Urban Crime

Be ready for some action, humor, and mystery in this anthology with short stories. You’ll listen about gangsters, witches, magic potions, interrogations, werewolves, and murder. Several stories have a murder victim, while others are all about theft or robberies. But in many cases, they spark the imagination and make up for a great way to sit back, relax, and read or listen to stories from a completely different world.

Written in reaction to what Bentley perceived as the sterility and artificiality of the detective fiction of his day, Trent's Last Case features Philip Trent, an all-too-human detective who not only falls in love with the chief suspect but reaches a brilliant conclusion that is totally wrong. Trent's Last Case begins when millionaire American financier Sigsbee Manderson is murdered while on holiday in England. A London newspaper sends Trent to investigate, and he is soon matching wits with Scotland Yard's Inspector Murth.

From its beginnings in the 1890s, Miami Beach has been a place made by visionaries and hustlers. During Prohibition, Al Capone had to muscle into its bootlegging and gambling businesses. After December 1941, when the Beach was the training ground for half a million army recruits, even the war couldn't stop the party. After a short postwar boom, the city's luck gave out. But in 1981, 125,000 Cubans arrived by the boatload.

After he fails to save a stranger from being mauled to death by a bear, a young mercenary is saddled with the baby girl the man died to protect. Now, 16 years later, that young mercenary has grown up to become cynical sword jockey Eddie LaCrosse. When his vacation travels bring him back to that same part of the world, he can't resist trying to discover what has become of the mysterious infant. He finds that the child, now a lovely young teenager named Isadora, is at the center of a complicated web of intrigue.

Pascha, the snarky ghost of a deceased 25-year-old, finds himself stuck between this world and the next with no one to talk to aside from Martin, a coroner with the dubious gift of being able to hear the dead. Since Martin prefers his girlfriend's company to Pascha’s, Pascha is stuck haunting hospital rooms and accident sites hoping to meet a spirit who will stay a while and keep him company.

Alastair Stone needs a break. He’d gladly trade a big chunk of his newly-acquired fortune for a few uninterrupted weeks of rest, but that’s not going to happen. On top of dealing with his new magical status and a relationship heading in unexpected directions, he soon learns the bombshell revelations about his family aren’t even close to over yet. As if all that weren’t enough, an ancient and malevolent set of magical game pieces has resurfaced, leaving a trail of murder and mayhem in its wake.

Almena Guillory, better known as the Grizzly Queen of the West, has plenty to recommend her for the noose, but US Marshal Apostle Richardson enforces the law, he doesn't decide it. When a posse tries to lynch Almena ahead of her trial, Apostle refuses their form of expedited justice - and receives a bullet for his trouble. Before escaping, however, Almena unexpectedly saves his life by absorbing his wound through the use of dangerous flesh magic.

USA Today best-selling author Jaye Wells pens paranormal thrillers brimming with nonstop action and wit. There's a blue moon rising in Babylon, putting Detective Kate Prospero and the rest of the city on edge. When she learns a rogue wizard stole deadly potions to build a dirty magic bomb, Kate must locate him and defuse the bomb - before the city surrenders to chaos.

As a painter travels the world and creates his art, he also mourns the death of his queen, his wife. He is secluded from the world and finds an escape through the drawings in his work. Not until he gets an unexpected knock at his door does his life take a drastic turn. The guest presents a problem that traps them inside of a home for 72 hours and this quiet suburban estate becomes the devil’s playground. The painter is then thrown into a psychological game that has twists and turns, which leads to an unforeseeable ending.

Beau Bond hates fiercely and loves hard. He’ll do anything to protect his twin Brett, and his girlfriend Jolene. Brett is a survivor. He’s always followed his brother’s lead, even if it means he's lived to regret it. As Beau and Jolene get hitched, their feuding families must put their differences aside. But the brothers have a dark secret that could cause a war between both sides … and what better place to reveal all than at a wedding… When their past sins resurface to threaten those closest to them, will the brothers still have each other’s backs?

The Diamond family has survived murder, deceit, and betrayal. Through it all, they’re still standing tall, and a new era has begun. After surviving an attempt on her life, Breeze has moved into the queen’s position by Zyir’s side. Zyir has taken over the empire and locked down Miami’s streets; the world is in his hands. But there is always new blood ready to overthrow the throne. Young Carter has retired and moved away from the madness - that is, until he gets an unexpected visitor at his home. This person shakes up the whole family, causing chaos that threatens to bring down the Cartel for good.

Acapulco, 1974: Rina Walker is on assignment. Just another quick, clean kill. She wakes to discover her employer's severed head on her bedside table and a man with an AK-47 coming through the door of her hotel room. She needs all her skills to neutralise her attacker and escape. After a car chase, she is captured by a Mexican drug boss who exploits her radiant beauty and ruthless expertise to eliminate an inconvenient member of the government.

A 29-year-old man lives alone in his Glasgow flat. The telephone rings; a casual conversation, but behind this a job offer. The clues are there if you know to look for them. He is an expert. A loner. Freelance. Another job is another job, but what if this organisation wants more? A meeting at a club. An offer. A brief. A target: Lewis Winter. It’s hard to kill a man well. People who do it well know this. People who do it badly find out the hard way. The hard way has consequences.

Exotic dancer Ceazia Deveareux has grown accustomed to the luxurious lifestyle she was living before the death of her boyfriend, Vegas Jackson. Even though she was the one who caused his death, Ceazia feels no guilt. She believes she still deserves to have the finest of everything, and she's determined to get it. Vegas' brother Snake is patiently waiting for the day that he can avenge his brother's death. The only problem is that he has a fascination with strippers, and the sexy Ceazia might prove to be more than he can resist.

Carl Weber brings the best of urban street lit authors together, all telling their own dramatic tales of life in the streets in known cities across the USA. The second installment continues with Treasure Hernandez telling the tale of the Dirty South.

When Rachel moves into the spare room in Mary’s flat, everyone is quick to jump to the conclusion that there’s something strange about her. Everyone apart from Mary. And when Rachel starts sleepwalking, the flatmates’ fears grow. But there’s something about the new girl that Mary can’t help but trust, and having recently escaped a toxic relationship, she needs the support. Rachel becomes a friend and an ally, and Mary soon discovers that they have more in common than she ever could have imagined. In fact, Rachel seems to know more about Mary than she knows about herself....

Jerry has a traumatic past that leaves him subject to psychotic hallucinations and depressive episodes. When he stands accused of stealing a priceless Van Gogh painting, he goes underground, where he develops an unwilling relationship with a woman who believes that the voices she hears are from God.

Robyn and Aries are "The Murder Mamas", contract killers from Los Angeles who take no prisoners. It doesn't take them long to link up with Hollywood's biggest drug kingpin, who hires them to take out a snitch and a judge. But the plans backfire, and they complete only half the job. Robyn is caught and put on death row, and Aries goes on the run. She winds up in the islands, where she takes up a new life as a mother and wife and tries to forget who she once was.

Chris Bathum was a respected therapist, addiction specialist, and founder of one of the fastest-growing rehabilitation chains in America. But Bathum was a total fraud: he was a homicidal meth-head with a history of sexually abusing his patients, scamming insurance companies, and eliminating whistle-blowers. Like Rose Stahl. But this intended victim would be his last. Stahl would risk her life to bring down the monster she and so many other people in need had once trusted for their salvation.

June discovers she was born into a family of psychics and her homeopathic cures truly are magical. Unfortunately, they are not magical enough to save her from being the number-one murder suspect when a member of the community that she had just had a disagreement with shows up facedown in the lake with June’s lucky charm in the victim’s grasp. Add to that an attraction to her high school best friend, Sheriff Oscar Park and that Mr. Prince Charming, her cat, is stealing charms from Belle’s Baubles, and June is forced to clear her name in more ways than murder.