Amateur Detective

Dr. Theo Cray has a legendary mathematical knack for catching serial killers. Until his exposure to a mind-altering pathogen knocks him off his game. It has upended an investigation, destroyed his reputation, and left him to question his own sanity. One person still trusts him to finish the job. His former professor Amanda Paulson is helping point Cray down a logical path to his prey: a nomadic health-care worker whose murder spree stretches back decades and whose victims number in the hundreds.

French's department store was famous for the rare merchandise it offered its elite clientele. But no one there could be proud of its latest exclusive window display: the bloodstained corpse of the owner's wife. Ellery Queen and his father, Inspector Richard Queen, soon discover that this palace of commerce is a viper's nest of fear, jealousy, suspicion, and hatred, where love is cheap and the price of honor marked down. But worst of all is the mysterious mocking mastermind who is out to turn the glittering store into a bargain basement of murder.

Though the inheritance from her dearly departed Alexander was meant to set Sarah Kelling up for life, it vanishes quickly in the face of hounding from charitable organizations and the IRS. Facing the loss of her stately Back Bay brownstone, Sarah opens her home to lodgers - deciding she prefers a boardinghouse to the poorhouse. Soon she is cooking meals and serving tea for a cast of quirky residents, a cozy little family that would be quite happy were it not for the unpleasant presence of a certain Barnwell Augustus Quiffen.

Three perplexing puzzles - and three inimitable Wimsey solutions - told with wit, humor, and suspense. Narrator Ian Carmichael, the quintessential Lord Peter, provides great entertainment with his talented performance of these three stories. In "Striding Folly", a frightening dream provides a haunting premonition. A house numbered 13 is in a street of even numbers, and a dead man was never alive in "The Haunted Policeman." And "Talboys" sees Lord Peter's own children accused of theft.

Newly returned from investigating a murder in Monkslip-super-Mare, former M15 agent Max Tudor wants nothing more than to settle back into his predictable routine as vicar of St. Edwold's Church in the village of Nether Monkslip. But the flow of his sermon on Bathsheba is interrupted when Lady Duxter is found dead after having made a suicide pact with her lover. Lady Duxter's husband rallies quickly from the double tragedy - too quickly, it is murmured in the village. Having already planned a writer's retreat at his manor house, he insists the show must go on.

Arnold Landon finds himself drawn into another bitter dispute over land—in which a defenseless old woman pays the ultimate price. To the casual observer, Penbrook Farm might seem like a ramshackle hovel, buried deep in the woods of Northumberland. But to fragile old Sarah Ellis, it’s home. And the developers can have the place over her dead body. Of course, no one ever expected it to come to that.

Boston expat Maura Donovan has been getting accustomed to Irish living, complete with an inherited house and a pub named Sullivan’s. But now, her mother has returned - and she’s brought Maura’s half-sister in tow. To make matters more confusing, a handful of Cork University students are knocking on Maura’s door, asking about a mystical fairy fort that happens to be located on Maura’s piece of land. Then one of the students disappears after a day of scoping out the fort, and Maura uncovers a decades-old corpse.

Meet Sage Poe—witch, amateur detective, and woman who's definitely rethinking her life choices. She thought the biggest challenge this Halloween would be keeping her sisters from hexing the town council. She thought wrong. When murder strikes the annual Halloween festival, turning the corn maze into a crime scene, Sage finds herself trapped in a real-life nightmare. Her childhood friend is dead, the town is whispering, and something wicked comes this way . . . again.

C'est avec cette série d'aventures que "Sherlock Holmes" conquit complètement les goûts des lecteurs, établissant les bases du roman policier moderne, avec une rigueur scientifique, tout en redressant les torts de l'Angleterre victorienne. Le Dr. Watson relate plusieurs enquêtes, certaines humoristiques, d'autres criminelles, que Sherlock Holmes mena dans les années qui suivirent leur rencontre.

Spring is in the air of Fort Connor, Colorado - a time of new beginnings for the House of Lambspun knitters. But for fellow knitter Jennifer's new real-estate client, it is his end. He's been murdered, and Kelly Flynn is left unraveling a tangle of clues. This may prove to be her most challenging project yet.

The powerful Lord complains loudly to the local bishop, who asks Father Max Tudor, vicar of Nether Monkslip and former MI5 agent, to investigate. Just as Max comes to believe the poisoning was accidental, a body is discovered in the cloister well. Can Max Tudor solve the case and restore order in time to attend his own nuptials?

For my birthday, my best friends Gilly and Pippa signed us up for a weekend at the Central Midwest Spa Convention. Yay. Massages, fine dining, maid service, and best of all, as long as we attend a few workshops, the weekend is a tax write-off. It should be all sunshine and roses, right? Wrong. My former intern at Belliza Beauty aka the Job Stealer, Carmen Carraway, is a featured presenter. Yuck. Throw in an ex-boyfriend, a number one fan, a brewing scandal, and a dead body, and my relaxing birthday weekend is DOA.

In December 1893, Sherlock Holmes-adoring Londoners eagerly opened their Strand magazines-- anticipating the detective's next adventure-- only to find the unthinkable: his creator, Arthur Conan Doyle, had killed their hero off. London spiraled into mourning -- crowds sported black armbands in grief -- and railed against Conan Doyle as his assassin.

After losing her copywriting job, young Gwynne Dacres seeks a place to live when she stumbles upon Mrs. Garr's old boarding house. Despite the gruff landlady and an assortment of shifty tenants, Gwynne rents a room for herself. She spends her first few nights at 593 Trent Street tensely awake, the house creaking and groaning as if listening to everything that happens behind its closed doors. A chain of chilling events leads to the gruesome discovery of a mutilated body in the basement kitchen, dead of unknown circumstances. Was it an accident or murder?

Alex Torkelsson has just gotten word: His late uncle Magnus's plane has been found south of Hawaii's Big Island after 10 long years. So too have Magnus' few skeletal remains, now handed over to the only man who can fit together the pieces of this mystery. What forensic detective Gideon Oliver discovers could shake the Torkelsson family tree to its very roots. But this time his work is yielding more questions about the past than answers. Questions about the long-ago execution-style murder of Magnus's brother...about a mysterious will that benefits - as well as incriminates - its heirs.

As yuletide settles upon Gwenafwy Abbey, the rural Welsh convent's peace is shattered when Tiffany Reese, president of the Village Art Society, is found dead on the floor of the parish hall. Sister Agatha, whose interests lie more with reading and writing mystery stories than with making the abbey's world-renowned organic gouda, is not shy about inserting herself into the case. With the not-entirely eager assistance of Father Selwyn, she begins her investigation.

Erin Coleridge's used bookstore in Kirkbymoorside, North Yorkshire, England, is a meeting place for the villagers and, in particular, for the local Jane Austen Society. At the Society's monthly meeting, matters come to a head between the old guard and its young turks. After the meeting breaks for tea, persuasion gives way to murder with extreme prejudice when president Sylvia Pemberthy falls dead to the floor. Poisoned? Presumably, but by whom? And was Sylvia the only target?

When Donna branches out from floristry to private investigation and opens The Edge of the World Detective Agency, the last thing she expects is to have a murder fall into her lap almost immediately. Now, normally she wouldn’t be one to look a gift horse in the mouth, but there’s one significant problem with the case – all the evidence points to Donna as the murderer!

Charlie and Diesel, along with Charlie's fiancee, Helen Louise Brady, are heading to Asheville, North Carolina, to spend a week at a boutique hotel and participate in a gathering of a mystery reader's club composed of patrons of the Athena Public Library. The always spry Ducote sisters, friends of the hotel's owners, are helping underwrite the expenses, and they've insisted that Charlie, Helen, and Diesel join them. When an intrusive, uninvited guest turns up dead, only one mystery club member with a connection to the deceased appears to have a motive to kill.

Lucy McGuffin has three problems: She's a human lie detector, a "gift" she tries hard to keep hidden. Her rescue dog Paco is a ghost-whisperer. And someone's just been found murdered in her kitchen. The murder weapon? One of Lucy's famous apple walnut cream cheese muffins. The victim? Tara Bell, the producer for a reality TV cooking competition that Lucy is determined to win. Lucy and Tara had a very public disagreement the day before the murder. When it's discovered that Lucy's cafe was about to be disqualified from the show, all fingers point to Lucy as the prime suspect.