Adam Hamdy Books in Order (Updated September 10, 2026)

Adam Hamdy writes conspiracy thrillers, espionage, crime fiction, and genre-bending suspense. His major original series are the Pendulum trilogy and the Scott Pearce trilogy, while his collaborations with James Patterson form a substantial run inside the international Private franchise.

The cleanest starting points are Pendulum for conspiracy suspense, Black 13 for modern espionage, or The Other Side of Night for a standalone that moves far beyond conventional thriller structure. His newer novel Deadbeat is also independent and can be read without any earlier Hamdy book.

Three Adam Hamdy reading lanes

• Pendulum: John Wallace survives an apparent suicide attempt and discovers that someone is systematically hunting people for reasons he cannot understand.
• Scott Pearce: A former intelligence operative confronts political extremism, covert networks, and international threats across three connected espionage novels.
• Private: Hamdy co-writes globe-spanning investigations with James Patterson inside the established Private franchise.

The Pendulum trilogy in order

The Pendulum books form one continuous conspiracy story built around photographer John Wallace. What begins as a mysterious attempt to murder him expands into a much larger network involving manipulation, surveillance, violence, and people who appear to have been selected for death.

1. Pendulum (2016): John Wallace wakes to find a masked intruder trying to hang him in his own home and make the death look like suicide, but surviving the attack reveals that he is only one target in a much wider pattern.
2. Freefall (2018): Wallace remains caught in the aftermath of the Pendulum conspiracy and is forced deeper into a conflict involving political influence, hidden identities, and enemies capable of manipulating events on a national scale.
3. Aftershock (2018): The trilogy reaches its conclusion as Wallace and the surviving characters confront the full scale of the organization behind the earlier attacks and the consequences of everything uncovered in the first two books.

Read all three consecutively. This is not a series of loosely connected cases. Freefall and Aftershock depend heavily on the people, conspiracies, and revelations introduced in Pendulum.

Pendulum begins with a murder staged as suicide

John Wallace has no idea why anyone wants him dead. The attacker wears a mask, ties a noose around his neck, and intends to leave behind a scene that should convince investigators he killed himself.

Wallace’s survival creates the central mystery. If the attacker was willing to take such elaborate steps, then the real question is not simply who tried to kill him, but why someone needs his death to look voluntary.

Freefall is not an optional second adventure

The second book carries forward the personal and political consequences of the first. Wallace already knows that the danger extends beyond one masked attacker.

The conspiracy becomes broader, and the people pursuing him have resources capable of distorting information, manipulating institutions, and turning public assumptions into weapons.

Aftershock closes the John Wallace arc

Aftershock was written as the third and final Pendulum novel. It brings the trilogy’s central conspiracy toward resolution rather than leaving Wallace inside an open-ended procedural series.

Readers should therefore resist stopping after Freefall. The third book is where the earlier revelations, loyalties, and surviving threats are meant to pay off.

Run belongs before Pendulum chronologically

• Run: A short-story prequel to the Pendulum trilogy that gives readers an earlier glimpse of the danger surrounding the world John Wallace is about to enter.

Chronological readers can place Run first. For a first experience, Pendulum remains the stronger entry point because it was designed to introduce Wallace and the central mystery without prior explanation.

Scott Pearce books move from domestic extremism to global espionage

Scott Pearce is a former intelligence operative whose world is shaped by political extremism, covert networks, disinformation, radicalization, and people willing to manipulate democratic societies from inside.

1. Black 13 (2020): Pearce is drawn back into action when a conspiracy involving political extremism and a hidden organization threatens Britain, forcing him to confront enemies capable of exploiting fear and division.
2. Red Wolves (2021): Pearce follows a trail involving Russian influence, covert operations, and destabilization while the enemies facing him become more international and more difficult to separate from legitimate power.
3. White Fire (2023): The trilogy escalates into a global crisis in which Pearce must confront a threat capable of exploiting geopolitical conflict and the dangerous systems that have developed across the previous books.

Each Scott Pearce novel contains a major immediate threat, but publication order is strongly recommended because Pearce’s alliances and the political forces around him develop across all three.

Black 13 is the true beginning of Scott Pearce

Black 13 introduces Pearce as a damaged former intelligence professional who has reasons to distrust both political institutions and the people operating in their shadows.

The book uses political extremism as an operational weapon rather than mere background. The threat depends on convincing ordinary people to fear, divide, and radicalize themselves while more disciplined actors benefit from the resulting chaos.

Red Wolves widens the battlefield

The second Pearce novel expands beyond the immediate British political environment and gives Russian strategy and international manipulation greater importance.

Pearce is fighting people who understand that influence can be more useful than open warfare. Propaganda, covert financing, hidden operatives, and social division can destabilize an opponent long before conventional weapons are used.

White Fire completes the Scott Pearce trilogy

White Fire is Book 3 and the current conclusion of Pearce’s principal series.

Readers who begin here lose much of the context behind Pearce’s relationships and the forces he has spent two books trying to understand. Read Black 13 and Red Wolves first.

Adam Hamdy’s Private books with James Patterson

Private is James Patterson’s international investigation franchise centered on Jack Morgan and the global detective agency he leads. Adam Hamdy joined the franchise with Private Moscow and went on to co-write a long run of international entries.

1. Private Moscow (2020, with James Patterson): The murder of a former soldier in Moscow sends Jack Morgan and the Private team into a Russian investigation involving espionage, old loyalties, and enemies willing to kill to protect state-level secrets.
2. Private Rogue (2021, with James Patterson), also published as Private: Missing Persons: Jack Morgan searches for a former Marine and his children after they vanish, while the investigation uncovers a threat far more dangerous than a family disappearance.
3. Private Beijing (2022, with James Patterson): An attack on Private’s Beijing office leaves agents dead and the local team devastated, forcing Jack Morgan to investigate a coordinated assault against the organization itself.
4. Private Rome (2023, with James Patterson): Jack Morgan becomes involved in an Italian investigation where organized crime, secrets, and threats against powerful people push Private into another international crisis.
5. Private Monaco (2024, with James Patterson): The glamorous world of Monaco becomes the setting for murder, wealth, political influence, and an investigation involving some of the richest and most protected people in Europe.
6. Private Dublin (2025, with James Patterson): Private’s international operation moves to Ireland for a case involving violence, hidden motives, and danger surrounding people who appear secure behind money and influence.
7. Private Tokyo (2026, with James Patterson): The global agency turns toward Japan for another high-stakes investigation that places Jack Morgan and Private inside a new cultural and criminal environment.

These are Hamdy’s Private collaborations in publication order. They are part of a franchise that began many books before Private Moscow, so do not treat that novel as Private Book 1 overall.

Private Moscow begins Hamdy’s contribution, not Jack Morgan’s career

Jack Morgan and Private were already established before Adam Hamdy entered the series.

Readers following Hamdy specifically can start at Private Moscow. Readers following every Private novel should place it after the earlier books written by Patterson with other collaborators.

Private Rogue and Private: Missing Persons are the same book

The second Patterson and Hamdy collaboration has appeared under different titles in different markets.

• Private Rogue: One principal market title.
• Private: Missing Persons: Alternate title for the same Jack Morgan investigation.

Do not buy both expecting two different stories.

The Other Side of Night should be approached without expecting Scott Pearce

• The Other Side of Night (2022): Former police officer Harriet Kealty investigates the disappearance of David Asha after finding a strange plea for help, but the case develops into a story about love, time, memory, loss, and the nature of reality itself.

This is a standalone and deliberately different from Hamdy’s action-heavy espionage series.

The mystery structure is important, but so are philosophical ideas that become clearer only as the book reveals how its apparently separate pieces fit together.

The Other Side of Night is safest with as little advance explanation as possible

The novel depends heavily on the reader’s assumptions about what kind of story is being told.

Detailed summaries risk weakening its effect. The useful starting information is simple: Harriet Kealty discovers a message connected with a missing man named David Asha and begins investigating what happened to him and the people he loved.

Deadbeat gives Hamdy a very different damaged protagonist

• Deadbeat (2024): Peyton Collard is a divorced, alcoholic father whose life collapsed after a terrible car accident, and an anonymous patron offers him a life-changing amount of money to kill a man described as evil.

Peyton accepts the offer and becomes a vigilante killer, moving across California from one target to another.

The central problem changes when he begins asking who is selecting these supposedly deserving victims and why someone has chosen Peyton to carry out the murders. His investigation into his employer becomes more dangerous than the killings themselves.

Deadbeat is not the first book of a confirmed series

As of September 10, 2026, Deadbeat is best treated as a standalone novel in Hamdy’s principal bibliography.

It introduces Peyton Collard and gives him a complete central investigation without requiring Pendulum, Scott Pearce, or Private knowledge.

Hamdy’s original fiction in compact publication order

1. Pendulum (2016): John Wallace survives an attempted murder staged to look like suicide.
2. Freefall (2018): Wallace continues investigating the conspiracy revealed in the first book.
3. Aftershock (2018): The Pendulum story reaches its planned conclusion.
4. Black 13 (2020): Scott Pearce enters a conflict shaped by political extremism and covert manipulation.
5. Red Wolves (2021): Pearce’s war expands into Russian influence and international destabilization.
6. The Other Side of Night (2022): A missing-person mystery develops into a philosophical story about love and reality.
7. White Fire (2023): Scott Pearce’s trilogy reaches its current endpoint.
8. Deadbeat (2024): Peyton Collard accepts money to kill bad men and then hunts the person choosing his victims.

A five-book sampler of Hamdy’s different styles

1. Pendulum: Begin with a relentless conspiracy and an attempted murder that looks impossible to explain.
2. Black 13: Move into geopolitics, intelligence, extremism, and Scott Pearce.
3. Private Moscow: Sample Hamdy working inside James Patterson’s established global investigation franchise.
4. The Other Side of Night: Shift toward a more literary and philosophical form of suspense.
5. Deadbeat: Finish with morally complicated crime fiction and a vigilante who begins investigating his own employer.

Which Adam Hamdy series are complete?

• Pendulum: Complete trilogy, ending with Aftershock.
• Scott Pearce: Three published novels through White Fire.
• Private collaborations: Hamdy has contributed multiple installments to the continuing James Patterson franchise rather than creating the series himself.

Adam Hamdy reading questions

What Adam Hamdy book should I read first?

Start with Pendulum for conspiracy thrillers, Black 13 for espionage, or The Other Side of Night if you want a standalone.

How many Pendulum books are there?

There are three full-length novels: Pendulum, Freefall, and Aftershock, plus the short-story prequel Run.

Should I read Run before Pendulum?

You can for strict chronology, but Pendulum remains the better first introduction.

How many Scott Pearce novels are there?

There are three principal books: Black 13, Red Wolves, and White Fire.

Is Private Moscow the first Private novel?

No. It is the first Private novel co-written by Adam Hamdy, but the James Patterson franchise began much earlier.

Are Private Rogue and Private: Missing Persons different?

No. They are alternate titles for the same Patterson and Hamdy collaboration.

Does The Other Side of Night belong to Scott Pearce?

No. It is an independent novel with a separate cast and a more philosophical form of suspense.

Is Deadbeat connected to Pendulum?

No. It is a separate crime thriller centered on Peyton Collard.

The Adam Hamdy order that keeps every universe separate

Read John Wallace from Pendulum through Aftershock. Read Scott Pearce separately from Black 13 through White Fire.

Place the James Patterson collaborations together beginning with Private Moscow, remembering that these are Hamdy’s contributions to a much larger franchise rather than a new series beginning with him.

Keep The Other Side of Night and Deadbeat on the standalone shelf. That division makes Hamdy’s bibliography easy to navigate without mixing John Wallace, Scott Pearce, Jack Morgan, Harriet Kealty, and Peyton Collard into one false chronology.