Urban Mystery Thrillers

Vampire hunter and zombie animator Anita Blake is an expert at sniffing out the bad from the good. But in The Lunatic Cafe - now in trade paperback for the first time - she's about to learn that nothing is ever as it seems, especially in matters of the not-so-human heart. Dating a werewolf with self-esteem issues is stressing Anita out. Especially when something - or someone - starts taking out the city's shapeshifters.

Betrayed, shattered, and transformed. Sick of everyone’s crap, can this snarky lone wolf find belonging, respect, and love? Lark Emerson vaguely remembers being happy. After catching her husband and her sister in the sack, the IT professional walks away from twenty-seven years of marriage and takes a job on the border of a shifter community. But after a rogue pack storms her office and attacks, to her horror she’s captured and savaged. Wounded and ill, the forty-something limps home and is shocked when her injuries rapidly heal, her eyesight sharpens, and noise hurts her ears.

Murder isn’t uncommon in a big city, but when young women start turning up dead next to mysterious symbols painted in their blood, the police turn to Alex Lockerby to find the killer. Unfortunately, the bloody symbols aren’t any form of magic Alex knows, leaving him precious little to work with and a nagging feeling that he’d better stop this madman before he finishes whatever spell he’s attempting.

It's not the dead body - Jack Leightner has seen hundred of bodies in his tour with the NYPD. It's not the dank setting - the narrow banks along Brooklyn's Gowanus Canal. So why does the sight of the fatally stabbed young man make the detective almost faint in the canal's tangled weeds? Jack doesn't understand why he becomes obsessed with this low-priority case, why he allows it to jeopardize his career and even his life. Especially since the investigation draws him exactly where he doesn't want to go: into the heart of Red Hook.

Vincent Banecroft, the irascible editor of The Stranger Times, has never believed his wife died despite emphatic evidence to the contrary. Now, against all odds, it seems he may actually be proved right; but what lengths will he go to in an attempt to rescue her?

My Name is Otto Schneider and I am a wizard. I think. When a missing person case brings me into contact with the only other supernatural creature I have ever seen, it’s not long before I am ass-deep in trouble. The police don’t like me, there’s a clandestine organisation who want me to join them, and what might be a demon trying to catch me. When I refuse to play ball with any of them, my life starts to get tough, but I had no idea how low they might stoop to force my hand.

Fog rolls into Tulsa, and with it comes Darkness. Zoey knows something is up, and that the something involves Neferet, but Neferet can’t possibly be freed, right? Other Neferet and her companion, Lynette, arrive in Woodward Park to set this world’s Neferet free from her grotto prison, and discover there may be those who sympathize with their cause. Meanwhile, Other Kevin and Other Stark are hot on their trail, but how can the new friends travel to this world without invoking Old Magick and paying a costly, perhaps deadly, price?

The Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter backlist lights up the night. In her eighth adventure, Anita Blake can't turn her back on a former lover during the full moon. Especially since he's behind bars - and he's a werewolf.

My name's Elle. Princess Arielle, for those who know about my past. Cursed by my own father, now I'm banished to Grimm. I'm a siren, killer, and one of the best damned cold-case detectives in all of the bloody realms. I don't stop until I discover the truth. My next case sends me to Wonderland, a harrowing place of madness and dark secrets. I'd rather be landlocked than step foot on that tainted soil, but I don't have a choice after discovering Alice's bloodstained ribbon and a bandicoot's claw covered in blood beside two stiffs at the Charmings' castle.

At first, med student Misty Heiress just wants to help. With her cousin Jillian in constant pain, and the doctor refusing to prescribe, Misty steals opioids from the Virginia Beach pharmacy where she works. But when Jillian starts reselling them to local dealers and gets big money, Misty grabs an unbelievable opportunity to get out of crushing debt. Soon Misty's boss, Sanjay, learns the truth and wants in. In no time, their illegal business dominates the street - and racks up a fortune. But when demand quickly outstrips supply, Sanjay way overplays his hand - and the Feds come calling.

When Tanz, the accidental medium, is asked to help in the search for a missing woman, she finds herself at the Cross Bones Graveyard in London’s Southwark. From the outset it’s obvious there is unrest among the spirits who call this place their home, and now Tanz is right in the middle of it. What’s more, she now finds her ‘so-called gift’ is even stronger than it was and the dead really want to talk!

After what was supposed to be a simple job, Raven and Christian uncover a sinister plot against the higher authority, and the stakes are as high as the body count. The assassins are merciless, with anyone who stands in their way becoming collateral damage. Meanwhile, Raven is still struggling to make sense of her feelings for Christian following a memory wipe. During a blackout, the city erupts into chaos. With Breed on the brink of war, Keystone has only 24 hours to complete a secret mission. Raven seeks help from the most unlikely of places, but at what cost?

For nearly 600 years, Vlad Tepesh cared for nothing, so he had nothing to lose. His brutal reputation ensured that all but the most foolhardy stayed away. Now, falling in love with Leila has put him at the mercy of his passions. And one adversary has found a devastating way to use Vlad's new bride against him. A powerful spell links Leila to the necromancer Mircea. If he suffers or dies, so does she.

In The Killing Dance, vampire hunter Anita Blake finds herself the victim when a $500,000 price is put on her head, and the two men in her life-a vampire and a werewolf-aren't helping the situation.

Werewolf and private investigator Sara Flores has found nine missing people since she was turned. Her secret gives her an edge, but in this case it may not be enough. Alaska Brown hasn’t been seen since she disappeared from a casino parking lot. The cops say she left willingly. The FBI isn’t looking. The trail is cold and there are too many suspects, but Sara’s caught the scent of something very evil here. A man who thinks his wealth excuses any perversion. A man who doesn’t see the rest of us as even human. If Alaska is still alive, her terror must be unimaginable.

Can Mike battle back from the final outcome? Now the world needs him the most. New and old threats emerge to claim a war-ravaged world on the verge of collapse. Lana, Bailey, and Azile the Red Witch have assembled all that remains of man in one final battle that could determine the fate of mankind forever. And it just might not be enough.

I never thought my life would take a turn into the world of murder mysteries, but here I am, Ophelia Pane, vampire veterinarian extraordinaire, caught in the middle of a deadly game of cat and mouse... or should I say parrot and vampire? As I struggle to juggle my overflowing clinic of fur babies and mythical creatures, a simple house call to check in on a chatty parrot named Elvis turns into a nightmare when I stumble upon his owner’s lifeless body.

Every Winter, the human population hibernates. Your name is Charlie Worthing, and it's your first season with the Winter Consuls, the committed but mildly unhinged group of misfits who are responsible for ensuring the hibernatory safe passage of the sleeping masses. You are investigating an outbreak of viral dreams which you dismiss as nonsense; nothing more than a quirky artifact borne of the sleeping mind. When the dreams start to kill people, it's unsettling. When you get the dreams, too, it's weird. When they start to come true, you begin to doubt your sanity.

After landing my first official journalist job I thought the ideas would be spilling out faster than I could type. But it turns out life in the shadow of my debut piece is a little...make that a lot, harder than I expected. So, when a convicted murderer reaches out begging for help in proving her innocence, I jump at the chance to dig into another investigation. The only problem? This trail is ice cold.

In this delightful 15th installment, Mma Ramotswe has her hands full both at home and in the office. To add to her current challenges, her devoted partner, Grace Makutsi, has decided to branch out on her own and open The Handsome Man's Deluxe Cafe. But even “Miss 97 Per Cent” can't quite meet all the demands of running a business - not to mention those that a lightning strike makes on her building.