Comedy Crime Fiction

"Tout le monde riait. Les Manoscrivi riaient. C'est l'image d'eux qui est restée. Jean-Lino, en chemise parme, avec ses nouvelles lunettes jaunes semi-rondes, debout derrière le canapé, empourpré par le champagne ou par l'excitation d'être en société, toutes dents exposées. Lydie, assise en dessous, jupe déployée de part et d'autre, visage penché vers la gauche et riant aux éclats. Riant sans doute du dernier rire de sa vie. Un rire que je scrute à l'infini."

It's hard to find work as a doctor when using your real name will get you killed. So hard that when a reclusive billionaire offers Dr. Peter Brown, aka Pietro Brnwa, a job accompanying a sexy but self-destructive paleontologist on the world's worst field assignment, Brown has no real choice but to say yes. Even if it means that an army of murderers, mobsters, and international drug dealers - not to mention the occasional lake monster - are about to have a serious Pietro Brnwa problem.

Meet Martin, a broke British drama teacher trying to make ends meet in a picturesque Irish town. Saddled with a subprime mortgage containing terms & conditions that even loan sharks would disapprove of, he seeks a deadly escape route. A healthy payout would be some consolation should anything happen to his dear wife, like being bitten by the viper housed in his terrarium (It’s like a corner of Arizona but in the good room). Enter Laura, a beautiful staff nurse and medieval weaponry expert who has ruthless plans of her own. None of them involve being murdered.

Detective Roger LeCarre: a man on a quest to rid the world of crime (starting with Devon and Cornwall and then working outwards) so he can concentrate on his watercolours. LeCarre runs 10 km a day but probably burns more calories shaking his head at what has become of his city. Now Exeter is set to become the UK Capital of Culture and the ambitious lord mayor wants to turn things around. But when a young man's (dead) body is found in the centre of town, things get murky.

Twenty-nine-year-old Alexandra Dorenfield suddenly finds herself in heaven after an unfortunate encounter with a Mini Cooper. The seventh - and highest - level of heaven to be exact. Her dog, Peaches, is with her; she is reunited with her beloved grandparents; she has the wardrobe of a movie star; and she lives in the house of her dreams next door to a handsome guy. This is heaven!

Two dumb, wannabe criminals bite off more than they can chew when they abduct a schoolgirl from a particularly modern, angular suburban house. In the mould of Elmore Leonard or early Tarantino Blockhouse Blues and the Elmore Beast is a distinctly Australian story about kidnapping, obsession, and architecture. So, if you enjoy your crime gritty, your humour dark and dry and don't object to a little colourful language, you’ll love Jack Stroke’s debut novel Blockhouse Blues and the Elmore Beast.

Detective Roger LeCarre. Scourge of crime. Guardian of Exeter. Amateur squash player. And now, party guest at Powderham, the manor house owned by mysterious billionaire tech genius Eli Quartz. It is a small and unconventional gathering: the Bishop, a fading radio star, a desperate aristocrat, the ageing butler and his absurdly beautiful daughter—and Detective Roger LeCarre. Then a snowstorm blows in and the group realise they are trapped. And when, completely against expectations for this kind of situation, someone winds up dead, it's obvious who must solve the crime.

Best friends Annie and Sarah need cash - fast. Sarah, a beautiful, successful lawyer, wants nothing more than to have a baby. But balancing IVF treatments with a grueling eighty-hour workweek is no walk in the park. Meanwhile, Annie, a Harvard-grad chemist recently transplanted to Southern California, is cutting coupons to afford her young autistic son's expensive therapy.

Early in July, Northern Nevada’s senior Internal Revenue Service agent, Ronald Soranden - disliked by every agent in the Reno IRS office - vanished without a trace. In September, he makes a dramatic reappearance, of sorts. His skull - stripped clean and white - is dropped through the slashed top of a Mustang convertible. The vehicle belongs to Lucy Landry, PI Mortimer Angel’s gorgeous young assistant now working with him on a seemingly unrelated embezzlement case. But Mort is a former IRS field agent in Reno.

Bob Burns is an old-fashioned kind of Scottish sleuth, more interested in catching villains than creeping to get promotion. But, when his enquiries into a brutal and bizarre murder are blocked by his bosses, he wonders if he should risk losing his career by carrying on his investigations? Encouraged by an attractive, though maverick, forensic scientist and assisted by a keener-than-bright young constable, Bob does it his way. The trail leads the trio from Scotland to Mallorca, where intrigue and mayhem mingle with the crowds at a fishermen’s fiesta.

What do you do when you fall through the loopholes in the system and all you have to rely on are your own wits? Lois and Sophie have scrambled and saved for years, planning for their retirement in Florida. But now they've lost it all, and Lois' sniper training from her long-ago service as an Army nurse leads to a desperate career choice. When Detective Morgan Holiday is assigned to investigate a spate of sniper killings, it's just one more stress point in her already overburdened life.

Julie Bryson and rookie detective, Andy Green, once again aid Scottish detective Bob Burns. When Andy becomes the unwitting recipient of a drop of £100,000 in used notes, the trio become enmeshed in a web of murder, intrigue and Caledonian skulduggery, as the action shifts to Sicily, New York and a remote Hebridean island. The arrival of a Sicilian blacksmith as the island’s new laird leads to some hilarious misunderstandings as the line between the good and bad guys becomes increasingly blurred. After many a Highland shenanigan, the mystery is finally solved...or is it?

The droll Scots detective, Bob Burns, is once more aided by forensic scientist and ladyfriend, Dr Julie Bryson, and abetted by overly-keen Andy Green. Working undercover on a cruise liner bound for the Canary Islands, Bob and his two sidekicks have plenty to cope with. The discovery of a severed finger in a passenger’s quiche lorraine sparks an investigation full of greed, guile, deceit and double-dealing. Does the finger belong to an alleged man-overboard victim? Was the man-overboard victim pushed, or did he commit suicide? Is it all just a cleverly engineered insurance scam?

Chloe and her husband Scott are holidaying with their families on the beautiful Greek island of Mykonos. But Chloe has a secret... She has hired a hitman to kill Scott when they return home. This week, her plan is to pretend to be such a happy wife that no suspicion can possibly fall on her after the murder. But she's reckoning without Scott’s meddlesome sister, Tori, plus the rivalries and demands of both families. Can she deal with them all while keeping her murderous intentions hidden?

Una de las más brillantes e irreverentes farsas del autor, una sátira orgiástica donde el horror arranca carcajadas y en la que nadie se salva del ridículo, ya sea de izquierdas o de derechas, ecologista o partidario de la energía atómica, esposo fiel o donjuán irredento: ¡temblad, temblad, malditos! En esta novela, Wilt vive con su mujer, la inefable Eva, entregada a sus sucesivas pasiones alternativas, medicinales, nutritivas, religiosas, etc., y con sus temibles cuatrillizas...

El protagonista de esta historia es Héctor "El Sapo" Vizcarra, un periodista gastronómico, gordo y obsesionado con la comida, que vive en el Abasto de la actualidad. La acción transcurre en un diciembre de mucho calor, en los espacios ganados por la comunidad peruana en el centro de Buenos Aires. Una noche, en busca del ceviche perfecto, El Sapo llega al restaurante peruano Doña Lili. Allí se encuentra con el ceviche buscado, pero no llegará a saborearlo completamente.

Tre donne. La protagonista, il suo ex marito, sua madre. L'ingenua, il bello e la perfida. La madre, algida e chicchissima donna d'affari, traffica coi narcos messicani, finché l'ignara figlia Jole, ex ballerina del Crazy Horse, mentre mamma è in Messico, trova un cadavere senza testa nel suo appartamento e l'ex marito – ora felicemente Corinna – l'aiuta a sbarazzarsene, ma così facendo finiscono tutt'e due nelle grinfie dei criminali, che le rapiscono e le portano a Mexico City, dal boss dei boss Xavier, detto "la Tumba", amante segreto dell'anziana madre.

Eine halbe Stunde vor der Hochzeit ihrer Cousine Emma finden Carlina und Emma ihren Großvater tot in seiner Wohnung in der Altstadt von Florenz. Carlina merkt schnell, dass Emma nicht bereit ist, ihre Hochzeit wegen des plötzlichen Todesfalls abzusagen - ein natürlicher Tod liegt ja auch nahe. Also lässt sich Carlina überreden, ihren toten Opa in seinem Bett zu verstecken und jedem zu erzählen, dass er sich nicht gut genug fühlte, um an der Hochzeit teilzunehmen.

Meet Sam Applewhite, a security consultant with no staff, no resources, and some big jobs to tackle. When an armed robber targets a local bank, things quickly go wrong and hostages are taken. Sam’s stage magician dad is in the firing line and no magic tricks are going to get him out of this situation. The police say they’ve got things under control, but Sam knows there’s something strange going on. Why has a law-abiding man suddenly turned to crime? How can it be an armed robbery if the robber has left his gun at home? Sam has to put the pieces together before it’s too late.

Edward was a respectable architect when a disagreement over the wrong shade of Georgian red with Aubyn, a mean-spirited conservation officer, saw the full force of the law applied. Ian had been a successful accountant until he was shafted by dodgy PPI pusher Kevin. Their lives tumble and they end up in prison, where they meet Nelson, banged up after stealing a sapphire and a Bentley from a contessa in Monaco. An early release prompts Edward, Ian, and Nelson to take a road trip in search of a new life, revenge, and adventure. Will the vintage Bentley manage the trip?