Dark Thriller

My name’s Ernest Cunningham. I used to be a fan of reading Golden Age murder mysteries, until I found myself with a haphazard career getting stuck in the middle of real-life ones. I’d hoped, this Christmas, that any self-respecting murderer would kick their feet up and take it easy over the holidays. I was wrong. So here I am, backstage at the show of world-famous magician Rylan Blaze, whose benefactor has just been murdered. My suspects are all professional tricksters: masters of the art of misdirection.

Savage (adjective): 1) Not domesticated; wild and untamed 2) A brutal or vicious person 3) Malek Antonov. He’s a myth. A ghost. A legend. A Bratva assassin so feared, some won’t even dare to speak his name. He comes in search of vengeance for the death of his brother, but what he finds instead is me.

When Tea accidentally resurrects her brother from the dead, she learns she is different from the other witches in her family. Her gift for necromancy means that she's a bone witch, a title that makes her feared and ostracized by her community. But Tea finds solace and guidance with an older, wiser bone witch, who takes Tea and her brother to another land for training.

Detective Renée Ballard is working the night beat - known in LAPD slang as "the late show" - and returns to Hollywood Station in the early hours to find a stranger rifling through old file cabinets. The intruder is retired detective Harry Bosch, working a cold case that has gotten under his skin. Ballard can't let him go through department records, but when he leaves, she looks into the case herself and feels a deep tug of empathy and anger. She has never been the kind of cop who leaves the job behind at the end of her shift - and she wants in.

When a senior Edinburgh civil servant spectacularly takes his own life in Kinloch harbour, DCI Jim Daley comes face to face with the murky world of politics. To add to his woes, two local drug dealers lie dead, ritually assassinated. It's clear that dark forces are at work in the town. With his boss under investigation, his marriage hanging on by a thread, and his sidekick, DS Scott, wrestling with his own demons, Daley's world is in meltdown.

The world's population is soaring, creating overcrowded cities and an economic crisis. And in the UK, the breaking point has arrived. A growing number of people can no longer afford to start families, let alone raise them. But for those desperate to experience parenthood, there is an alternative. For a monthly subscription fee, clients can create a virtual child from scratch who they can access via the metaverse and a VR headset. To launch this new initiative, the company behind Virtual Children has created a reality TV show called The Substitute.

FBI Agent Ella Dark, 29, is given her big chance to achieve her life’s dream: to join the Behavioral Crimes Unit. Ella’s hidden obsession of gaining an encyclopedic knowledge of serial killers has led to her being singled out for her brilliant mind, and invited to join the big leagues. But nothing is adding up about this strange new killer. His kills are random and erratic, following no pattern Ella can find—and the body count is growing by the day.

Harry and Kat take the sleeper train to the Scottish Highlands for a New Year's weekend, guests of an American movie mogul who's bought himself a "real live castle". But when a massive blizzard leaves them isolated, it soon becomes clear that the other guests who've made it through the snow all have secrets. And after an "accident" that is clearly no accident, our two heroes wonder.

He appears in the darkness like a ghost, made of shadows and fear - the Midnight Man. He comes for the parents but leaves the children alive, tiny witnesses to unspeakable horror. The bedroom communities of Los Angeles are gripped with dread, and the attacks are escalating. Still reeling from her best friend's close call in a bombing six months ago, FBI behavioral analyst Caitlin Hendrix has come to Los Angeles to assist in the Midnight Man investigation and do what she does best - hunt a serial killer.

For Sergeant Jim Chee of the Navajo Tribal Police, the case begins when he finds a pair of boots in the rabbit brush beside a wilderness trail. The boots' owner lies nearby, his palms and soles "scalped" in what appears to be a witch's scavenging. The federal investigators tell Chee to mind his own business. But a series of disturbing events draws Chee into a dangerous web of intrigue spun by Navajo sorcery and white greed.

Emilia is reeling from the shocking discovery that her twin sister, Vittoria, is alive. But before she faces the demons of her past, Emilia yearns to claim her king, the seductive Prince of Wrath, in the flesh. Emilia doesn’t simply desire his body, she wants his heart and soul—but that’s something the enigmatic demon can’t promise her. When a high-ranking member of House Greed is assassinated, Emilia and Wrath are drawn to the rival demon court. Damning evidence points to Vittoria as the murderer, and she’s quickly declared an enemy of the Seven Circles.

Grower's Market is set in remote marijuana country peopled with characters whose backgrounds are diverse and whose futures are uncertain. Sunbeam, who entered adult life as a 1960s San Francisco hippie girl, moved north searching for peace and quiet in unspoiled nature. Eventually she ended up running the Bird of Prey Tavern and growing enough weed to support her tranquil life.

Five years ago, Geeta lost her no-good husband. As in, she actually lost him—he walked out on her and she has no idea where he is. But in her remote village in India, rumor has it that Geeta killed him. And it’s a rumor that just won’t die.

A decade ago 18-year-old Hannah Docherty was arrested for the shocking murder of her family. It was an open-and-shut case, and Hannah has been incarcerated in a secure psychiatric hospital ever since. When psychotherapist Frieda Klein is asked to meet Hannah and give her assessment, she reluctantly agrees. But what she finds horrifies her. Hannah has become a tragic figure, old before her time.

A sudden burst of radiation is detected beneath the desert in Iran. Alex Hunter – code name Arcadian – and his highly trained incursion team are dropped into the ruins of Persepolis. All they find is an empty underground facility – nothing to explain the gamma spike. It is as if a black hole has swept everything away.... Israel is threatening nuclear war. And someone, or something, is draining the fluids from the bodies of Iranian soldiers in the desert.

Like most families, they had their secrets...and they hid them under a genteelly respectable veneer. No onlooker would guess that prim Vera Hillyard and her beautiful, adored younger sister, Eden, were locked in a dark and bitter combat over one of those secrets. England in the '50s was not kind to women who erred, so they had to use every means necessary to keep the truth hidden behind closed doors - even murder.

It was his first big murder case - and one of the bloodiest and most violent crimes LAPD detective Danny McGuire would ever encounter. Andrew Jakes, an elderly multimillionaire art dealer, had been brutally murdered in his Hollywood home, his lifeless body tied to his naked young wife. Raped and beaten, the lovely Angela Jakes had barely survived the attack herself. Gazing into her deep, soulful eyes, Danny swore that he'd find the psychopath behind this barbarous act.

Former Army Night Stalker Rick Jordan usually has his camp for foster children to himself during the winter months. But someone has visited recently - leaving a trail of blood. One of the two clues left behind tips Rick off to the identity of his visitor, who soon turns up dead. The police deem it an accident, but Rick isn't convinced. With the help of private investigator Heather Shields, he sets out to decipher the remaining clue. Except someone doesn't want them to succeed - and will stop at nothing to keep them from finding the truth.

It is August of 1704, and Matthew Corbett and his companions have narrowly escaped the island of Golgotha and are recuperating in the town of Alghero on the northwestern coast of Sardinia, currently under Spanish rule. Hudson Greathouse is at his limits, both mentally and physically, after their harrowing ordeal.

FBI Agent Ella Dark, 29, is given her big chance to achieve her life’s dream: to join the Behavioral Crimes Unit. Ella’s hidden obsession of gaining an encyclopedic knowledge of serial killers has led to her being singled out for her brilliant mind, and invited to join the big leagues. But this time Ella finds herself in a cat and mouse chase with no way out, and she must wonder if she is hunting—or the one who is hunted….