Some cases never leave you.
For John Rebus, forty years may have passed, but the death of beautiful, promiscuous Maria Turquand still preys on his mind. Murdered in her hotel room on the night a famous rock star and his entourage were staying there, Maria's killer has never been found.
Meanwhile, the dark heart of Edinburgh remains up for grabs. A young pretender, Darryl Christie, may have staked his claim, but a vicious attack leaves him weakened and vulnerable, and an inquiry into a major money laundering scheme threatens his position. Has old-time crime boss Big Ger Cafferty really given up the ghost, or is he biding his time until Edinburgh is once more ripe for the picking?
In a tale of twisted power, deep-rooted corruption and bitter rivalries, Rather Be the Devil showcases Rankin and Rebus at their unstoppable best. Views: 70
When Frank and Joe Hardy set out to catch the elusive prankster who is after rancher Roy Carlson's oil-rich land, the amateur sleuths find themselves struggling to survive in a vast New Mexico desert. Views: 70
SUMMARY:
The Barnes & Noble ReviewBestselling Italian author Andrea Camilleri has built a massive international following for his sardonic Sicilian mysteries featuring a listless, dejected, nonconformist protagonist who somehow always accomplishes his duty in spite of himself. The Shape of Water is his first Inspector Salvo Montalbano adventure to be translated into English.
When a local politician is found dead in his car, half naked, in a seedy neighborhood known for prostitution and drug trafficking, it's assumed that he died of natural causes in the middle of a sexual escapade. Hoping to avoid an embarrassing situation, Montalbano's superiors expect him to close the case quickly. But the inspector senses that not all is as it seems and determinedly launches a full investigation.
While pursuing the case, Montalbano encounters a number of bizarre and comical characters, from an elderly schoolteacher driven mad by his 80-year-old wife's "cheating" to a former classmate who's now an intellectual pimp. The inspector is drawn into the shadowy world of Sicilian politics as he discovers affiliations made between bureaucratic adversaries, meets with promiscuous beauties, and finds corruption that might even reach into the Church. He takes it all with the accepting attitude that one needs to survive in an often bleak and impoverished part of the world.
Not your typical fast-paced, shootout-filled genre mystery, The Shape of Water is an artfully written novel that provides its own brand of rewards. Replete with the sights and sounds of Sicily, this is an atmospheric and frequently droll tale that offers American readers a new and distinctive voice. (Tom Piccirilli) Views: 70
Mary Miller had always been an outcast. As a young girl she had fallen into the hot burn - a torrent of warm chemical run-off from the local coal mine. Fished out white-haired and half-dead, sympathy for her quickly faded when the young man who pushed her in died in a mining accident just two days later. From then on she was regarded with a mixture of suspicion and fascination by her God-fearing community. Now, years later she is hardly less alone. She is the mother of a bastard son, Sandy, and caught up in a faltering affair with a local teacher. Sandy, meanwhile, has fallen in love with a strange homeless girl. The search for happiness isn't easy. Both mother and son must face a dark secret from their past, in the growing knowledge that their small dramas are being played out against a much larger canvas, glimpsed only in symbols and flickering images - of decay and regrowth, of fire and water - of the flood. The Flood is both a coming-of-age novel and an amazing portrait of a time and place. Dark, atmospheric and powerful, it is a remarkable debut from a remarkable author. Views: 70
A Gripping Mystery Thriller That Will Keep You Guessing Until The Final, Shocking Twist. A prominent Grosse Pointe doctor is found dead, in his car, in an abandoned section of Detroit with a rope around his neck. Private Investigator John Rockne knows the victim, and soon finds himself in the middle of an investigation that blows the lid off Grosse Pointe's glamorous façade. Soon, Rockne becomes the target of a killer whose depraved sadism knows no bounds. The trail of his friend's brutal murder takes him into Detroit's darkest and most dangerous corners, until one final explosive piece of the puzzle makes him question everything, and everyone. "Fast-paced, engaging, original." -New York Times bestselling author Thomas Perry Views: 70
Donna Leon’s critically acclaimed, internationally bestselling Commissario Guido Brunetti series has attracted readers the world over with the beauty of its setting, the humanity of its characters, and its fearlessness in exploring politics, morality, and contemporary Italian culture. In the pages of Leon’s novels, the beloved conversations of the Brunetti family have drawn on topics of art and literature, but books are at the heart of this novel in a way they never have been before. One afternoon, Commissario Guido Brunetti gets a frantic call from the director of a prestigious Venetian library. Someone has stolen pages out of several rare books. After a round of questioning, the case seems clear: the culprit must be the man who requested the volumes, an American professor from a Kansas university. The only problem—the man fled the library earlier that day, and after checking his credentials, the American professor doesn’t exist. As the investigation proceeds, the suspects multiply. And when a seemingly harmless theologian, who had spent years reading at the library turns up brutally murdered, Brunetti must question his expectations about what makes a man innocent, or guilty.** Views: 70
Gene Redhouse believes in signs. But when Lori Baker literally jumps into his life, the Navajo wisdom he's learned disappears. Lori is being stalked and she's never been so frightened, or so alone. Although it seems they belong to different worlds, the connection between them is instant and intense. And if he can keep her alive long enough, he vows to explore every inch of her....With his chiseled features and powerful build, Gene is the safe harbor in Lori's stormy sea. And yet with her past weighing her down, Lori must decide which is more dangerous: the stranger trailing her every step, or the one daring her to trust him. Views: 70
Six Award-Winning Authors have contributed brand new stories to A Timeless Romance Anthology: Winter Collection. A collection unlike any other, readers will love this compilation of six sweet historical romance novellas, set in varying eras, yet all with one thing in common: Romance.The Road to Cavan Town by Sarah M. Eden, set in 1864 Ireland, combines Eden’s sense of humor with her signature sweet romance. Alice Wheatley walks each weekend into town, accompanied by Isaac Dancy. And while Alice finds herself falling in love with the gentleman, unfortunately he has his eyes set on the belle of the town, Miss Sophia Kilchrest. Alice must find a way to turn Isaac’s eyes toward her.Regency author Heidi Ashworth’s delightful story, It Happened Twelfth Night, set in England 1812, follows Luisa Darlington who discovers the man of her dreams, Percy Brooksby, isn’t in love with her as much as she thought he was. When Percy’s friend, the mysterious foreigner, Mr. Flynn, visits for the twelfth night holiday, he promptly sweeps Luisa off her feet, quite literally. Luisa is left catching her breath in more ways than one.An Unexpected Proposal by Annette Lyon is a captivating romantic novella, set in remote Wood Camp, the snowy canyon of Logan, Utah, 1880. When Caroline Simpson is forced to thwart the aggressive advances of Mr. Butch Larson, she discovers that her long-time friend, James, has genuine affection for her. But as stubborn as Caroline is, she minimizes the feelings he’s awakened in her, and it takes almost losing James to admit her true feelings for him.In Joyce DiPastena’s charming medieval story, Caroles on the Green, we enter England of 1151, in which Lady Isabel has a dilemma. She promises herself that she’ll marry the man who sent a ring hidden in her pastry since the man she truly loves, Sir Lucian de Warrene, has proved to be impossible and exasperating. To forget him, Isabel sets her eyes on other eligible men, only to face another confrontation with Lucian—who isn’t about to back off and leave her to her newest plot.Donna Hatch’s enchanting novella, A Winter’s Knight, begins when Clarissa Fairchild’s coach just happens to break down in front of the most forbidding estate in the county, that of Wyckburg Castle, a place where young brides have been murdered for generations by their husbands. Clarissa is horrified yet curious all in the same breath. When she meets widower Christopher de Champs, Earl of Wyckburg, she must decide if she should flee or uncover the greatest secret in the county about her handsome rescuer. In Heather B. Moore’s exciting turn-of-the-century story, A Fortunate Exile, Lila Townsend finds herself the victim of a broken heart—broken by the most notorious bachelor in 1901 New York City. If that isn’t bad enough, her father sends her to Aunt Eugenia’s remote farm where Lila must wait for her father’s anger to subside and the gossip columns to find new fodder. When Lila meets her aunt’s boarder, Peter Weathers, she discovers a man who isn’t afraid to stand up to her formidable family and take a chance on a woman with a sullied reputation. Views: 70
Midnight Harvest is a novel by Chelsea Quinn Yarbro.At the publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management software (DRM) applied. Views: 70
Stationed in Bamberg, Germany, in the chaotic aftermath of WWII, pint-sized Charles "Chucky" Cronin O'Malley can't seem to keep himself out of harm's way. Whether it be with black marketeers, border patrols, or even his commanding officer, Chucky always seems to land in impossible scrapes, relying on a quick wit and blind luck (or is it Heavenly intervention?) to save his hide. And until the day he meets beautiful seventeen-year-old Trudi, a girl on the run from smugglers and the U.S. Army, he manages to keep himself in one piece. Trudi needs Chucky's help. If he isn't careful though, she may also make off with his heart. Views: 70
From Publishers WeeklyIn Zeltserman's unconvincing third thriller (after Fast Lane), Cambridge, Mass., detective Bill Shannon dreads every February 10th, the anniversary of the day his mother was brutally murdered in their California home when Bill was 13. Around the anniversary, Bill suffers from debilitating blackouts that often cause long stretches of amnesia. As the 20th anniversary approaches, the blackouts become more severe, disrupting Bill's work and home life. Soon he's spiraling out of control, unsure how to tell reality from nightmare. A series of gruesome slayings have Bill questioning whether he himself could be responsible and terrified that Herbert Winters, his mother's killer, has come back to claim him. Crime novelists from Robert B. Parker to Dennis Lehane have found fertile ground in a similar premise and setting, but Zeltserman falls short of their standard. Bill Shannon lacks the depth required for a character who walks the line between victim and potential killer, and instead collapses into stereotype. Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. FromA compellingly clever wheels-within-wheels thriller, Zeltserman's new novel blends genres in a subtle mix that will appeal to both mystery and horror fans. Police detective Bill Shannon's dreams are being invaded by images of horrific violence, but the source of the intrusion remains shadowed until the harrowing conclusion of the novel, a homage to the Australian Aboriginal concept of "Dreamtime." The reader will be kept guessing as to whether the psychologically hammered cop is being revisited by his own guilt or whether there's an outside factor involved in his recurring visions of murdering his own mother. The resolution of the novel clearly indicates the possibility of sequels to come, so if you want to get in on the ground floor, now's the time. An ingenious plot, skillfully executed. Elliott SwansonCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved Views: 70
Maui County homicide detective and composite sketch artist Leila Kahana and her partner Detective Jonny Chung investigate the murders of beautiful hula dancers by a serial killer dubbed the "Hula Killer." Each victim was stabbed to death. As they chase leads and suspects, Leila starts to believe that Chung might be a dirty cop. But should she act on her suspicions and report it to her boss Lieutenant Blake Seymour?In the meantime, Leila is in the midst of a new relationship with handsome restaurateur Maxwell Kishimoto. When he asks her to marry him, she's conflicted due to her conservative upbringing, career, and independence.Also in the Homicide Unit, Detectives Trent Ferguson and Rachel Lancaster investigate the murder of a woman whose charred corpse was found in a vehicle along a deserted road. Could solving one case help solve the other? Or be an impediment?As the Hula Killer continues to evade capture with the body count rising, Leila volunteers to go undercover as a hula dancer to try and flush out the murderer. But is the cunning killer one step ahead of them? Is Leila putting her life at risk to become another one of his victims? Views: 70
