Share


Add your comments

Add to this list, contribute an article about this series, or start documenting another series ...



Official Website: www.johnsandford.org


More by John Sandford:

Lucas Davenport (Prey) series

Kidd and LuEllen series

Search Festivale for more work by this author.


Books at Festivale

The Bookroom for recent reviews

Series Series (essays and reading orders)

Buy books online


Authors at Festivale

Authors answer the Usual Questions (interview project)

Author Index (interviews and features)

Series Series (essays and reading orders)

What's new in Festivale



space


space

Author's Official Website:

Official Website: www.johnsandford.org


More by John Sandford:

Lucas Davenport (Prey) series

Kidd and LuEllen series



Crime Series:

Susan Wittig Albert's China Bayles

Lawrence Block's Bernie Rhodenbarr (Burglar)

Lawrence Block's Matt Scudder

Lilian Jackson Braun's Qwilleran and Koko (Cat Who)

Lee Child's Jack Reacher

Janet Evanovich's Stephanie Plum

Janet Evanovich's Alex Barnaby

Janet Evanovich & Lee Goldberg's O'Hare/Fox series

Sue Grafton's Kinsey Milhone

Kerry Greenwood's Phryne Fisher

Kerry Greenwood's Corinna Chapman

Wendy Hornsby's Maggie MacGowen

Tanya Huff's Vicki Nelson (Blood)

Val McDermid's Kate Brannigan

Shane Maloney's Murray Whelan

Sara Paretsky's V. I. Warshawski

J D Robb's Eve Dallas and Roarke

Dorothy Sayers'Lord Peter Wimsey

Michael W. Sherer's Blake Sanders

Zoe Sharp's Charlie Fox

John Sandford's Lucas Davenport

John Sandford's Virgil Flowers

John Sandford's Kidd & LuEllen


Fantasy/Science Fiction series:

Douglas Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series

Isaac Asimov's Foundation and Robots series

Mary Janice Davidson's Undead series

Anne McCaffrey's Dragonrider series

Anne McCaffrey's Crystal Singer series

Anne McCaffrey's Brain Ships series

Anne McCaffrey's Talents (psychic, rowan, tower) series

Anne McCaffrey's Petaybee series

Anne McCaffrey's Freedom series

Anne McCaffrey's Acorna series

George R. R. Martin's Game of Thrones and more

Tanya Huff's Vicki Nelson (Blood Lines)

Tanya Huff's Confederation

Terry Pratchett's Discworld series

Spider Robinson's Callahan and Stardance series

Roger Zelazny's Amber Series



space

Buy from Amazon, help us fund the site

See also John Sandford's Lucas Davenport page; 160x480

John Sandford (John Camp)

The Detective with the Rock and Roll T Shirts -- Virgil Flowers

A member of Lucas Davenport's team in the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension (BCA), Virgil Flowers is a Minnesota detective whose uniform includes esoteric t-shirts of varying vintage. He's a bright investigator lured to the BCA with a promise only to be given the hardest cases who's just as likely to be working with a boat on a trailer dragging behind his vehicle.

Virgil has a problem with women -- he likes them and tends to fall and love and marry them. Before this series starts he has already been through three marriages, and isn't quite free of finding the ex-wives attractive.

"Virgil was a social guy. So social he'd been married three times over a short space of years, until he finally gave it up. He didn't plan to resume until he'd grown old enough to distinguish love from infatuation. He felt he was making progress, but he'd thought that the other three times, too."

He has a semi-lucrative sideline writing for outdoor magazines, hence his tendency to travel with a boat and a camera. He can't quite fit everything into his busy schedule and sometimes has to do a little "undertime". He also thinks best on water and has been ordered out onto his boat by Lucas Davenport in order to sort things through.

"The thing about Flowers was, in Lucas's humble opinion, you could send him out for a loaf of bread and he'd find an illegal bread cartel smuggling in heroin-saturated wheat from Afghanistan. Either that or he'd be fishing in a muskie tournament, on government time. You had to keep an eye on him."

To read all the books in sequence, it's best to start with the Lucas Davenport stories, otherwise these books constitute a spoiler. Virgil is first mentioned in the Davenport novel Invisible Prey and as noted below appears in such novels as Storm Prey .

Summary:

This is the Virgil Flowers summary, we recommend that you use the Lucas Davenport reading order as they intertwine. All stories take place in the Kidd and LuEllen world. Completists should begin with them.

Dark of the Moon

Heat Lightning

Rough Country

Bad Blood

Storm Prey (appearance)

Shock Wave

Stolen Prey (appearance)

Mad River

Storm Front

Deadline

Escape Clause

Deep Freeze

Holy Ghost

Bloody Genius



Book cover, Dark of the Moon, John Sandford; 81x139
Dark of the Moon, John Sandford (John Camp)

Dark of the Moon

Virgil heads to investigate the death of an elderly couple when he comes upon a firey scene and becomes involved in the death of local businessman-of-ill-repute, Bill Judd. Virgil is a trouble-shooter, called in to investigate the crimes that local sheriffs are not in a position or qualified to handle. Virgil, of course, struggles with his fascination with eligible women and finds time to help the local sheriff's love life along while dealing with small-town politics and shoot outs.

Buy Online Amazon.com Kobo ebooks

Book cover, Heat Lightning, John Sandford; 81x139
Heat Lightning, John Sandford (John Camp)

Heat Lightning

Virgil is called in when an apparent serial killer is working in Minnesota, notably placing a lemon in the mouths of his victims and placing their bodies at war memorials. He is told that this was a trick used in Vietnam to silence execution victims and his investigation leads him to an academic radical with ties to Vietnam and his attractive daughter.

Buy Online Amazon.com Kobo ebooks

Book cover, Broken Prey, John Sandford; 81x139
Broken Prey, John Sandford (John Camp)

Reading Order -- Spoiler Alert

Read Heat Lightning before the Davenport novel Broken Prey, which begins immediately after the resolution of Heat Lightning.


Book cover, Rough Country, John Sandford; 81x139
Rough Country, John Sandford (John Camp)

Rough Country

It's a fishing vacation for Virgil and he's just starting out for a day on the water when Lucas Davenport orders him to a relatively nearby resort for ladies only. Virgil discovers that many of the ladies prefer ladies, although quite a few are not immune to the attractions of the resort's young male staffers. The victim is one of these women -- a wealthy, cut-throat advertising executive about to take over her firm and rout out the dead wood. How can Virgil find the answer when so many people would like to see McGill fall?

Buy Online Amazon.com Kobo ebooks

Book cover, Bad Blood, John Sandford; 81x139
Bad Blood, John Sandford (John Camp)

Bad Blood

Virgil is approached by a sheriff to investigate when a teenage boy apparently murders a local farmer. The pair rapidly find themselves looking at four murders, stemming from the death of a the boy's female friend a year earlier. And the deaths involve the members of a "private religious organisation".

Meanwhile, Virgil's reputation as a ladies man might, she tells him, be just what the sheriff needs.

"What I feel like, Virgil, is a little experimentation, something quick and shallow, somebody with experience..."

Virgil said, finally, "Well, you've got my attention."

Buy Online Amazon.com Kobo ebooks

Book cover, Storm Prey, John Sandford; 81x139
Storm Prey, John Sandford (John Camp)

Reading Order Note

Virgil Flower's adventure Bad Blood takes place in December, in January he appears in the Lucas Davenport novel, Storm Prey .


Book cover, Shock Wave, John Sandford; 93x140
Shock Wave, John Sandford (John Camp)

Shock Wave

Virgil is watching full-scale Minnesotan women seriously attacking a beach volleyball when he's called onto a new case. A bomber is attacking the site (and company headquarters) of a new large-scale store that will likely destroy numerous old family-owned businesses and - horror! - possibly damage the local trout fishing spot. Virgil grabs his boat, fishing gear and a suitable supply of controversial t-shirts and is on his way.

Buy Online Amazon.com Kobo ebooks

Book cover, Stolen Prey, John Sandford (John Camp); 81x139
Stolen Prey, John Sandford

Reading Note: Spoiler Alert

In August Virgil conducts an investigation in Stolen Prey for Lucas Davenport. The action in Stolen Prey is mentioned in Mad River when Virgil writes an article about the happenings. The sequence is a bit strange because Mad River takes place in April, but read Stolen Prey first.


Book cover, Mad River, John Sandford; 93x140
Mad River, John Sandford (John Camp)

Mad River

Bronzed, boasting about the Bahamas' beach bimbos dressed only in bikini bottoms, and more than a little bit boozed-up, Virgil is called back to work when four murders occur within a small section of Minnesota. He finds himself chasing a would-be Bonnie and Clyde.

Buy Online Amazon.com Kobo ebooks

book cover, Storm Front, by John Sandford; 93x140
Storm Front, John Sandford

Storm Front

Virgil has a whole mess of trouble including two Israeli agents, murderous Turks, questionable Lebanese, a pair of rival artifact hunters and a well-endowed redneck with a nose for profit. It all begins when a dying university professor steals a stone that might rewrite Jewish history, the bible, and the land rights of Israel.

Read our review of Storm Front

Buy Online Amazon.com

book cover, Deadline by John Sandford; 92x140
Deadline (Virgil Flowers), John Sandford

Deadline

Virgil drags his boat into a new adventure. This time the theft of local dogs in Trippton has Virgil going to help out old friend and fishing buddy Johnson Johnson.

But there's a criminal underbelly to Trippton and Virgil is soon up to his neck in DEA agents, rednecks and corrupt officials.

Takes place while Davenport is investigating the Black Hole murders.

Read our review of Deadline

Buy Online Amazon.com

Escape Clause by John Sandford, book cover, Virgil Flowers reading order;283x498
Escape Clause, John Sandford

Escape Clause

The first comes from, of all places, the Minnesota zoo. Two large Siberian tigers have vanished from their cage, and authorities are very concerned that they've been stolen for their organs. Traditional Chinese medicine prizes their parts for home remedies, and people will do extreme things to get--and keep--what they need. As Detective Flowers of the Minnesota Bureau of Apprehension is about to find out.

Then there's the homefront. Virgil's relationship with his girlfriend Frankie has been getting kind of serious, but when Frankie's sister, Sparkle, moves in for the summer, things get a lot more complicated. Sparkle has a roving eye, and it's fixed right on Virgil.

Forget a storm--this one's a tornado. (G.P. Putnam's Sons, 978-0425276228)

Buy Online Amazon.com

Deep Freeze by John Sandford, book cover, reading order Virgil Flowers;283x498
Deep Freeze, John Sandford

Deep Freeze

Virgil knows the town of Trippton, Minnesota, a little too well. A few years back, he investigated the corrupt--and, as it turned out, homicidal--local school board, and now the town's back in view with more alarming news: A woman's been found dead, frozen in a block of ice.

There's a possibility that it might be connected to a high school class of twenty years ago that has a mid-winter reunion coming up, and so, wrapping his coat a little tighter, Virgil begins to dig into twenty years' worth of traumas, feuds, and bad blood. In the process, one thing becomes increasingly clear to him. It's true what they say: High school is murder. (416p) (G.P. Putnam's Sons, 978-0399573781)

Buy Online Amazon.com

Holy Ghost by John Sandford, book cover, reading order;279x454
Holy Ghost, John Sandford

Holy Ghost

Wheatfield, Minnesota: a metropolis of six hundred souls and change, for which the word "moribund" might have been invented. Nothing ever happened there and nothing ever would--until the mayor of sorts (campaign slogan: "I'll Do What I Can") and his precocious teenage buddy come up with a scheme to put Wheatfield on the map.

Should something dramatic occur--say, that the apparition of the Virgin Mary miraculously appeared at the local Catholic Church--the whole town would be turned into a shrine, attracting thousands of pilgrims. And all those pilgrims needed food, shelter, all kinds of crazy things. The town would get rich! What could go wrong?

Then the shootings begin. And as they--and Virgil Flowers--are about to discover, that's only the beginning of their troubles. . . . (432 pages) (G.P. Putnam's Sons, 978-0735217348)

Buy Online Amazon.com

Bloody Genius by John Sandford, book cover, reading order;280x434
Bloody Genius, John Sandford

Bloody Genius

At the local state university, two feuding departments have faced off on the battleground of science and medicine. Each carries their views to extremes that may seem absurd, but highly educated people of sound mind and good intentions can reasonably disagree, right?

Then a renowned and confrontational scholar winds up dead, and Virgil Flowers is brought in to investigate . . . and as he probes the recent ideological unrest, he soon comes to realize he's dealing with people who, on this one particular issue, are functionally crazy. Among this group of wildly impassioned, diametrically opposed zealots lurks a killer, and it will be up to Virgil to sort the murderer from the mere maniacs. (432 p) (G.P. Putnam's Sons, 978-0525536635)

Buy Online Amazon.com