Dark Humor Mystery

Midnight Rider Productions is a dark-web nightmare machine, headed by the one man who years ago drove Darby to hide in the seamy environs of Old Town and make his life there. But Darby left his own mark back in the day, and the shadowy head of production has a grudge to settle. Rider has found him at long last and plans to make an example of him.

Time is up in Old Town. As the pace of gentrification reaches frenzy in Portland, Oregon, Darby Holland’s beloved tattoo parlor, Lucky Supreme, is destroyed by a bomb that ripped through an entire city block. Only a warning call from his favorite prostitute saved his life. Developers have been like wolves at the door of Dmitri (the drunken landlord) for the past few years, but this is different.

The night world of Old Town, Portland, Oregon, has gone mad in the grip of gentrification, and at the center of it all is Lucky Supreme, a seedy tattoo parlor, whose proprietor is a street-bred artist with a unique approach to problem solving. Darby Holland has enough on his radar, but when some flash (tattoo artwork) stolen from him resurfaces in California, he can't help himself. His efforts to reclaim it set him on a dangerous path, dragging along his delightfully eccentric colleagues.

When eighteen-year-old Ellie Canning is discovered wandering the countryside, dazed and traumatized, she tells a harrowing story of abduction, captivity, and escape. An overnight symbol of survival and empowerment, Ellie enthralls an outraged nation. Then authorities zero in on an unlikely suspect: high school teacher Suzannah Wells, identified by Ellie as the woman who kept her drugged and bound in a basement. The evidence against Suzannah is damning—vilified by the media, Suzannah’s only defense is that not a single word Ellie says is true. Suzannah has no reason to lie.

It’s 1997 at the dawn of the digital age in San Francisco. Ex-journalist and struggling alcoholic David “Itchy” Crane’s fledgling “information consultancy” business is getting slowly buried by bad luck, bad decisions, and the growing presence of the Internet. Before he can completely self-destruct, a private investigator offers him 50 grand to find a missing girl named Ashley. Crane takes the job because the money’s right and because the only clue to her disappearance is a dead-on oil portrait of Crane himself - painted by the mysterious missing girl he has never met.

Just days after Josie is the last-minute bridesmaid at a massive Boston Brahmin wedding, the lovely bride dies on her honeymoon at an exclusive Arizona resort. The mother of the bride thinks Josie, with her... unique people skills, can find out what really happened. Josie discovers the dead bride may not have been the first dead girl. And to Josie's horror, the killer has set his sights on her next.

Ann Noyd has lived a carefree suburban Minnesotan life for years. But soon, she gets bored and decides to turn to a life of crime. But her plans get derailed when she is given a long prison sentence for a botched murder attempt. Once released, Ann seeks revenge on those who put her behind bars.

Ivan Sorokin is missing. Who wants him out of the picture - his wife, his business partner, or the stripper who holds his heart? Josie Tucker stands on Beach Street with her back to the San Francisco wharf. Above her, the Ghirardelli sign winks in the dusky twilight, seducing her. The ice cream parlor lights beckon like a lactose lothario, a casein casanova, trying hard to woo her. But her heart longs for dumplings, for dim sum.

In the court of the “King”, everyone knows their place. But as the Artist wins hearts and egos with his ballads, uncomfortable truths emerge that shake the Kingdom to its core. Part surreal fable and part narco-lit romance, this prize-winning novel from Yuri Herrera questions the price of keeping your integrity in a world ruled by patronage and power.

It was my father’s arrest that brought me here, although you could certainly say that I took the scenic route. Here is rehab, where Ben - the only son of a rich South Dublin banker - is piecing together the shattered remains of his life. Abruptly cut off, at the age of 27, from a life of heedless privilege, Ben flounders through a world of drugs and dead-end jobs, his self-esteem at rock bottom. Even his once-adoring girlfriend, Clio, is at the end of her tether. Then Ben runs into an old school friend who wants to cut him in on a scam.

When snarky food critic, Josie Tucker, heads to Austin, Texas, to wax philosophical about the local barbecue joints, she stumbles on to a decades' old missing person case. With the help of a local reporter, a Goth ghost hunter, and a bunco-playing transvestite, she tries to unravel the heart-tugging, hidden history before the whole place goes up in smoke. 

Baylee Scott has the gift of touch. Except it’s not a gift. Seeing other people's memories doesn't make her very popular in Reed Hollow. It was one of the reasons she left the small town as soon as she was able. But after losing her ghost-hunting husband, Baylee returns home to help her brother run the family business: a defunct antique shop and tea house. It’s a dull existence that leaves her dreaming of adventures elsewhere.

Excuse me if I'm feeling sentimental. I might die tonight. My name is Candy Tran. Before I was hunting down serial killers and feeding men to alligators, I was a normal, church-going, tax-paying citizen. Before all of this. I've been given a chance to tell my story, so please, listen closely. This is going to take a while.

To prevent the chaos and destruction they could impose upon the world, an age-old system has been in existence forcing beings of darkness and power to use humanity's legal systems. Snug safely under a "blanket of ignorance", most humans remain unaware of the existence of supernatural beings and the legal disputes which involve them. A select few professionals are required to participate and assist in the resolution of paranormal conflicts. Martin Sandberg is one of those professionals. This is his story.

After Jake quits the drug business, his realtor/ex-wife, Nina, gets him a job as a housesitter for her wealthy clients. Jake celebrates by throwing a party in the mansion he was hired to look after. Unfortunately, the guest list gets out of hand, leaving Jake to contend with a hallucinogenic-vitamin-dispensing yogi, a dead guy in the bathroom, and the Norwegian - a criminal force of nature with a grudge against Jake.

A finely tuned comic depiction of Melbourne's ethnically diverse northern suburbs and the dark underbelly of city life. Down on his luck and hard up for cash, Carl works in the kitchen of a seedy rock 'n' roll joint in ethnically diverse Brunswick. The bouncers and bosses terrify him, he's desperately in love with a much younger Greek waitress, and to make matters worse his mother has come to stay with him. Then a dead body turns up. He and his best mate, Dave, will have to do something about it, and fast....

In 1965, Laura, an American illustrator of children's books, committed suicide in Primrose Hill after Benedick's father left her for another woman. Her son can remember nothing about her, but the fairy-tales and their tantalizing illustrations convince him that his own life is in some way echoing hers.

When Verity Hudson goes missing, Peddyr Quirk—with assistance from his wife Connie—investigates a strange new case which unfolds in an unsavory part of town. It soon becomes apparent that they are not the only ones looking for Verity. A freelance researcher is searching for her birth mother. An influential man of power and money is desperate to find his estranged sister. A local politician is determined to expose a hidden tragedy. A TV journalist will stop at nothing to expose the true story…if it can be uncovered. Where is Verity, who is Verity, and who will find her first?

Scott Fletcher is dead—his lifeless body in a pool of blood. Sarah Holden’s life is turned upside down the day she is discovered with her fiancé’s body next to the motorbike he’d been working on. She has blood on her hands, but the screams do not come. If she didn’t kill him, then who did? The answer seems too easy, the culprit too obvious. Peddyr and Connie Quirk, husband-and-wife private investigators, are brought in to unravel the tangle, prove Sarah’s innocence, and find the true culprit. As they are about to discover, the truth is sometimes more than skin-deep.

Jay and his friends are on the cusp of perpetrating the greatest heist in Leif Erickson High history when they unwittingly find themselves dangerously close to a murder scene. Consumed with an irrational obsession, he is determined to do anything to solve the crime, including hiring a private investigator, infiltrating a sex club, and indulging in a 90-day LSD binge. Forced to confront his demons, both real and imagined, he must unravel the conspiracy of an elusive octopus and his lascivious minions to find the killer.