The Bogue Banks Chronicles: coastal apocalypse fiction
Mike Anthony’s apocalyptic fiction series follows Evan Mercer and the survivors of Bogue Banks, where the water that offers refuge also limits the choices they can make.
A North Carolina coast shaped by survival
Across Bogue Sound begins with an ordinary act of helping: Evan, a boat mechanic and former Coast Guardsman, goes looking for an overdue fishing boat. An unfamiliar illness brings that working coastal world into danger. His responsibilities to neighbors cannot be separated from his wife, Claire, and daughter, Abigail.
The later books move beyond reaching safety. The Mirador Season confronts dwindling water, raiders, and contact from Harkers Island. The Severed Coast sends Evan and Abigail beyond the island in search of communities they can trust. In The Returning Shore, the survivors must face the mainland again.
Bogue Banks, Atlantic Beach, and Emerald Isle
The real Bogue Banks barrier island includes Atlantic Beach and Emerald Isle on North Carolina’s Crystal Coast. Bogue Sound lies between the island and the mainland. Readers familiar with that geography will recognize why access, bridges, boats, and separation matter to this kind of coastal survival story.
The novels are fiction, not predictions or emergency-preparedness manuals. Real geographical context is kept separate from individual plot claims: the book descriptions explain which journeys, communities, and conflicts belong to each installment.
The Bogue Banks Chronicles reading order
Begin with Across Bogue Sound, then continue with The Mirador Season, The Severed Coast, and The Returning Shore. Book Four is the final volume in the author’s planned series. The book links below show current release information; dates for forthcoming volumes will be added when announced.
Betrayal, Calico Creek, and The Summer We Found Everything are other Mike Anthony novels, not additional volumes of The Bogue Banks Chronicles.
Books in reading order
Across Bogue Sound
Book One of The Bogue Banks Chronicles, an apocalyptic series by Mike Anthony. In Across Bogue Sound, an overdue fishing boat draws mechanic and former Coast Guardsman Evan Mercer into the first signs of a spreading illness on North Carolina's Crystal Coast.
Read about Across Bogue SoundThe Mirador Season
Coming soonThe hurricane is over, but Bogue Banks has only a month of water left. As the Miradors regroup and the Coastal Recovery Authority makes its offers, a weak call from Harkers Island reaches Evan Mercer's community.
Read about The Mirador SeasonThe Severed Coast
Coming soonFood and medicine are running out on Bogue Banks. Evan Mercer and his daughter, Abigail, must leave the island to discover which coastal communities can be trusted—and what each alliance will cost.
Read about The Severed CoastThe Returning Shore
Coming soonThe wells are turning salt, and the island cannot sustain its survivors forever. In the series' final book, Evan Mercer leads a return to a mainland whose people have not forgotten who closed the bridges.
Read about The Returning Shore