Crime Town

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.

Thirteen years ago, Assemblyman Derrick Bell was murdered in his home by an intruder. His wife, Noelle Marshall, was left for dead. The crime was unsolved, but it wasn’t forgotten. Today the FBI is tackling a fresh perspective on the case and looking to Noelle, now a detective for the Deschutes County sheriff’s office, for new clues. It is reopening everything Noelle thought was behind her. Memories of her escape from a traumatic childhood. A marriage that wasn’t the perfect love story she’d been promised. And a husband whose charm and privilege hid a dark side.

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.

Adisa Johnson is living her dream of practicing law with a prestigious firm in downtown Atlanta. Then a split-second mistake changes the course of her career. Left with no other options, Adisa returns to her hometown, where, a few days earlier, a white police officer shot an unarmed black teen who is now lying comatose in the hospital. Adisa is itching to jump into the fight as a special prosecutor but feels pulled to do what she considers unthinkable as a young black woman — defend the officer.

When called upon, she can talk the death out of the dying and save their lives—only once, never twice. But this truly unique gift comes at a price, rooting Weatherly to people who only want her around when they need her and resent her backwater ways when they don’t. Weatherly’s cousin Adaire also has a gift: she’s a Scryer and can see the future reflected back in dark surfaces. Right before she is killed in an accident, Adaire saw something unnerving, and that’s why Weatherly believes she was murdered—never thinking for a moment that it was an accident.

Date with Poison is the brilliant fourth novel in Julia Chapman's Dales Detective Agency series and is perfect of fans of M C Beaton's Agatha Raisin series and Gervase Phinn. A young teenager has gone missing. Can Samson O'Brien and Delilah Metcalfe find him? Spring is in the air in Bruncliffe. But not everyone is filled with the joys of the season. Implicated in the murder of a man in Leeds, the Dales Detective Agency’s Samson O’Brien is facing tough questions from the police....

Street-smart and straightforward police chief Cuddy Mangum and his refined homicide detective Justin Savile V are determined to keep their town’s cultural, political and racial divisions stable…even peaceful. But when a young black activist is murdered while in the process of fighting for his brother’s freedom from death row, the lines keeping Hillston, North Carolina, in balance start to crumble.

The lead homicide investigator in a rural town, Detective Sergeant Gemma Woodstock is deeply unnerved when a high school classmate is found strangled, her body floating in a lake. And not just any classmate, but Rosalind Ryan, whose beauty and inscrutability exerted a magnetic pull on Smithson High School, first during Rosalind's student years and then again when she returned to teach drama. As much as Rosalind's life was a mystery to Gemma when they were students together, her death presents even more of a puzzle.

With veterinarian Sydney Jones being targeted, K-9 Officer Gavin Walker and his furry partner must stand between her and certain death in Lenora Worth’s Hidden Christmas Danger. And the clock is ticking in Silent Night Explosion by Katy Lee—but can Jodie Chen trust the newest K-9 officer, Victor Abrams, and his dog to find a bomb and keep her alive…despite Victor’s shadowed past?

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.

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.

Baby’s heart is in the right place, but she’s got problems—namely, a fierce taste for booze and an on-again-off-again boyfriend who can't commit. She’s living and working at Oakwood Hills, a crumbling lakeside resort, with her friends, Crystal Nugget and DJ Overalls, reeling since her adoptive mother died of a stroke. And now, the return of local drug kingpin Bad Mike is about to throw her already unstable summer into full-blown chaos. To make matters worse, the owner of Oakwood Hills announces plans to sell the resort to Amelia, her boyfriend's wealthy twin sister.

Hello, Shadowlands takes a deep plunge into crime rings both large and small. It also examines how China’s rise and America’s decline are creating new opportunities for transnational syndicates to thrive. Focusing on human stories on both sides of this crime wave, the acclaimed Bangkok-based broadcaster and journalist Patrick Winn intimately profiles the men and women of the region who are forced to make agonizing choices in the absence of law.

The salacious and scandalous murders of a series of couples on Texarkana's "lovers' lanes" created a media maelstrom and cast a pall of fear over an entire region. What is even more surprising is that the case has remained cold for decades. Combining archival research and investigative journalism, Pulitzer Prize-nominated historian James Presley reveals evidence that provides crucial keys to unlocking this decades-old puzzle.

It's 1998. Varg Veum sits by the hospital bedside of his long-term girlfriend, Karin, whose life-threatening injuries provide a deeply painful reminder of the mistakes he's made. Investigating the seemingly innocent disappearance of a wind-farm inspector, Varg Veum is thrust into one of the most challenging cases of his career, riddled with conflicts, environmental terrorism, religious fanaticism, unsolved mysteries and dubious business ethics.

Wanted: A picturesque new town, a fresh start, and a much-needed escape from the constant reminder that the world is still full of bad guys. For FBI agent Olivia Knight, that perfect place is Belle Grove, a charming small town in Northern Virginia, a place hidden by lush greenery and away from the big city. But when Olivia finds a young girl malnourished and disheveled outside her home, she is thrown into a disturbing case. In order to catch the culprit and find the missing children in her new hometown, Olivia must dive deep into the twisted mind of a deranged serial kidnapper.

Gemma Hayden has returned to her hometown of Alice Springs for a new job as a primary school teacher. It's been six years since her family broke apart following the disappearance of her twin brother. And the scars still run deep. Hard on the heels of her homecoming, Saul Pearce, the man she once loved, is reposted from Parks and Wildlife in Darwin back to Alice. When an old car wreck is uncovered, washed down the river to Ruby Gap, Saul investigates only to find that the wreck belonged to Ethan, Gemma's twin—and there's a coded note for her in the glovebox.

Mick Hardin is an Army CID officer home on leave, recovering from an IED attack and flirting with prescription painkillers, when a body is found in the center of town. It’s Barney Kissick, the local heroin dealer, and the city police see it as an occupational hazard. But when Barney’s mother, Shifty, asks Mick to take a look, he finds there’s more to the killing than it seems. Mick should be rehabbing his leg, signing his divorce papers, and getting out of town—and most of all, staying out of the way—but he keeps on looking, and suddenly he’s getting shot at himself.

When young Daniel Whitman is killed at a high-school party, the community is ripped apart. The death of Sanctuary's star quarterback seems to be a tragic accident, but everyone knows his ex-girlfriend Harper Fenn is the daughter of a witch - and she was there when he died. Was Daniel's death an accident, revenge, or something more sinister? As accusations fly, paranoia grips the town, culminating in a witch-hunt...and the town becomes no sanctuary at all.

When reclusive writer Jock falls for vivacious tea shop owner, Sapphire, he is amazed that she seems to feel the same way about him. He watches with pride as Sapphire is crowned May Queen at the town's May Day celebrations, but his joy turns to heartbreak when she runs off into the crowd, never to return.