English Private Detectives

The heist was legendary, still talked about 20 years after the priceless paintings disappeared from one of Boston's premier art museums. Most thought the art was lost forever, buried deep, sold off overseas, or, worse, destroyed as incriminating evidence. But when paint chips from the most valuable piece stolen, Gentlemen in Black by a Spanish master, arrives at the desk of a Boston journalist, the museum finds hope and enlists Spenser's help.

The Valley of Fear is the fourth and final Sherlock Holmes novel by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. It is loosely based on the Molly Maguires and Pinkerton agent James McParland. The story was first published in the Strand Magazine between September 1914 and May 1915. The novel starts with Sherlock Holmes receiving a cipher message from Fred Porlock, a pseudonymous agent of Professor Moriarty. After Porlock sends the message, however, he changes his mind for fear of Moriarty's discovering that he is a traitor. He decides not to send the key to the cipher, but he sends Holmes a note telling of this decision.

Sherlock Holmes and his faithful friend, Dr John Watson, have been hired by actor George Reynolds. George wants them to find out why the audience who comes to see him perform every night are the same people, only wearing disguises. Is something sinister going on and, if so, what? Meanwhile, Holmes’ archenemy, Professor James Moriarty, is having problems of his own. Implicated in the murder of a gang leader, Moriarty and his second, Moran, must go on the run from the police in order to find out who is behind the set-up.

Rick Riordan’s first book in the Tres Navarre series, Big Red Tequila hit the mystery market like a Texas tornado. Readers couldn’t get enough of its hero’s offbeat combination of academic degrees, tai chi skills, and nose for danger. When the second adventure, Widower’s TwoStep, was published, it quickly earned an Edgar Award.

Meet Elvis Cole, L.A. private eye.... He quotes Jiminy Cricket and carries a .38. He's a literate, wisecracking Vietnam vet who is determined never to grow up.

Most girls would die for a life of privilege; some would even kill for it. Ariana Osgood ruled exclusive Easton Academy---until she was arrested for murdering Thomas Pearson. She's spent the past two years at the Brenda T. Trumbull Correctional Facility for Women plotting her escape and is determined to get a second chance at the glamorous life she left behind. And Ariana will do anything to get her way.

Pearl’s detective agency takes a back seat as she prepares to offer a warm welcome to a group of special visitors. A local arts festival is being held to honour a cultural exchange visit from representatives of Borken - Whitstable’s Twin Town in Germany. Yet very soon, personality clashes surface among the participants; local politicians try to use the festival for their own ends, while others jostle for improved billing on the festival programme. Tempers flare, old feuds re-surface, and on the eve of the first event, a cryptic message is received by the local police.

An academic so conservative he thought Ronald Reagan was a pinko, Hale Markham rules Prescott University like an intellectual tyrant - until the morning he’s found dead at the bottom of one of Prescott’s famously beautiful ravines. Every liberal on campus hated the crotchety old crank, but which one is responsible for giving Markham his final push to the right? The case so intrigues the incomparable, reclusive master detective Nero Wolfe that he takes the unusual step of leaving the confines of his home.

When Cockney private detective George Harley saves a young girl's life on a dark London night in 1929, he doesn't realize it marks the beginning of an investigation which will change his life forever. The incendiary novel which inspired the girl's abduction also seems to be linked to a series of grisly murders that are taking place on Harley's patch, and though he's delighted to be asked by Scotland Yard to help find the killer before they strike again, he could do without the local razor- and cosh-wielding mobsters thinking he's a police informant.

For the men of Madison Avenue, the battle between soft-drink giants Cherr-o-key and AmeriCherry seems heaven-sent. For years now, the firm of Mills/Lake/Ryman has fought to help Cherr-o-key become the nation’s favorite fizzy cherry soda, but each time they come up with a new slogan, mascot, or jingle, AmeriCherry somehow beats them to it. There’s a mole inside the agency, and only Nero Wolfe can ferret him out.

Minnie Polson is dead. Burned to a crisp in a fire so big and bad it had to be deliberate. The only thing worse is that Hap and Leonard could have prevented it. Maybe. Minnie had a feeling she was being targeted, shaken down by some shadowy force. However, when she’d solicited Hap & Leonard, all it took was one off color joke to turn her sour and she’d called them off the investigation. Wracked with a guilty conscience, the two PIs—along with Hap’s fleet-footed wife, Brett—tuck in to the case.

During the height of Hollywood’s golden age, one man lorded over the city’s lurid underbelly of forbidden sin and celebrity scandal like no other: Fred Otash. An ex-Marine turned L.A.P.D. vice cop, Otash became the most sought-after private detective and fixer to the stars by specializing in the dark arts that would soon dominate the entertainment industry. The Fixer delves into the extraordinary life of Hollywood’s most infamous private detective and “fixer” to the stars, revealing newly discovered shocking revelations from his never-before-seen investigative files.

Los Angeles, 1986. A group of right-wing Christians has put an initiative on the November ballot to allow health officials to force people with HIV into quarantine camps - and it looks like it’s going to pass. Rios, now living in LA, agrees to be counsel for a group of young activists who call themselves QUEER. QUEER claims to be committed to peaceful civil disobedience. But when one of its members is implicated in the bombing of an evangelical church that kills its pastor, Rios finds himself with a client suddenly facing the death penalty.

Mumbai is a city that thrives on extravagant spectacles and larger-than-life characters. But as Chopra is about to discover, even in the city of dreams, there is no guarantee of a happy ending.

Victor Silvius has spent nine years as an inmate at The Grange, a private sanatorium, for the crime of attacking judge Sir Giles Drury. Now, the judge's wife, Lady Elspeth Drury, believes that Silvius is the one responsible for a series of threatening letters her husband has recently received. Eager to avoid the scandal that involving the local police would entail, Lady Elspeth seeks out retired stage magician Joseph Spector, whose discreet involvement in a case Sir Giles recently presided over greatly impressed her.

After being imprisoned for two years, a former teacher enrolls in a course to learn how to become a Private Detective. What begins out of curiosity, turns into a serious business, until she is being threatened by someone who doesn't want her to continue her investigation….

Cecil Younger never thought it would come to this: providing surveillance for a chicken coop being raided by a fowl thief. But things have not exactly been breaking right lately for the Alaskan P.I. The logical thing to do? Take a vacation, of course. Well, it's not exactly a vacation. Younger has been paid to investigate a doctor aboard a luxurious first-class cruise ship up the Alaskan coast. Except passengers are dying. Now Younger finds himself trapped on a ship of fools with a murderer who is leaving a trail of well-to-do passengers in his wake...and leaving evidence pointing an accusing finger at Cecil!

Archie Goodwin’s aunt Edna is about to lure him away from his work at Nero Wolfe’s New York brownstone. After a phone call, he heads off to Ohio, where the president of Farmer’s State Bank and Trust, an elderly widower, has died in an apparent suicide. But Archie’s aunt has expressed nagging suspicions - which only grow stronger when someone takes a shot at a local reporter who wrote about the case.

There are few people Nero Wolfe respects, and Lon Cohen of the New York Gazette is one of them. So when Cohen asks for a favor, the famously brilliant - and notoriously lazy - detective is inclined to listen. According to Cohen, someone wants to kill the Gazette’s gossip columnist, Cameron Clay. Death threats are a regular hazard for Clay, who’s hurled insults and accusations at every boldfaced name in the five boroughs. But the latest threats have carried a more sinister tone.

First published in 1890, The Sign of the Four is Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s second book starring legendary detective Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson. Each year following the strange disappearance of her father, Miss Morstan has received a present of a rare and lustrous pearl. Now, on the day she is summoned to meet her anonymous benefactor, she consults Holmes and Watson.