English Detective Noir

It could have happened to any of us, but it happened to a man named Flavieres. His days as a detective were over, and everyone knew he had his reasons. But when an old friend appeared out of nowhere with concerns about his withdrawn and mysterious wife, Flavieres didn't have the heart to refuse. Soon, he would be scouring the streets of Paris in search of an answer - in search of a girl who belonged to no one, not even to herself. Intrigue would be replaced by obsession, and dreams replaced by nightmares.

Fritz Brown’s L.A. - and his life - are masses of contradictions, like stirring chorales sung for the dead. A less-than-spotless former cop with a drinking problem - a private-eye-cum-repo man with a taste for great music - he has been known to wallow in the grime beneath the Hollywood glitter. But Fritz Brown’s life is about to change, thanks to the appearance of a racist psycho who flashes too much cash for a golf caddie and who walked away clean from a multiple murder rap.

Los Angeles, August 4, 1962. The city broils through a midsummer heat wave. Marilyn Monroe ODs. A B-movie starlet is kidnapped. The overhyped LAPD overreacts. Chief Bill Parker’s looking for some getback. The Monroe deal looks like a moneymaker. He calls in Freddy Otash. The freewheeling Freddy O: tainted ex-cop, defrocked private eye, dope fiend, and freelance extortionist. A man who lives by the maxim “Opportunity is love.” Freddy gets to work. He dimly perceives Marilyn Monroe’s death and the kidnapped starlet to be a poisonous riddle that only he has the guts and the brains to untangle

December, 1933. The city that cannot sleep, where cartels and mobsters go bump in the night. Manhattan's delicate peace is broken when four politicians in the pocket of America's reigning megacorporation are murdered at the Edison Hotel, dispatched by an unknown assassin wielding a rare and unique weapon. The NYPD calls upon the only man for the job: Elias Roche, the Nightcaller.

This second volume of a must-listen collection contains 15 bibliomysteries by best-selling and award-winning authors.

The first new Henry Rios novel in 20 years from six-time Lambda Literary award winner Michael Nava is a brilliantly plotted mystery that weaves together the gripping story of two gay men against the backdrop of 1980s San Francisco as the tsunami of AIDS bears down upon the city.

A completely revised edition of the first Henry Rios mystery, The Little Death, Lay Your Sleeping Head introduces Michael Nava’s singular protagonist, gay Latino criminal defense lawyer Henry Rios. Rios, beset by personal and professional problems, begins a passionate affair with the black sheep heir to a great California fortune who tells Rios an improbable tale of murder and sexual predation in his wealthy family. When the young man is found dead of an apparent drug overdose, Rios begins an investigation that ultimately reveals much more than murder.

On a bone-chilling October night, Medical Examiner Rowan Winthorp investigates the death of her daughter’s best friend. Hours later, the tragedy hits even closer to home when she makes a devastating discovery—her daughter, Chloe, is gone. But, not without a trace. A morbid mosaic of clues forces Rowan and her husband to question how deeply they really knew their daughter. As they work closely to peel back the layers of this case, they begin to unearth disturbing details about Chloe and her secret transgressions…details that threaten to tear them apart.

A body discovered in the river in the centre of Cardiff with its tongue amputated leads to more deaths in the Polish community. John Marco and his team have to delve into the East European immigrant community and uncover the murky world of people trafficking. But what is it that links all the deaths together?

1850: Charles Dickens is in Manchester, performing at the Queen's Theatre with his acting group. But his career on the stage is cut short when a man is shot dead - on set. With Dickens himself caught with the gun in his hands, he is immediately arrested. Along with the help of his good friend Superintendent Sam Jones, Dickens must do all he can to find the real killer, before he is locked up for a crime he didn't commit. Can Dickens convince the authorities of his innocence? Will he unmask the true assassin?

Retired policeman turned killer Jeffrey Brandt has gone underground. He is even living something like a normal life in North Wales. He killed to make society stand up and take notice. It did. His crimes are notorious. So infamous, in fact, that someone wants to emulate him. How will Brandt react to a copycat killer? Will he be flattered, or disturbed that someone wants to steal his limelight? Crucially, for investigating officer DSI Stella Johnson, the new spate of murders might offer an opportunity to finally bring Brandt to justice.

Freelance private detective Thomas "Ravn" Ravnsholdt is attempting to move on with his life following the murder of his girlfriend. But when wealthy business mogul Ferdinand Mesmer enlists his help finding his son, Ravn reluctantly takes on what he thinks will be a straightforward missing person case. A decade ago, Jacob Mesmer founded the mysterious and scandal-scarred religious sect "God's Chosen." Now he's vanished without a trace. As Ravn digs deeper, he discovers the previous private eye assigned to the case has also disappeared.

Three friends go on a foodie road trip to the Scottish Highlands and Islands to celebrate their pending retirement, expecting stunning scenery, great food, fine wines, and a chance to reminisce about the good old days. When they somehow secure a reservation at a remote and extremely exclusive restaurant set on a private island in Loch Broom, they know they’re in for a once-in-a-lifetime dining experience.

When five-year-old Ava Sawyer goes missing from a birthday party at a local garden center, the police are bewildered by the lack of leads. That is, until two years later, when Ava’s body is found and another little girl, Audrey Briggs, goes missing. Audrey also attended that party. Leading the investigation is Detective Natalie Ward. A mother of two teenagers, this case chills her to the bone and is a disturbing reminder of the last job she worked on. One that still keeps her awake at night.

The Sternwood family, immortalized in Raymond Chandler's The Big Sleep, is in trouble again. Lovely Vivian's psychotic sister, Carmen, has disappeared from the sanitarium, and Vivian herself has once again fallen into the clutches of the shady underworld character Eddie Mars. Enter Philip Marlowe, the original tough-but-tender private eye, resurrected by Robert B. Parker, creator of his own phenomenally popular Spenser mystery series. He saved the Sternwoods once before. The question is: Can he do it again?

Criminal investigator Thomas Ravnsholdt—better known as Ravn—is on leave from Copenhagen’s special crime unit following the brutal murder of his wife. Wracked with guilt over her death, Ravn has withdrawn to a ramshackle houseboat with only his grumpy Old English Bulldog to keep him company. But his self-imposed exile ends when a friend asks him for help finding a young woman who disappeared without a trace a few years earlier. The investigation brings Ravn back to his former workplace and the underworld he’d hoped to leave behind.

As Sheriff Clayton Burroughs tries to juggle fatherhood, his job, and his recovery from being shot in the confrontation that killed his two criminally inclined brothers last year, he’s doing all he can just to survive. Yet after years of carefully toeing the line between his life in law enforcement and his family, he finally has to make a choice. When a rival organization makes a first foray into Burroughs' territory, leaving a trail of bodies and a whiff of fear in its wake, Clayton is pulled back into the life he so desperately wants to leave behind.

Marcy Addwatter killed her husband - there's no question about that. Shot him dead in the motel room where he was trysting with a blonde hooker. Shot the hooker, too. But where the cops might see an open-and-shut case, private eye Michael Tree - Ms. Michael Tree - sees a conspiracy. For Ms. Tree, digging into it could mean digging her own grave...and digging up her own murdered husband's. Based on the longest-running private-eye comic book series of all time, Deadly Beloved brings you an all-new adventure of the legendary Ms. Tree.

Suspended from his job, criminal investigator Thomas "Ravn" Ravnsholdt lives a lonely, dissolute existence—until he crosses paths with a woman desperate for help locating her missing brother. Driven to embezzlement, the man has vanished without a trace on a visit to Berlin. Ravn's investigation takes a chilling turn when he uncovers a pattern of similar disappearances involving single men in the German capital. As the pieces of this puzzle start to fall into place, Ravn finds himself entangled in a web of darkness and deception that dates back to the era of the Stasi.

The boy studied the bruise turning yellow at the base of his neck. With quick fingers his mother tightened his tie and pulled his collar high above it. Her eyes alone said, We will not speak of this.... Years later a man is found shot dead in a local park. On his phone is a draft text: I can’t keep this secret any longer. The recipient is unnamed. Detective Robyn Carter knows this secret is the key to the case, but his friends and family don’t offer any clues, and all her team have to go on is a size-ten footprint.