Women Crime

You probably know Roxie and Velma, the good-time gals of the 1926 satirical play Chicago and its wildly successful musical and movie adaptations. You might not know that Roxie, Velma, and the rest of the colorful characters of the play were inspired by real prisoners held in "Murderess Row" in 1920s Chicago - or that the reporter who covered their trials for the Chicago Tribune went on to write the play Chicago. Now, more than 90 years later, the Chicago Tribune tells the story of the four women who inspired the timeless characters of Chicago.

Private Investigator Cassie Dewell’s business is thriving, and her latest case puts her on the hunt for a slippery con man who’s disappeared somewhere in the “treasure state”. A wealthy Florida widow has accused him of absconding with her fortune, and wants Cassie to find him and get it back. The trail takes Cassie to Anaconda, Montana, a quirky former copper mining town that’s the perfect place to reinvent yourself. As the case develops, Cassie begins to wonder if her client is telling her everything.

Handsome Mark Callender did not die the way a young gentleman should. He was found hanged, a lipstick stain on his mouth and a nude girl's picture nearby. The official verdict was suicide, but his aristocratic father suspects murder. He hires Cordelia Gray, a fledgling detective, to investigate. And as she follows a trail of guilty secrets and shameful sins, she concludes that the nicest people do the nastiest things!

On October 24, 1890, a woman's mutilated and lifeless body was discovered on a pile of rubbish in Hampstead, North London. Her arms were lacerated, her face crushed and bloodied, and her head almost completely severed from her body. A mile away a blood-soaked stroller was found leaning against a residential gate. The dead baby's body, hidden beneath a nettle bush, was not located until the following morning. So began the incredible story of the Hampstead Tragedy.

Jasper Fforde's delightfully zany Thursday Next series shows no signs of slowing down with its seventh entry, The Woman Who Died a Lot. Despite being semihappily semi-retired from SpecOps, Thursday accepts the head librarian position at the Swindon library. But soon threats from a supreme Deity, a mnemonomorph, and the nefarious Goliath corporation press Thursday back into active duty.

On a winding mountain road into the town of Denton, Pennsylvania, Detective Josie Quinn finds the body of a local teenage girl, Dina Hale. The sight of plum-colored bruises gathering around the girl’s neck pierces Josie’s heart, but the discovery of a second girl’s empty purse in the dirt nearby gives her a flicker of hope that one person, at least, made a lucky escape. Dina’s parents are grief-stricken as the town rallies together in a desperate search for the second girl, who waitressed with Dina. The two best friends were on their way to a shift when they were attacked.

When Notes on a Silencing hit bookstores in the summer of 2020, even amidst a global pandemic, it sent shockwaves through the country. Not only did this intimate investigative memoir usher in a media storm of coverage, but it also prompted the elite St. Paul's School to issue a formal apology to the author, Lacy Crawford, for its handling of her report of sexual assault by two fellow students nearly 30 years ago.

A journalist shows up on Eve Duncan's doorstep with a plea for help. Jill Cassidy has just come from a small African village with a heart wrenching story: Half the villagers - many of them children - have been killed in a horrific attack by guerilla soldiers, the bodies burned beyond recognition. Now, the families desperately need Eve's help to get closure and begin to heal. But when Eve arrives in the remote jungle, she begins to suspect that Jill's plea may have been a cover story for a deeper, more sinister plot.

The suspicious drowning death of Captain Edward Eubank breaks archaeologist Faye Longchamp’s heart. It also confuses her, because he was found in scuba gear and she’s never heard him even mention scuba diving. During their last conversation, he told her that he believed he’d found a storied shipwreck, but when Faye checks it out she finds nothing there—not a plank, not a single gold coin, nothing. If there’s no treasure, then why is her friend dead? But the situation quickly escalates beyond a murder mystery.

Although a trip to Florida is supposed to be about rest and relaxation, there’s no such thing as a day off for Dr. Temperance Brennan. She has come to visit her friend, a dedicated ornithologist who’s researching the threat that intrusive Burmese pythons pose to indigenous bird species in the Everglades. While sorting through the stomach of an eighteen-foot specimen, they make a disturbing discovery: bones that are unmistakably human.

A music therapist who thrives on helping others, Kendra Michaels cherishes the ordinary life she has achieved after stem cell surgery restored her sight. The skills she perfected during those sightless years - the ability to pick up the most subtle audio, olfactory, and tactile cues in the world around her - coupled with her laser-sharp mind - have made her a uniquely potent observer and problem solver. Kendra’s uncanny way of connecting the dots is as baffling to law enforcement as it is legendary.

Raised by preppers, survivalist and FBI agent Mercy Kilpatrick has a deep-rooted need for a safe place. Her getaway in the Cascade Foothills is her secret. But when skeletal remains are unearthed - those of a murdered man linked to a notorious heist - Mercy realizes she isn’t the only one with something to hide. Thirty years ago, an armored-car robbery turned deadly. The mastermind was captured. Four conspirators vanished with a fortune. One of them, it appears, never made it out of the woods alive.

It’s Dr. Kay Scarpetta’s birthday, and she’s about to head to Miami for a vacation with Benton Wesley, her FBI profiler husband, when she notices seven pennies on a wall behind their Cambridge house. Is this a kids’ game? If so, why are all of the coins dated 1981 and so shiny they could be newly minted? Her cellphone rings, and Detective Pete Marino tells her there’s been a homicide five minutes away.

Detective Angie Pallorino hasn't forgotten the violent rapist who left a distinctive calling card—crosses etched into the flesh of his victim's foreheads. When a comatose Jane Doe is found in a local cemetery, sexually assaulted, mutilated, and nearly drowned, Angie is struck by the eerie similarities to her earlier unsolved rapes. Could he be back?

Homicide detective Tracy Crosswhite has returned to the police force after the sensational retrial of her sister’s killer. Still scarred from that ordeal, Tracy is pulled into an investigation that threatens to end her career, if not her life. A serial killer known as the Cowboy is killing young women in cheap motels in North Seattle.

Richmond, Virginia, is a city rich in Southern history yet overrun by such modern-day problems as drug trafficking and escalating juvenile crime. Former Charlotte police chief Judy Hammer is brought in to clean up the police force--the most difficult assignment of her career. Now, in the face of overwhelming public scrutiny, she must navigate through local politics and prejudices to solve a brutal murder that springs straight from the rotting core of Richmond's heart.

Recently ghosted and sick of watching her friends fade into the suburbs, thirty-something Hannah finds community in a true-crime forum that’s on a mission to solve the murders of four women in Atlanta. After William, a handsome lawyer, is arrested for the killings, Hannah begins writing him letters. It’s the perfect outlet for her pent-up frustration and rage. The exercise empowers her, and even feels healthy at first. Until William writes back.

The first book in an original mystery series featuring 28-year-old Veronica Mars, back in action after the events of Veronica Mars: The Movie. With the help of old friends - Logan Echolls, Mac Mackenzie, Wallace Fennel, and even Dick Casablancas - Veronica is ready to take on Neptune's darkest cases with her trademark sass and smarts.

First as a reporter and then as a PI, Tess Monaghan has learned how to survive and thrive on the streets of Baltimore. But a new case will force her to confront her own past, and a man she loved and lost. It starts when she gets a newspaper photograph of her old boyfriend with a tantalizing shard of headline attached: In Big Trouble. The answers lie far from Baltimore, deep in a world of good-time music, old-fashioned ambition, and rich people's games. For Tess must find out what happened to a man she thought she knew, to a woman who may have changed him forever, and to the victims of a killer who dances to a different - and deadly - drummer.

One minute, silly Heather Babcock had been babbling on at her movie idol, the glamorous Marina Gregg. The next, Heather suffered a massive seizure, poisoned by a deadly cocktail. It seems likely that the cocktail was intended for the beautiful actress. But while the police fumble to find clues, Miss Marple begins to ask her own questions, because as she knows...even the most peaceful village can hide dark secrets.