skip navigation links

Readers > Adult & teen lists > Novels Set in Portland

Novels Set in Portland

This list features a selection of novels set in Portland, Oregon. For additional titles, use the subject heading, Portland (Or.) - Fiction. All titles shelved in Fiction collection, except as noted: M=mystery, SF=science fiction.

General Fiction

The Night Season bookjacket Cain, Chelsea
Portland is threatened by the worst flood since 1948, when the town of Vanport, just north of the city, was wiped from the map. Now several victims are discovered with mysterious puncture wounds. Detective Archie Sheridan and Journalist Susan Ward investigate.
Day One bookjacket Cameron, Bill
M
A retired Portland homicide cop about to give up on life helps a woman escape an abusive past.
Hard Rain Falling bookjacket Carpenter, Don
Hard Rain Falling follows the adventures of Jack Levitt, an orphaned teenager living off his wits in the fleabag hotels and seedy pool halls of Portland, Oregon.
42: Cooper, M. Thomas
Portland, Oregon resident, George Olson works for an insurance company in a downtown office, The Black Box, from where he begins noticing a string of disappearances, strange disasters and the recurrence of the number 42.
The Girl Who Fell From the Sky bookjacket Durrow, Heidi
The daughter of a Danish immigrant and a black G.I., Rachel survives a family tragedy only to face new challenges. Sent to live with her strict African-American grandmother in a racially divided Portland, Oregon, she must suppress her grief and reinvent herself in a mostly black community. The world wants to see her as either black or white, but that's not how she sees herself.
Forest Moon Rising bookjacket Frost, P. R.
SF
A dark elf has settled in the heart of Portland's Forest Park and is ravishing women, leaving them pregnant and stealing the babies. Tess Noncoiré, successful fantasy writer and Celestial Blade Warrior, forfeits her own dreams in order to save those nearest and dearest to her.
Wrenn: Egypt House bookjacket Lynn, Alice
Wrenn is a journey of romance and personal growth set in turn-of-the-20th-century Portland, Oregon. Wrenn's adventures lead her to New York, where she is treated to the opera and riding lessons in Central Park. Returning to Portland, Wrenn struggles to resume her working-class life against the backdrop of the 1905 Lewis & Clark Exposition.
Sleeping with the Devil bookjacket Marlow, Vanessa
A chef in Portland is seduced and introduced to a life of luxury and dark sexual kinks. She allows herself to be trapped in a web of lust and sexual depravity, pain and pleasure — and she may not survive.
Magic on the Storm bookjacket Monk, Devon
SF
Allison Beckstrom is committed to her work tracing illegal spells. Now there's an apocalyptic storm bearing down on Portland, and when it hits, all the magic in the area will turn unstable and destructive.
The Shanghai Tunnel bookjacket Newman, Sharan
A widow takes over her husband's business in the rough, bustling trading outpost of 1868 Portland, Oregon. She must deal with his hostile partners and investigate the murder of a man in her kitchen.
My Abandonment bookjacket Rock, Peter
In the tradition of Jon Krakauer's Into the Wild, Rock's My Abandonment, inspired by a true story, offers a riveting and unsettling account of a girl and her father who live off the grid in the forest park outside Portland, Oregon.
Portland Noir bookjacket Sampsell, Kevin, editor
M
Explore the dark, rainy underbelly of one of America's most beautiful but enigmatic cities.
Fixation bookjacket Schorr, Mark
M
A Vietnam vet with post-traumatic stress disorder and a history of substance abuse, Brian Hanson has turned his life around working as a counselor with some of Portland, Oregon's, most troubled citizens. Taking readers from Portland's mysterious underground tunnels, to computer dives in Seattle, to the back streets and alleyways of the Rose City, Fixation offers gripping characters with a rich sense of place.
Lean on Pete bookjacket Vlautin, Willy
Fifteen-year-old Charley Thompson and his father move from Spokane, Washington, to Portland, Oregon, to give starting over yet another try. Charley takes a job in the tack room of a run-down horse track and is comforted by his friendship with a failing racehorse named Lean on Pete. In increasingly desperate circumstances, Charley will head east, hoping to find his aunt who had once lived a thousand miles away in Wyoming.