

This guide splits John Harvey's 240 books into 18 named series and 29 titles that stand alone or appear only in collections: Apache (27 books, 1974–1984); Herne The Hunter (24 books, 1976–1984); Hawk (14 books, 1979–1983); Charlie Resnick (12 books, 1989–2014); Gringos (10 books, 1979–1982), plus 13 further series.