Owen Parr books

Abel Jones Reading Order

Alpha Team Reading Order

Anthologies

Battle Hymn Cycle Reading Order

Collections

Jack Ryder Crime Mystery Reading Order

Joey Mancuso, Father O’Brian Reading Order

Non-Fiction

Owen Parry Collections Reading Order

Standalone Novels

Stonewall Jackson’s Triumph and Tragedy

This author page covers two different writers whose similar names sometimes cause confusion. The Civil War fiction, military thrillers, standalone novels, non-fiction, anthologies, and collections listed here are by Ralph Peters, a retired US Army lieutenant colonel who used the pen name Owen Parry (spelled with a Y) for his historical fiction. The contemporary crime series (Joey Mancuso, Father O’Brian; Jack Ryder Crime Mystery; Alpha Team) are by a different Owen Parr (no Y), who writes modern-day thrillers.

Ralph Peters served 22 years in the US Army and became a noted military commentator and analyst after his retirement. Under his own name, he published military thrillers like Bravo Romeo (1981) and Red Army (1989), along with nine non-fiction books on military strategy and geopolitics. Writing as Owen Parry, he created the Abel Jones series, six novels following a Welsh immigrant and Union Army officer investigating crimes during the American Civil War. His later Battle Hymn Cycle (2012-2017) is a five-book series covering major battles from Gettysburg to Appomattox. Honor’s Kingdom, the fourth Abel Jones novel, won the Hammett Prize in 2002.

Owen Parr (the crime fiction writer) is best known for the Joey Mancuso, Father O’Brian series, which began in 2017 with A Murder On Wall Street. These books follow an ex-NYPD detective and his half-brother, a Catholic priest, as they solve crimes in New York City and beyond. The series has grown to thirteen books and is still ongoing. Parr also writes the Alpha Team series, about a covert operations team, and the Jack Ryder Crime Mystery series.