Aloysius Archer
historical crime
Series · mystery
Cal Hooper
The Cal Hooper series by Tana French has 3 books and is best read in publication order, starting with The Searcher (2020).
- Books
- 3 books
- First published
- 2020
- Status
- completed
- Last checked
Start here: The Searcher (2020) — then read straight through in publication order.
Reading order
The order the books were released — the default way to read the series.
- Book 1:
The Searcher
Alternative text for cover: Cover of The Searcher - Book 2:
The Hunter
Alternative text for cover: Cover of The Hunter - Book 3:
The Keeper
Alternative text for cover: Cover of The Keeper
About the Cal Hooper series
After six Dublin Murder Squad novels, Tana French left the city entirely for this trilogy, trading her relay of urban homicide detectives for one retired Chicago police officer trying to disappear into rural Ireland. Cal Hooper buys a run-down cottage in the fictional townland of Ardnakelty hoping for nothing more than quiet renovation work and distance from his old life. The Searcher (2020) pulls him back into detective habits when a local kid enlists his help finding a missing brother, exposing the closed, watchful community's own rules about which secrets stay buried. The Hunter (2024) brings trouble to Cal's own doorstep: a smooth operator returns to town chasing a gold-prospecting scheme, dragging Cal's makeshift found family — particularly Trey, the teenager he's informally taken under his wing — into danger. The Keeper (2026) closes the trilogy as a young woman's death forces Ardnakelty's carefully maintained silences to finally break.
Where the Dublin Murder Squad books turned on unreliable narrators unraveling their own self-deception, Cal Hooper is French's most steady, plainly decent protagonist — an outsider slowly, warily earning trust in a place that guards its business fiercely. The trilogy is as much about Cal's own reconstruction after a career and a marriage both ended badly as it is about who's lying to whom in Ardnakelty, and it confirmed French could sustain a single continuing lead across multiple books, something the Dublin series deliberately never attempted.
Frequently asked questions
How many Cal Hooper books are there?
Three: The Searcher (2020), The Hunter (2024) and The Keeper (2026), published as ‘the million-copy-bestselling Cal Hooper trilogy,’ now complete.
What order should I read the Cal Hooper books in?
Publication order, starting with The Searcher. Cal's relationships in Ardnakelty, especially with the teenager Trey, build directly across all three books.
Is Cal Hooper connected to Tana French's Dublin Murder Squad series?
No. It shares no characters or setting with the Dublin Murder Squad novels; Cal Hooper is a retired Chicago police officer living in rural Ireland, an entirely separate cast and location.
Is the Cal Hooper trilogy finished?
Yes. The Keeper (2026) was published and marketed as the third and final book in the trilogy.
Do I need to read the Dublin Murder Squad books first?
No. Cal Hooper is a completely separate series with no shared continuity, and can be read with no prior knowledge of French's other work.
If you like the Cal Hooper series
Reading order last verified .