Steve Brown Books In Order

Publication Order of Susan Chase Books

Publication Order of Standalone Novels

Steve Brown is a mystery thriller and historical fiction author from South Carolina. Brown is best known for the “Susan Chase” series of novels and several free-standing novels. While she is a dyed in the wool South Carolinian, she went to college at the University of North Alabama where she got a degree in political science and history. After graduation, she went on to serve with the 25th Infantry in Vietnam where she was a combat platoon leader. Steve Brown currently live s in Grandstand in Greenville South Carolina. He often complains that his home is four hours too far from the beach though he totally fell in love with his home when he was introduced to it by his wife. He wrote his debut novel Of Love and War in 1999 and from then on became prolific averaging one or two novels every year for about two decades. His first novel was a historical novel with a setting in the backdrop of the bombing of Pearl Harbor. He would then publish “Black Fire a suspense novel set in the modern South. Given how well this was received, he went on to write “Color her Dead” also set in the American south. Color Her Dead became the first of her Susan Chase series which is her longest-running series to date. Steve is a member of several professional author organizations including Sisters in Crime and Mystery Writers of America.

Having immediately fallen in love with Myrtle Beach and South Carolina, Steve Brown loves to write his novels in the same setting. Brown knows the low country around Myrtle Beach like the back of his hand. He writes about beaches swarming with young adults and teenagers who get into all manner of troublemaking from some very intriguing mysteries. His lead is Susan Chase a private investigator who resides at the Marina and is always willing to help out whenever there is a mystery. Similar to the Agatha Christie novels, he writes the lead character Susan as a modern Hercule Poirot with an edge. Brown has been praised for being a male yet portraying the essence of what being a young woman such as Chase is. His lead is never the damsel in distress but a strong and independent woman that knows her way around investigations. Susan does not take crap from anyone whether they be a man or woman and gives as good as she gets whenever she finds herself in a tight spot. Brown writes light beach reads that take his readers to another time and place.

Steve Brown’s first novel in the series “Color Her Dead” introduces Susan Chase, a lifeguard who sometimes works to find runaways. She is a sexy, interesting heroine full of attitude who can take on anyone and anything thrown at her. She has been employed by the city as a lifeguard and her base of operations is the Grand Strand on Myrtle Beach. Since she has made a name for herself for finding persons that have run away or disappeared, she is the go-to when Mrs. Roger the penny-pinching bitchy woman needs to find her 26-year-old daughter that has gone missing. Just like everyone in town, Susan has never liked Mrs. Rogers and almost refuses but reluctantly takes the case. Once she takes on the case, her go-getter attitude comes to the surface as she showcases it working with lecherous art dealers, jealous lovers and neighborhood drug sellers. Something of Buffy the vampire slayer but without the supernatural powers, her quest to find the missing woman sees her assaulted in her houseboat, shoved down a flight of stairs and accused of murder and trespass.

“Stripped to Kill” the second novel of the series opens to a story of the mysterious disappearance of two strippers. They had gone missing after they picketed a topless club in Myrtle Beach South Carolina for mismanaging or misappropriating their health benefits. One of the missing women is the dumb and blond friend of Susan Chase the lifeguard and part-time runaway finder. As a licensed runaway tracker, she is not going to let this lie and immediately embarks on a search to find the two women. But her actions alienate her rich boyfriend at home while she makes a bigger ruckus outside. She does not back down and goes for the jugular threatening the club owner, the club bouncers and tracking down the women’s pasts. There is plenty of action in the novel as the likable heroine stars in a story with a borderline salacious theme. This even as the subplots provide some good side tales that add to the flavor of the main story.

Steve Brown’s “Dead Kids Tell No Tales” is the story of the uncovering of the mystery of a missing child. The child who is named Megan is the godchild to Susan Chase that she used to babysit until the big storm. Investigators and police had found her mother in her car dead though Megan had disappeared and had not been seen for months. Susan had taken interest in the case and had immediately begun to investigate and search for the child. She began by tracking down one of the babysitters that had replaced her named Connie Pernell. She learns that Connie had left without notice some time back and that it had become a habit. Chase also learns that Connie was a serial babysitter and that almost all of the children she babysat would die. The deaths ranged from drowning to crib death. Connie was not easy to track down and Susan searched for quite a while. But the more she investigated, the more she was convinced that Connie had probably murdered her godchild Megan. She finally tracks down the woman and has a talk with her before convincing the police to question her on the whereabouts of the lost child. Will she crack under pressure or will it all be for nothing?