Historical Police Procedural

When a band of homeless people cremate a beloved dog in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park, the authorities are willing to overlook a few broken regulations. But three weeks later, when the dog's owner gets the same fiery send-off, the SFPD has a real headache on its hands. The autopsy suggests homicide, but Inspector Kate Martinelli and her partner, Al Hawkin, have little else to go on: a homeless victim with no positive ID, a group of witnesses with little love for the cops, and a possible suspect, known only as Brother Erasmus, who proves both articulate and impossible to understand.

In 1920s Munich, the body of Anna Gross, a young society wife, has been found in the English Gardens, still clothed in finery. Soon a second body is discovered, also a woman of high society. When a third body is found, homicide detective Axel Berg realizes he's dealing with unprecedented evil. Is the murderer politically motivated? Is he a lone madman? Or worse, is the killer possessed by both political and personal demons?

Lawton's novel opens in 1938 with Europe on the brink of war. In London, Frederick Troy, newly promoted to the prestigious Murder Squad at Scotland Yard, is put in charge of rounding up a list of German and Italian "enemy aliens" that also includes Frederick's brother, Rod, who learns upon receiving an internment letter that despite having grown up in England he is Austrian-born. Hundreds of men are herded by train to a neglected camp on the Isle of Man. And, as the bombs start falling on London, a murdered rabbi is found, then another, and another.

Eine tote Schauspielerin, ein dubioser Beleuchter und ein erpressbarer Kölner Bürgermeister: Gereon Rath gerät selbst in Gefahr. Berlin 1930: Der Tod der gefeierten Schauspielerin Betty Winter führt Gereon Rath in die Studios der Filmmetropole Berlin. Der junge Kölner Kommissar in der Berliner Mordinspektion lernt schnell die Schattenseiten des Glamours kennen und erlebt eine Branche im Umbruch. Der Tonfilm erobert die Leinwände, und dabei bleiben viele auf der Strecke: Produzenten, Kinobesitzer – und Stummfilmstars.

The man who lies bleeding to death in a London brickyard is no ordinary drifter but a secret informant with details of an international plot against the British government. Special Branch officer Thomas Pitt, hastening to rendezvous with him, arrives seconds after the knife-wielding assassin—who, in turn, flees on an erratic course that leads Pitt in wild pursuit to picturesque St. Malo on the French coast. Meanwhile, Pitt’s supervisor, Victor Narraway, stands accused of embezzling government funds.

London, 1882. Alec Lonsdale, a young reporter on the Pall Mall Gazette, is working on a story about a fatal house fire. But the postmortem on the victim produces shocking results: Patrick Donovan's death was no accident. But why would someone murder a humble shop assistant and steal part of his brain? When a second body is discovered, its throat cut, and then a third, Lonsdale and his spirited female colleague, Hulda Friederichs, begin to uncover evidence of a conspiracy that reaches to the highest echelons of Victorian society.

One stormy night, a ghostly encounter on a lonely road leads Inspector de Silva into a case of murder and a mystery that stretches back to Ceylon’s distant past. To uncover the truth, he will have to face death and his inner demons. If you love entertaining and absorbing mysteries, spiced with colorful characters and a dash of humor, don’t miss the Inspector de Silva Mysteries.

Why was the redoubtable King Henry, an aborigine from Western Australia, killed during a thunderstorm in New South Wales? What was the feud that led to murder after nineteen long years had passed? And who was the woman who saw the murder and kept silent? This first story of Inspector Napoleon Bonaparte, the half-aborigine detective, takes him to a sheep station in the Darling River bush country where he encounters those problems he understands so well... mixed blood and divided loyalties.

Berlin 1931: Wirtschaftskrise, gewalttätige Auseinandersetzungen zwischen SA und Rotfront, Machtkampf unter den Ringvereinen. Gereon Rath bekommt vom FBI den Auftrag, den US-Gangster Abraham »Abe« Goldstein zu beschatten, und ahnt auf seinem Posten nicht, dass dieser sich frei und bewaffnet in der Stadt bewegt. Als der Unterweltboss Marlow Rath zu einer privaten Ermittlung zwingt, gerät er zwischen die Fronten des Bandenkriegs.

Two hundred years ago a loyalist family fled to England to escape the American War of Independence and seemingly vanished into thin air. American genealogist Jefferson Tayte is hired to find out what happened, but it soon becomes apparent that a calculated killer is out to stop him.

A sadistic practical joker is haunting the popular music halls of London, interfering with the actors and interrupting their acts by orchestrating humiliating disasters that take place in view of the audience. A trapeze artist misses her timing when the trapeze ropes are shortened. Mustard has been applied to a sword swallower's blade. A singer's costume has been rigged. The girl in a magician's box is trapped. Then the mischief escalates to murder. Or was murder intended all along?

Scotland Yard Detective Joe Sandilands is caught off guard one night in 1933 by a phone call from a distressed boy named Jackie Drummond, who just might be the illegitimate son Joe never knew he had....

When a man’s naked corpse is found strapped to a waterwheel, newly appointed Inspector Haze is called upon to investigate the crime. With the help of American surgeon Captain Redmond, he delves into the life of Frank Darrow, a man who inspired such hatred, his mere death wasn’t enough to satisfy his killer. Finding few clues and no obvious motive for the murder, Redmond and Haze must peel away the layers of Frank Darrow’s relationships to get to the shocking truth, while also coming to terms with unexpected developments in their own lives.

Berlin 1927: Charlotte Ritter genießt nach dem Abitur ihre frisch errungene Freiheit, gemeinsam mit ihrer Freundin Greta zieht sie nachts durch die Tanzlokale Berlins. Tagsüber lernt sie Schreibmaschine und Stenografie, denn ihr Studium wird sie sich selbst finanzieren müssen. Lottes Vater ist Gefängniswärter - ein einfacher, ehrlicher Mann, der seine Tochter unterstützt, wo er kann. Kein Wunder, dass es nicht spurlos an Lotte vorübergeht, als ihr Vater eines Tages in ein brutales Attentat im Moabiter Gefängnis verwickelt wird.

April 1937, die Familie Rath ist zersprengt. Eigentlich wollte Charlotte Rath, geborene Ritter, schon längst im Ausland sein, doch halten die Umstände sie in Berlin fest. Ihr ehemaliger Pflegesohn Fritze ist in die geschlossene Abteilung der Nervenheilanstalt Wittenau gesteckt worden, ihre beste Freundin Greta ist spurlos verschwunden und steht unter Mordverdacht. Dem untergetauchten und von den Behörden für tot gehaltenen Gereon Rath wird es derweil zu gefährlich in Deutschland, er besteigt einen Zeppelin, um in die USA zu entkommen.

Fred Underhill is a young cop on the rise in Los Angeles in the early 1950s - a town blinded to its own grime by Hollywood glitter; a society nourished by newspaper lies that wants its heroes all-American and squeaky clean. A chance to lead on a possible serial killing is all it takes to fuel Underhill's reckless ambition - and it propels him into a dangerous alliance with certain mad and unstable elements of the law enforcement hierarchy. When the case implodes with disastrous consequences, it is Fred Underhill who takes the fall. His life is in ruins, his promising future suddenly a dream of the past.

An old flame has returned to Chief Inspector Frederick Troy's life: Kitty Stilton, wife of an American presidential hopeful. Private eye Joey Rork has been hired to make sure Kitty's amorous liaisons with a rat pack crooner don't ruin her husband's political career. But he also wants to know why Kitty has been spotted with Danny Ryan, whose twin brothers, in addition to owning one of London's hottest jazz clubs, are said to have inherited the crime empire of fallen mobster Alf Marx. Before Rork can find out, he meets a gruesome end.

La jeune fille d'un bourgmestre possédée par le diable, des villageois qui meurent chaque jour, une abbaye hantée depuis la mort de son abbé, une Dame blanche errant dans la forêt, et une jeune fille à la capuche rouge qui semble ne pas craindre les loups. Trop de tensions dans un espace trop restreint, et une enquête étonnante pour le commissaire aux morts étranges.

Stoke Newington, 1863: Little Margaret Lovejoy is found brutally murdered in the outhouse at her family’s estate. A few days later, a man is cut down in a similar manner on the doorstep of courtesan and professional detective Heloise Chancey’s prestigious address. At the same time, Heloise’s maid, Amah Li Leen, must confront events from her past that appear to have erupted into the present day. Once again Heloise is caught up in a maelstrom of murder and deceit that threatens to reach into the very heart of her existence.

Napoli, 1932. Manca una settimana a Pasqua e l'aria profuma di primavera. In un'esclusiva casa di tolleranza, viene trovata morta una delle ragazze più belle, la famosa Vipera. Chi è stato a soffocarla con un cuscino? Nella sua indagine, il commissario Ricciardi si troverà impigliato in una rete di sentimenti e passioni insospettabili, che toccheranno anche lui. Rappresentata con maestria nella sua vivace autenticità, la città arriverà a svelare il suo volto meno conosciuto.