These stories have a variety of themes from domestic crime thrillers to serial killers and everything in between. Each story will have an epic twist and haunting characters that will stay with you long after the last page.
The Donut Legion
Joe R. Lansdale
Charlie Garner has a bad feeling. His ex-wife, Meg, has been missing for over a week and one quick peek into her home shows all her possessions packed up in boxes. Neighbors claim she's running from bill collectors, but Charlie suspects something more sinister is afoot. Meg was last seen working at the local donut shop, a business run by a shadow group most refer to as 'The Saucer People'; a space-age, evangelist cult who believe their compound to be the site of an extraterrestrial Second Coming. Along with his brother, Felix, and beautiful, randy journalist Amelia "Scrappy" Moon, Charlie uncovers strange and frightening details about the compound (read: a massive, doomsday storehouse of weapons, a leashed chimpanzee!) When the body of their key informer is found dead with his arms ripped out of their sockets, Charlie knows he's in danger but remains dogged in his quest to rescue Meg.
Read More View in CatalogThe Rescue
T. Jefferson Parker
While reporting on a Tijuana animal shelter, journalist Bettina Blazak falls in love with one of her story's subjects--an adorable Mexican street dog who is being treated for a mysterious gunshot wound. Bettina impulsively adopts the dog, who she names Felix after the veterinarian who saved him. In investigating Felix's past, Bettina discovers that his life is nothing like what she assumed. For one thing, he's not a Mexican street dog at all. A former DEA drug-sniffing dog, Felix has led a very colorful, dangerous, and profitable life. With Bettina's story going viral, some interesting people are looking for Felix, making him a target--again. Bettina soon finds herself drawn into a deadly criminal underworld from which she and her beloved dog may not return.
Read More View in CatalogMalcolm Kershaw Series, Book 1
Eight Perfect Murders
Peter Swanson
Years ago, bookseller and mystery aficionado Malcolm Kershaw compiled a list of the genre's most unsolvable murders, those that are almost impossible to crack--which he titled "Eight Perfect Murders"--chosen from among the best of the best including Agatha Christie's A. B. C. Murders, Patricia Highsmith's Strangers on a Train, Ira Levin's Deathtrap, A. A. Milne's The Red House Mystery, Anthony Berkeley Cox's Malice Aforethought, James M. Cain's Double Indemnity, John D. MacDonald's The Drowner, and Donna Tartt's The Secret History. But no one is more surprised than Mal, now the owner of the Old Devils Bookstore in Boston, when an FBI agent comes knocking on his door one snowy day in February. She's looking for information about a series of unsolved murders that look eerily similar to the killings on Mal's old list. And the FBI agent isn't the only one interested in this bookseller who spends almost every night at home reading. The killer is out there, watching his every move--a diabolical threat who knows way too much about Mal's personal history, especially the secrets he's never told anyone, even his recently deceased wife. To protect himself, Mal begins looking into possible suspects . . . and sees a killer in everyone around him. But Mal doesn't count on the investigation leaving a trail of death in its wake. Suddenly, a series of shocking twists leaves more victims dead--and the noose around Mal's neck grows so tight he might never escape.
Read More View in CatalogHaven's Rock Series, Book 1
Murder at Haven’s Rock
Kelley Armstrong
Deep in the Yukon wilderness, a town is being built. A place for people to disappear, a fresh start from a life on the run. Haven's Rock isn't the first town of this kind, something detective Casey Duncan and her husband, Sheriff Eric Dalton, know first-hand. They met in the original town of Rockton. But greed and deception led the couple to financing a new refuge for those in need. This time around, they get to decide which applicants are approved for residency. There's only one rule in Haven's Rock: stay out of the forest. When two of the town's construction crew members break it and go missing, Casey and Eric are called in ahead of schedule to track them down. When a body is discovered, well-hidden with evidence of foul play, Casey and Eric must find out what happened to the dead woman, and locate those still missing. The longer Casey and Eric don't know what happened, the more danger everyone is in.
Read More View in CatalogAlex Delaware Series, Book 37
City of the Dead
Jonathan Kellerman
Los Angeles is a city of sunlight, celebrity, and possibility. The L.A. often experienced by Homicide Lt. Detective Milo Sturgis and psychologist Alex Delaware, is a city of the dead. Early one morning, the two of them find themselves in a neighborhood of pretty houses, pretty cars, and pretty people. The scene they encounter is anything but. A naked young man lies dead in the street, the apparent victim of a collision with a moving van hurtling through suburbia in the darkness. But any thoughts of accidental death vanish when a blood trail leads to a nearby home. Inside, a young woman lies butchered. The identity of the male victim and his role in the horror remain elusive, but that of the woman creates additional questions. And adding to the shock, Alex has met her while working a convoluted child custody case. Cordelia Gannett was a self-styled internet influencer who'd gotten into legal troubles by palming herself off as a psychologist. Even after promising to desist, she's found a loophole and has continued her online career, aiming to amass clicks and ads by cyber-coaching and cyber-counseling people plagued with relationship issues. But upon closer examination, Alex and Milo discover that her own relationships are troublesome, including a tortured family history and a dubious personal past. Has that come back to haunt her in the worst way? Is the mystery man out in the street collateral damage or will he turn out to be the key to solving a grisly double homicide? As the psychologist and the detective explore L.A.'s meanest streets, they peel back layer after layer of secrets and encounter a savage, psychologically twisted, almost unthinkable motive for violence and bloodshed. This is classic Delaware: Alex, a man Milo has come to see as irreplaceable, at his most insightful and brilliant.
Read More View in CatalogTwenty Years Later
Charlie Donlea
Avery Mason, host of American Events, knows the subjects that grab a TV audience's attention. Her latest story--a murder mystery laced with kinky sex, tragedy, and betrayal--is guaranteed to be ratings gold. New DNA technology has allowed the New York medical examiner's office to make its first successful identification of a 9/11 victim in years. The twist: the victim, Victoria Ford, had been accused of the gruesome murder of her married lover. In a chilling last phone call to her sister, Victoria begged her to prove her innocence. Emma Kind has waited twenty years to put her sister to rest, but closure won't be complete until she can clear Victoria's name. Alone she's had no luck, but she's convinced that Avery's connections and fame will help. Avery, hoping to negotiate a more lucrative network contract, goes into investigative overdrive. Victoria had been having an affair with a successful novelist, found hanging from the balcony of his Catskills mansion. The rope, the bedroom, and the entire crime scene was covered in Victoria's DNA. But the twisted puzzle of Victoria's private life is just the beginning. And what Avery doesn't realize is that there are other players in the game who are interested in Avery's own secret past--one she has kept hidden from both the network executives and her television audience. A secret she thought was dead and buried.
Read More View in CatalogThe Lie Maker Intl
Linwood Barclay
Your dad's not a good person. Your dad killed people, son. These are some of the last words Jack Givins' father spoke to him before he was whisked away by witness protection, leaving Jack and his mother to pick up the shattered pieces of their lives as best they could. Years later, Jack is a grown man with problems of his own. He's a talented but struggling author, barely scraping by on the royalties from his moderately successful first book. So when the U.S. Marshals approach him with a lucrative opportunity, he's in no position to turn them down. They're recruiting writers like Jack to create false histories for people in witness protection--people like Jack's father. The coincidence is astonishing to Jack at first, but he soon realizes this may be a chance to find his dad. Only there's one problem--Jack's father hasn't made contact with his handlers recently, and they have no idea where he is. He could be in serious danger, and Jack may be the only one who can find him. But how will he find a man he's never truly known? A man who has done terrible things in his lifetime and made some deadly enemies in the process--enemies who wouldn't think twice about using his own son against him.
Read More View in CatalogThe Island
Adrian McKinty
After moving from a small country town to Seattle, Heather Baxter marries Tom, a widowed doctor with a young son and teenage daughter. A working vacation overseas seems like the perfect way to bring the new family together, but once they're deep in the Australian outback, the jet-lagged and exhausted kids are so over their new mom. When they discover remote Dutch Island, off-limits to outside visitors, the family talks their way onto the ferry, taking a chance on an adventure far from the reach of iPhones and Instagram. But as soon as they set foot on the island, which is run by a tightly knit clan of locals, everything feels wrong. Then a shocking accident propels the Baxters from an unsettling situation into an absolute nightmare. When Heather and the kids are separated from Tom, they are forced to escape alone, seconds ahead of their pursuers. Now it's up to Heather to save herself and the kids, even though they don't trust her, the harsh bushland is filled with danger, and the locals want her dead. Heather has been underestimated her entire life, but she knows that only she can bring her family home again and become the mother the children desperately need, even if it means doing the unthinkable to keep them all alive.
Read More View in CatalogAli Reynolds Series, Book 17
Collateral Damage
J.A. Jance
After spending twenty years behind bars, Frank Muñoz, a disgraced former cop, is out on parole and focused on just one thing: revenge. The wife who abandoned him after his arrest, the mistress who ratted him out for abetting a money-laundering scheme, the detectives who presided over his case all those years ago--they all have targets on their backs. For Ali Reynolds, the first Christmas without her father is riddled with grief and uncertainty. And with her husband and founding partner of High Noon Enterprises, B. Simpson, preoccupied by an upcoming New Year's trip to London, she is ready for a break. But when Stu Ramey barges into her home with grave news about a serious--and suspicious--accident on the highway to Phoenix involving B.'s car, things reach a breaking point. At the hospital, a groggy, post-op B. insists that Ali take his place at a ransomware conference in London, as troubles brimming around High Noon come to light. But questions remain: Who would go to such lengths to cut the tech company from the picture? And what if Ali and the rest of the team are also in danger?
Read More View in CatalogStay Awake
Megan Goldin
Liv Reese wakes up in the back of a taxi with no idea where she is or how she got there. When she's dropped off at the door of her brownstone, a stranger answers--a stranger who claims to live in her apartment. She reaches for her phone to call for help, only to discover it's missing. In its place is a bloodstained knife. Her hands are covered in scribbled messages, like graffiti on her skin: STAY AWAKE. Two years ago, Liv was thriving as a successful writer for a trendy magazine. Now, she's lost and disoriented in a New York City that looks nothing like what she remembers. Catching a glimpse of the local news, she's horrified to see reports of a crime scene where the victim's blood has been used to scrawl a message across a window, similar to the message that's inked on her hands. What did she do last night? And why does she remember nothing from the past two years? Liv finds herself on the run for a crime she doesn't remember committing. But there's someone who does know exactly what she did, and they'll do anything to make her forget--permanently.
Read More View in CatalogAaron Falk Series, Book 2
Exiles
Jane Harper
Federal Investigator Aaron Falk is on his way to a small town deep in Southern Australian wine country for the christening of an old friend's baby. But mystery follows him, even on vacation. This weekend marks the one-year anniversary of Kim Gillespie's disappearance. One year ago, at a busy town festival on a warm spring night, Kim safely tucked her sleeping baby into her stroller, then vanished into the crowd. No one has seen her since. When Kim's older daughter makes a plea for anyone with information about her missing mom to come forward, Falk and his old buddy Raco can't leave the case alone. As Falk soaks up life in the lush valley, he is welcomed into the tight-knit circle of Kim's friends and loved ones. But the group may be more fractured than it seems. Between Falk's closest friend, the missing mother, and a woman he's drawn to, dark questions linger as long-ago truths begin to emerge. What would make a mother abandon her child? What happened to Kim Gillespie?
Read More View in CatalogDanny Ryan Series, Book 2
City of Dreams
Don Winslow
Hollywood. The city where dreams are made. On the losing side of a bloody East Coast crime war, Danny Ryan is now on the run. The Mafia, the cops, the FBI all want him dead or in prison. With his little boy, his elderly father and the tattered remnants of his loyal crew of soldiers, he makes the classic American migration to California to start a new life. A quiet, peaceful existence. But the Feds track him down and want Danny to do them a favor that could make him a fortune or kill him. And when Hollywood starts shooting a film based on his former life, Danny demands a piece of the action and begins to rebuild his criminal empire. Then he falls in love. With a beautiful movie star who has a dark past of her own. As their worlds collide in an explosion that could destroy them both, Danny Ryan has to fight for his life in a city where dreams are born. Or where they go to die.
Read More View in CatalogKay Scarpetta Series, Book 26
Livid
Patricia Cornwell
Chief medical examiner Kay Scarpetta is the reluctant star witness in a sensational murder trial when she receives shocking news. The judge's sister has been found dead. At first glance, it appears to be a home invasion, but then why was nothing stolen, and why is the garden strewn with dead plants and insects? Although there is no apparent cause of death, Scarpetta recognizes telltale signs of the unthinkable, and she knows the worst is yet to come. The forensic pathologist finds herself pitted against a powerful force that returns her to the past, and her time to catch the killer is running out.
Read More View in CatalogPendergast Series, Book 21
The Cabinet of Dr. Leng
Douglas Preston, Lincoln Child
AN INCREDIBLE JOURNEY Astoundingly, Constance has found a way back to the place of her origins, New York City in the late 1800s, leaping at the chance, although it means leaving the present forever. A DESPERATE OPPORTUNITY Constance sets off on a quest to prevent the events that lead to the deaths of her sister and brother. But along the road to redemption, Manhattan's most infamous serial killer, Dr. Enoch Leng, lies in wait, ready to strike at the slightest provocation. UNIMAGINABLE ODDS Meanwhile, in contemporary New York, Pendergast feverishly searches for a way to reunite with Constance--but will he discover a way back to her before it's too late?
Read More View in CatalogAll Good People Here
Ashley Flowers
Everyone from Wakarusa, Indiana, remembers the infamous case of January Jacobs, who was discovered in a ditch hours after her family awoke to find her gone. Margot Davies was six at the time, the same age as January--and they were next-door neighbors. In the twenty years since, Margot has grown up, moved away, and become a big-city journalist. But she's always been haunted by the feeling that it could've been her. And the worst part is, January's killer has never been brought to justice. When Margot returns home to help care for her uncle after he is diagnosed with early-onset dementia, she feels like she's walked into a time capsule. Wakarusa is exactly how she remembers--genial, stifled, secretive. Then news breaks about five-year-old Natalie Clark from the next town over, who's gone missing under circumstances eerily similar to January's. With all the old feelings rushing back, Margot vows to find Natalie and to solve January's murder once and for all. But the police, Natalie's family, the townspeople--they all seem to be hiding something. And the deeper Margot digs into Natalie's disappearance, the more resistance she encounters, and the colder January's case feels. Could January's killer still be out there? Is it the same person who took Natalie? And what will it cost to finally discover what truly happened that night twenty years ago?
Read More View in CatalogSmall Mercies
Dennis Lehane
In the summer of 1974 a heatwave blankets Boston and Mary Pat Fennessy is trying to stay one step ahead of the bill collectors. Mary Pat has lived her entire life in the housing projects of "Southie," the Irish American enclave that stubbornly adheres to old tradition and stands proudly apart. One night Mary Pat's teenage daughter Jules stays out late and doesn't come home. That same evening, a young Black man is found dead, struck by a subway train under mysterious circumstances. The two events seem unconnected. But Mary Pat, propelled by a desperate search for her missing daughter, begins turning over stones best left untouched--asking questions that bother Marty Butler, chieftain of the Irish mob, and the men who work for him, men who don't take kindly to any threat to their business.
Read More View in CatalogI Will Find You
Harlan Coben
Five years ago, an innocent man began a life sentence for murdering his own son. Today he found out his son is still alive. David Burroughs was once a devoted father to his three-year-old son Matthew, living a dream life just a short drive away from the working-class suburb where he and his wife, Cheryl, first fell in love--until one fateful night when David woke suddenly to discover Matthew had been murdered while David was asleep just down the hall. Half a decade later, David’s been wrongly accused and convicted of the murder, left to serve out his time in a maximum-security prison—a fate which, grieving and wracked with guilt, David didn’t have the will to fight. The world has moved on without him. Then Cheryl’s younger sister, Rachel, makes a surprise appearance during visiting hours bearing a strange photograph. It’s a vacation shot of a bustling amusement park a friend shared with her, and in the background, just barely in frame, is a boy bearing an eerie resemblance to David’s son. Even though it can’t be, David just knows: Matthew is still alive. David plans a harrowing escape, determined to achieve the impossible – save his son, clear his own name, and discover the real story of what happened. But with his life on the line and the FBI following his every move, can David evade capture long enough to reveal the shocking truth?
Read More View in CatalogMickey Gibson Series, Book 1
Simply Lies
David Baldacci
Mickey Gibson, single mother and former detective, leads a hectic life similar to that of many moms: juggling the demands of her two small children with the tasks of her job working remotely for ProEye, a global investigation company that hunts down wealthy tax and credit cheats. When Mickey gets a call from a colleague named Arlene Robinson, she thinks nothing of Arlene's unusual request for her to go inventory the vacant home of an arms dealer who cheated ProEye's clients and fled. That is, until she arrives at the mansion to discover a dead body in a secret room--and that nothing is as it seems. Not only does the arms dealer not exist but the murder victim turns out to be Harry Langhorne, a man with mob ties who used to be in Witness Protection. What's more, no one named Arlene Robinson works at ProEye. In the blink of an eye, Gibson has become a prime suspect in a murder investigation--and now her job is also on the line until she proves that she was set up. Before long, Gibson is locked in a battle of wits with a brilliant woman with no name, a hidden past, and unknown motives--whose end game is as mysterious as it is deadly.
Read More View in CatalogWomen's Murder Club Series, Book 23
The 23rd Midnight
James Patterson, Maxine Paetro
Detective Lindsay Boxer put serial killer Evan Burke in jail. Reporter Cindy Thomas wrote a book that put him on the bestseller list. An obsessed maniac has turned Burke's true-crime story into a playbook. And is embellishing it with gruesome touches all his own. Now Lindsay's tracking an elusive suspect, and the entire Murder Club is facing destruction.
Read More View in CatalogThe Woman in the Library
Sulari Gentill
The ornate reading room at the Boston Public Library is quiet, until the tranquility is shattered by a woman's terrified scream. Security guards take charge immediately, instructing everyone inside to stay put until the threat is identified and contained. While they wait for the all-clear, four strangers, who'd happened to sit at the same table, pass the time in conversation and friendships are struck. Each has his or her own reasons for being in the reading room that morning—it just happens that one is a murderer.
Read More View in Catalog
Murder Book
Thomas Perry
When a sudden crime wave hits several small midwestern towns, the U.S. Attorney for the region calls on Harry Duncan to investigate. An ex-cop known for his unorthodox methods, Duncan is reluctant to go up against a widespread criminal organization-but the attorney in question is Ellen Leicester, the wife who left him fifteen years earlier, and to her, he can't say no. Initially brought in as a consultant to determine if the racketeering is severe enough to require an all-out investigation by the FBI, Duncan quickly finds himself in conflict with a syndicate far more violent than first suspected. As the investigation develops, he begins compiling a “murder book,” the notebook in which a detective keeps records, interviews, photos-everything he needs to build his case. But his scrutiny of the gang soon makes Duncan a target. And Ellen, too.
Read More View in CatalogPortrait of a Thief
Grace D. Li
History is told by the conquerors. Across the Western world, museums display the spoils of war, of conquest, of colonialism: priceless pieces of art looted from other countries, kept even now. Will Chen plans to steal them back. A senior at Harvard, Will fits comfortably in his carefully curated roles: a perfect student, an art history major and sometimes artist, the eldest son who has always been his parents' American Dream. But when a mysterious Chinese benefactor reaches out with an impossible--and illegal--job offer, Will finds himself something else as well: the leader of a heist to steal back five priceless Chinese sculptures, looted from Beijing centuries ago. His crew is every heist archetype one can imagine--or at least, the closest he can get. A con artist: Irene Chen, a public policy major at Duke who can talk her way out of anything. A thief: Daniel Liang, a premed student with steady hands just as capable of lockpicking as suturing. A getaway driver: Lily Wu, an engineering major who races cars in her free time. A hacker: Alex Huang, an MIT dropout turned Silicon Valley software engineer. Each member of his crew has their own complicated relationship with China and the identity they've cultivated as Chinese Americans, but when Will asks, none of them can turn him down. Because if they succeed? They earn fifty million dollars--and a chance to make history. But if they fail, it will mean not just the loss of everything they've dreamed for themselves but yet another thwarted attempt to take back what colonialism has stolen.
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