Humor Thriller

Isabel Spellman's life consists of 24-hour surveillance, routine investigations into her acquaintances, and listening devices planted in her deadbolt-locked room. For a 28-year-old in a family composed almost entirely of private investigators or former cops, the tools of the trade turn typical family dysfunction into commonplace espionage.

It's been a long, rainy summer for Goldy Schulz, who is engaged in planning wedding receptions for what seems to be all of Aspen Meadow. It's bad enough that Billie Attenborough, the bride from hell, wants to move the location to the Gold Gulch Spa just a scant two days before tying the knot to her doctor fiance. Then Doc Finn, best friend of Goldy's godfather Jack, is killed when his car tumbles into a ravine. But Jack thinks Doc was murdered because of research he was doing at the spa....

Callahan Garrity is the owner of House Mouse, a cleaning service that tidies up after Atlanta's elite. She's also a former cop and a part-time sleuth. She and her coterie of devoted helpers can ransack a house for clues faster than it takes a fingerprint to set. From her time on the Atlanta police force, Callahan has excelled at mopping up messes of all kinds. But she has no idea what she's getting into when she agrees to work for infamous antiques dealer Elliot Littlefield. The first day on the job, she and her crew are on the trail of a stolen Civil War diary.

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.

Jan Nyman, the ace detective of the covert operations unit of the National Central Police, is sent to a sleepy seaside town to investigate a mysterious death. Nyman arrives in the town dominated by a bizarre holiday village - the ‘hottest beach in Finland’. The suspect: Olivia Koski, who has only recently returned to her old hometown. The mission: find out what happened, by any means necessary.

Lenny Marks is excellent at not having a life. She bikes home from work at exactly 4pm each day, buys the same groceries for the same meals every week, and owns thirty-six copies of The Hobbit (currently arranged by height). The closest thing she has to a friendship is playing Scrabble against an imaginary Monica Gellar while watching Friends reruns. And Lenny Marks is very, very good at not remembering what happened the day her mother and stepfather disappeared when she was still a child. The day a voice in the back of her mind started whispering, You did this.

Summer 1989: Gunther Fahnstiel, once a tough cop who wasn't averse to taking a little side money from a certain madam, has just escaped the dementia ward of his Wichita nursing home. He's not exactly sure where he wants to go, but wherever it is, it has to do with the bag full of cash belonging to the man he accidentally backed over with his RV in 1979. During his search, Gunther begins to relive the violent fallout of that madam's sex lottery 40 years ago. As Gunther's memories unravel, his past and present will collide in a devastating reckoning.

Eloise Foley, known to her friends as Weezie, has been through the divorce from hell. Her ex-husband Tal (aka Talmadge Evans III) was awarded their house in Savannah's historic district, the house that Weezie had spent years painstakingly restoring to its original splendor. Weezie was awarded the two-bedroom carriage house on the same property. Each was sure the other would sell.

My name is Addison Holmes, and I teach history at James Madison High School in Whiskey Bayou, Georgia. You might be under the assumption that my life went to the dogs when my fiancé left me at the altar for the home economics teacher, or when I got notice that my apartment building was going to be condemned, or even when I was desperate enough to strip to my unmentionables to earn some extra cash. The truth is that I'm pretty much used to disasters following me around on a daily basis.

With fugitive parents, a brother dodging loan sharks, a hunky cop who's made her outlaw family his business, and her ex-fiance back in the picture, Carlotta Wren thought her life couldn't get any more complicated. And then...her fugitive parents phone home. Her look-alike is found, well...dead. Under suspicion for murder, Carlotta discovers that her devious double might have been bumped off accidentally - and that she could be the real target!

Abounding in Southern charm, Miss Julia Paints the Town finds the plucky North Carolinian pushed to the limit by a daunting heap of difficulties. Already trying to help three friends find their missing husbands, Miss Julia also must concoct a scheme to chase a slick New Jersey developer away from Abbotsville. But perhaps she's bitten off a bit more than she can chew.

Private investigator Isabel Spellman is back on the case and back on the couch -- in court-ordered therapy after getting a little too close to her previous subject. Filled with the signature side-splitting Spellman antics, Revenge of the Spellmans is an ingenious, hilarious, and disarmingly tender installment in the Spellman series.

It would take a miracle to keep Dortmunder out of jail. Though he cased the electronics store perfectly, the cops surprised him, turning up in the alley just as he was walking out the back door, a television in each hand. Already a two-time loser, without divine intervention he faces a long stretch inside. Then God sends J. Radcliffe Stonewiler, a celebrity lawyer who gets Dortmunder off with hardly any effort at all. Stonewiler was sent by Arnold Chauncey, an art lover with a cash-flow problem. He asks the thief to break into his house and make off with a valuable painting in exchange for a quarter of the insurance money.

Cuervo is a pampered Nicaraguan moneyman, funding a guerrilla war from his cushy Miami penthouse. Sixto is his hulking, pistol-packing attendant, whose job satisfaction is on the wane. When an aging mobster enters their lives with a promise to help the rebel cause - with a planeload of chickens originally intended for voodoo sacrifice - a tense situation turns combustible. From the wickedly funny mind of Carl Hiaasen comes "The Edible Exile", a raucous story of sleazeball nihilists, lovable thugs, and jungle-weary freedom fighters who collide in a battle of wills, ego, and the almighty dollar.

Etwas lustlos organisiert Kommissarin Nicole Stappenbek das Wiedersehen mit ihrer früheren Jugendgruppe auf Amrum, wo man sich zuletzt im Herbst 1998 getroffen hatte. So richtig sympathisch fand Nicole die Leute noch nie, trotzdem ist sie neugierig, was aus ihnen geworden ist. Doch mit der guten Stimmung ist es schlagartig vorbei, als der "schöne Alex" äußerst unschön und tot kopfüber in der Toilette des Wellnesshotels hängt. Nicole beordert sofort ihren Kollegen Thies Detlefsen auf die Insel.

When Inspector Peter Glebsky arrives at a remote ski chalet on vacation, the last thing he intends to do is get involved in any police work. He's there to ski, drink brandy, and loaf around in blissful solitude. But he hadn't counted on the other vacationers, an eccentric bunch, including a famous hypnotist, a physicist with a penchant for gymnastic feats, a sulky teenager of indeterminate gender, and the mysterious Mr. and Mrs. Moses.

As the chief problem solver for Babylon, Las Vegas’ most over-the-top destination, murder is a bit outside of her normal. But armed with a wicked wit and an even more wicked right-cross, Lucky takes it all in stride. But tonight taxes even Lucky’s formidable skills. Lucky’s former lover, Teddie, shows up, hat in hand. A gaggle of egomaniacal chefs appear for a televised cook-off. And Lucky’s current lover, Jean-Charles, stops answering his phone. Since trouble comes in threes, Lucky is sure this is the extent of tonight’s trouble. As usual, she’s a tad optimistic.

What, you ask, is a Fred Fitch? Well, for one thing, Fred Fitch is the man with the most extensive collection of fake receipts, phony bills of sale, and counterfeit sweepstakes tickets in the Western hemisphere, and possibly in the entire world. For another thing, Fred Fitch may be the only New York City resident in the twentieth century to buy a money machine.

Senior sleuth Essie Cobb and her three gal pals Opal, Marjorie, and Fay take a cross-country train trip. Surely four little old ladies from the Happy Haven Retirement Home couldn't cause any trouble on a quiet journey across the country by rail...or could they? True to form, Essie and her friends manage to get into all sorts of trouble as they attempt to help fellow passengers in need.

There are three things you should know about Elsie. The first is that she's my best friend. The second is that she always knows what to say to make me feel better. And the third...might take a little bit more explaining. Eighty-four-year-old Florence has fallen in her flat. As she waits to be rescued, Florence wonders if a terrible secret from her past is about to come to light; and, if the charming new resident is who he claims to be, why does he look exactly like a man who died 60 years ago?