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Plot Summary

December 1953

Hugo Hawksworth is on the tail of rogue Cold War agents at a top-secret government facility, while back home at Selchester Castle they’re awaiting the arrival of the new Earl—an American, the long-lost son of the murdered Lord Selchester.

The town of Selchester, rich in scandal and gossip, is unsure what to make of the Earl or his teenage daughters, but they know that his sharp-tongued half-sister, Lady Sonia, furious at being deprived of her inheritance, won’t be a merry guest over Christmas.

The new Lord Selchester can cope with the strangeness of English country life, but he hadn’t expected stolen paintings—or a body in the hothouse.

What’s the link between Hugo’s investigations and the suspicious goings-on in the town and at the Castle? And will he and his allies get to the heart of the mystery before the murderer gets to them?

  • Rating: full starfull starfull starfull starstar outline (4/5)

Plot Summary

From USA Today bestselling author Debra Webb comes another heart-pounding thriller featuring investigator Finley O’Sullivan, this time taking on a cold case that could uncover new dangers.

Legal investigator Finley O’Sullivan has dealt with her share of shady characters, but the firm’s latest client has an even darker past than most. In fact, Nashville Metro Police seems to think he’s a murderer.

Finley isn’t so sure. Her investigation into Ray Johnson’s history focuses on the unsolved murder of a teenager who died seventeen years earlier. The case went cold, but questions remain. Months after the girl’s death, people close to her started disappearing—her mother first, then Ray’s brother. But why?

As Finley races to solve a decades-old murder, she uncovers new clues and long-buried secrets that could blow the case wide open. But whoever killed the girl all those years ago may still be a threat—and now the chase is on. 

  • Rating: full starfull starfull starfull starstar outline (4.0/5)

Plot Summary

They’re hoping this visit is a return journey—but it might be a one-way ticket to murder.

July 1912. Lady Hardcastle and her tenacious lady’s maid, Florence Armstrong, are enjoying a convivial gathering at the home of their dear friends, the Farley-Strouds. The only fly in the idyllic ointment seems to be the lack of musical entertainment for the forthcoming summer party—until, that is, Lady Hardcastle’s brother Harry calls with news of a murder.

Harry dispatches them to Bristol on behalf of the Secret Service Bureau, with instructions to prevent the local police from uncovering too much about the victim. It seems an intriguing mystery—all the more so when they find a connection between the killer and an impending visit from an Austrian trade delegation, set to feature a very important guest…

Summoned to London to help with some very important security arrangements, the intrepid duo will have to navigate sceptical bureaucrats, Cockney gangsters and shadowy men in distinctive hats in their attempts to foil an explosive—and internationally significant—threat.

  • Rating: full starfull starfull starfull starstar outline (4/5)

Plot Summary

The mystery of three missing teens and a traumatizing murder unearths decades of buried secrets.

Twenty years ago, five teenage campers disappeared. Two eventually turned up, bound and left for dead on the Columbia River’s rocky shore. Only Devin Bonner miraculously survived, but with no memories of what happened in the Oregon forest.

After decades, the cold case generates heat for FBI Special Agent Mercy Kilpatrick and her husband, Police Chief Truman Daly. They’re investigating the murder of a true-crime podcaster found at the river’s edge in the same location, and with the exact same manner of death. With the discovery, Devin’s nightmares return. His only real friend is Ollie Smith, Truman’s orphaned ward, whose own search for the truth sucks Ollie into a mystery far greater and more dangerous than anyone imagined.

Following a trail of fresh blood and an escalating series of murders, Mercy and Truman must work fast to unlock whatever traumas are buried in Devin’s memories before the secrets of the past claim another victim.

  • Rating: full starfull starfull starfull starstar outline (4.0/5)

Plot Summary

In the wake of a woman’s savage murder, the suspects and motives are only mounting for Sheriff Bree Taggert in a twisting novel of suspense by #1 Wall Street Journal bestselling author Melinda Leigh.

In a quiet suburban neighborhood in upstate New York, single mom Kelly Gibson is slain in her home—the victim of a rage killing. Right away, Sheriff Bree Taggert has three persons of interest: an angry soon-to-be ex-husband, a furtive rebound boyfriend, and an obsessive neighbor.

But as Bree and investigator Matt Flynn work together to narrow the field, there’s a shocking twist in the case: a second woman is murdered in the same brutal fashion.

While investigating, Bree is attacked and left for dead. When another woman is kidnapped, Bree and Matt must act quickly to unravel the deceptions in Kelly’s life and death and find a killer before someone else dies.  

  • Rating: full starfull starfull starfull starstar outline (4/5)

Plot Summary

A master manipulator accused of murder. An attorney sworn to defend her. Keera Duggan returns in a riveting novel of suspense by New York Times bestselling author Robert Dugoni.

When Jenna Bernstein, disgraced wunderkind CEO of a controversial biotech company, is accused of murdering her former partner and lover, she turns to Seattle attorney Keera Duggan to defend her. Keera is more than a master chess player who brings her intuitive moves into court—she’s Jenna’s childhood friend. But considering their history, Keera knows that where Jenna goes, trouble follows.

Three years earlier, Keera’s father successfully defended Jenna when she was tried for the killing of her company’s chief medical scientist who threatened to go public with allegations of corporate fraud. Keera knows Jenna too well. When she was a kid, Keera saw Jenna for what she a manipulative and frighteningly controlling sociopath. Now, with only circumstantial evidence against Jenna, Keera is willing to bury any trepidation she might have to defend a woman she believes, this time, to be innocent.

As the investigation gets underway and disturbing questions arise, Keera puts her trust in a client who swears nothing but the truth. If this is all just another devious game, Keera might be working to set a murderer free. 

  • Rating: full starfull starfull starfull starstar outline (4/5)

Plot Summary

Vera Boyett is a master at cracking a case.

After tragedy destroyed her career as deputy police chief, she felt lost. Moving back home near her sisters, she put her skills back to use as a crime analyst, and now her star is finally back on the rise. Vera’s work really begins to heat up after the local sheriff, Gray “Bent” Benton, calls to ask her for assistance with a pressing case.

Pushing aside their complicated past, Vera agrees to help Bent search for a missing reporter. But their investigation uncovers an improbable connection to the Messenger, a serial killer she put behind bars twelve years ago. The killer, who is dying of cancer, wants his final revenge. And the reporter is merely a distraction—Vera is his true target.

When the Messenger pulls her sister Eve into his twisted game, Vera vows to stop him for good. But can she find Eve and the reporter before it’s too late?

  • Rating: full starfull starfull starfull starstar outline (4/5)

Plot Summary

A gated dream town for the megarich becomes a murderous nightmare in a riveting Eve Ronin thriller by #1 New York Times bestselling author Lee Goldberg. Hidden Hills is a private celebrity enclave of white picket fences and horse trails that seems to exist in a dreamworld. But when reality superstar Kitty Winslow is killed within their gates and corpses are found in the vast state park outside them, LASD detective Eve Ronin realizes there is a deadly, razor-thin line between what’s real and what’s imagined. Eve discovers that Kitty’s surreal on- and off-camera life, a blur of fact and fantasy, shockingly mirrors her own as she struggles to investigate the killings, wade into a music industry war, and battle a vicious Chilean gang―all while her life is being turned into a fictional cop show directed by her estranged father. Eve’s grip on reality and the case is strained to the breaking point as the slayings continue, the media frenzy reaches a fever pitch, and the only inescapable truth she can see is death…and it’s coming for her.

  • Rating: full starfull starfull starfull starstar outline (4/5)

Plot Summary

When two cross-country cases collide, Bree Taggert and Mercy Kilpatrick join forces to catch a serial killer in an addictive novel of suspense by bestselling authors Melinda Leigh and Kendra Elliot.

During a vicious heat wave, a county maintenance worker stumbles upon two suspicious suitcases abandoned by the side of the road. Sheriff Bree Taggert responds to find two bodies stuffed inside the luggage. The press demands action. The community is on edge. Suddenly, Bree is at the center of a media firestorm.

In Oregon, a senator’s daughter goes missing. FBI Special Agent Mercy Kilpatrick agrees to keep the politically sensitive case on the down-low. When she finds a link between the disappearance and a double homicide three thousand miles away, Mercy takes the next plane out—and lands right in the middle of Bree’s double homicide investigation.

To save the missing girl, Bree and Mercy must work together to stop a killer who’s playing deadly games with the press and stirring up public rage. Hungry for notoriety, he dares Bree and Mercy to catch him before he kills again.

  • Rating: full starfull starfull starstar outlinestar outline (3/5)

Plot Summary

In the second book in the Detective Harriet Foster thriller series, author Tracy Clark weaves a twisted journey into the underbelly of Chicago as Harriet and her team work to unmask a serial killer stalking the city’s aldermen.

The Chicago PD is on high alert when two city aldermen are found dead: one by apparent suicide, one brutally stabbed in his office, and both with thirty dimes left on their bodies—a betrayer’s payment. With no other clues, the question is, Who else has a debt to pay?

Detective Harriet Foster is on the case before the killer can strike again. But even with the help of her partner, Detective Vera Li, and the rest of their team, Harriet has little to go on and a lot at risk. There’s no telling who the killer’s next target is or how many will come next.

To stop another murder, Harriet and her officers will have to examine what the victims had going on behind the scenes to determine who could be tangled up in this web of betrayal…and who could be out for revenge

  • Rating: full starfull starfull starfull starstar outline (4/5)

Plot Summary

From bestselling author J. B. Turner comes a deadly mission for Jon Reznick—but when the target is a master of disinformation, finding him might be harder than killing him.

Black-ops specialist Jon Reznick is hoping for some well-earned down time under the Florida sun when he gets a surprise call from the CIA. An embittered US counterintelligence expert is about to sell a career’s worth of state secrets to the Russians, and the Agency wants Reznick to track him down.

With the spook holed up somewhere in the diplomatic cauldron of the Middle East, protected by highly trained Russian mercenaries, Reznick knows it’s almost certainly a suicide mission. But with tough Scot Mac McCafferty and cybersecurity genius Trevelle Williams to back him up, patriot Reznick is soon racing across the region in pursuit of the target.

Time is ticking and death is a strong possibility, but with stakes this high, for Jon Reznick there are no rules that can’t be broken…and failure is never an option.

  • Rating: full starfull starfull starfull starfull star (5.0/5)

Plot Summary

To save a client accused of murder, defense attorney Keera Duggan must fight a complex web of corruption in a riveting novel of suspense by New York Times bestselling author Robert Dugoni.

In a quiet South Seattle neighborhood, a suspected drug smuggler and his girlfriend are murdered in their home. When a young man named Michael Westbrook is accused of the brutal double homicide, his uncle JP Harrison turns to Keera Duggan to defend him. JP is Keera’s trusted investigator, and he desperately needs Keera to save his nephew against escalating odds.

The evidence is circumstantial—Michael worked with one of the victims, drugs were found in his possession, and he bolted from authorities. Ruthless star prosecutor Anh Tran has gotten convictions on much less. With the testimony of two prison informants, the case looks grave. But Keera never concedes defeat. To free her client, she must dig deep before Tran crushes both of them.

As the investigation gets more twisted with each new find, Keera is swept up in a mystery with far-reaching consequences. This case isn’t just murder. It’s looking like a conspiracy. And getting justice for Michael could be the most dangerous promise Keera has ever made.   

  • Rating: full starfull starfull starfull starstar outline (4/5)

Plot Summary

Three boys were taken and murdered fifteen years ago. The killer is in jail. So why is history repeating itself? A family outing to Tattershall Castle comes to a chilling end when eleven-year-old Tommy Burton disappears without a trace in broad daylight. All that remains in his place is a small blue teddy bear. DS Karen Hart and her team are called in to investigate the unusual circumstances―but for DI Morgan the crime scene is eerily familiar. It’s been fifteen years since Morgan worked on a traumatic case that saw Graham Donaldson put behind bars for abducting and murdering three young boys. His calling a blue teddy bear left at the scene of each crime, a detail never revealed to the press or public. Could Donaldson, recently transferred to a local prison, have something to do with the missing boy? Has he somehow inspired a copycat? Or, worse, is the original killer still out there―and embarking on a second campaign of terror? With Tommy still missing, and a growing list of suspects, Karen’s team must piece the puzzle together before the unthinkable happens. But as a dizzying chase for the truth unfolds, could it be that the evil they seek is hiding in plain sight?

  • Rating: full starfull starfull starhalf starstar outline (3.5/5)

Plot Summary

The peace of a Midlands village is upset when local businessman Harry Bowers doesn’t return from choir practice.

More concerned than the man’s own wife, it would seem, investigating officer Detective Sergeant Sunita Roy becomes convinced he has been done away with.

But there is no trace of the man, just a litany of evidence of an ailing marriage and a nose-diving business venture.
In charge of her first serious case, DS Roy will struggle to win the respect of her colleagues – in particular her Brummie boss, DCI Gavin Roscoe. All that whilst fighting off the intentions of an increasingly desperate suitor.

Who had it in for the budding chorister? And is Roy tough enough to break down the defences and prejudices of Middle England?

  • Rating: full starfull starfull starfull starstar outline (4/5)

Plot Summary

Isabella Rose is on the run, hunted by the very people she had been hired to work for. Trained killer Isabella and former handler Michael Pope are forced into hiding in India and, when a mysterious informer passes them clues on the whereabouts of Pope’s family, the prey see an opportunity to become the predators.

Chased from the poverty of Mumbai’s slums into the sights of a sniper’s rifle amongst the lavish wealth of Shanghai, Isabella and Pope hunt fleeting shadows in a race against time. And they can’t afford to lose.

The Agent is the third part in a continuing story involving Isabella Rose that also includes The Angeland The Asset.

  • Rating: full starfull starfull starfull starstar outline (4/5)

Plot Summary

Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, is the most dangerous city in the world. And when a mission to break the local cartel’s grip goes wrong, Isabella Rose, the Angel, finds herself on the wrong side of prison bars. Fearing the worst, Isabella plays her only remaining card…

British agent Vivian Bloom is determined to be the first to reach her, certain she will lead him to other operatives he’s under pressure to hunt down. But US agents are circling too. And with the shadowy Prometheus group pulling the strings, Isabella knows that she and her mentor, the Asset, are living on borrowed time…

The Assassin is the fourth part in a continuing story involving Isabella Rose that also includes Act The Angel, Act The Asset and Act The Agent.

  • Rating: full starfull starfull starfull starstar outline (4/5)

Plot Summary

Life moves at a slower pace on the canals. But death always comes when you least expect it. The last thing DS Stephanie Johnson and DS Andy Carter expected during their much-needed canal holiday was a murder. When retired folk musician Annie Shipton is found stabbed through the neck at the helm of her barge, the couple can’t help investigating the seemingly impossible crime. Nobody else boarded Annie’s boat—so how was she killed from behind?

With the method a perplexing mystery, DCI Oldroyd is summoned from Harrogate, and it’s not long before the detectives have a long list of potential suspects with a motive to want Annie dead. There’s the young cyclist she argued with over access to the towpath, an ambitious and arrogant local developer she clashed with repeatedly, an estranged husband…and more than a few lingering issues with her former bandmates, most of whom live along the canal. When a second shocking murder sends shockwaves through the community, the locals start talking about a curse on the waterway. It seems the killer will go to any lengths to avoid detection.

But can Oldroyd hunt them down before someone else becomes the next target?

  • Rating: full starfull starfull starfull starstar outline (4.0/5)

Plot Summary

A wealthy family. An isolated island. A dead body. Is it a tragic accident or foul play? The Shell House Detectives are investigating again…

Lone Island is a remote and windswept spot, but for nature reserve warden Pippa Grant it’s always been a haven. Until a body washes ashore—and she’s the one to find it.

The police believe the deceased, Axel Marks, accidentally fell from the cliffs near Porthmerrin House, the grand estate on the mainland where Axel’s mother once served as housekeeper to the Grey family. But Pippa is adamant that there’s more to Axel’s death, and begs Ally and Jayden, the Shell House Detectives, to take the case.

Soon it emerges that Axel had a troubled past, and a complicated history with both Edward Grey and his son, Lucas. As the reasons behind Axel’s visit to Porthmerrin become clear, Ally and Jayden feel sure that the house holds the key, and both owners and staff come under scrutiny. But when the police switch their focus back to Lone Island, Ally and Jayden are forced to question whether it’s their client who has something to hide.

Was Axel murdered out of jealousy and greed, or because of an ancient betrayal? And how far will the killer go to achieve their ultimate goal? As Ally and Jayden finally bring the devastating truth to light, it’s clear that Axel’s death was just the beginning of the story…

  • Rating: full starfull starfull starfull starstar outline (4/5)

Plot Summary

As the Summer Solstice nears, who will be the next target? A dark thriller from the bestselling author of the DI Louise Blackwell series.

In a cave near Weston, potholers discover what they think are human remains. The bones are identified as belonging to Hugo Latchford, a boy who went missing a decade ago, and whose parents belonged to a quasi-religious cult masquerading as environmental activists. It’s not long before rumours that he was sacrificed in a midsummer ritual resurface.

Returning to duty from maternity leave, DI Louise Blackwell finds herself leading the investigation, soon discovering that Hugo’s parents are still alive and the cult very much still active.

As she begins to fathom the ghoulish depths of the group’s pagan beliefs, new mother Louise is profoundly disturbed by the case. And with the Summer Solstice fast approaching, she’s faced with the terrifying prospect that the group might be preparing for their next sacrifice… 

  • Rating: full starfull starfull starfull starfull star (5.0/5)

Plot Summary

A double murder. A missing body. A shocking death. Can DI Holler connect the three cases in time?

In Liverpool, a woman inexplicably leaps to her death. The following morning, two bodies are found on nearby Crosby Beach: a woman tied to a statue, and a man buried up to his neck and left to drown.

When a nine-month-old murder case is reopened, DI Sheridan Holler is shocked to uncover family connections between the victim, Daniel Parks, and the three unexplained deaths. With Daniel’s body still missing and the number-one suspect cleared of the crime, Holler’s cold case suddenly becomes a major murder investigation.

Someone seems hell-bent on destroying the Parks family—but why? And as the links between the victims become increasingly sinister, can DI Holler find who’s pulling the strings before the killer strikes again?