Doc Macomber Books In Order

Publication Order of Jack Vu Books

Publication Order of Jason Colefield Books

Doc Macomber is an award-winning and bestselling mystery author best known for the “Jason Colefield” and the “Jack Vu” series of novels. Macomber is a member of several writing organizations that include the Willamette Writers, Mystery Writers of America, Friends of Mystery, and International Thriller Writers. He has also been a contributor to the prestigious “Bloodletter” and “Mystery Readers Journal” where he wrote on the history of ethnic detectives. He has also written articles in “Now Write Mysteries” that was published by the Penguin Group in 2012. His expertise on ethnic detectives comes from his writing of the “Jack Vu” mystery series with which he debuted his writing career. “Riff Raff” the fourth novel in the series made the shortlist for the Killer Nashville Claymore Award. Macomber wrote his debut novel “The Killer Coin” in 2003 and has never looked back since. For his work, he has been awarded several awards including an Independent Book Publishers Association Benjamin Franklin Silver Medal. He gets much of his inspiration from his experiences serving in the National Guard and the Special Tactics Unit of the American Air Force. He currently lives with his wife on a trawler on the Columbia River.

Before Doc Macomber became a bestselling author, he had worked as a hazardous materials cleanup, photographer, bartender, bouncer, and of course a special ops officer for the US Air Force. All of these provide a lot of material to use in his novels. His journey to becoming a mystery author began when he got a job as a private investigator in Arizona. He would be told to follow people and do things he would find strange today. On his first day on the job, he had to wait in the lounge at Tucson airport until a private plane landed. He was to then call a number and his work was done. He was not given much detail and he was surprised to find that he was concerned as much as he was fascinated with the work. Macomber soon left the job but the curiosity to know the full story got him interested in mystery stories. He moved back to Portland to go back to school as he intended to take a creative writing course and become a mystery author. But he ended up taking philosophy as Portland State University did not have a creative writing program. However, his professors allowed him to turn in short plays and short stories for his philosophy classes. His very first work was a story of seagulls that got into a library and proceeded to hold a philosophical discussion.

After he graduated from Portland State University in 1984, he joined the Oregon Air National Guard and became a member of the 125th Special Tactics Unit. After he retired from the National Guard, he spent five years with the Special Forces before he retired to the Columbia River living on a 42-foot trawler. After his many experiences, he was hoping for a quiet life only to learn that the many problems that were common on the streets of New York had followed him home. Right off his stern was arson, murder, DUI, drugs, robbery, violence, and homelessness, all of which he believed he had left behind. Within a month, he got a visit from the River Patrol who were asking questions about a murder on the marina. This jumpstarted his interest in writing mysteries and he enrolled at the Portland Community College taking a course in Screenwriting, Travel Writing, and Criminal Investigations. By 2008, he had graduated with a master from Portland University where he took courses in Advance Book Publishing and Fiction Writing.

Doc Macomber’s “The Killer Coin” opens to the scene of a burned corpse whose slender neck glitters with a gold coin. The lure of gold reveals the morass of intrigue behind the veneer of morals and threatens to destroy Jack Vu’s military career that has been built on order and ethics. The hunt for the killer begins to unravel as Vu is sent from the bustling streets of New Orleans to the Pacific Northwest. On the way to his new assignment, he has to deal with unexpected enemies, even though he also makes some new and unlikely allies. He also gets reinforcements from bush pilots, cantankerous swamp rats, and several shots of bourbon. Honor, betrayal, love, and a final sense of justice play out as Jack goes on a wild ride that threatens to dash him on the rocks.

“Wolf’s Remedy” the second novel in the Jack Vu series asks the question of what secrets could some WWII Harley motorcycles be hiding. A young man had recently been killed in a crowded train depot in what the authorities believe to have been an assassination. Investigator Jack Vu is an Air Force investigator who goes on a hunt to find the killer. His investigations reveal an aged corps of veterans, hell-bent on redeeming themselves by taking a cache of treasures that they intend to return to the survivors of the Holocaust. As time runs out and the wounds of war come become clear, a sense of urgency drives the contemporary Robin Hoods towards their objectives. It is a historically accurate story of the moral choices made by memorable characters that provide one of the most entertaining stories.

“Snip” by Doc Macomber is a novel set in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. The hurricane had inflicted massive damage in the south and killed many people. Jack Vu the Air Force Special Investigator is among the thousands forced to flee from the rising waters of the storm. Meanwhile, the body of a woman had washed ashore and the authorities believed it a suicide though Vu thinks otherwise. He has to live in a barracks even as he investigates the case while dreaming of the solitude of a hotel room in Louisville. But then the police make another gruesome discovery and Vu teams up with two unlikely allies from New Orleans, one of whom is a cop convicted of murder. The Big Easy was a city that easily convicted suspects and a delicate snip could be disastrous. From the historic Churchill Downs to the Mississippi riverbank, the detective needs to read carefully among the bantering musicians and jockeys.