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Craig Johnson is an author from Huntington, West Virginia who currently lives in Ucross, a town in northern Wyoming. He has been writing novels since 2004 and has particularly become popular for creating one of the most popular characters in the world of mystery.
Craig Johnson is best known for his Sheriff Walt Longmire series of books. The series started in 2004 with the Cold Dish and has spawned many other stories. The series has inspired the popular Longmire television series and continues to be made to this day.
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Order of Walt Longmire Series
| # | Read | Title | Published | Details |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | The Cold Dish | 2004 | Description / Buy | |
| 2 | Death Without Company | 2006 | Description / Buy | |
| 3 | Kindness Goes Unpunished | 2007 | Description / Buy | |
| 4 | Another Man's Moccasins | 2008 | Description / Buy | |
| 5 | The Dark Horse | 2009 | Description / Buy | |
| 6 | Junkyard Dogs | 2010 | Description / Buy | |
| 7 | Hell Is Empty | 2011 | Description / Buy | |
| 8 | Divorce Horse | 2012 | Description / Buy | |
| 9 | As the Crow Flies | 2012 | Description / Buy | |
| 10 | Messenger | 2013 | Description / Buy | |
| 11 | A Serpent's Tooth | 2013 | Description / Buy | |
| 12 | Spirit of Steamboat | 2013 | Description / Buy | |
| 13 | Any Other Name | 2014 | Description / Buy | |
| 14 | Dry Bones | 2015 | Description / Buy | |
| 15 | The Highwayman | 2016 | Description / Buy | |
| 16 | An Obvious Fact | 2016 | Description / Buy | |
| 17 | The Western Star | 2017 | Description / Buy | |
| 18 | Depth of Winter | 2018 | Description / Buy | |
| 19 | Land of Wolves | 2019 | Description / Buy | |
| 20 | Next to Last Stand | 2020 | Description / Buy | |
| 21 | Daughter of the Morning Star | 2022 | Description / Buy | |
| 22 | Hell and Back | 2022 | Description / Buy | |
| 23 | The Longmire Defense | 2023 | Description / Buy | |
| 24 | First Frost | 2024 | Description / Buy | |
| 25 | Tooth and Claw | 2024 | Description / Buy | |
| 26 | Return to Sender | 2025 | Description / Buy |
Order of Walt Longmire Short Stories/Novellas
| # | Read | Title | Published | Details |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Christmas in Absaroka County | 2012 | Description / Buy |
Order of Walt Longmire Collections
| # | Read | Title | Published | Details |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Wait for Signs: Twelve Longmire Stories | 2014 | Description / Buy |
Craig Johnson Anthologies
| # | Read | Title | Published | Details |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Crime Plus Music | 2016 | Description / Buy | |
| 2 | The Best American Mystery Stories 2017 | 2017 | Description / Buy |
Chronological Order of Craig Johnson Books
The chronological order of all of Craig Johnsons Walt Longmire series are the same as the publication order of the books.
Craig Johnson Awards
Craig Johnson has won a number of awards in his writing career. His 2011 novel Hell Is Empty won the Mystery Novel of the Year Award from Library Journal. His 2008 novel Another Man’s Moccasins won the Spur Award from the Western Writers of America organization for the best novel of the year.
The Cold Dish and the Dark Horse were both finalists for the Dilys Award, a prominent award given by the Independent Mystery Booksellers Association for the best mystery novel of the year. Death Without Company won the Wyoming Historical Association’s award for the Book of the Year.
Craig Johnson Books Into TV/Movies
The Longmire novels that Craig Johnson has written were made into the Longmire television series. The show premiered on A&E in 2012 for three seasons. The series was picked up by Netflix for a fourth season in 2015. The show will return for a fifth season on Netflix in the future.
Longmire is made in New Mexico and stars Robert Taylor in the title road. The show also stars Katee Sackhoff and Lou Diamond Phillips. The pilot episode received a nomination for the Edgar Award from the Mystery Writers of America association. The show also won an Bronze Wrangler award from the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum in 2013 for being the best fictional television drama of the year.
Best Craig Johnson Books
Here are a few of the most popular books in the series that Craig Johnson has written in the Longmire series:
The Cold Dish: This is the first novel that Johnson write and the first to feature Longmire. The story was nominated for a Dilys Award. The novel features Walter Longmire looking forward to ending his tenure in Wyoming only to have its hopes set aside after a person is found dead around the Northern Cheyenne Reservation. This leads to a need to find the killer of that person.
Death Without Company: Another prominent book in the Longmire series was Death Without Company, a 2006 story. This story features Longmire as he finds something shocking as a Basque woman dies in an assisted living home. The circumstances appear to be suspicious, thus leading Longmire to look around for clues with his deputy Victoria Moretti. This leads to be a substantial series of discoveries around the Big Horn Mountains.
Hell Is Empty: This book from 2011 brings Longmire into one of the most difficult cases in his nearly thirty year career as the sheriff of his town. Longmire was tasked with transporting a series of convicts through a tough snowstorm in Wyoming. One of these is a man who murdered a young buy and buried him in the mountains a long time ago and eventually confessed to him. After that convict escapes, Longmire goes out on an expedition to try and find that convict and bring him to justice.
An Obvious Fact: The 12th novel in the series from 2016 brings Walter Longmire and company the famous motorcycle rally in Sturgis. A simple hit and run accident near the Devil’s Tower landmark turns out to be much more than that. This book has a darker plot than some of the other novels with drug running, neo-Nazis, murders and more. The Sturgis location makes for an interesting diversion for long time readers of Longmire books.
A Craig Johnson FAQ
Q: Who writes the Longmire series?
A: Craig Johnson created and writes the series of books known as Longmire.
Q: What is the first book in the Longmire series?
A: The first book in the Longmore series is The Cold Dish, which was released in December of 2004. The title refers tot he adage “revenge is a dish best served cold”.
Q: How many seasons are there of the Longmire television series?
A: There are six seasons of the Longmire series. The show aired for five seasons on AMC in the United States before being picked up by Netlfix for a sixth and final season. The series stars Robert Taylor as Longmire as well as Katee Sackhoff as Vic Moretti.
Q: Where does Craig Johnson live?
A: Craig Johnson lives in a small town in Wyoming. A VERY small town in fact as Johnson lives in Ucross, Wyoming which has a population of just twenty-five people. He based many of his stories in the bigger town of Buffalo which is not too far from Ucross.
When Does The Next Craig Johnson book come out?
The next book by Craig Johnson is Return to Sender and will be released on May, 27th 2025. It is the newest book in the Walt Longmire Series.