Rural Mystery

After suddenly inheriting a funeral home from her father - from whom she hadn't heard in decades - Ilka Jensen has impulsively abandoned her quiet life in Denmark to visit the small town in rural Wisconsin where her father lived. There, she's devastated to discover her father's second family: a stepmother and two half sisters she never knew existed. Then a local woman is killed, seemingly the victim of a home invasion turned violent. But when Ilka learns that the woman knew her father, it becomes increasingly clear that she may not have been a completely random victim after all.

In Louviec, einem kleinen Ort in der Bretagne, gehen merkwürdige Dinge vor sich: Ein Wildhüter wird mit einem kostbaren Messer in der Brust tot aufgefunden. In der Nacht zuvor wollen die Alten des Dorfes den hinkenden Schritt eines Geistes gehört haben, der immer dann erklingt, wenn Unheil bevorsteht. Als Adamsberg, der legendäre Kommissar, von dem Fall Wind bekommt, ist er nicht mehr zu halten: Er steigt in die Ermittlungen ein und sofort fallen ihm drei Flohbisse an der Leiche auf – ein Detail, das sonst niemand gesehen hat.

A short story introduces listeners to Brian Panowich's brutal, mesmerizing North Georgia landscape, in preparation for Like Lions. Enter the world of Brian Panowich, where Gareth Burroughs runs McFalls County, in North Georgia, and all the criminal enterprises therein. Two of his three sons, Halford and Buckley, are aiming to follow in his footsteps. The third, Clayton, has turned his back on the family and became a lawman, a sheriff in town.

Six-million acres of Adirondack forest separate Natalie and Doug Larson from civilization. For the newlyweds, the isolated backcountry honeymoon seemed ideal for starting their lives together, but as they begin to explore the dark interiors of their own hearts, it soon becomes clear that they are not alone in the woods. A man watches them, wielding the forest like a weapon. He wants something from them that's more terrifying than death. And once they are near him, he will do everything in his power to make sure they never walk out again.

When two teenage girls vanish without a trace from an educational retreat at Chidlow House in Lincolnshire, the students and teachers are put on high alert. Called in to investigate, Detective Karen Hart questions everyone who came into contact with the two girls, Cressida and Natasha, in the days leading up to their disappearance. Stories of Chidlow House being haunted abound, but Hart - still coming to terms with the suspicious circumstances surrounding the tragic loss of her own family - knows that while the house might be otherworldly, the crime is grimly real.

Police Officer Jemima Cotton expected Little Cote to be a quieter pace of life. But, unlike London, everyone knows everyone, and beyond the cake sales and coffee mornings, tea parties and village fetes, the neighbours aren't all the best of friends. When Jemima is unpacking her mugs and teabags in her new home on Foxglove Close, she's called to attend her first murder investigation. She's excited, until she discovers it's only a few doors down from her. And she hasn't even met her new neighbours yet.

Maggie Gerber - one of the founding members of the Good Buy Girls - loves her quiet life in St. Stanley, Virginia. But all that changes when Sam Collins, her old flame, moves back to town as the new sheriff. On top of that, Claire Freemont, a librarian and the newest member of the Good Buy Girls, starts acting utterly strange. When Maggie goes to visit her the next day at the library, she finds the body of a very dead man. Turns out the man is someone from Claire's past.

Billy Edgewater is a harbinger of doom. Estranged from his family, discharged from the navy and touched by a rising desperation, he sets out hitchhiking home to East Tennessee, where his father is slowly dying. On the road, separately, are Sudy and Bradshaw, brother and sister, and a one-armed con man named Roosterfish. All, in one way or another, have their pasts and futures embroiled with D. L. Harkness, a predator in all the ways there are.

Nestled in an overlooked part of the Mediterranean, Dog Island is home to a quiet and untouched community that has long lived off its fishing, its vines, and its olive trees, far away from the turmoil its neighbors. But when the bodies of three unidentified men wash up on the beach, the witnesses are faced with an impossible decision: Report the discovery and open up the island to grisly inquiries, or conceal the terrible truth?

Solve a murder, bring a killer to justice... but at what cost? Harry Probert-Lloyd, a young barrister forced home from London by encroaching blindness, has begun work as the acting coroner of Teifi Valley with solicitor's clerk John Davies as his assistant. When a faceless body is found on an isolated beach, Harry must lead the inquest. But his dogged pursuit of the truth begins to ruffle feathers. Especially when he decides to work alongside a local doctor with a dubious reputation and experimental theories considered radical and dangerous.

When Sarah's Aunt Evelyn passes away, she discovers a hidden fortune has been left to her, including a foreboding mansion in a small Northumberland town. But it comes with one condition. For most of her life, Evelyn had been haunted by the loss of a friend who went missing in Cragsmoor—the very house Evelyn has left to Sarah. Now, Evelyn's final wish is for Sarah to return to Cragsmoor and uncover the truth. If she does, she will inherit everything. But someone wishes for the secrets of Cragsmoor to remain hidden.

From one of the bestselling western novelists of all time, comes another classic story. Templeton Lambeth had so desperately wanted a son - an heir to ride by his side through the vast, wild ranges just west of the Pecos River. But to his disappointment, his wife bore a girl. His hopes crushed and in denial, he decides to raise his daughter as if she were a boy. In honor of Lambeth's more successful brother, they named her: Terrill.

Jenna Abbott’s life went up in flames even before the fire started in Tenmile, Oregon. She was still coping with her husband's affair—and the revelation that he got a much younger woman pregnant—when the fire finally died down, and Ryan was among the missing. Chelsea Goddard still can’t explain how her estranged husband got back to Tenmile from out of the country the day of the fire, and she also can’t shake the nagging feeling that the secrets they’ve kept between them for the last twenty years might just be the tinder that made it all burn.

When nineteen-year-old university student Emma goes missing, Detective Inspector Gareth Gravel is called in. But what is a simple missing person case soon turns into something much darker as Gravel’s inquiries lead him to the graves of five young women - each of whom looks just like Emma. With a serial killer on the loose and his latest victim already in his control, can the police find Emma in time? Or will Emma have to save herself?

Agatha and Anthony Award nominee Susan Wittig Albert has garnered popular and critical acclaim for her whimsical mysteries based on the life and times of Beatrix Potter. Set in the summertime splendor of 1913 England, this eighth tale finds Beatrix eager to marry her fiancé, solicitor William Heelis. But a few obstacles are still blocking the happy couple’s path to the altar - like the troubled remodeling of Castle Cottage, Will and Beatrix’s future home.

Works by best-selling author Susan Wittig Albert have been nominated for the Agatha and Anthony awards. In The Tale of Oat Cake Crag, Miss Beatrix Potter is frustrated by distractions near her home. As the noisy test flights of a hydroplane disrupt her concentration, Beatrix investigates a string of bizarre letters threatening a friend’s reputation. Then life becomes even more complicated when the body of the hydroplane project funder is found at the foot of Oat Cake Crag.

A St Mary Mead, un tranquillo villaggio nella campagna inglese, la vita scorre monotona, senza che accada mai nulla di nuovo. O almeno così pensano tutti. Tranne miss Marple, persuasa che il male possa nascondersi ovunque. E infatti, quasi a dimostrare la teoria della simpatica ed estrosa anziana signora, proprio nella canonica davanti alla sua villetta vittoriana viene commesso un feroce delitto.

Doctor Rowan Dupont knows death. She grew up surrounded by it in her family’s Victorian funeral home, and it’s haunted her since the day her twin sister drowned years ago. Between her mother’s subsequent suicide and the recent murder of her father, coming home to run the funeral home feels fitting - even if it leaves her vulnerable to an obsessive serial killer.

The body of Reginald Williamson had been well concealed under a bush in Middlesbury Common and the murder efficiently carried out - a single stab wound to the chest. Reggie’s dog had been killed just as efficiently. With no clues or obvious motive, the case is going nowhere. Then he gets a break. Warren’s instincts tell him that the informant is dodgy - a former police officer under investigation. But when Warren hears the incredible story he has to tell, he's glad to have given him a chance to speak.

When Detective Karen Hart hears a scream echoing out of beautiful Lincoln Cathedral one snowy evening, she is the first officer on the scene. In the chapel a man lies murdered, a bloody cross carved into his forehead. A note to the police from the murderer, signed by "The Cleanser", confirms their worst fears: this sadistic slaying is the first of many. When early leads become dead ends, Karen starts to wonder if there’s a link to a rumoured conspiracy within police ranks - particularly when an abrasive new officer is assigned to the case.