Raider Books In Order

Publication Order of Raider Books

The Raider series is a successful book series written by author J.D. Hardin. This series is based on the mystery, suspense, western, and spy-thriller genres, and is comprised of a total of 42 books, which were released between the years 1987 and 1990. All the books of the series feature the lead character in the role of Raider, who is described as a Pinkerton agent. Raider possesses a set of special skills that make him very efficient in whatever task he takes up. He is also very sharp and cunning, and is capable of overcoming any situation.

Even though every book of this series contains the name of the writer as J.D. Hardin, he is not the actual writer of the books. In fact, J.D. Hardin is not even a real person. The name has come up as a result of the combination of all the authors who have contributed to the series. They include, Victor Milan, Neal Barrett Jr, and Doanld Bain. These authors have J.D. Hardin as a pen name for writing the books of this series as well as of several other series. Before writing this series, author Hardin had penned the books of his very successful series called the Doc and Raider series. In this particular series, he has depicted the characters of both Raider and Doc.

They are shown as being Pinkerton agents. Raider is shown assisting Doc in a number of tasks. Following the tremendous success of the Doc & Raider series, author Hardin decided to write another western genre series showing only Raider as the main lead. The character of Doc was not included in this series. Author Hardin wrote the series’ first book titled as the lead character’s name, Raider. He quickly followed it up by another book called Sixgun Circus. And as the previous series was quite successful and popular, this series too got a lot of appreciation and praise. The immense success of his first two books of this series motivated author Hardin to keep writing books after books, which kept on becoming successful. Eventually, he went on to write forty two novels in total within a period of 3 years. The series finally came to an end with the novel titled End of the Trail.

The debut novel of the Raider series written by author JD Hardin is entitled ‘Raider’. This book was released by the Berkeley publication in the year 1987. Author Hardin has mentioned the chief character in this book as Raider. He is introduced as an agent of Pinkerton. He possesses excellent skills that make him very deadly. Raider comes to help for DOc Weatherbee whenever he lands in any form of trouble or faces any situation. Quite often, Doc Weatherbee comes across situations involving revenge or women, Raider is the first name that comes to his mind for help. At the start of the book’s story, it is shown that Doc Weatherbee faces some problem with a woman in his life. So, he calls Raider overcome the situation.

Raider too, feels more than happy to help out Doc in this particular situation. However, when Raider learns about the problem in Doc Weatherbee’s life, he becomes shocked to know that the woman causing him problems is none other than his own former lover. And the problem seems even bigger when Raider comes to know that the woman is determined to take away everything from Doc Weatherbee. Doc tells Raider that his ex lover is playing her best moves to get him involved in a big scandal. But, Raider assures him that he is not going to let anything like that happen to him until he is on his side. The next events in the book depict how Raider manages to prevent the woman from succeeding and helps out his friend overcome a major threat to his life and reputation.

The sequel to the first book of the series is called ‘Sixgun Circus’. This book was also released by the Berkley publishers in 1987. At the beginning of the story of this book, it is depicted that Raider is back with a new assignment to complete. This time, he is given the task of protecting a famous West-located circus. But, before Raider could start his work on this mission, he is made to solve a case involving a burglary during an event that was supposed to be a security detail. It turns out that an important strongbox has been taken away by robbers.

In order to find any clue about the burglars, Raider is forced to involve himself in the investigations of some other events as well, which seem connected to each other. The cases that he investigates along with the robbery of the strongbox include a murder and a kidnapping. Prior to the kidnapping, a big event was organized in a top-rated circus. The circus had planned to put up a wild show in order to provide a type of entertainment to the locals that they had not seen before. However, before the big event could take place, someone gets robbed and kidnapped. Following this, a killing also takes place.

All these events compel Raider to think that something very sinister is happening in and around the circus and he needs to find out soon for solving the kidnapping and murder cases. The case appears to be too difficult for Raider to solve. He believes that in all the years of his service, he didn’t see a case like this before. What makes it so difficult fro Raider to crack is the fact that it is a combination of multiple cases and Raider seems lost half way into the investigation because of so much of complexities.

The current task forces him to deal with a beautiful woman as well as with an old gunslinger at the well known circus. Raider suspects that all the members of the circus are somehow involved in the things that are taking place there. If not involved, Raider feels they are definitely complicit because of the suspicious ways in which they behave in front of him. In the end, the truth comes out about the strongbox and Raider discovers that it contained gold. This is the reason why this robbery took place in the first place and then the other criminal also took place after it. The book seems very intriguing till its last page. It is definitely a page-turner and does not fail to attract all those readers, who have a taste for suspense and thriller novels. The readers can easily find the book at libraries or even on online stores.