Reading order
Waverley Novels reading order
- Waverley1814
- Guy Mannering1815
- The Antiquary1816
- Rob Roy1817
- Ivanhoe1819
- Kenilworth1821
- The Pirate1822
- The Fortunes of Nigel1822
- Peveril of the Peak1823
- Quentin Durward1823
- St. Ronan's Well1823
- Redgauntlet1824
- Every volume in order (15) ↓
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12- 7.67.6 / 10175 ratings
- Score
- 15 volumes
- Volumes
- 1814–2008
- Published
- about 125 h
- Reading time
- Completed
- Status
- Historical fiction
- Genre
Quick answer
Publication order
15 volumes1814–2008Completed
- Not a series in any modern sense: twenty-six novels published over eighteen years, sharing no characters and no plot, gathered under one name because Scott published the first anonymously as "by the author of Waverley" and kept the pose for a decade.
- Read whichever one interests you.
- Ivanhoe is the one most people mean and needs nothing before it; Waverley itself is the historical one, about the 1745 rising, and is the better book if you want what Scott was actually doing — inventing the historical novel.
- Rob Roy and The Heart of Midlothian are the other two usually named.
A plan for the whole series
15 volumes, 6,710 pages, about 125 hours. At 45 min a day that is about 5 months.
Stages
8 stages, with 7 short books from outside the series between them. You finish around May 14, 2027, about 5 weeks later than in one go.
- Stage 19 h12 daysby November 10, 2026
- Short breakThe Fire Next Time · James Baldwin · 120 pp. · score 8.8
- Stage 216 habout 3 weeksby December 6, 2026
- Short breakThe Emperor's Soul · Brandon Sanderson · 96 pp. · score 8.8
- Stage 319 habout 4 weeksby January 4, 2027
- BreakMaus · Art Spiegelman · 295 pp. · score 9.0
- Stage 418 habout 3 weeksby February 6, 2027
- Short breakOn Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century · Timothy Snyder · 128 pp. · score 8.4
- Stage 518 habout 3 weeksby March 6, 2027
- Short breakTo Be Taught, If Fortunate · Becky Chambers · 153 pp. · score 8.3
- Stage 617 habout 3 weeksby April 2, 2027
- Short breakA Room of One's Own · Virginia Woolf · 144 pp. · score 8.2
- Stage 717 habout 3 weeksby April 30, 2027
- Short breakThe Screwtape letters · C. S. Lewis · 106 pp. · score 8.2
- Stage 88 h11 daysby May 14, 2027
- The end of the series
We count 1.1 min per page, the pace of an average novel reader. Faster? Move the slider.
≈ next to a page count: a volume with no page count in our data is counted at this series’s average.
How this plan is calculated
The plan comes from the pages and ratings of each volume: we split the series into stages of about three weeks’ reading, size each break to the stage before it, and read the chance of finishing from how many readers rate the last volume compared with the first. How we work out the plan →
Every volume in order
Order checked by hand · Order and years: Wikidata (CC0). Spotted an error? Tell us. · Data updated October 29, 2026
Extras, short stories and spin-offs
Not needed to follow the main story — read them after the series or skip them.
- The Fair Maid of Perth1828
- Anne of Geierstein1829
Frequently asked questions
Which Waverley Novels book is the longest?
“Peveril of the Peak” is the longest at 556 pages; the shortest is “Kenilworth” with 128 pages.
What should I read after Waverley Novels?
After the main series: The Fair Maid of Perth, Anne of Geierstein.