Claire Watkins Books In Order

Publication Order of Claire Watkins Books

The “Claire Watkins” series by Mary Logue is from the thriller and mystery genres. The books began publication in the year 1999, when “Blood Country” was released.

The series stars a deputy sheriff for the Pepin County Police Department named Claire Watkins. She was once a police detective in the Twin Cities after her husband, Steve (was also a cop) was murdered. She left with Meg (her ten year old daughter) after he was killed, and moved to a tiny town called St. Antoine.

“Dark Coulee” won a Minnesota Book Award in the year 2000. While “Bone Harvest” won a Wisconsin Library Association Literary Honor in the year 2005. “Poison Heart” was nominated for a Minnesota Book Award in the year 2006.

“Blood Country” is the first novel in the “Claire Watkins” series, which was released in the year 1999. Landers Anderson is an elderly man and a neighbor as well as a friend to Claire and Meg. He dies of a heart attack after he got sideswiped with a shovel, and Claire is determined to find the culprit. This includes diving into Landers’ family history as well as investigating the inner workings of Homeowners of America (a right wing group) that is buying a lot of property to construct a development that is environmentally not sound.

At the same time this is going on, Meg admits that she saw the guy that killed Steve. She gets in contact with her old partner, Detective Bruce Jacobs, getting him into speeding up the investigation to find Steve’s killer.

Fans of the novel enjoyed this stellar mystery. The author was even able to keep the killer a secret. The characters were well drawn and vivid. Some were hooked on the book, even if they were able to figure out who the killer was by the midway point.

“Dark Coulee” is the second novel in the “Claire Watkins” series, which was released in the year 2000. Despite recurring panic attacks that are associated with Steve’s death, Claire is close to finding the security and peace that she has been looking for her and Meg (her ten year old daughter), after leaving her career at the St. Paul-Minneapolis police department to work in the tiny town of St. Antoine.

One summer night, while Bridget (Claire’s sister) is watching Meg, Claire and Rich Haggard (who is a local peasant farmer) go to a street dance in Little Rock. Right when the fun starts, screams for help put a stop to the music and put a hold on romance. Someone stabbed Jed Spitzler, a well liked farmer, in the chest. Members of the close-knit town of St. Antoine join Jed’s kids in finding his killer. Long held secrets of the town become revealed as Claire looks for the truth and keeps struggling with her personal demons.

This series combines excellent writing, solid stories, strong secondary characters, and a strong yet vulnerable protagonist to make superb reads.

“Glare Ice” is the third novel in the “Claire Watkins” series, which was released in the year 2001. Claire Watkins is still getting used to life in small Fort St. Antoine. She notices the bruises and stiff gait of Stephanie Klaus, a local woman. Either big city or small town, Claire recognizes abuse when she sees it.

Stephanie is not talking, though. Not even when Buck, her current boyfriend, gets tied into his car and taken out to Lake Pepin and left to drown. Stephanie tries to leave St. Antoine with Snooper (Buck’s wonderful dog), she gets beaten once again. She barely survives the attack. Yet, she still is not identifying her attacker.

Fans of the novel found this to be one of those books that is able to grab you from the start and keep you until you have finished it. Mary Logue is someone that is an ace at penning mystery novels.

“Bone Harvest” is the fourth novel in the “Claire Watkins” series, which was released in the year 2004. Some dangerous pesticides gets stolen from the town co-op, and Claire is called in to investigate the matter. The thief left an odd clue behind: a finger bone from a child that has been long dead. The pesticides make a devastating reappearance: in animal feed, flowerbeds, and at a Fourth of July picnic in a lethal concoction.

Every time, there is a small human bone left at each crime scene. With Harold Peabody (who is the quirky and the aging editor of the Durand Daily), Claire finds the secrets from the past. It leads her to two young lovers, an obsessive recluse, a man enraged after his mother died, and a deputy who found the Schuler family’s corpses. Claire hurries to find the killer before he can use this lethal pesticide once more. He will not be stopped. Not until he is able to get what he wants.

The novel creates full and human characters while having prose that is true throughout.

“Poison Heart” is the fifth novel in the “Claire Watkins” series, which was released in the year 2005. Patty Jo Tilde, a gambling addict and gold digger, married a widower twenty years older than her. She hopes to inherit her husband’s property, and then sell it to a guy named Daniel Reiner. He is buying up a lot of the property in town. Then she will leave the countryside behind her. The only issue, her husband has to die, first.

Claire dives deeper into this mystery, and thinks she has found an awful history of lies, arson, poison, and deceit. Her biggest issue is she has to prove it, and she finds out about what happened to the last guy that Patty Jo married.

Fans found this to be one of those books that is able to grab you from the start and keep you until you have finished it. Mary Logue is someone that is an ace at penning mystery novels. The fun in this one is rooting for Deputy Watkins as she resourcefully proves that Patty is the killer.