Humor Thriller

Monday mornings aren’t supposed to be fun, but they should be predictable. However, on this particular Monday, Stephanie Plum knows that something is amiss when she turns up for work at Vinnie’s Bail Bonds to find that longtime office manager Connie Rosolli, who is as reliable as the tides in Atlantic City, hasn’t shown up. Stephanie’s worst fears are confirmed when she gets a call from Connie’s abductor. He says he will only release her in exchange for a mysterious coin that a recently murdered man left as collateral for his bail.

It's not every afternoon that an enigmatic, comely blonde named Stilton (like the cheese) walks into the scruffy gin joint where Sammy "Two Toes" Tiffin tends bar. It's love at first sight, but before Sammy can make his move, an air force general named Remy arrives with some urgent business. 'Cause when you need something done, Sammy is the guy to go to; he's got the connections on the street.

The beloved writing tandem of Rita Mae Brown and her feline collaborator Sneaky Pie craft another tantalizing mystery with Hiss of Death. Spring is in the air in Crozet, Virginia, and Mary Minor “Harry” Haristeen looks forward to her first season of harvesting grapes. But then Harry falls ill and finds herself in a hospital—where a nurse turns up dead. When another hospital staffer kicks the bucket soon after, it falls to Harry’s animal friends to crack the case.

London, 2044. The St. James Park pelicans have gone missing - the day before its rookie, celebrity president unveils the British Republic's new pelican flag. At the same time, British intelligence uncovers coded messages about possible anti-government activity. Who are the bird-nappers and what do they want? And who is behind the secret messages? Agent Howie Pond - license to lunch - reluctantly agrees to try and find out.

It was supposed to be a simple caviar heist. Dortmunder is almost in the building when the alarm sounds, forcing him up the fire escape and onto the roof. He leaps onto the next building, smashing his ankle and landing in the den of the worst kind of creature he can imagine: nuns.

Al Engel had worked his way up to being Nick Rovito’s right-hand man, near the top of the syndicate. And this was a delicate job that Rovito had given him: retrieving a very important jacket, loaded with heroin, from the fresh grave of the drug mule who was accidentally buried wearing it. There was just one problem (at least - just one to begin with): It turned out the grave was empty. Suddenly Engel was the one finding himself “in deep”.

Autumn is in the air in the Blue Ridge Mountain community of Crozet, Virginia - and all the traditions of the changing seasons are underway. Mary Minor "Harry" Haristeen cleans her cupboards; her husband, Fair, prepares the horses for the shorter days ahead; and the clamorous barking of beagles signals the annual rabbit chase through the central Virginia hills. But the last thing the local beaglers and their hounds expect to flush out is a dead body.

The continuing success of the beloved Mrs. Murphy mystery series is given its proper due with the publication of this 20th-anniversary tale. When a local mechanic gets his odometer turned back—for good—Mary Minor “Harry” Haristeen steps in to investigate. There’s more to the crime than meets the eye, though, and sleuthing cats Mrs. Murphy and Pewter, along with faithful corgi Tee Tucker, do their level best to keep Harry out of harm’s way.

Lisa and Joe Stone, married for 20 years and sole partners in their small law firm in Henry County, Virginia, handle less-than-glamorous cases: domestic disputes, personal injury settlements, or a plethora of complaints from their cantankerous client Lettie VanSandt. When she dies in a freakish incident, the Stones think it's within the realm of possibility that she was cooking meth in her trailer. But details soon emerge that lead them to question how accidental Lettie's demise actually was.

Anthony Award-winning author Charlaine Harris has earned a devoted fan base with her USA Today and New York Times best-selling Sookie Stackhouse mystery series. All Together Dead features more dark but frequently hilarious adventures of buxom, blonde, beautiful, and telepathic cocktail waitress Sookie, who prefers the company of vampires to that of the living.

There's nothing like a good deli, and the Red River Deli in Trenton is one of the best. World-famous for its pastrami, cole slaw, and for its disappearing managers. Over the last month, three have vanished from the face of the earth, and the only clue in each case is one shoe that's been left behind. The police are baffled. Lula is convinced that it's a case of alien abduction. Whatever it is, they'd better figure out what's going on before they lose their new manager, Ms. Stephanie Plum.

When Fletch learns there are four ex-cons on the loose in his part of the county, little does he suspect that one of the scruffy and very dangerous men will claim to be the son he never knew - a son about whom he was never even told, in fact. But when a muddy and bedraggled young man accosts him in his study, it doesn't take our wily reporter and investigator long to surmise this kid might well be his son. When Fletch meets the kid's compatriots, he wonders how either of them is going to get out of this situation unscathed.

Lost something? Gabriela Rose knows how to get it back. As a recovery agent, she’s hired by individuals and companies seeking lost treasures, stolen heirlooms, or missing assets. She’s reliable, cool under pressure, and well trained in weapons of all types. But Gabriela’s latest job isn’t for some bamboozled billionaire, it’s for her own family, whose home is going to be wiped off the map if they can’t come up with a lot of money fast.

In his latest bizarre concoction, Dorsey picks up - sort of - various plot strands from his earlier books, including Florida Roadkill, Hammerhead Ranch Motel, and Orange Crush. There's still the matter, you see, of the briefcase full of cash, and still unresolved are the stories of Serge Storms, the serial killer and history buff; Johnny Vegas, the startlingly handsome virgin; Jethro Maddox, the Hemingway look-alike; and Paul, the Passive-Aggressive Private Eye. Fans of Dorsey's magnificently off-kilter adventures will be thrilled to rejoin these characters....

1893 is a tough year in Montana, and any job is a good job. When Big Red and Old Red Amlingmeyer sign on as ranch hands at the secretive Bar-VR cattle spread, they're not expecting much more than hard work, bad pay, and a comfortable campfire around which they can enjoy their favorite pastime: scouring Harper's Weekly for stories about the famous Sherlock Holmes.

For a policeman, there can be few things worse than a serial killer loose in your city. Except, perhaps, a serial killer who targets coppers, and a city on the brink of bloody revolution. For Commander Sam Vimes, it all feels horribly familiar. Caught on the roof of a very magical building during a storm, he's found himself back in his own rough, tough past without even the clothes he was standing up in when the lightning struck. Living in the past is hard, especially when your time travel companion is a serial killer who knows where you live.

London, 2045. Three months into the Coffee Wars, and Britain's caffeine supplies are at critical levels. Brits are drinking even more tea than usual, keeping a stiff upper lip and praying for an end to it all. A secret government coffee stockpile could save the day...but then mysteriously disappears overnight. One man is asked to unravel the missing-coffee mystery. His name is Pond. Howie Pond. And he's in desperate need of a triple espresso.

The second crime novel by internationally best-selling writer Eoin Colfer is a gritty and utterly compelling follow-up to the critically acclaimed Plugged. In Screwed, Colfer adds an entirely new chapter to the adventures and misadventures of Daniel McEvoy, the down-on-his-luck Irish bouncer at a seedy New Jersey bar who, with the help of a motley crew of unlikely characters, solved a bizarre string of murders - including the one of the girl he loved. But people around him continue to die mysteriously, and Daniel is called into action once again.

Plain Heathen Mischief ups the existential ante, as Joel King, a defrocked Baptist minister, finds life even more bedeviling once he's served six months for a career-ending crime he might not even have committed. Now his incommunicado wife wants a divorce, the teenage vixen of his disgrace is suing him for a cool $5 million, a fresh start in Montana offers no hope for ex-cons of any religious persuasion, and the refuge provided by his sister turns as nasty as his parole officer. Talk about a crisis of faith.

The first time somebody tried to kill him was an accident. The second time was deliberate. Now Paul Mulchrone finds himself on the run with nobody to turn to except a nurse who has read one-too-many crime novels and a renegade copper with a penchant for violence. Together they must solve one of the most notorious crimes in Irish history. Or else they’ll be history.