The Last Kids on Earth Books in Order: How to read Max Brallier’s series?

Written by American author Max Brallier, The Last Kids on Earth is a book series for children about a group of kids surviving and having fun at the end of the world. Ever since the monster apocalypse hit town, average thirteen-year-old Jack Sullivan has been living in his tree house, which he’s armed to the teeth with catapults and a moat, not to mention video games and an endless supply of Oreos and Mountain Dew scavenged from abandoned stores.

But Jack alone is no match for the hordes of Zombies and Winged Wretches and Vine Thingies, and especially not for the eerily intelligent monster known only as Blarg. So Jack builds a team: his dorky best friend, Quint; the reformed middle school bully, Dirk; Jack’s loyal pet monster, Rover; and the fiercest girl Jack knows, June.

How to read The Last Kids on Earth Series in Order?

Every entry in The Last Kids on Earth book series works as a standalone story, but the lives of the different characters evolve from one novel to the other. They need to be read in order for a greater appreciation of the story.

1. The Last Kids on Earth – Ever since the monster apocalypse hit town, thirteen-year-old Jack Sullivan has been living in his tree house. But Jack alone is no match for the hordes of Zombies and Winged Wretches and Vine Thingies, and especially not for the eerily intelligent monster known only as Blarg. So Jack builds a team. With their help, Jack is going to slay Blarg, achieve the ultimate Feat of Apocalyptic Success, and be average no longer! Can he do it?
2. The Last Kids on Earth and the Zombie Parade – The zombies are disappearing. This might seem like a good thing since zombies eat your brains, but normal human kid Jack Sullivan is suspicious. He keeps hearing an eerie shrieking noise that seems to be almost summoning the zombies-but to where, and for what (probably) foul purpose?
3. The Last Kids on Earth and the Nightmare King – Jack’s friends make a startling discovery: they may not be the last kids on earth, after all. This is great news for everyone… except Jack. Once they’ve found other humans, his friends won’t stick around for long! Jack’s only hope for keeping things the way they are is to prove that everything here is perfect. One problem: it’s hard convincing his friends that everything is great when they’re being hunted by a monstrous Nightmare King and an ancient evil who won’t rest until Earth has been devoured.

4. The Last Kids on Earth and the Cosmic Beyond – It’s the first winter after the monster apocalypse. For Jack and his buddies, that means sled catapults, epic snowball battles, and one monstrous Christmas celebration. But their winter wonderland turns dark when a villainess begins hunting them. And this villainess is different-she’s a human.
5. The Last Kids on Earth and the Midnight Blade – When Jack discovers his Louisville Slicer has new, otherworldly powers, he’s thrown into epic training to find out what kind of destruction the blade can wield. But between fighting off zombies, fleeing from strange, glowy Vine-Thingies erupting from the ground, and squeezing in a video game session or two, there’s barely time left to figure out what’s wrong with their buddy, Dirk, who’s been acting weird any time he’s around the undead. When an unexpected villain appears, can Jack and his friends save themselves–and the rest of the world–from cosmic domination?
6. The Last Kids on Earth: June’s Wild Flight – While the kids plan their next move, an unexpected threat emerges and June gets separated from her friends, dragged miles away from Wakefield to a town overgrown with monstrous vines and never-before-seen creatures. Drawing on her post-apocalyptic survival and action skills–and with the help of some odd new companions–June attempts to make her way back home.

7. The Last Kids on Earth: Thrilling Tales From the Tree House (a Standalone graphic novel) – The kids and their monster buddies are hanging out in the tree house, when Jack launches into an epic, totally-heroic, super rad story of one of his many post-apocalyptic adventures. Of course, after he’s finished, everyone’s eager to one-up his tale with a story of their own. Soon, Quint, Dirk, June and Skaelka, and even Globlet regale the group with sometimes outrageous, often hilarious details of their action-packed escapades during the monster-zombie apocalypse.
8. The Last Kids on Earth and the Skeleton Road – Jack Sullivan and the gang are furiously searching for the villainous Thrull and his skeleton army. The clock is ticking: the enemy has begun constructing the Tower–a portal with the power to bring Rezzoch the Ancient, Destructor of Worlds, to our dimension. Equipped with a crucial clue discovered by June on her Wild Flight, the group does the once-unthinkable: they leave Wakefield behind and embark on an . . . EPIC ROAD TRIP!
9. The Last Kids on Earth: and the Doomsday Race – With his zombie-controlling powers growing stronger, Jack Sullivan and his buddies are road-tripping toward themysteriousTower, where they must once and for all stop Rezzoch the Ancient, Destructor of Worlds, from descending upon our dimension. But theirjourney is sidetrackedwhen they are swept up by the Mallusk, an enormous centipede monster carrying theworld’s largest shopping mall on its back.

10. The Last Kids on Earth: Quint and Dirk’s Hero Quest – Picking up after the events of The Last Kids on Earth and the Doomsday Race, adventure abounds as Quint and Dirk encounter new monsters and embark on a postapocalyptic quest for the ages.
11. The Last Kids on Earth and the Forbidden Fortress – The Last Kids are happily reunited-but quickly faced with a monstrous new mission. Inside an other-dimensional fortress, the evil Thrull, alongside a vile new villain, is carrying out a sinister plan. Jack, Quint, June and Dirk must make their own plans to infiltrate the stronghold before Thrull gets any closer to completing the mysterious Tower, a structure that could ultimately spell doom for this dimension.
12. The Last Kids on Earth and The Monster Dimension – The last kids may have escaped the forbidden fortress by the skin of their teeth, but there isn’t much to celebrate. Thrull has what he needs to complete the Tower, Rezzoch will most certainly come to Earth, and the world as they know it will cease to exist. Except Jack’s Cosmic Hand is now even more powerful than he realized, and it might just be able to stop the inevitable from happening. To get the answers he seeks, he’ll need to travel farther than he’s ever been. He must go . . . to the monster dimension! 

The Last Comics on Earth

• The Last Comics on Earth – Jack, Quint, June, and Dirk are about to face a challenge unlike any they’ve faced before . . . At their local comic book store, the kids make a startling discovery: they’ve read every last issue of their favorite comic, Z-Man, and no new issues are coming…ever! (Thanks a lot, apocalypse.). Nooo! Our heroes have but one choice: continue Z-Man’s legacy by writing and illustrating THEIR OWN COMIC BOOK! Step one? Knock off their beloved Z-Man and cast themselves as super rad, super goofy, superhero protectors of the mysterious city of Apocalyptia. What could possibly go wrong? Just about everything!
• The Last Comics on Earth Too Many Villains! – Jack, June, Quint, and Dirk face their biggest challenge yet: creating the sequel to their hit graphic novel! And like all sequels, it must be BIGGER, BETTER, and PACKED WITH EVEN MORE NEAT STUFF! While the kids get to work, their superhero alter-egos make a startling discovery: supervillains do not come up with their own evil plans! The shocking truth? Every supervillain scheme comes from the mind of a single, mysterious bad guy.

If you like our article about the Last Kids on Earth reading order, don’t forget to bookmark it! You may also be interested in the Wings of Fire series by Tui T. Sutherland, or the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series by Jeff Kinney. Don’t hesitate to follow us on Twitter or Facebook to discover more book series.