First Mystery

Killer clowns, a hungry hedge maze, and rich kids who got bored. Friendly cannibals, impossible slashers, and the dead who don’t stay dead…. A museum curator who despises “diasporic inaccuracies.” A sweet girl and her diary of happy thoughts. An old house that just wants friends forever…. These stories are filled with ancient terrors and modern villains, but go ahead, go into the basement, step onto the old plantation, and open the magician’s mystery box because this time, the white guy dies first.

Set in the wilds of Maine, this is an explosive tale of an estranged son thrust into the hunt for a murderous fugitive - his own father. Game warden Mike Bowditch returns home one evening to find an alarming voice from the past on his answering machine: his father, Jack, a hard-drinking womanizer who makes his living poaching illegal game. An even more frightening call comes the next morning from the police: They are searching for the man who killed a beloved local cop the night before - and his father is their prime suspect.

When Auggie Lopez returns to Wahredua for his senior year of college, he’s excited about the future: He’s growing his brand as an influencer, he’s almost done with school, and he’s building a life with his boyfriend, Theo. Then Auggie gets a phone call from Howard Cartwright, Theo’s ex—and Cart tells Auggie he’s being framed for murder.

Psychic Nora Ashcroft is somewhere she never thought she'd see again: her old world. Desperate to bring Tanner and Eva back to Eastwind as soon as possible, she faces a major up-levee battle in New Orleans. Because without any money or a clear place to start, finding two witches in the city could require more magic than she alone possesses. When she catches wind of mysterious slayings among the local vampires and witches, her only shot at finding her friends could be to unmask a murderer. But time is running out, and a dangerous cloaked figure is running amok....

Emma, a wealthy, independent, sensible CEO, has long put her chaotic childhood at the hands of alcoholic parents behind her. When she meets Matthew, a widower, gentle, interested and full of admiration for her success, they quickly fall into a serious relationship. Her best friends, Heidi and Gina, are initially delighted, but when Emma gets engaged after just three months, they panic. Matthew says the death of his first wife means he believes in seizing the day. And Emma says she's in love and that’s all that matters.

Maya is hiding in plain sight in London. The 26-year-old has abandoned the dangerous obligations pressed upon her by her father and chosen instead to live a normal life. But Maya comes from a long line of people who call themselves Harlequins, a fierce group of warriors willing to sacrifice their lives to protect a select few known as Travelers.

Luigi has a knack for games and puzzles. But sometimes it feels like the cards are stacked against him. UNTIL a carnival arrives in town and Luigi gets the CHANCE OF A LIFETIME—the opportunity to work for the world-famous Professor Marvelmous—a dazzling, banana-hat-wearing barker who puts the SHOW in SHOWMAN! When the carnival closes, Professor Marvelmous leaves behind a mysterious puzzle box, along with a clue. A clue that will lead Luigi and his friends on a fantastical treasure hunt to a prize beyond anything they could imagine—if they can find it!

Captain Jim Agnihotri and his wife Lady Diana Framji are embarking to England in the summer of 1894. Jim is hopeful the cruise will help Diana open up to him. Something is troubling her, and Jim is concerned. On their first evening, Jim meets an intriguing Spaniard, a fellow soldier with whom he finds an instant kinship. But within twenty-four hours, Don Juan Nepomuceno is murdered, his body discovered shortly after he asks rather urgently to see Jim.

In a research hangar in Virginia, a Unit 51 team studies an ancient but long-dormant virus that can transform human physiology - and turn it into something else.... In the Amazon rain forest, a newly evolving life form known as Subject Z acquires the ability to think conceptually, build elaborate traps, create new carriers - and spawn a new race....

A sparkling new translation of this flashback to the start of Inspector Maigret's career, part of the new Penguin Maigret series. The profession he had always yearned for did not actually exist...he imagined a cross between a doctor and a priest - a man capable of understanding another's destiny at first glance. The very first investigation by eager young police secretary Jules Maigret leads him to a wealthy Paris family's dark secrets.

For years, Filio Amorosa has had one goal, and only one goal: getting back to Mars. All that matters is finding out what happened on her mission there, and why she can’t remember any of it. But when she finally discovers the truth, it blows her whole world apart. Meanwhile, on Earth, Agatha Devenworth and Pano Hofer have a new mission: Travel from the Human Foundation’s secret underground base to New York to uncover what the enemy is plotting.

When Frank Meyer and his family are executed during a home invasion, the police begin investigating the secret life they're sure Meyer had. Joe Pike's on a hunt of his own: to clear his friend's name, and to punish the people who murdered him. What starts out as a simple trail gets twisted fast by old grudges, double crosses, blood vengeance, and a crime so terrible even Pike and his partner Elvis Cole have no way to measure it.

The year is 2650. Seventy-five years ago, an alien fleet attacked Earth. Without warning. Without mercy. We were not prepared. Hundreds of millions perished. Dozens of cities burned. We nearly lost everything. Then the aliens abruptly left. We rebuilt. We armed ourselves. We swore: never again. But the aliens never came back. Until now. With overwhelming force the aliens have returned, striking deep into our territory, sending Earth into a panic.

Jack and Elsa knew one thing: Miami was magical - and full of wealthy businessmen just begging to be conned out of their money. Jack uses Elsa’s confidence as an erotic dancer to lure men into embarrassing situations that they will pay generously to escape from. Could this trick continue to bring in riches for this unscrupulous pair? When Jack and Elsa target Irish American tycoon Simon Walsh, Jack believes the payday could well be their last - and he may be right. The scam goes dangerously wrong.

Her code name: Jet. A lethal operative for the Mossad. Many wanted her eliminated. Faking her own death was the only way to survive, but it didn't work out like she planned. The tranquil island's beauty was shattered in an instant. The attack forced her hand, and now she must make a decision. Will she stay dead, or return to a world that wants to kill her?

Determined to make the First Edition Library a success, Hayley Burke wasn’t expecting to have to solve an old friend’s murder in this all-new mystery from USA Today best-selling author Marty Wingate.

For years, people have feared that sexual material removed from victims of alien abductions might lead to the creation of something that modern science considers impossible: hybrids of the alien and the human. They would think like aliens, but appear human, and be able to do something that full-blooded aliens can't: walk the earth freely.

It’s the summer of 1969, and the shock of conflict reverberates through the youth of America, both at home and abroad. As a student at a quiet college campus in the heartland of Indiana, Terry Ives couldn’t be farther from the front lines of Vietnam or the incendiary protests in Washington. But the world is changing, and Terry isn’t content to watch from the sidelines. When word gets around about an important government experiment in the small town of Hawkins, she signs on as a test subject for the project, code named MKULTRA.

Former time vice detective Tom Mandel lost his wife after failing to stop Malcolm Wolfe from pulling off the biggest time heist in Unity history. Nine years later, with less than a day remaining on his government-allotted Life Tracker, Tom's ready to join her. But when his former partner, Alaina Raines, brings word that Wolfe has escaped prison and is gearing up for another heist, Tom must decide: spend his last hours on Earth in a drug-induced haze or return to the life he left behind to catch the man who broke him.

Many Christians mistakenly believe that their only choice is either to reconcile themselves to a fundamentalist reading of scripture (a "literal-factual" approach) or to simply reject the Bible as something that could bring meaning and value into their lives. In Reading the Bible Again for the First Time, Marcus Borg shows how instead we can freshly appreciate all the essential elements of the Old and New Testaments - from Genesis to Revelation - in a way that can open up a new world of intelligent faith.