Womens Fiction Thriller

"This is a very difficult letter to write. I hope you will not hate us too much.... My son broke into your home recently while you were out." In a quiet, leafy suburb in upstate New York, a teenager has been sneaking into houses - and into the owners' computers as well - learning their secrets, and maybe sharing some of them, too. Who is he, and what might he have uncovered? After two anonymous letters are received, whispers start to circulate, and suspicion mounts. And when a woman down the street is found murdered, the tension reaches the breaking point.

Ruth and Nelson investigate a string of murders and disappearances deep within the abandoned tunnels hidden far beneath the streets of Norwich. Norwich is riddled with old chalk-mining tunnels, but no one's sure exactly how many. When Ruth is called in to investigate a set of human remains found in one of them, she notices the bones are almost translucent - a sign they were boiled soon after death. Once more she finds herself at the helm of a murder investigation.

For residents of Salem, Massachusetts, the day after Halloween brings empty candy wrappers, sagging pumpkins, and a community-wide identity crisis. That is, until Lee Barrett's TV production class suggests extending the spooky season with the traditional Mexican celebration Dia de Los Muertos. But when the students discover not all of Salem's dead are resting in peace, the post-October blues don't seem so bad after all....

Cash and Sheriff Wheaton make for a strange partnership. He pulled her from her mother's wrecked car when she was three. He's kept an eye out for her ever since. It's a tough place to live - northern Minnesota along the Red River. Cash navigated through foster homes, and at 13 was working farms. She's tough as nails, five feet two inches, blue jeans, blue jean jacket, smokes Marlboros, drinks Bud Longnecks. Makes her living driving truck. Playing pool on the side.

For modern-day detective Mallory Atkinson, being trapped in the body of a Victorian housemaid means overcoming endless obstacles. Her current challenge is winning over the suspicious young parlormaid, Alice. Mallory’s plan starts with teaching the girl to make Molotov cocktails, which is a perfectly valid science experiment and not at all a desperate ploy to gain Alice’s attention. Before the lesson can begin, though, Alice receives a letter that has her slipping off in the night. Concerned for her safety—and naturally curious—Mallory follows.

Clare's grown very fond of Alfred Glockner, the part-time comic and genuinely jolly charity Santa who's been using her coffeehouse as a place to warm his mittens. When she finds him gunned down in a nearby alley, a few subtle clues convince her that Alfred's death was something more than the tragic result of a random mugging, despite the conclusions of the police. Between baking delicious Christmas goodies and fending off the attentions of a persistent professional elf, Clare sets out to solve St. Nick's murder.

London’s bright young things are partying, Soho’s nightlife is buzzing, and Augusta Peel is hiding in her basement. She has a reason to hide there: it’s home to her Bloomsbury workshop where she repairs old, neglected books. After a busy time during the war, all Augusta wants is peace and quiet. But events take a turn when Augusta agrees to chaperone nineteen-year-old Harriet Jones on a date. Failing to get her home on time, she ends up in a riotous nightclub. She can’t imagine the evening getting much worse when the police raid it. But then the murder happens.

Follow Mae West as she searches for clues to bring killers to justice in this Campers and Criminals Cozy Mystery bundle.

Bess Campbell has escaped to the windswept Australian coastal town of Port Bannir, determined to begin her life again. She is loving her fresh start, thanks to her fun job running a hip gallery, her territorial chickens, and a lot of self-help books to find her new, better self. Port Bannir local Margaret Gale runs an austere maritime museum, and rules her staff with an iron fist. She has no time for that crazy modern gallery or upbeat, earnest Bess sweeping around town on her hipster bicycle.

All Mrs. Pollifax has to do is help a bumbling CIA agent confirm the identities of seven undercover informants in Morocco. A simple assignment. But right away, things go wrong. The first informant is murdered just after Mrs. P. identifies him in Fez. Worse, she has the frightening sensation that her associate is not who or what he says he is.

Normally, not even drunk on a bet would Violet Parker go to Slagton, a creepy ghost town inhabited by those too stubborn - or deranged - to leave. But a certain bullheaded Deadwood detective has a problem - his informant from Slagton has gone missing. When Violet is shanghaied into taking a hunting trip to the ghost town to search for the missing snitch, she stumbles into trouble that will take more than a double-barreled shotgun to escape. Will Violet survive this new hell that haunts her, or will she end up on Slagton's growing list of those "gutted and hung"?

It is 1918. Coming out of retirement, an aging Sherlock Holmes travels to Palestine with his 19-year-old partner, Mary Russell. There, disguised as ragged Bedouins, they embark on a dangerous mission. If they fail, the holy city goes up in flames.

Trust is a delicate thing, and no one knows that better than Rosalind Thorne. Lady Melbourne has entrusted her with recovering a packet of highly sensitive private letters stolen from her desk. The contents of these letters hold great interest for the famous poet Lord Byron, who had carried on a notorious public affair with Lady Melbourne's daughter-in-law, the inconveniently unstable Lady Caroline Lamb. Rosalind is to take up residence in Melbourne House, posing as Lady Melbourne's confidential secretary. There, she must discover the thief and regain possession of the letters.

Rosalind is pleased when she's invited to Cassel House to help her friend Louisa prepare for her upcoming wedding. But that's not the only event on her agenda. The trip will also afford Rosalind the chance to see Devon Winterbourne, the newly minted duke of Casselmaine. Devon and Rosalind were on the verge of betrothal before the infamous Thorne family scandal derailed their courtship. Now Rosalind wonders if there's a chance their love might reignite.

Alchemist Zoe Faust and her impish gargoyle sidekick Dorian Robert-Houdin travel to Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris to investigate a mysterious discovery found in the wreckage of the tragic fire: a long-lost gargoyle illustration drawn by Victor Hugo himself. When the work of art is stolen under impossible circumstances, Dorian must use his “little gray cells” — not to mention his culinary skills — to solve the crime and discover the true origins of where he came from.

Kit Kenyon is a first-rate hostage negotiator. Noah Lambert is a good detective with excellent instincts. These new partners have hardly had time to get used to each other when they are thrown into a grisly murder case. As evidence mounts up and more victims are found, Kit and Noah realize that they are on the hunt for a serial killer. The problem is he may be hunting one of them, too.

Former English professor Cat Latimer is back in Colorado, hosting writers' retreats in the big blue Victorian she's inherited, much to her surprise, from none other than her carousing ex-husband. Now it's an authors' getaway, but Cat won't let anyone get away with murder. The bed-and-breakfast is open for business, and best-selling author Tom Cook is among its first guests. Cat doesn't know why he came all the way from New York, but she's glad to have him among the quirkier - and far less famous - attendees.

The discovery of a dead infant in an Amish barn shakes Lancaster County to its core. But the police investigation leads to a more shocking disclosure: Circumstantial evidence suggests that 18-year-old Katie Fisher, an unmarried Amish woman believed to be the newborn's mother, took the child's life. When Ellie Hathaway, a disillusioned big-city attorney, comes to Paradise, Pennsylvania, to defend Katie, two cultures collide - and for the first time in her high-profile career, Ellie faces a system of justice very different from her own.

Tending to the soldiers in the trenches of France during the First World War, battlefield nurse Bess Crawford can't help but notice the photo of a young pilot's wife every time she tends to him. But then at the railway station, in a mob of troops leaving for the front, Bess glimpses a familiar face - the pilot's wife, with another man. Later, back in France, Bess sees a newspaper with a drawing of the woman's face on the front page. She'd been murdered - the very day Bess saw her.

Meet Stephanie Plum, a bounty hunter with attitude. In Stephanie’s opinion, toxic waste, rabid drivers, armed schizophrenics, and August heat, humidity, and hydrocarbons are all part of the great adventure of living in Jersey. She’s a product of the “burg,” a blue-collar pocket of Trenton where houses are attached and narrow, cars are American, windows are clean, and (God forbid you should be late) dinner is served at six.