Frank Clevenger Books In Order

Publication Order of Frank Clevenger Books

Frank Clevenger is the main character in a series of psychological thrillers novels written by an American author of nonfiction, mystery and thrillers, Keith Ablow. Clevenger is a forensic psychiatrist determined to find the truth regardless of where it leads. Keith Ablow began the publication of Frank Clevenger series in 1996 when Denial the first book in the series was published. Frank Clevenger series lasted six novels concluding in 2004 with The Architect.

Denial

Denial is the debut novel in Frank Clevenger thriller series featuring forensic psychology that makes quite an unusual hero you ever saw. He repeatedly makes same mistakes over and over again but in a fun way. Goes from one billowing to the next, buys cocaine on borrowed money, drives drunk, buys sex at seedy dance bars, can’t pay his bills, bottomless gulps scotch, and solicits his mother for drug money and so much more.

On the positive side is that Clevenger’s colossal insight into unusual behavior may, in fact, be just because he has twisted himself. As a result, it is suggested that because he is the product of a suicidal, alcoholic, abusive father and a profligated mother.

In this first book, we meet Frank being called by Chief Emma Hancock to help find the killer who killed a young woman and chopped her breasts off. A homeless man wants to confess but after Frank interviews him, but he says no. However, when Emma’s niece soon becomes a victim of the serial killer, she gives Frank free rein to chase the killer and throws in some few grams of coke to keep stable.

In the meanwhile, Frank has big fights with Kathy, an ob-gyn who delivers babies and keeps breaking up with Frank for he won’t quit the coke. Following the clues to his old girlie bar, where he feeds money to the naked dancers, Frank finds himself yearning for Rachel, a beautiful lady who analyzes him vividly than he can himself.

Keith Ablow central theme in this first book is psychology and not around the bush melodrama mostly seen in some books. He was woven a cautionary tale that the readers can relate with. The debut novel also revolves around Frank Clevenger investigating a serial killer targeting women in Boston. He is also battling his own demons such as addiction to gambling, drugs, and women. He is better at finding truths about criminal activities than discovering the truth about himself.

What makes Denial a quite interesting read is the fact that the author has woven a main character that can be said to a “mirror image of us.” Clevenger is the perfect example of what can really happen when you try to distance yourself from your emotional pain. He is trying to cover up the truth using cocaine, alcohol, gambling, and women. We all try to cover up our demons in different ways.

Ablow’s background as a forensic psychiatrist and experience in interviewing and testifying about dozens of violent offenders and murderers contributed much to the creation of Frank Clevenger.

Projection

In the second book in Frank Clevenger series, the forensic psychiatrist put life on the line to solve a revolt in a hospital for the criminally insane. Dr. Trevor Lucas, also known as the Slasher killer was declared insane by the jury and sentenced to Massachusetts mental hospital.

Then Frank Clevenger, the forensic psychiatrist who helped Lucas to justice clearly knows that he did not kill anyone, but not long, the rogue doctor is over the edge, mutilating his right arm and claiming that he is possessed by an evil spirit. Clevenger suffers from guilt regarding the verdict and tries to assuage it with Cynthia, a beautiful, charming call girl, but before the healing can begin, Lucas riots in a psychopathic room where a handful of staff, including a pregnant nurse, is taken, hostages. Lucas throws the horribly murdered body of a hermit through a window on the fifth floor and calls for an escape helicopter and a Catholic priest. After a Harvard psychologist sent to negotiate is killed, Lucas demands that Clevenger accompany him into the room.

Always plagued by guilt, but determined to help, Clevenger enters the lion’s den, hoping to use his psychotherapeutic abilities, which Lucas cannot cure. After proudly demonstrating his unbearably terrible surgical battle with Satan, Lucas suggests that his pathology may have something to do with his childhood in Baltimore. Clevenger stops a SWAT team raid in the hospital and is then released by Lucas to find everything that is buried in Lucas’s past and can cure him. If not, Lucas will kill everyone within 24 hours, including himself. Unfortunately, just as Clevenger takes the first flight to Baltimore, Cynthia at his side, the psychopath responsible for Lucas’s death becomes a hospital for the escapes and goes into a riot. Gore in abundance with incredibly improbable storylines, while the Ablow-worthy premise that evil can be overcome when empathic individuals confront their inner demons.

Psychopath

A psychopath is book four in Frank Clevenger series by Keith Ablow featuring Clevenger first introduced in Denial the first novel in the series. In this 4th installment, Clevenger meets his mirror image; a demonically brave psychiatrist turned a serial murderer. In the beautifully woven opening scene, Dr. Jonah drives his BMW along Route 90, Rome, New York desperately searching for a highway victim to allure into his soul warmth before he razors open his victim’s organs and orgasms as he watches his victims breathe their last breaths.

In a short span, the rogue doctor leaves 14 bodies butchered across 14 states before the FBI calls in Clevenger to help them analyze the killer’s motives as well as the way of working. Apparently, Jonah is a traveling doctor for the kids severely affected by mental illness, and he spends approximately six weeks at each hospital that he attends. Now he’s at Canaan Memorials looking to attend to his 25 damaged patients same way he does to all his highway victims. His broken mind allows himself entry into the unthinkable and escapes his guilt.

Meanwhile, Clevenger has problems raising his adopted son, Billy Bishop, but he still chooses to help to flush out a serial killer cunny as he is. While successful in solving damaged kids problems, Jonah looks forward to setting himself free via Clevenger- and as everyone says it: He is the nicest man in the world.