Classic English Mystery

As a dense yellow fog swirls through the streets of London, a deep melancholy has descended on Sherlock Holmes, who sits in a cocaine-induced haze at 221B Baker Street. His mood is only lifted by a visit from a beautiful but distressed young woman - Mary Morstan, whose father vanished 10 years before. Four years later, she began to receive an exquisite gift every year: a large, lustrous pearl. Now she has had an intriguing invitation to meet her unknown benefactor and urges Holmes and Watson to accompany her.

The Count of Monte Cristo is a tale of revenge and retribution. Edmond Dantes, a young, energetic sailor, is falsely accused of treason on his wedding day and incarcerated in the forbidding Chateau d'If prison. His escape and ultimate revenge on those who wronged him makes this one of the most thrilling stories in French literature, as compelling now as when it was first published in 1846.

One of the great works of the 20th century, Kafka's The Trial has been read as a study of political power, a pessimistic religious parable, or a crime novel where the accused man is himself the problem. In it, a man wakes up one morning to find himself under arrest for an offence which is never explained. Faced with this ambiguous but threatening situation, Josef K. gradually succumbs to its psychological pressure.

Is the ‘perfect murder’ possible? Can that crime be committed with such consummate care, with such exacting skill, that it is unsolvable—even to the most astute investigator? In this unique collection, legendary crime writers Margery Allingham, Anthony Berkeley, Freeman Wills Crofts, Ronald Knox, Dorothy L. Sayers and Russell Thorndike each attempt to create the unsolvable murder, which Superintendent Cornish of the CID then attempts to unravel.

Eighteen-year-old Jason Rogers’ life is turned upside-down when he finds himself in the custody of an unnamed government agency that is falsely accusing him of being responsible for the explosion that caused the death of his parents. Anya is 17 - a teenager who wishes she could be normal for once - but she’s not. A secret government agency, headed by none other than her father, knows how to leverage the dangerous capability she was born with. All goes well for her until one of the agents turns on her.

The best of the golden age crime writers, praised by all the top modern writers in the field including P. D. James and Ruth Rendell, Dorothy L. Sayers created the immortal Lord Peter Wimsey. His second appearance is a thrilling quest to save his own brother - the Duke of Denver - from the hangman. The Duke of Denver, accused of murder, stands trial for his life in the House of Lords. Naturally, his brother Lord Peter Wimsey is investigating the crime - this is a family affair.

The year 1942 marked the turning point of World War II. The Americans destroyed the Japanese Battle Fleet in the decisive engagements of Midway and the Coral Sea. General Montgomery defeated General Rommel at El Alamein. But for President Roosevelt, 1942 was the darkest hour of the war. He knew the Germans were developing the atomic bomb. Our victories would be meaningless if the Nazis perfected the “A” bomb first. There was only one man who could find out the biggest Nazi secret of the war: Lanny Budd.

Arthur Morrison has brought to life detective Martin Hewitt in a glimpse into the day-to-day life of civil servants and different moral codes that were being questioned pre WWI.

Cornwall, Midsummer 1947. Pendizack Manor Hotel is buried in the rubble of a collapsed cliff. Seven guests have perished, but is it murder, and what brought this strange assembly together for a moonlit feast before this Act of God - or Man? Over the week before the landslide, we meet the hotel guests in all their eccentric glory: and as friendships form and romances blossom, sins are revealed, and the cliff cracks widen....

The Cure is a genre-bending thriller reminiscent of Michael Crichton or Douglas Preston, about the biological underpinnings of psychopathy. As a child, her family was taken from her by a serial killer. Erin Palmer is left orphaned and forever scarred. She dedicates her life to the study of psychopaths, conducting one-on-one interviews and tests with inmates. When Erin finally finishes years of exhaustive research, she finds herself in possession of the key to ending psychopathic behavior - in the species - forever. That' s when they try to kill her.

Martha Macnamara knows that her daughter, Elizabeth, is in trouble; she just doesn't know what kind. Mysterious phone calls from San Francisco at odd hours of the night are the only contact she has had with Elizabeth for years. Now, Elizabeth has sent her a plane ticket and reserved a room for her at San Francisco's most luxurious hotel. Yet she has not tried to contact Martha since she arrived, leaving her lonely, confused, and a little bit worried. Into the story steps Mayland Long, a distinguished-looking and wealthy Chinese man who lives at the hotel and is drawn to Martha's good nature and ability to pinpoint the truth of a matter.

London, June 1965. Karl Braun arrives as a lodger in Pimlico: hatless, with a bow-tie, greying hair, slight in build. His new neighbours are intrigued by this cultured German gentleman who works as a piano tuner; many are fellow émigrés, who assume that he, like them, came to England to flee Hitler. That summer, Braun courts a woman, attends classical concerts, dances the twist. But as the newspapers fill with reports of the hunt for Nazi war criminals, his nightmares become increasingly worse.

In the only novel Conrad set in London, The Secret Agent communicates a profoundly ironic view of human affairs. The story is woven around an attack on the Greenwich Observatory in 1894 masterminded by Verloc, a Russian spy working for the police, and ostensibly a member of an anarchist group in Soho. His masters instruct him to discredit the anarchists in a humiliating fashion, and when his evil plan goes horribly awry, Verlac must deal with the repercussions of his actions.

Mr Fortune Explains is HC Bailey's sixth collection of eight golden-age mysteries for the eclectic surgeon-detective Mr Reginald Fortune. Including a child kidnapped from a picnic; a milliner's assistant vanishing from home without a word to her friends; a strange visit, followed by a violent attack on Mr Fortune himself; a raid on a jeweler's shop, and the theft of a photograph; an ill-situated rock garden, and a haunted man; a rigidly saintly clergyman suspected of a trivial theft; a dead policeman and a broken bicycle lamp; and a curiously disturbing picture in the Paris salon.

Newly moneyed Jimmy can’t seem to get a certain girl out of his head. He’s never even spoken to her—the two have merely shared looks and smiles while traveling on an ocean voyage. But when he takes a bet to break into a house, and is caught by the owner of the house, (the chief of police, no less), a series of complicated events is set in motion. The first of which is the unaccountable appearance of his mystery girl. Soon Jimmy must show his true mettle, while demonstrating his singular gift for intrusion.

This audiobook contains 17 short stories inspired from famous classic fairy tales. In addition to 17 classic tales, you’ll get another three bonus stories from Aesop’s Fables book.

Twenty classic authors from the Golden Age of Detective Fiction are brought together in the latest “Bodies from the Library” anthology series of previously unpublished and uncollected stories of crime and suspense.

Maigret savoured the sensations of his youth again: the cold, stinging eyes, frozen fingertips, an aftertaste of coffee. Then, stepping inside the church, a blast of heat, soft light; the smell of candles and incense. The last time Maigret went home to the village of his birth was for his father's funeral. Now an anonymous note predicting a crime during All Souls' Day mass draws him back there, where troubling memories resurface and hidden vices are revealed. Georges Simenon was born in Liège, Belgium, in 1903.

The eclectic surgeon-detective Mr. Reggie Fortune solves a fourth collection of Golden Age mysteries, including: the sudden disappearance of a husband; a skillful but oddly undiscriminating cat burglar; a jewel theft at a society party; a cryptic inscription on an ancient oak chest; a fatal poisoning and a troubled woman; and the whimsical theft of a Persian kitten—which leads Mr. Fortune to a far more chilling and sinister crime.

The Secret Seven have a new meeting place - a treehouse! But someone else is using it, too. The gang is furious, but then they learn the intruder is in big trouble and needs their help.