Old Crime

This is a story from the Normandy Stories collection. Maupassant is hailed as one of the greatest masters of the short story. This collection focuses upon the land he knew and loved so well - Normandy. Its people and its countryside are portrayed here in vivid color and with great warmth. Amusing, saucy, and sometimes even farcical they may be, but they are also capable of great pathos, often branching off to end tragically.

Like sharks to blood in the water, the mob arrived in Hollywood greedy and ready to tear away huge chunks of cash. Opportunistic mobsters saw labor unions as the means for muscling into the movie industry and extorting millions of dollars from studio bosses. Control the unions to which projectionists, art directors, cinematographers, electricians, scene designers, stagehands, extras belong, and you control the whole industry.

Clarice Beech has two passions in life: animal rescue and Detective Inspector Rick Beech. She is devoted to the first, but she and Rick have been separated for the past six months - life without him is hard. Clarice shares her other love, for contemporary ceramics, with the charming Lady Vita Fayrepoynt. When Vita's adopted three-legged ginger cat, Walter, disappears from Weatherby Hall, Clarice is called in to find him.

Thomas Horn Jr. was an infamous figure in the 19th-century American Old West. Cowboy, soldier, government scout, translator, and gunman, Horn’s storied life has become an important part of western folklore. In 1902, he was convicted for murdering a 14-year-old boy after a run-in during a feud with a cattle rancher. The Life of Tom Horn is his life story in his own words, written from prison before he met his fate at the gallows the following year.

In the summer of 1976, Duane Oshun finds himself stranded in a remote Montana town beset by a series of strange and menacing events. He takes a job as a logger and builds a cabin on an isolated road near a reclusive neighbor—a hermit named Ted Kaczynski. The two men are captivated by the valley’s endangered old-growth forest, but Kaczynski’s violent grievances against modern society soon threaten the lives of all those around him.

Sergeant Nita Slowater has just reconnected with Grandma Greene after years of estrangement when she discovers the elderly woman missing from her home. When local law enforcement refuses to take the disappearance of the 85-year-old woman seriously, Nita turns to the Special Crimes Team and to a private investigator, Jaz Wheeler. Nita can't stand the thought of losing Grandma Greene, yet the death of an elderly woman during her last case haunts her.

While tracking down his tormentor, the author encounters an improbable cast of characters that includes an elocution teacher with ill-fitting dentures, a gang of faux-royal swindlers, a crime investigator with "paper in his blood", and a monocled grand master of the Knights of Malta. Yet for all its global exoticism and comic exuberance, Kurzweil's riveting account is, at its core, a heartfelt and suspenseful narrative about the "parallel lives" of a victim and his abuser.

In the remote and tranquil village of Zarechnoye, nestled within the vast expanse of the Russian countryside, lived an old couple who epitomized resilience and fortitude. Ivan and Svetlana Ivanov, both weathered by time and hardened by the hardships of life, had seen their fair share of adversity. The recent turmoil of war with Ukraine had left their once vibrant community a shadow of its former self. The economy lay in ruins, and daily life had become a struggle for survival.

Old Wounds: A Nick Shelby Case and Other Crime Stories is a collection of 15 short crime stories from dark detective noir to domestic murder, crossing time periods as far back as the Victorian era and into the near future—some with a twist of horror, science fiction, or the supernatural. Each story revolves around intriguing characters with twists and turns and on occasion a sting in the tail.

Jake Crosby has traded in a stockbroker's suit and tie for a standard-issue uniform. As a newly minted Mississippi game warden, he has two tough cases to cut his teeth on - the ongoing robbery of wealthy hunters and the ruthless search for a rumored hidden fortune.

Tanner and Romeo team up to protect an old friend from England whose husband has become a target. When the threat escalates, Tanner faces off against the London mob.

During a vigil calling for police reform, students from Spelman College, a historically black women's institution, are assaulted by rifle fire from a passing vehicle. On her way to interview witnesses, Detective Sarah "Salt" Alt confronts the fleeing vehicle of the suspects, but they get away. While other detectives take the lead on the Spelman murders, Salt is tasked to investigate the case of a recently discovered decomposed body. When she combs through the missing-persons reports, it becomes clear the victim is a girl Salt took into custody two years before.

What happens when a reactionary, retired British brigadier general comes to Los Angeles looking for his missing goddaughter? Comic chaos, that's what, with California beach babes, Jamaican drug gangs, and other colorful characters feuding, fighting, but not quite fornicating, in a mad search and rescue operation.

Lynn Naismith gave up the job she loved when she married Ed, the love of her life, but it was worth it for the happy years they enjoyed together. Now, 10 years on, Ed has been diagnosed with early onset dementia, and things start to happen - things more sinister than missing keys and lost words. As some memories are forgotten, others, long buried, begin to surface...and Lynn’s perfect world begins to crumble. But is it Ed’s mind playing tricks, or hers....?

Millions of honest, hardworking Americans invest in pension funds hoping to survive comfortably in retirement. Dishonest managers swoop down like vampires and suck these funds dry. They use this money to support their own lavish lifestyles or salt it away in hidden accounts to use at their leisure leaving their clients destitute. If caught, these criminals serve minimum sentences in country club prisons and, on release, live in luxury on their ill-gotten gains.

When David Audley, that most subtle of Intelligence chiefs, sends his insubordinate protégé Paul Mitchell off to investigate a KGB operation by researching a long-forgotten naval engagement off France in 1812, it doesn't look to Mitchell as if it will lead anywhere. But the fate of the crew of the Vengeful has more than a few surprises in store for Mitchell, and suddenly the past throws a dazzling and very dangerous light on the present.

Sheriff Colt Harper believes he's colorblind in his enforcement of the law. But is he? When a Black man is murdered, it ignites age-old anger in the African American community over the injustices they've endured and forces Harper to confront his own personal demons. Harper's single-minded pursuit of justice for the dead man thrusts him between two volatile groups - furious Blacks who don't know if they can trust him and racist Whites who want to use the controversy to spark a bloody race war.

Billy the Kid once said that he killed 22 men - one for each year that he lived. While it’s more likely that he only killed eight or nine, this young outlaw was clearly deadly. But his brief and brutal life reveals how his tragic existence led him into a life of crime. After growing up in poverty as an Irish immigrant in New York City and losing his father at a young age, Billy the Kid had to endure losing his mother when he was only 15.

Diana and her sister, Antonia, are house-sharing spinsters who have never got over their respective first loves. Naomi lives alone, haunted by the failure of her two marriages. When a body is discovered in the local quarry, all three women’s lives are turned upside down. And when Diana’s old flame Gill turns up unexpectedly, tensions finally spill over and threaten to destroy the outwardly peaceful lives all three women have carefully constructed around themselves.

The Last Ride of the Old Peacekeepers is a compilation of over 125 stories of some of the hilarious, dangerous, and emotional interactions that Bill Matthews enjoyed during his thirty years in law enforcement. He recalls moments when he was called upon to put his life on the line as well as behind-the-scenes details that never show up in incident reports. He also takes stock of those decisions that happen in a moment inside a moment—decisions that can and do change lives forever. Most of all, he celebrates the brotherhood of officers that he loves.