Brian Panowich
Brian Panowich has published 11 books across 3 series. The recommended reading order starts with C'mon and Do the Apocalypse Volume 1 (2012).
Brian Panowich is an American crime fiction novelist who won the International Thriller Writers Award for Best First Novel and the Pat Conroy Award for Best Mystery for his debut, Bull Mountain. Published in 2015, Bull Mountain introduced readers to the McAllister clan and the meth trade running through the rural Georgia country he knows from years as a firefighter and from home. Panowich, who is also the father of four, has continued to build out the world of his McAllister family crime saga in subsequent novels. He still lives in Georgia, though in his quieter moments he dreams of Parma.
Shelf & Shadows
Order of Anthologies
- TagscrimemysteryDescriptionC'mon and Do the Apocalypse Volume 1 is a zombie fiction anthology that opens on two very different survivors. In the first story, a pop culture zombie expert finds himself at a small Christmas party in the suburbs when the outbreak begins. He knows the rules, he knows what comes next, and now his family and friends are looking to him to keep them alive through the first few hours. What he faces is nothing like the movies prepared him for. My Wife Dawn is a love story set against the collapse of everything. The second story jumps two years ahead. Nelson runs a farm where the undead serve a new and brutal purpose, and his last surviving customer arrives with an offer: a living girl in exchange for Nelson's services. The trade sets off a chain of violence that threatens the fragile order Nelson has built. The anthology funnels crime noir sensibilities into the zombie apocalypse, moving from the tearful first night to the hardened calculus of survival years later.Publication dateDecember 16, 2012Amazon rating4/5Print length123LanguageEnglishPublisherBrian Panowich / Ryan Sayles / Zelmer Pulp Books
- Tags---DescriptionFive Broken Winchesters is a weird western anthology that collects seven tales from the Zelmer Pulp team and guests. The stories range across a West reimagined — not the tidy frontier of history books, but a landscape where the strange and the violent meet. One story unfolds in the icy mountains of Montana; another stretches all the way to the red plains of Mars. The collection includes five stories from the regular Zelmer Pulp contributors, a guest entry from the editor-in-chief of western fiction website The Big Adios, and a rare flash story introduced by the creator of Hawthorne. Each writer takes the western template and bends it toward something darker, weirder, and harder to predict. The question running through all seven is how far the genre can stretch before it stops being a western at all — and whether that boundary matters when the story lands.Publication dateOctober 6, 2013Amazon rating3.8/5Print length260LanguageEnglishPublisherZelmer Pulp
- Tagsdystopianpost-apocalypticsci-ficrimemysteryDescriptionHey, That Robot Ate My Baby Volume 1 is a 2013 science fiction anthology that delivers five stories from five writers, each one pushing into a different corner of speculative chaos. A minor celebrity in the 24th century travels to 1957 to prevent Ayn Rand from wrecking the future, only to discover she has been expecting him. Twin sisters vanish in 1947 during a night of terror, reappear with new parents and new scars, and die decades later as recluses — an event that triggers the end of humanity. A tech-savvy assassination squad updates murder for the digital age but still cannot solve high school. In the 22nd century, a man heads to the lawless reaches of deep space to find what Earth no longer permits, while a reverend follows with divine orders of his own. A border agent in a dystopian future patrols the Dark Lands searching for her missing brother, navigating a landscape where refugees and machines blur together and reality itself cannot be trusted. The anthology pairs time travel paradoxes with apocalyptic consequences, contract killers with cosmic vice, and every story asks what happens when the tools of the future collide with the frailties that have always defined us.Publication dateMarch 17, 2013Amazon rating4.8/5Print length165LanguageEnglishPublisherZelmer Pulp
- TagscrimemysteryDescriptionReloaded is a crime and noir flash fiction anthology collecting 25 stories from writers working at the edge of the genre. Each piece is built for speed and impact — the form demands every line earn its place, every scene land before the reader can look away. The collection pulls from contributors including Patti Abbott, Eric Beetner, Rob W. Hart, Bracken MacLeod, Brian Panowich, and Ryan Sayles, each bringing a different corner of the crime world into focus: backroom deals, bad decisions, violence that arrives too fast to stop, and the silence that follows. Flash fiction strips a story to what cannot be cut, and in crime writing that means motive, opportunity, and consequence compressed into a handful of pages. The anthology was published in 2013 as part of the Shotgun Honey project, which built its reputation on exactly this kind of work — short, dark, and unforgiving. Reloaded delivers 220 pages of stories that start in motion and never slow down, each one asking how much damage a person can do in the time it takes to make one choice.Publication dateSeptember 8, 2013Amazon rating3.9/5Print length220LanguageEnglishPublisherOne Eye Press
- TagscrimemysteryDescriptionMaybe I Should Just Shoot You In The Face is a 2014 noir and crime anthology that drags readers through gritty side streets and dark alleys where the underbelly of what men can do comes into sharp focus. Part of the Order of Anthologies series, this first Zelmer Pulp collection arrives with both guns out across 116 pages of short fiction. Each story maps a different corner of that underbelly — the violence, the desperation, the choices made when the light runs out. Photographer Mark Krajnak pairs every piece with a black and white image from his professional archive, so the darkness on the page has a face to match.Publication dateOctober 9, 2014Amazon rating3.6/5Print length116LanguageEnglish
- TagscrimeDescriptionTrouble in the Heartland pairs crime fiction with the songs of Bruce Springsteen, each of its thirty-seven stories taking a title from the Boss as its starting point. The anthology gathers writers who followed that spark wherever it led — some toward hope and redemption, others straight into the ditch. The premise is simple: choose a Springsteen song, then write a crime story in its spirit. What arrives is anything but uniform. One author answers Dancing in the Dark, another The Ghost of Tom Joad. Streets of Fire sits alongside Candy's Room; State Trooper next to Queens of the Supermarket. The range is as wide as the catalog itself, and the stories refuse to settle into a single mood or outcome. Published in 2014 as part of the Order of Anthologies series, the collection runs 270 pages and includes work from writers like Dennis Lehane, Jordan Harper, and Hilary Davidson. Each story stands alone, but together they map the territory Springsteen has always claimed: the space between what people want and what the world gives them, the moment before a choice tips into consequence. The question the anthology leaves open is whether any of these characters will find their way out, or whether the road only leads deeper in.Publication dateDecember 1, 2014Amazon rating3.8/5Print length270LanguageEnglishPublisherGutter Books
Order of Bull Mountain Books
- TagsmysteryDescriptionClayton Burroughs comes from a long line of outlaws, but he took the job of sheriff in a neighboring community to distance himself from his family's criminal empire. For generations, the Burroughs clan has made its home on Bull Mountain in North Georgia, running shine, pot, and meth over six state lines, virtually untouched by the rule of law. Clayton has kept what peace he can by staying away. Then a federal agent with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms shows up at his office with a plan to shut down the mountain. The agent has a hidden agenda, and his plan will pit brother against brother and test every loyalty Clayton thought he understood. The choice ahead could lead Clayton down a path to self-destruction. Bull Mountain is a crime novel that spans decades and alternates between points of view, tracing the lengths men will go to protect, honor, or destroy their families. The question at its center is whether Clayton can escape the blood he was born into, or whether the mountain will claim him the way it has claimed every Burroughs before him.Publication dateJune 21, 2016Amazon rating4.3/5Print length320LanguageEnglishPublisherG.P. Putnam's Sons
- TagscrimemysteryDescriptionA brutal murder in a Jacksonville motel room pulls Dane Kirby back into the criminal underworld he knows too well. Hard Cash Valley is a crime novel set in McFalls County and Bull Mountain, where Dane, a former arson investigator, consults on the killing of Arnie Blackwell alongside FBI Special Agent Roselita Velasquez. The investigation leads them straight back to the violent circles of Dane's own backyard — but Arnie's death is only the first. Someone is carving a bloody path across the Southeast, hunting Arnie's younger brother: a boy with Asperger's Syndrome whose unusual gift for numbers has already left bodies in its wake. That skill could generate serious money, and the deadliest players in the region — from the Filipino Mafia to federal agents with their own agendas to the hardest southern outlaws Dane has ever encountered — will do whatever it takes to control him. Dane joins the race to find the boy first, but every step forward tangles him deeper in a web of secrets that reaches further than he imagined. The clock is running, the body count is rising, and the question is whether Dane can reach the boy before the people willing to kill for him do.Publication dateMay 5, 2020Amazon rating4.3/5Print length304LanguageEnglishPublisherMinotaur Books
- TagscrimeDescriptionNothing But the Bones is a crime novel set in McFalls County, where local boss Gareth Burroughs controls everything on the mountain and Nelson Nails McKenna has served as his enforcer since he was a teenager. Nails has never had his heart in the dirty work, but he has stayed loyal. Then one night in a roadhouse, he defends a woman and goes too far. A dead body and a room full of witnesses mean even Burroughs cannot protect him this time. Nails and the woman become fugitives, unlikely partners running for Jacksonville and the possibility of escape. More than one party picks up their trail, and what looked like a clean getaway grows harder to reach with every mile. By the time they reach the end of the road, Nails faces one final stand: win his freedom or lose both their lives. The novel is part of the Order of Bull Mountain Books series and was first published in 2024.Publication dateApril 16, 2024Amazon rating4.3/5Print length321LanguageEnglishPublisherMinotaur Books
- TagscrimemysteryDescriptionClayton Burroughs is sheriff of a small Georgia town, a new father, and the last living heir to Bull Mountain's most violent criminal family. Like Lions, a crime novel and the second in the Order of Bull Mountain Books series, opens a year after a confrontation that killed his two brothers and left Clayton shot, trying to balance fatherhood, his badge, and staying alive. He has spent years walking the line between law enforcement and legacy, but the vacuum left by his brothers' deaths has made everyone on the mountain vulnerable. When a rival organization moves into Burroughs territory and leaves bodies behind, Clayton is pulled back into the life he wants to escape. His wife Kate realizes no one is left to protect Bull Mountain — except her. With their infant son's birthright at stake and wolves circling, Kate taps into the same darkness she used to avenge her husband a year ago. This time she finds herself developing a taste for it. The question is whether that darkness will save her family or consume what remains of it.Publication dateJanuary 1, 2035Amazon rating4.4/5Print length304LanguageEnglishPublisherG.P. Putnam's Sons
Order of Short Stories/Novellas
- TagscrimeDescriptionGareth Burroughs is getting old, and no king lives forever. The Broken King is a crime story set in North Georgia, where Gareth runs McFalls County and every criminal enterprise inside it. Two of his sons, Halford and Buckley, plan to inherit his empire. The third, Clayton, became a sheriff and turned his back on the family entirely. This short story takes place before the events of Bull Mountain and Like Lions, the novels that chronicle the brothers' violent confrontation and Clayton's reckoning with what his father and brothers left behind. On a very cold night, Gareth faces a final confrontation — one that will determine what happens to the kingdom he built and to the sons who want it, fear it, or enforce the law against it. The question is who walks away, and what McFalls County becomes after the king falls.Publication dateMarch 5, 2019Amazon rating4/5Print length63LanguageEnglishPublisherMinotaur Books
Frequently Asked Questions about Brian Panowich
The reading order for Brian Panowich's books is determined by the series. His debut novel, Bull Mountain, published in 2015, launched the crime saga featuring the McAllister family. The subsequent novels in this series are Hard Cash Valley, Nothing But the Bones, and Like Lions. Panowich has also published several anthologies and short stories. For readers new to his work, starting with Bull Mountain is the recommended approach to understand the interconnected narrative of his crime fiction.
A good starting point for Brian Panowich's books is his debut novel, Bull Mountain. This 2015 release introduced the McAllister family and the rural Georgia setting that informs much of his writing. It won the International Thriller Writers Award for Best First Novel. Following Bull Mountain, readers can continue with the established crime saga in Hard Cash Valley, Nothing But the Bones, and the upcoming Like Lions. This provides a clear entry into his primary body of work.
While some of Brian Panowich's books can be enjoyed on their own, reading the Bull Mountain series in order is recommended to fully appreciate the unfolding story of the McAllister family. The narrative progresses from one novel to the next, building on established characters and plot points. His anthologies and short stories are separate from this main series, but the core crime novels are best experienced chronologically to grasp the full scope of the saga.
Brian Panowich primarily writes series, with his most notable being the Bull Mountain crime saga. This series follows the complex history of the McAllister clan through multiple novels. He has also published anthologies and standalone short stories. However, his longer works are largely integrated into the interconnected world of the McAllister family, suggesting a preference for developing extended narratives within a consistent fictional universe.
Brian Panowich has written at least seven books across his various projects. This includes the four novels in the Bull Mountain series: Bull Mountain, Hard Cash Valley, Nothing But the Bones, and the forthcoming Like Lions. He also has multiple anthology contributions, such as C'mon and Do the Apocalypse Volume 1, Five Broken Winchesters, and Hey, That Robot Ate My Baby Volume 1, along with short stories like The Broken King. This count reflects his published and announced works.
The first book Brian Panowich wrote was C'mon and Do the Apocalypse Volume 1, published in 2012. This was an anthology contribution. His debut novel, Bull Mountain, which introduced the McAllister crime saga, was published in 2015. While Bull Mountain is the start of his well-known series and garnered significant awards, C'mon and Do the Apocalypse Volume 1 predates it as his initial published work.
Brian Panowich's most recent book is Nothing But the Bones, published in 2024. This novel continues the crime saga of the McAllister family, following the events of Bull Mountain and Hard Cash Valley. The series is planned to continue with a future installment titled Like Lions, expected in 2035, which will further expand the narrative established in his earlier works.
Brian Panowich writes crime fiction. His work is often set in rural Georgia and focuses on themes of family, loyalty, and the consequences of criminal enterprises. The Bull Mountain series, his primary body of work, delves into the intricacies of a crime family and the meth trade. His writing style is known for its grounded atmosphere and exploration of the darker aspects of human nature within a specific regional context.
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Jaime Lee Moyer
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Ada Palmer
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Patrick deWitt
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We verified the reading order for Brian Panowich's books by cross-referencing official publication dates, ISBN databases, and publisher catalogs.
Last verified: July 2026
Shelf & Shadows. (…). “Brian Panowich Books in Order.” Retrieved …, from https://www.shelfandshadows.com/authors/brian-panowich