Books in series
#1
The Chase
2007
For decades, Clive Cussler has been delighting readers with novels filled with suspense, action, and sheer audacity. Now he does it again, in one of the wildest, most entertaining historical thrillers in years.
April 1950: The rusting hulk of a steam locomotive rises from the deep waters of a Montana lake. Inside is all that remains of three men who died forty-four years before. But it is not the engine or its grisly contents that interest the people watching nearby. It is what is about to come next . . .
1906: For two years, the western states of America have been suffering an extraordinary crime spree: a string of bank robberies by a single man who cold- bloodedly murders any and all witnesses and then vanishes without a trace. Fed up by the depredations of the "Butcher Bandit," the U.S. government brings in the best man they can find-a tall, lean, no-nonsense detective named Isaac Bell, who has caught thieves and killers coast to coast. But Bell has never had a challenge like this one. From Arizona to Colorado to the streets of San Francisco during its calamitous earthquake and fire, he pursues what is quickly becoming clear to him is the sharpest criminal mind he has ever encountered, and the woman who seems to hold the key to the bandit's identity.
Using science, deduction, and intuition, Bell repeatedly draws near only to grasp at thin air, but at least he knows his pursuit is having an effect. Because his quarry is getting angry now, and has turned the chase back on him. The hunter has become the hunted. And soon it will take all of Isaac Bell's skills not merely to prevail . . . but to survive.
#2
The Wrecker
2009
It is 1907, a year of financial panic and labor unrest. Train wrecks, fires, and explosions sabotage the Southern Pacific Railroad's Cascades express line and, desperate, the railroad hires the fabled Van Dorn Detective Agency. Van Dorn sends in his best man, and Bell quickly discovers that a mysterious saboteur haunts the hobo jungles of the West, a man known as the Wrecker, who recruits accomplices from the down-and-out to attack the railroad, and then kills them afterward. The Wrecker traverses the vast spaces of the American West as if he had wings, striking wherever he pleases, causing untold damage and loss of human life. Who is he? What does he want? Is he a striker? An anarchist? A revolutionary determined to displace the 'privileged few'? A criminal mastermind engineering some as yet unexplained scheme?Whoever he is, whatever his motives, the Wrecker knows how to create maximum havoc, and Bell senses that he is far from done; that, in fact, the Wrecker is building up to a grand act unlike anything he has committed before. If Bell doesn't stop him in time, more than a railroad could be at risk; it could be the future of the entire country.
Filled with intricate plotting and dazzling set pieces, The Wrecker is one of the most entertaining thrillers in years.
#3
The Spy
2010
Detective Isaac Bell, hero of The Chase and The Wrecker, returns in the remarkable new adventure from the #1 New York Times-bestselling author.
It is 1908, and international tensions are mounting as the world plunges toward war. When a brilliant American battleship gun designer dies in a sensational apparent suicide, the man's grief-stricken daughter turns to the legendary Van Dorn Detective Agency to clear her father's name. Van Dorn puts his chief investigator on the case, and Isaac Bell soon realizes that the clues point not to suicide but to murder. And when more suspicious deaths follow, it becomes clear that someone-an elusive spy-is orchestrating the destruction of America's brightest technological minds... and the murders all connect to a top- secret project called Hull 44.
But that is just the beginning. As the intrigue deepens, Bell will find himself pitted against German, Japanese, and British spies, in a mission that encompasses dreadnought battleships, Teddy Roosevelt's Great White Fleet, Chinatown, Hell's Kitchen, and the Brooklyn Navy Yard. Isaac Bell has certainly faced perilous situations before, but this time it is more than the future of his country that's at stake- it's the fate of the world.
#4
The Race
2011
It is 1910, the age of flying machines is still in its infancy, and newspaper publisher Preston Whiteway is offering $50,000 for the first daring aviator to cross America in less than fifty days. He is even sponsoring one of the prime candidates-an intrepid woman named Josephine Frost-and that's where Bell, chief investigator for the Van Dorn Detective Agency, comes in.
Frost's violent-tempered husband has just killed her lover and tried to kill her, and he is bound to make another attempt. Bell has tangled with Harry Frost before; he knows that the man has made his millions leading gangs of thieves, murderers, and thugs in every city across the country. He also knows that Frost won't be only after his wife, but after Whiteway as well. And if Bell takes the case...Frost will be after him, too.
#5
The Thief
2012
On the ocean liner Mauretania, two European scientists with a dramatic new invention are barely rescued from abduction by the Van Dorn Detective Agency's intrepid chief investigator, Isaac Bell. Unfortunately, they are not so lucky the second time. The thugs attack again-and this time one of the scientists dies. What are they holding that is so precious? Only something that will revolutionize business and popular culture-and perhaps something more.
For war clouds are looming, and a ruthless espionage agent has spotted a priceless opportunity to give the Germans an edge. It is up to Isaac Bell to figure out who he is, what he is up to, and stop him. But he may already be too late . . . and the future of the world may just hang in the balance.
#6
The Striker
2013
Detective Isaac Bell returns in the remarkable new adventure in the #1 New York Times–bestselling series.
It is 1902, and a bright, inexperienced young man named Isaac Bell, only two years out of his apprenticeship at the Van Dorn Detective Agency, has an urgent message for his boss. Hired to hunt for radical unionist saboteurs in the coal mines, he is witness to a terrible accident that makes him think that something else is going on, that provocateurs are at work and bigger stakes are in play.
Little does he know just how big they are. Given exactly one week to prove his case, Bell quickly finds himself pitted against two of the most ruthless opponents he has ever known, men of staggering ambition and cold-bloodedness . . . who are not about to let some wet-behind-the-ears detective stand in their way.
#7
The Bootlegger
2014
When Detective Isaac Bell's mentor is shot, the turn-of-the-century investigator traces the attack from a booze-smuggling operation back to a team of international saboteurs in this #1 New York Times– bestselling series.
It is 1920, and both Prohibition and bootlegging are in full swing. When Isaac Bell’s boss and lifelong friend Joseph Van Dorn is shot and nearly killed while leading the high-speed chase of a rum-running vessel, Bell swears to him that he will hunt down the men responsible. But Bell doesn’t know what he is getting into. When a witness to Van Dorn’s shooting is executed in a ruthlessly efficient manner invented by the Russian secret police, it becomes clear that these are no ordinary criminals.
In a trail that leads from the ravages of post-World-War-I Europe to the speakeasies of New York, to the lawless streets of Detroit and Florida’s lavish beachside resorts, Isaac tracks the footsteps of a enterprise more ingenious and far-reaching than any he has ever known. For this is no mere bootlegging operation, but a powerful international organization with the very downfall of America in its sights . . .
#8
The Assassin
2015
Detective Isaac Bell tracks a killer across the nation’s oilfields in this adventure in the #1 New York Times–bestselling historical series.
As Van Dorn private detective Isaac Bell strives to land a government contract to investigate John D. Rockefeller’s Standard Oil monopoly, the case takes a deadly turn. A sniper begins murdering opponents of Standard Oil, and soon the assassin—shooting with extraordinary accuracy at seemingly impossible long range—kills Bell’s best witness. Then the shooter detonates a terrible explosion that sets the victim’s independent refinery ablaze.
Bell summons his best detectives to hunt down the mysterious killer. But the murders—shootings, poisonings, staged accidents—have just begun as Bell tracks his phantom-like criminal adversary from the “oil fever” regions of Kansas and Texas to Washington, D.C., to the tycoons’ enclave of New York, to Russia’s war-torn Baku oil fields on the Caspian Sea, and back to America for a final, desperate confrontation. And this one will be the most explosive of all.
#9
The Gangster
2016
Isaac Bell is back in this thrilling new novel from the #1 New York Times–bestselling grand master of adventure Clive Cussler.
It is 1906, and in New York City, the Italian crime group known as the Black Hand is on a spree: kidnapping, extortion, arson. Detective Isaac Bell of the Van Dorn Agency is hired to form a special “Black Hand Squad,” but the gangsters appear to be everywhere—so much so that Bell begins to wonder if there are imitators, criminals using the name for the terror effect. And then the murders begin, each one of a man more powerful than the last, and as Bell discovers, to his dismay, the ultimate target may be the most powerful man of all.
#10
The Cutthroat
2017
Isaac Bell may be on the hunt for the greatest monster of all time in the newest action-adventure novel from the #1 "New York Times" bestselling author.
The year is 1911. Chief Investigator Isaac Bell of the Van Dorn Detective Agency has had many extraordinary cases before. But none quite like this.Hired to find a young woman named Anna Pape who ran away from home to become an actress, Bell gets a shock when her murdered body turns up instead. Vowing to bring the killer to justice, he begins a manhunt which leads him into increasingly more alarming territory. Anna Pape was not alone in her fate petite young blond women like Anna are being murdered in cities across America.
And the pattern goes beyond the physical resemblance of the victims there are disturbing familiarities about the killings themselves that send a chill through even a man as experienced with evil as Bell. If he is right about his fears, then he is on the trail of one of the greatest monsters of his time."
#11
The Titanic Secret
2019
Both a prequel and a sequel to Clive Cussler's first bestselling phenomenon, Raise the Titanic!, the new Isaac Bell novel is a thrilling action-adventure novel from the #1 New York Times-bestselling author.
A century apart, Dirk Pitt and Isaac Bell team up to unlock the truth about the most famous maritime disaster of all time.In the present day, Dirk Pitt is must make a daring rescue from inside an antiquated submersible in the waters around New York City. His reward afterwards is a document left behind a century earlier by legendary detective Isaac Bell—a document that re-opens a historical mystery...
In 1911 Colorado, Isaac Bell is asked to look into an unexplained tragedy at Little Angel Mine, a disaster in which nine people died. His dangerous quest to answer that riddle leads to a larger one centered on a rare element with extraordinary powers and of virtually incalculable value. As he discovers that there are people who will do anything to control the substance, Isaac Bell will find out how far he'll go to stop them.
#12
The Saboteurs
2021
Isaac Bell returns for another thrilling mission in a new book from the Grand Master of Adventure, Clive Cussler
Detective Isaac Bell's wife has said that he is always in the wrong place at the right time. This is certainly the case when Bell thwarts the attempted assassination of a United States Senator shortly after meeting the man. This heroic rescue is just the start of the mystery for Bell, who suspects that the would-be assassins have a much larger and more dangerous agenda—one involving the nearly constructed Panama Canal. While the Senator supports the building of the canal, there are many, including a local Panamanian insurgency known as the Red Vipers, who never want to see the its completion.
With millions of dollars and the fates of two nations at stake, Bell heads to Panama to find answers. After a deadly bombing at the Canal's construction site, he is determined to stop the insurgents—or whoever is funding them—before they can attack again.
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#13
The Sea Wolves
2022
An old nemesis. A secret technology. The outcome of a Great War at stake...
Summer, 1914. As New England swelters, Detective Isaac Bell is asked to investigate a cache of missing rifles. But whoever broke into this Winchester factory wasn't looking to take weapons - they wanted to leave something in the shipping crates: a radio transmitter, set to summon a fleet of dreaded German U-boats to their location in the seas.
This means only one thing: someone is trying to keep American supplies from reaching British shores. If Bell doesn't crack the conspiracy in time, the Atlantic Ocean will run red with blood.
With the outcome of the war in the balance and Franklin Roosevelt's orders on the line, Bell must confront an old enemy, and hunt down a new piece of technology that is allowing the Germans to rule the seas from New York to England. In the high-stakes, high seas pursuit of explosive suspense, Bell will risk everything to stop the U-boats, before they strike again...
#14
The Heist
2024
Detective Isaac Bell faces an attack on the Federal Reserve in an all-new adventure in the #1 New York Times bestselling series from Clive Cussler.
In the summer of 1914, Isaac Bell attends a private meeting on Woodrow Wilson's presidential yacht, as Wilson addresses the newly launched regional Federal Reserve banks. Bell is present as a security agent with his father, who will be the head banker of the Boston region. Just after Wilson introduces a plan for new currency notes, the yacht comes under attack from a bi-wing airplane. Bell shoots down the plane with a machine gun and saves everyone aboard.
But the attack on the yacht was only the first of Bell's problems. While responding to a curious murder scene in Rhode Island, he learns of a heist planned for the new federal printing and engraving building in D.C., where the new currency has been printed. Bell must track down the thieves and the currency before the new Federal Reserve system—and America's economy—is destroyed.
Authors
Clive Cussler
Author · 97 books
Cussler began writing novels in 1965 and published his first work featuring his continuous series hero, Dirk Pitt, in 1973. His first non-fiction, The Sea Hunters, was released in 1996. The Board of Governors of the Maritime College, State University of New York, considered The Sea Hunters in lieu of a Ph.D. thesis and awarded Cussler a Doctor of Letters degree in May, 1997. It was the first time since the College was founded in 1874 that such a degree was bestowed. Cussler was an internationally recognized authority on shipwrecks and the founder of the National Underwater and Marine Agency, (NUMA) a 501C3 non-profit organization (named after the fictional Federal agency in his novels) that dedicates itself to preserving American maritime and naval history. He and his crew of marine experts and NUMA volunteers discovered more than 60 historically significant underwater wreck sites including the first submarine to sink a ship in battle, the Confederacy's Hunley, and its victim, the Union's Housatonic; the U-20, the U-boat that sank the Lusitania; the Cumberland, which was sunk by the famous ironclad, Merrimack; the renowned Confederate raider Florida; the Navy airship, Akron, the Republic of Texas Navy warship, Zavala, found under a parking lot in Galveston, and the Carpathia, which sank almost six years to-the-day after plucking Titanic's survivors from the sea. In addition to being the Chairman of NUMA, Cussler was also a fellow in both the Explorers Club of New York and the Royal Geographic Society in London. He was honored with the Lowell Thomas Award for outstanding underwater exploration. Cussler's books have been published in more than 40 languages in more than 100 countries. His past international bestsellers include Pacific Vortex, Mediterranean Caper, Iceberg, Raise the Titanic, Vixen 03, Night Probe, Deep Six, Cyclops, Treasure, Dragon, Sahara, Inca Gold, Shock Wave, Flood Tide, Atlantis Found, Valhalla Rising, Trojan Odyssey and Black Wind (this last with his son, Dirk Cussler); the nonfiction books The Sea Hunters, The Sea Hunters II and Clive Cussler and Dirk Pitt Revealed; the NUMA® Files novels Serpent, Blue Gold, Fire Ice, White Death and Lost City (written with Paul Kemprecos); and the Oregon Files novels Sacred Stone and Golden Buddha (written with Craig Dirgo) and Dark Watch (written with Jack Du Brul). Clive Cussler died at his home in Scottsdale, Arizona on February 24, 2020.
