Crime Town

On the surface, Bria's Mediterranean life radiates beauty—the kind her late husband, Carlo, dreamed about when he concocted the romantic idea to start a bed and breakfast on the breathtaking Amalfi Coast. With the grand opening of Bella Bella approaching six months after Carlo's tragic death, Bria and her eight-year-old son Marco brace for a bittersweet new beginning by the sea . . . Before celebratory vino flows on opening day, a stranger appears in an otherwise pristine guest room, lifeless and covered in blood. Bria can't understand why murder would check into Bella Bella.

Fourteen-year-old Jesse is shipped halfway round the world after the death of his father. He struggles to adapt to life on the Welsh Atlantic coast but eventually befriends John, a popular, charismatic, and outwardly charming boy. But as their friendship grows, a darker side to John emerges. Will Jesse notice before it's too late?

When her stepmother dies, Caro returns to her childhood home in the rural English countryside. She hadn’t seen Elizabeth in years, but the remote farmhouse offers refuge from a bad relationship and a chance to start again. But going through Elizabeth’s belongings unearths memories Caro would rather stay buried. In particular, the story her stepmother would tell her about two little girls and the terrible thing they do. As heavy snow traps Caro in the village, where her neighbours stare and whisper, Caro is forced to question why Elizabeth hated her so much and what she was hiding.

In the glorious sunshine of Oxford, on a day when everyone should be celebrating, tragedy strikes when a university student is found floating in the river, dead. Probationary WPC Trudy Loveday finds herself paired with coroner Clement Ryder to investigate and it soon becomes clear that this case is not going to be easy. The witnesses all refuse to give a straight answer, each new lead sends them in a new direction and tales of other missing youngsters add further mystery to the investigation.

Harley McKenna is the only child of North County's biggest criminal. Duke McKenna's run more guns, cooked more meth, and killed more men than anyone around. Harley's been working for him since she was sixteen, dreading the day he'd deem her ready to rule the rural drug empire he's built. Her time's run out. The Springfields, her family's biggest rivals, are moving in. And they're coming for Duke's only weak spot: his daughter.

Gemma Guillory has lived in the Australian Outback enclave of Rainier her entire life. She knows the tiny, red-dust town’s ins and outs by heart, knows the people like they are her family, their quirks as if they were her own. She also knows her once charming town is now remembered for one reason and one reason only: three innocent people died there at the hands of a serial killer. The last stop on the Rainier Ripper’s trail of deaths fifteen years ago was her picturesque little tea shop.

There was the moment eight-year-old Ruth Corrigan ran away from playing in the woods with her best friend, and then the moment after, when Ceely was gone. Murdered. Now the silence of that day lives within Ruth. Lives in the judgment she sees in the faces of so many in the small town she still calls home. Ruth may be older now, tougher, a cop by trade, but her life has been unraveling ever since that tragic day in the woods. Alcohol, sex, broken marriages—nothing can lighten the truth she knows inside. Until the child-killer returns, free and unencumbered, having already paid for his crime.

What if Sean Courtland’s old Chevy truck had broken down somewhere else? What if he’d never met Denise Givens, a waitress at a local tavern in the Wisconsin town where he lands? Or Dan Young, another young man like Sean drifting through, having fled Minnesota for reasons unknown? Instead, together Sean and Dan pick up carpentry and plumbing work for an old man named Marion Devereaux, and Sean gets drawn into the lives of Denise and her father—and of the townspeople, all haunted by the disappearance of three young boys decades ago, in the 1970s.

When a body washes up on the state park beach, Deputy Tessa Black’s experience as a former Seattle detective tells her that the death was not an accident. All evidence points to another murder on the remote island. The victim is a local contractor with a shockingly long list of enemies. The more locals Tessa interviews, the more people she suspects - from the bitter ex-wife and estranged current wife to disgruntled former clients and employees. They all have different reasons to want him dead.

Mike Hammer steals a ride on a train upstate to Killington. But he is welcomed by a nasty surprise: he is accused by police of raping and murdering a young woman near the freight yards. Roughed up by the cops and facing a murder charge, Hammer's future looks bleak. Only a beautiful blonde, Melba Charles - daughter of powerful Senator Charles - might possibly save him...if he pays the price. From a brittle, brown manuscript, the first Mike Hammer novel - begun by Mickey Spillane in the mid-40s and completed 70 years later by Max Allan Collins - is a gift to mystery fans on the noir master's 100th birthday.

In September of 1990, in the Cleveland suburb of Shaker Heights, sixteen-year-old Lisa Pruett was on her way to a midnight tryst with her boyfriend when she was viciously stabbed to death only thirty feet from the boy's home. The murder cast a palpable gloom over the upscale community and sparked accusations, theories, and rumors among Lisa's friends and peers. With a fresh perspective and painstaking research, James Renner reconstructs the events leading up to and following that heartbreaking night. What emerges is a portrait of a community seething with dark undercurrents.

One peaceful morning, in the small, Puget Sound town of Point Orchards, the lifeless body of Dr. Erin Landry is found hanging from a tree on the property of prodigal son and failed writer, Elijah Leith. Sheriff Jim Godbout’s initial investigation points to an obvious suicide, but upon closer inspection, there seem to be clues of foul play when he discovers that the circumstances of the beautiful doctor’s death were ripped straight from the pages of Elijah Leith’s own novel.

Six-million acres of Adirondack forest separate Natalie and Doug Larson from civilization. For the newlyweds, the isolated backcountry honeymoon seemed ideal for starting their lives together, but as they begin to explore the dark interiors of their own hearts, it soon becomes clear that they are not alone in the woods. A man watches them, wielding the forest like a weapon. He wants something from them that's more terrifying than death. And once they are near him, he will do everything in his power to make sure they never walk out again.

The Townhouse Massacre is a chilling and gripping account of one of the most brutal and gruesome true crime stories in American history. Ryan Green’s riveting narrative draws the listener into the real-life horror experienced by the victims and has all the elements of a classic thriller.

They call it Company Town - a city-size oil rig off the coast of the Canadian Maritimes, now owned by one very wealthy, powerful, byzantine family: Lynch Ltd. Hwa is of the few people in her community (which constitutes the whole rig) to forgo bioengineered enhancements. As such, she's the last truly organic person left on the rig - making her doubly an outsider as well as a neglected daughter and bodyguard extraordinaire.

With its reputation in tatters, Alexi Ellis is determined to save her beloved Hopgood Hall from any more bad press. A writing course for wannabe journalists shouldn't cause too many issues and will hopefully take the heat off Hopgood Hall. But disaster strikes when one of the group is found dead in a local pub. What’s worse Alexi was the last person to see the victim alive, which makes her suspect number one. Alexi is sure she is being set up, but who would go to such deadly lengths?

Emma Frost inherits a house on Fanoe Island when her grandmother dies. She decides to move there with her family, much to her teenage daughter's regret. One morning a wealthy older woman living in her street is found murdered and soon Emma finds herself wrapped in a mystery uncovering the island's dark secrets reaching into her own family.

Erin Sloane was sixteen when high school senior Andre Villiers was murdered by his friends. They were her friends, too, led by the intense, charismatic Ricky Hell. Five people went into West Cypress Woods the night Andre was murdered. Only three came out. Ativan, alcohol, and distance had dimmed Erin’s memories of that time. But nearly twenty years later, an aging father will bring her home. Now a journalist, she is asked to write a story about the Southport Three and the thrill-kill murder that electrified the country.

When the exuberant president of Ng'ombwana proposes to dispense with the usual security arrangements on an official visit to London, his old schoolmate, Chief Superintendent Alleyn, is called in to persuade him otherwise. Consequently, on the night of the embassy's reception, the house and grounds are stiff with police.

In 1972, the town of DeClare, Oklahoma, was consumed by the terrifying murder of Gaylene Harjo and the disappearance of her baby, Nicky Jack. When the child's pajama bottoms were found on the banks of Willow Creek, everyone feared Nicky Jack was dead, although his body was never found.