Keith Thomson Books in Order (Updated September 9, 2026)

Keith Thomson writes espionage thrillers, comic adventure, narrative history, and books about piracy and exploration. His fiction includes the two-book Drummond and Clark spy series, the standalone technothriller Seven Grams of Lead, and the comic pirate novel Pirates of Pensacola.

His later career moved into narrative non-fiction. Born to Be Hanged reconstructs an extraordinary seventeenth-century pirate expedition into the Pacific, while Paradise of the Damned follows Sir Walter Raleigh and the centuries-long European obsession with El Dorado.

If you want connected fiction, start with Once a Spy. If you prefer a standalone modern conspiracy thriller, choose Seven Grams of Lead. For historical adventure drawn from real events, begin with Born to Be Hanged.

The Keith Thomson Reading Map Is Short but Varied

1. Drummond and Clark: read Once a Spy and then Twice a Spy for the only continuing novel series.
2. Standalone espionage: read Seven Grams of Lead independently.
3. Comic pirate fiction: read Pirates of Pensacola without any other Thomson book first.
4. Narrative pirate history: read Born to Be Hanged for the 1680 buccaneer expedition across Panama and into the Pacific.
5. Exploration history: read Paradise of the Damned for Sir Walter Raleigh and the pursuit of El Dorado.

Drummond and Clark Books in Order

The Drummond and Clark series is built around an unusual father-and-son spy partnership. Drummond Clark spent decades as a deep-cover CIA operative, but Alzheimer’s disease has damaged his memory. His son Charlie initially knows almost nothing about that secret career.

The tension comes from the fact that Drummond can forget ordinary information while still retaining fragments of dangerous intelligence, tradecraft, weapons knowledge, and instincts developed during his years in covert operations.

1. Once a Spy (2010): Charlie Clark discovers that his seemingly ordinary father was a legendary CIA operative when gunmen attack them and Drummond suddenly displays skills that make it clear his damaged memory contains secrets powerful people want erased.
2. Twice a Spy (2011): Charlie and Drummond hide in Switzerland while experimental treatment may restore parts of Drummond’s memory, but the kidnapping of NSA operative Alice Rutherford forces them to recover the location of a secret weapons cache before terrorists can use its most dangerous contents.

Read these two in order. Twice a Spy directly continues the fugitive status, family relationship, Alice Rutherford storyline, and memory problems established in Once a Spy.

Why Once a Spy Has to Come First

Charlie begins the first book as a gambler with serious financial problems and little understanding of his father’s former life.

When he collects Drummond after another Alzheimer-related incident, shooters arrive. Charlie initially assumes the attack is connected with his own debts. That explanation collapses when his elderly father instinctively reacts like a trained operative.

Charlie then learns that Drummond spent years working undercover for the CIA and still carries sensitive information in a mind that can no longer reliably distinguish past from present.

Series foundation: The first novel explains why intelligence agencies and hostile actors fear Drummond even while his illness makes him appear vulnerable.

Twice a Spy Continues Rather Than Resets the Story

Twice a Spy begins with Charlie and Drummond already on the run.

They are living near a Swiss clinic where Drummond is receiving experimental Alzheimer’s treatment. NSA operative Alice Rutherford has joined them and is attempting to clear the Clarks of the charges created by the first book’s events.

When terrorists kidnap Alice, Charlie and Drummond are forced to search Drummond’s unstable memory for a weapons cache. The problem is not simply finding the weapons. They also have to prevent the kidnappers from using what they demand in exchange for Alice.

Book two: The emotional stakes are much stronger after readers have already watched Charlie discover who his father really was.

Is There a Third Drummond and Clark Book?

No third Drummond and Clark novel has been published.

Penguin Random House lists the series as two books: Once a Spy and Twice a Spy. Thomson subsequently moved to a standalone espionage thriller and later into historical non-fiction.

Readers can therefore treat Twice a Spy as the current endpoint of Charlie and Drummond Clark’s story.

Pirates of Pensacola

Pirates of Pensacola was published in 2005 and was Thomson’s first novel.

• Pirates of Pensacola (2005): Accountant Morgan Baker learns from his newly released father Isaac that their real family name is Cooke, that they descend from pirates, and that Isaac knows the location of millions of dollars in buried gold pursued by a rival pirate family.

The novel begins with Morgan living a conventional corporate life and believing his estranged father is simply an unreliable criminal.

Isaac instead reveals a continuing family feud between the Cookes and Hoods, pirate dynasties whose rivalry has survived into the modern Caribbean. He then drags Morgan into a treasure hunt involving a stolen yacht, hidden islands, rival crews, prisons, taverns, guns, maps, and an alcoholic parrot.

Standalone: Morgan and Isaac Cooke do not continue into the Drummond and Clark books.

Pirates of Pensacola Is Not a Historical Pirate Novel

The pirate ancestry is important, but most of the main action takes place in the modern era.

Thomson imagines that traditional Caribbean piracy never entirely disappeared. Modern descendants use ordinary businesses, yachts, fast boats, corporations, and criminal networks while still following older family grudges and treasure legends.

The tone is deliberately comic and exaggerated, making it very different from the researched history Thomson would later write in Born to Be Hanged.

Once a Spy

• Once a Spy (2010): Charlie Clark discovers his father Drummond was a deep-cover CIA operative when assassins force the pair into a flight from intelligence officials who fear the secrets trapped inside Drummond’s Alzheimer’s-damaged memory.

This was Thomson’s first conventional espionage thriller and the beginning of his only recurring-character novel series.

The premise allows Drummond to be both highly capable and dangerously unreliable. He may remember how to bypass security or operate like an experienced spy while forgetting why a particular person, object, or location matters.

Twice a Spy

• Twice a Spy (2011): Experimental treatment begins recovering fragments of Drummond’s memory just as terrorists abduct Alice Rutherford and demand access to weapons hidden during Drummond’s intelligence career.

The sequel expands the father-and-son relationship by making memory itself part of the rescue mission.

Charlie needs his father to remember enough to find the cache, but every recovered fragment may also expose dangerous information that other intelligence services want.

Seven Grams of Lead

Seven Grams of Lead is a standalone technothriller published in hardcover in 2013, with a widely available Anchor paperback and ebook edition following in 2014.

• Seven Grams of Lead (2013/2014): Investigative journalist Russ Thornton witnesses the murder of a former lover who was preparing to expose classified information and soon discovers that an advanced surveillance device has been implanted inside his own head.

Russ is known for investigating powerful people in government and business. When a Capitol Hill staffer from his past contacts him about highly classified information and is murdered in front of him, he becomes the next liability.

The conspiracy uses surveillance technology sophisticated enough to track and monitor Russ from inside his own body. The story develops into a struggle involving intelligence agencies, black sites, double agents, weapons, counter-surveillance, and the question of whether Russ can trust anyone offering help.

Standalone: Charlie and Drummond Clark do not appear.

Why Seven Grams of Lead Is Not Drummond and Clark Book Three

The novel was published after Twice a Spy and uses similar espionage and intelligence themes, which can make it look like another installment.

It has a completely different protagonist, however. Russ Thornton is a journalist rather than a member of the Clark family, and his conspiracy centers on advanced surveillance technology rather than Drummond’s deteriorating memory.

It should therefore be listed as an independent thriller.

Born to Be Hanged

Born to Be Hanged, published in May 2022, marked Thomson’s move from fiction into book-length narrative history.

• Born to Be Hanged: The Epic Story of the Gentlemen Pirates Who Raided the South Seas, Rescued a Princess, and Stole a Fortune (2022): Thomson reconstructs the 1680 expedition in which hundreds of English buccaneers crossed the Isthmus of Panama, entered the Pacific, attacked Spanish settlements and ships, accumulated treasure, and risked execution if captured.

The expedition began when more than three hundred pirates gathered in the Caribbean with plans to raid Spain’s Pacific possessions.

They crossed the dangerous Darien region, fought Spanish forces, formed temporary relationships with Indigenous communities, captured ships, attacked coastal settlements, and spent roughly two years moving through the South Seas.

Thomson builds the narrative from contemporaneous accounts and other primary material rather than inventing a fictional pirate crew.

Non-fiction: Do not place this inside the fictional Cooke family history of Pirates of Pensacola.

Pirates of Pensacola Versus Born to Be Hanged

• Pirates of Pensacola: comic modern fiction about descendants of pirate families searching for buried gold.
• Born to Be Hanged: researched history of real seventeenth-century buccaneers raiding Spanish America and the Pacific.

The books share Thomson’s fascination with piracy but differ completely in factual status, tone, characters, and purpose.

Paradise of the Damned

Paradise of the Damned was published on May 21, 2024 and is Thomson’s second major narrative-history book.

• Paradise of the Damned: The True Story of an Obsessive Quest for El Dorado, the Legendary City of Gold (2024): Thomson follows Sir Walter Raleigh and the explorers, conquistadors, courtiers, rivals, and Indigenous societies caught in the European pursuit of a supposedly golden city hidden in South America.

The book traces El Dorado stories back decades before Raleigh became consumed by them.

Raleigh rises at Elizabeth I’s court through military skill, ambition, appearance, and political daring. His secret marriage damages his royal position, and the promise of enormous South American treasure becomes increasingly attractive as he attempts to rebuild his fortunes and status.

His expeditions place him against difficult rivers, tropical disease, dangerous wildlife, Spanish colonial power, political rivals at home, and a legend that repeatedly survives the failure of earlier explorers.

Non-fiction: The book is historical narrative rather than another pirate or spy novel.

Born to Be Hanged and Paradise of the Damned Form a Natural Pair

The two books are not a numbered series, but they can be read together as Thomson’s narrative history of English adventurers confronting Spanish power in the Americas.

1. Paradise of the Damned: concentrates mainly on the sixteenth-century search for El Dorado and Walter Raleigh’s ambitions.
2. Born to Be Hanged: moves into the later seventeenth-century Golden Age of Piracy and the English buccaneer campaign in the Pacific.

Publication order places Born to Be Hanged first, but chronological-history readers may prefer Paradise of the Damned before it because Raleigh’s era predates the 1680 pirate expedition.

Keith Thomson Books in Original Publication Order

1. Pirates of Pensacola (2005): Morgan Baker learns that his father belongs to a surviving pirate dynasty and is dragged into a Caribbean treasure hunt against an enemy family.
2. Once a Spy (2010): Charlie Clark discovers his father was a CIA operative after assassins begin hunting the pair for secrets buried inside Drummond’s failing memory.
3. Twice a Spy (2011): Charlie and Drummond attempt to rescue Alice Rutherford while recovering dangerous weapons information from Drummond’s fragmented past.
4. Seven Grams of Lead (2013/2014): Journalist Russ Thornton investigates a classified conspiracy while being monitored through surveillance technology implanted inside his head.
5. Born to Be Hanged (2022): Real English buccaneers cross Panama and raid the Spanish Pacific during an extraordinary two-year expedition.
6. Paradise of the Damned (2024): Sir Walter Raleigh and generations of explorers pursue the elusive promise of El Dorado in South America.

Fiction and Non-Fiction Should Be Kept Separate

• Fiction: Pirates of Pensacola, Once a Spy, Twice a Spy, and Seven Grams of Lead.
• Non-fiction: Born to Be Hanged and Paradise of the Damned.

This distinction matters because Thomson’s historical books use the fast narrative pacing of adventure fiction while remaining researched accounts of real people and events.

A Spy-Thriller Reading Route

1. Once a Spy: Meet Charlie and Drummond and discover the CIA history concealed by Drummond’s Alzheimer’s disease.
2. Twice a Spy: Continue directly into the Swiss clinic, Alice Rutherford’s kidnapping, and the hunt for Drummond’s weapons cache.
3. Seven Grams of Lead: Move to a separate modern conspiracy built around intrusive surveillance technology and investigative journalism.

A Historical Adventure Reading Route

1. Paradise of the Damned: Begin chronologically with Raleigh and the sixteenth-century search for El Dorado.
2. Born to Be Hanged: Continue into the 1680 English pirate expedition against Spain’s Pacific empire.
3. Pirates of Pensacola: Finish with a fictional comic version of modern descendants still behaving like Caribbean pirates.

Keith Thomson Reading Order FAQs

What was Keith Thomson’s first novel?

Pirates of Pensacola, published in 2005, was his first novel.

What is the Drummond and Clark order?

Read Once a Spy first and Twice a Spy second.

Is there a third Once a Spy book?

No third Drummond and Clark novel has been published as of September 9, 2026.

Is Seven Grams of Lead part of Drummond and Clark?

No. It is a standalone espionage technothriller featuring journalist Russ Thornton.

Is Pirates of Pensacola based on a true story?

No. It is comic fiction about modern descendants of pirate families and a buried treasure hunt.

Is Born to Be Hanged fiction?

No. It is narrative history based on the real 1680 buccaneer expedition into the Pacific.

What is Paradise of the Damned about?

It is a non-fiction account of the search for El Dorado, with Sir Walter Raleigh as the central figure in the later part of the story.

What is Keith Thomson’s latest book?

Paradise of the Damned, published in May 2024, is his latest confirmed book as of September 9, 2026.

The Cleanest Keith Thomson Reading Strategy

There is only one sequence that requires strict order: Once a Spy followed by Twice a Spy. The father-and-son relationship, Alice Rutherford storyline, fugitive status, and Drummond’s memory problems continue directly between them.

After that, choose by subject. Seven Grams of Lead is independent espionage, while Pirates of Pensacola is comic pirate adventure.

For Thomson’s non-fiction, Born to Be Hanged and Paradise of the Damned make a natural historical pair but do not need to be read in publication order.