Order of Douglas Preston Books

When it comes to thrillers that mix the gothic with the scientific, the mysterious with the intellectual, and the elegant with the explosively terrifying, there’s one name—or rather, one duo—that stands above the rest: Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child, the twisted masterminds behind the Pendergast series. If you’ve ever fallen under the eerie charm of Special Agent Aloysius Pendergast, the pale, enigmatic FBI agent with Southern drawl and Sherlockian brilliance, you have these two literary alchemists to thank.

But who exactly are they? What dark hallways of knowledge and imagination did they walk to bring us 20+ novels of spellbinding terror and elegance?

Let’s open the creaky, oak-paneled doors into their lives.

Douglas Preston: The Explorer with a Pen

• Full Name: Douglas Jerome Preston
  Born: May 20, 1956
• Education: Pomona College (Bachelor of Arts in English Literature)
• Current Status: Alive and still conjuring nightmares.

Douglas Preston is not just a writer—he's an adventurer, historian, and accidental Indiana Jones. Born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Preston was seemingly fated for greatness—or at least for trouble. He studied English Literature at Pomona College, but don’t let that fool you. His path from academia to the Amazon rainforest is anything but conventional.

Before his literary fame, Preston worked at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City, where he handled public affairs and wrote museum books. One of these was about the museum’s mysterious basement and secret storage rooms, which would later become the chilling setting for Relic—the debut Pendergast novel. The place was filled with ancient skeletons, taxidermied beasts, and things that don’t have names. The kind of place where inspiration is just waiting to crawl out of a dusty sarcophagus and whisper a plot into your ear.

Preston is also a real-life explorer. He’s ventured deep into the jungles of Honduras in search of lost cities (and found one!), uncovered ancient ruins, and survived encounters with snakes, disease, and cartel territory. Oh—and he’s tangled with the FBI in real life, during the events that inspired The Monster of Florence. It seems poetic that a man who writes about secret agents and ancient curses would have his own brushes with real danger.

He now splits his time between writing bestsellers and hunting lost civilizations. No big deal.

️‍Lincoln Child: The Mastermind in the Shadows

• Full Name: Lincoln Child
• Born: October 13, 1957
  Education: Carleton College (B.A. in English), University of Iowa (M.A. in English Literature)
• Current Status: Also alive and plotting your next sleepless night.

Lincoln Child is the yang to Preston’s adventurous yin. Where Preston charges through the jungle with a machete, Child sharpens plotlines in dim libraries with the precision of a watchmaker. A native of Westport, Connecticut, Child graduated from Carleton College before earning his master’s in English from the University of Iowa—yes, the same Iowa known for its world-famous Writers' Workshop.

But don’t think he’s just a tweedy academic. Child began his career in publishing, where he worked as an editor at St. Martin’s Press. And here’s the twist: that’s where the cosmic duo first collided. Preston submitted a manuscript to Child. Sparks flew—not the romantic kind, but the literary equivalent of a supernova. Child immediately saw potential, and the two began collaborating on a novel that would make their names synonymous with intelligent terror: Relic.

Lincoln Child is the architect of structure, the one who takes the mad, brilliant ideas and gives them form and flow. He crafts characters with nuance and plots that twist like the serpents of mythology. And while he is famously private, one thing is clear—without his surgical precision, Pendergast might still be wandering the halls of the Museum of Natural History, without a narrative to call home.

Two Heads, One Dark Imagination

Together, Preston and Child form one of the most iconic duos in thriller fiction. Their contrasting energies—Preston’s adventurous heart and Child’s cerebral polish—give rise to a literary Frankenstein's monster: part action thriller, part intellectual mystery, and part horror tale.

They didn’t just create a series—they created a universe, centered around the hauntingly brilliant Agent Pendergast, who is as much philosopher as he is detective. The Pendergast novels are filled with ancient curses, underground catacombs, psychological horror, and enough forensic science to make CSI look like a kids' show.

And it all came from two men who met over a manuscript... one wielding an editor's red pen, the other fresh from the bowels of a museum.

The Legacy Lives On

To this day, Preston and Child continue writing the Pendergast series together, while also penning standalone novels and nonfiction thrillers. Their work has inspired TV shows, films, and a cult following of readers who aren’t satisfied with just a whodunit—they want a whydunit, a howdunit, and a what-the-hell-just-happened-dunit.

So the next time you crack open a Pendergast novel and find yourself sinking into the darkness of a cursed crypt or ancient manuscript murder mystery, remember: you're not just reading a thriller. You're stepping into the strange, compelling minds of two modern masters who turned curiosity, intellect, and a little madness into literary gold.

And just wait until you read what they’ve dreamed up next... ????????