Virgil Flowers is the main character of the series that began in 2007, he is a man in his thirties who has been divorced three times.Īfter being in the military police and army, Lucas Davenport brings Virgil to the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension. Virgil Flowers is a book series written by John Sanford, a novelist famous for his expertise in crime stories. Here is a list of each Virgil Flowers book, broken down by reading order so that you can figure out exactly how to follow along with the series! About Virgil Flowers If you are looking for a great thriller series featuring Virgil Flowers, then this article has everything you need to know about the books and exactly which order you should read them in.

The stories are mostly set in Minnesota and involve detective Virgil Flowers investigating all sorts of crimes from murders to tornadoes. This one is a little undercooked, but there's certain to be another one coming down the line soon.Virgil Flowers is a fictional character from the popular book series by best-selling author John Sandford. There is one saving grace for Sandford fans: He churns out these serial novels with the proclivity of a mini-donut machine. It's certainly a topic worth exploring, but we're not exactly talking Upton Sinclair's 'The Jungle' here. Flowers' girlfriend gets recruited to help with research for a doctoral thesis on how a food processing plant is taking advantage of its low-paid immigrant workforce. We end up knowing a little about all of them but not much about anyone in particular.Īdding to the sense of distance is a subplot that doesn't add much except 50 pages. But by the time we've met everyone, it's hard to figure out who to focus on - a problem the author seems to wrestle with a bit, too.

To his credit, Sanford tries to make all of them interesting. It takes planners, henchmen, brokers, exporters and importers. It opens with crooks stealing two rare tigers from a zoo with the intention of selling their organs on the black market for traditional Asian medicine. It's a typical Sandford work in that the plot starts quickly and moves briskly. He almost makes up for this with a terrific third act, but by then he's fighting an uphill battle. In 'Escape Clause,' the newest crime thriller featuring detective Virgil Flowers, we're well past the midway point before Sandford puts some oomph into his malefactor. It's the bad guys, different in each installment, who offer the potential for creating intriguing new characters. Once a protagonist has been established, there's only so much more that can be added in successive books.

One of the keys to John Sandford's success as a serial author is his ability to take us inside the twisted psyches of his villains.

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