Amanda Quick Books in Order: All 40 Titles
Amanda Quick is the historical-fiction pen name of Jayne Ann Krentz, born 28 March 1948 in Cobb, California. She took a history degree at UC Santa Cruz and a library science master's at San Jose State, worked as a librarian, and sold her first novel in 1979. Because publishing contracts of the period tied an author's name to one house and one line, she split her output across pseudonyms: Jayne Ann Krentz for contemporary romantic suspense, Jayne Castle for futuristic and paranormal, and - from Seduction in 1990 - Amanda Quick for historicals. The Amanda Quick books are historical romance with a strong mystery or suspense spine, mostly Regency and Victorian England, moving in 2017 to 1930s California with the Burning Cove series. Across all her names she has had more than fifty New York Times bestsellers and more than 35 million copies of her books in print.
Do you have to read Amanda Quick in order?
Most Amanda Quick books can be read in any order - the thirteen 1990s standalones are genuinely standalone, and each Burning Cove book is a self-contained mystery. There is one real exception: Lavinia Lake and Tobias March (Slightly Shady, Don't Look Back, Late for the Wedding) follows one couple across three books and must be read in sequence. The Arcane Society is the other thing to know about: it is a single 13-book universe shared with her Jayne Ann Krentz and Jayne Castle names, so if you read only the five Amanda Quick volumes you will get complete stories but will miss the connective tissue. Ladies of Lantern Street sits in that same world and reads perfectly well on its own.
Genres and eras: Historical romance with a mystery/suspense plot throughout, but the era shifts across her career. The 1990s standalones and the Vanza and Lavinia Lake series are Regency England; Mystique (1995) is set in medieval England, which makes it the outlier of the early books. From the mid-2000s the settings move to Victorian and late-Victorian England (The Paid Companion, The River Knows, the Arcane Society historicals, Ladies of Lantern Street, Garden of Lies). The Burning Cove series (2017-2023) leaves England entirely for 1930s Southern California - still historical, but Golden-Age-Hollywood noir rather than ballroom romance, which is worth flagging to Regency readers.
Pen names: Jayne Ann Krentz — Her married name and her main byline, used for contemporary romantic suspense. Same author. Those books are NOT part of this bibliography - they are present-day, not historical.; Jayne Castle — Her maiden name, used for futuristic and paranormal romantic suspense (the Harmony/Rainshadow books). Same author, not historical, and not part of this bibliography.; Amanda Quick — The pen name she adopted in 1990 specifically for historical romance and historical romantic suspense. This is the name that belongs on a historical romance site, and it is the only one counted below.; Stephanie James, Jayne Bentley, Jayne Taylor, Amanda Glass — Retired early pen names from the late 1970s and 1980s, used for category romance and one futuristic. Not historical and not counted here.
Vanza in order (1998-2005)
Linked by the fictional martial-arts-and-philosophy society of Vanza. Regency-set.
| Book | Title | First published |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | With This Ring | 1998 |
| 2 | I Thee Wed | 1999 |
| 3 | Wicked Widow | 2000 |
| 4 | Lie by Moonlight | 2005 |
Lavinia Lake and Tobias March in order (2001-2003)
A Regency-era investigating pair; the romance and the detective partnership develop across all three books, so this is the one Amanda Quick series that genuinely needs reading in order.
| Book | Title | First published |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Slightly Shady | 2001 |
| 2 | Don't Look Back | 2002 |
| 3 | Late for the Wedding | 2003 |
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Arcane Society (Amanda Quick historical entries only) in order (2006-2011)
The Arcane Society is a single 13-book universe written across three of her pen names. Only the five historical volumes below are Amanda Quick books; the contemporary volumes are Jayne Ann Krentz and the futuristic ones are Jayne Castle. The 'pos' values given here are the positions in the full Arcane Society sequence, so the gaps are the books written under her other names.
| Book | Title | First published |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Second Sight | 2006 |
| 4 | The Third Circle | 2008 |
| 6 | The Perfect Poison | 2009 |
| 8 | Burning Lamp | 2010 |
| 11 | Quicksilver | 2011 |
Ladies of Lantern Street in order (2012-2014)
A Victorian spin-off of the Arcane Society world, built around the Flint & Marsh investigation agency.
| Book | Title | First published |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Crystal Gardens | 2012 |
| 2 | The Mystery Woman | 2013 |
| 3 | Otherwise Engaged | 2014 |
Burning Cove, California in order (2017-2023)
1930s Hollywood-adjacent resort town; each book is a fresh couple, with recurring secondary characters. Her most recent series - no eighth book has been announced as of September 2026.
| Book | Title | First published |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | The Girl Who Knew Too Much | 2017 |
| 2 | The Other Lady Vanishes | 2018 |
| 3 | Tightrope | 2019 |
| 4 | Close Up | 2020 |
| 5 | The Lady Has a Past | 2021 |
| 6 | When She Dreams | 2022 |
| 7 | The Bride Wore White | 2023 |
Amanda Quick: standalone novels
These sit outside the numbered series and can be read in any order.
| Title | First published | |
|---|---|---|
| — | Seduction | 1990 |
| — | Surrender | 1990 |
| — | Scandal | 1991 |
| — | Rendezvous | 1991 |
| — | Ravished | 1992 |
| — | Reckless | 1992 |
| — | Dangerous | 1993 |
| — | Deception | 1993 |
| — | Desire | 1993 |
| — | Mistress | 1994 |
| — | Mystique | 1995 |
| — | Mischief | 1996 |
| — | Affair | 1997 |
| — | The Paid Companion | 2004 |
| — | Wait Until Midnight | 2005 |
| — | The River Knows | 2007 |
| — | Garden of Lies | 2015 |
| — | 'Til Death Do Us Part | 2016 |
Where to start with Amanda Quick
Ravished
The most widely recommended entry point to her Regency standalones - a Beauty and the Beast retelling that shows her humour-plus-mystery formula at full strength.
Slightly Shady
Opens the Lavinia Lake and Tobias March trilogy, her best sustained Regency detective romance.
The Girl Who Knew Too Much
Starts Burning Cove, the 1930s California series, if you want her current voice rather than her Regency backlist.
Crystal Gardens
A short, self-contained Victorian entry into the Arcane Society world with no prior reading required.
Frequently asked questions
Is Amanda Quick the same person as Jayne Ann Krentz?
Yes. Amanda Quick is the pen name Jayne Ann Krentz uses for historical fiction. She writes contemporary romantic suspense as Jayne Ann Krentz and futuristic and paranormal romance as Jayne Castle. She adopted separate names in an era when publishing contracts tied an author to a single house and line.
Do Amanda Quick's books need to be read in order?
Mostly no. Her eighteen standalones and the Burning Cove books each work alone. The exception is the Lavinia Lake and Tobias March trilogy, which follows one couple through three books and should be read in publication order.
How many books has Amanda Quick written?
Forty novels have been published under the Amanda Quick name, from Seduction in 1990 to The Bride Wore White in 2023. That figure excludes the much larger body of contemporary and futuristic work she publishes as Jayne Ann Krentz and Jayne Castle.
What order should I read the Burning Cove series?
The Girl Who Knew Too Much (2017), The Other Lady Vanishes (2018), Tightrope (2019), Close Up (2020), The Lady Has a Past (2021), When She Dreams (2022) and The Bride Wore White (2023). Each is a complete mystery with a new couple, so starting anywhere works, but secondary characters recur.
Are Amanda Quick's books Regency romance?
Her 1990s standalones and her Vanza and Lavinia Lake series are Regency. From the mid-2000s she moved into Victorian settings, and the Burning Cove series from 2017 onward is set in 1930s California. Mystique (1995) is medieval, making it the odd one out among the early books.
What is the Arcane Society series and which books are Amanda Quick's?
The Arcane Society is a thirteen-book paranormal universe about a secret society of psychically gifted people, written across all three of her pen names. The five historical volumes are Amanda Quick's: Second Sight, The Third Circle, The Perfect Poison, Burning Lamp and Quicksilver.
Is there a new Amanda Quick book coming?
No Amanda Quick title has been published since The Bride Wore White in 2023, and no eighth Burning Cove book had been announced as of September 2026. She has continued publishing under the Jayne Ann Krentz name in the meantime.
How this list was counted
This guide lists 40 titles — 22 across 5 series and 18 outside them. 40 full-length novels published under the name Amanda Quick, from Seduction (1990) to The Bride Wore White (2023): 18 standalones and 22 series novels. Excludes everything published as Jayne Ann Krentz or Jayne Castle, including the contemporary and futuristic entries in the shared Arcane Society universe; excludes the omnibus reissue Seduction and Surrender (2004), which reprints two novels already counted; excludes anthology reprints and boxed sets. No Amanda Quick novellas or short stories were found.
Points of uncertainty and source conflict. (1) 'Rendezvous / Virtue': orderofbooks.com and bookseriesinorder.com both print the 1991 novel as 'Rendezvous / Virtue', which reads as if there were a separate book called Virtue. Neither Wikipedia's list of works nor the Goodreads Amanda Quick listing contains any title called Virtue, so it is treated here as an alternate (probably UK) title for Rendezvous and only Rendezvous is counted. (2) Late for the Wedding: dated 2002 by orderofbooks.com and bookseriesinorder.com, 2004 by Amazon (which is the mass-market paperback), and 2003 by Wikipedia and Publishers Weekly (Bantam hardcover, May 2003). 2003 is used. (3) Wait Until Midnight: dated 2004 by two aggregators; the publisher record gives 25 January 2005, which is used. (4) Otherwise Engaged (2014) is listed as a standalone by Wikipedia but as Ladies of Lantern Street #3 by Goodreads, bookseriesinorder.com and orderofbooks.com; it is placed in the series here, with the disagreement flagged. Penguin Random House's own series page shows only the first two books. (5) Mystique's medieval setting is confirmed by the Kirkus review ('a feathery period romance, set in medieval England'). Desire (1993) is also commonly described as medieval, but this could not be re-verified against a primary source before the research budget ran out, so it is not asserted in genre_split. (6) Seduction and Surrender (2004) appears on aggregator lists as if it were a new title; it is an omnibus of the 1990 novels Seduction and Surrender and is excluded. (7) bookseriesinorder.com and orderofbooks.com list the full 13-book Arcane Society sequence on the Amanda Quick page, including White Lies, Sizzle and Burn, Running Hot, Fired Up, In Too Deep and The Scargill Cove Case Files (Jayne Ann Krentz) and Midnight Crystal and Canyons of Night (Jayne Castle). Those are not Amanda Quick books and are excluded from both the series list and the count. (8) No Amanda Quick novellas or short stories were found in any source; if any exist they are not represented here.