Order of Homer Kelly Books
Homer Kelly is the protagonist in a series of mystery novels by American novelist Jane Langton. Homer Kelly is a homicide detective turned philosophy professor at the prestigious Harvard University. The series combines a large knowledgebase with interesting characters, gentle humour, and a social conscience.
Jane Langton began her Homer Kelly series in 1964 with the novel The Transcendental Murder. It has also been known as The Minuteman Murder. The series consists of 18 books, with the last being Steeplechase in 2005. Below is a list of Jane Langton’s Homer Kelly books in order of when they were originally published (which is the same as their chronological order):
Publication Order of Homer Kelly Books
Note: The Transcendental Murder was re-published as The Minuteman Murder.
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Homer Kelly Synopsis: The Trescendental Murder is the first book in the Homer Kelly series by Jane Langton. The citizens of Concord, Massachusetts aren’t bored of history. For decades, the intellectuals of this little hamlet have never stopped endless debates about Concord’s favourite sons: Emerson, Hawthorne, Thoreau, and their contemporaries. Concord’s latter-day transcendental scholars are a strange bunch, but none is more peculiar than Homer Kelly, an expert on Emerson and on homicide. An old-fashioned murder is about to put both skills to the test. At a meeting of the town’s intellectuals, Ernest Goss produces a cache of saucy love letters written by the men and women of the transcendentalist sect. Although Homer chortles at the idea that Louisa May Alcott and Ralph Waldo Emerson might have had a fling, Goss insists the letters are real. He never gets a chance to prove it. Soon after he is found killed by a musket ball. The past may not be dead, but Goss certainly is.