Unwanted

Simon & Schuster Ltd 2011, Paperback, 480 pages, £12.99

Unwanted by Kristina Ohlsson

In the middle of a rainy Swedish summer, a little girl is abducted from a crowded train. Despite hundreds of potential witnesses, no one noticed when the girl was taken. Her mother, left behind at the previous station, alerted the crew immediately. But as the train pulled into Stockholm Central Station, the girl was nowhere to be seen. To Inspector Alex Recht of the Stockholm police, this looks like a classic custody row. But none of the evidence adds up and young Investigative Analyst Fredrika Bergman is convinced the case is far more complex than her boss is prepared to admit. So when the missing child is found dead in the far north of Sweden, with the word UNWANTED scribbled on her forehead, the rule book is finally thrown out of the window. Now on the trail of a ruthless murderer with a terrifying agenda, will Alex and Fredrika manage to put aside their differences and work together to find the killer, before it’s too late?

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In the Bleak Midwinter

Simon & Schuster Ltd 2011, Paperback, 480 pages, £6.99

The Bleak Midwinter by Carol Rivers

Winter 1919. Two months after the Armistice that ended the Great War, and life in London’s East End is slowly returning to normal. But for 25-year-old Birdie Connor the battle is only just beginning. Frank, Birdie’s older brother, has been sent to prison for deserting his army post whilst fighting in Belgium, and the shame heaped on the Connor family by their neighbours is unrelenting. Wilfred, Birdie’s widowed father, has disowned Frank and vows that he will never set eyes on his son again, but Birdie cannot believe that her brother is guilty. So when Frank escapes from prison and comes to find Birdie in secret, she promises to help him and is determined to prove his innocence. But little does she realise that she is exposing herself to danger as Frank gets himself deeper and deeper into trouble with the so-called friends he met in prison. Helped by the Connors’ lodger, the handsome Harry Chambers, will Birdie be able to find the proof that Frank needs in time to reconcile him to their frail father before it is too late? And can she build a future to keep herself and her younger brother, Patrick, safe?

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No Rest for the Dead

Simon & Schuster Ltd 2011, Paperback, 384 pages, £12.99

No Rest for the Dead by Jeffrey Deaver, David Baldacci, et al

When Christopher Thomas, a curator at San Francisco’s Museum of Fine Arts, is murdered and his decaying body is found in an iron maiden in Berlin, his wife Rosemary Thomas is the prime suspect. Long suffering under Christopher’s unfaithful ways, Rosemary is tried, convicted and executed.
Ten years later, Jon Nunn, the detective who cracked the case, becomes convinced that the wrong person was put to death. Along with financier Tony Olsen, he plans to gather everyone who was there the night Christopher died and finally uncover the truth about what happened that fateful evening.
Could it have been the ne’er do well brother Peter Hausen, interested in his sister’s trust fund having got through his own; the curatorial assistant Justine Olengard, used and betrayed by Christopher; the artist Belle who turned down his advances only to see her career suffer a setback; or someone else all together? No Rest for the Dead is a thrilling, page-turning accomplishment that only the very best thriller writers could achieve.

The Devil’s Mask

Faber and Faber 2011, Paperback, 320 pages, £12.99

The Devil’s Mask, by Christopher Wakling

The Georgian terraces are rising.

In the aftermath of the abolition of the slave trade, the port of Bristol is awash with the commercial gains of the Empire. But in the midst of all the grand building projects something is rotten at the heart of the city.

The first victim is discovered.

News of the mutilated body spreads quickly. And as further horrifically charred corpses are found, the new streets are gripped with a primal sense of fear. The city fathers decide to step in to suppress the rising panic.

An innocent is drawn into the tangled net.

A lowly legal clerk with an unruly head of hair and a taste for coffee, Inigo Bright has been charged with investigating customs fees in the great port. Yet this routine investigation will drag him down into a net of violence and deception that puts not only his life but that of those closest to him in deadly danger …

Lee Child said of Christopher Wakling’s debut novel, ‘It sucks you in like a dream and holds you like a nightmare.’ In The Devil’s Mask, Wakling has created an atmospheric thriller of great narrative force.

City of the Dead

Faber and Faber 2011, Paperback, 288 pages, £12.99

City of the Dead, by Sara Grun

Introducing the ‘world’s best private investigator’…

New Orleans, and Vic Willing, Assistant District Attorney for the prosecutor’s office, has been missing since Hurricane Katrina hit. Called in from San Francisco is Claire DeWitt, a detective whose expertise and methods derive from some unique sources.

What Claire discovers takes us into the heart of the crime-ravaged, deeply wounded city, where those who can afford it live behind fences and those who can’t are slain daily on the streets. And it’s there she discovers that the only thing worse than an unsolved case, maybe, is a solved one.

From the acclaimed author of Dope and Come Closer, City of the Dead is the first novel of a detective series unlike any you have read before, one that is sure to inspire a passionate and devoted following.

Snapshot

Simon & Schuster Ltd 2011, Paperback, 394 pages, £12.99

Snapshot, by Craig Robertson

A series of high-profile shootings by a lone sniper leaves Glasgow terrorised and police photographer Tony Winter – a man with a tragic hidden past – mystified. Who is behind the executions of some of the most notorious drug lords in the city? As more shootings occur – including those of police officers – the authorities realise they have a vigilante on their hands. Meanwhile, Tony investigates a link between the victims and a schoolboy who has been badly beaten. Seemingly unconnected, they share a strange link. As Tony delves deeper, his quest for the truth and his search for the killer lead him down dark and dangerous paths.

Grievous Angel (Bob Skinner Mysteries)

Headline 2011, Hardcover, 416 pages, £19.99

Grievous Angel, by Quintin Jardine

Skinner revisits his nightmares: old but not forgotten. Fifteen years in the past, newly promoted Detective Superintendent Bob Skinner is called to investigate a most brutal death. A man lies at the deep end of an empty swimming pool, his neck broken and almost every other bone in his body shattered. Soon, an organised crime connection looms, and bloody retribution spreads to a second city. Then violence erupts on a new front, as a vicious knifeman seems to be targeting Edinburgh’s gay population. As if this double dose of homicide isn’t enough for a single man with a teenage daughter to raise and protect, Skinner’s personal life takes a similar, perilous twist. Can he stay on the side of the angels, or will he fall…?

Bloodline

Simon & Schuster Ltd 2011, Hardcover, 496 pages, £18.99

Blood Line, by Lynda La Plante

Under the watchful eye of DCS James Langton, DCI Anna Travis takes charge of an investigation for the first time. But is it purely a missing person’s case – or a full blown murder enquiry? An ominous pool of blood and no victim lead Anna on a desperate hunt for a man who has disappeared without trace.

As Anna becomes obsessed with seemingly irrelevant details, Langton fears that she is losing control. They still have no body and Anna is under increasing pressure to make an arrest…

Blind Fury

Simon & Schuster Ltd 2011, Paperback, 544 pages, £7.99

Blind Fury, by Lynda La Plante

Close to a motorway service station, the body of a young woman is discovered. She appears to have no family, no friends, no one to identify her. DI Anna Travis is brought onto the team of investigators by DCS James Langton, who already suspects that this recent case could be linked to two unsolved murders. As more evidence is discovered the team realise that they are contending with a triple murder investigation — and no suspect. Anna’s blood runs cold when she receives a letter from a murderer she helped to arrest. He makes contact from prison insisting that he can track down their killer, but will only talk to Anna herself. Does he really have an insight into another killer’s mind, or is he merely intent on getting into hers?

Random

Simon & Schuster Ltd 2011, Paperback, 400 pages, £6.99

Random, by Craig Robertson

Glasgow is being terrorised by a serial killer the media have nicknamed The Cutter. The murders have left the police baffled as the only connection between the killings is that all the victims’ little fingers of their right hands have been severed. But as the police begin to close in on The Cutter, his carefully-laid plans threaten to unravel – with horrifying consequences.

• Watch author Craig Robertson discuss Random

The Terror of Living

Simon & Schuster Ltd 2011, Paperback, 320 pages, £12.99

The Terror of Living, by Urban Waite

Hunt, an ex-convict, has spent the past twenty years on a small ranch with his wife, supplementing his income with the odd drug smuggling job. Drake, a deputy sheriff, is newly married and has almost escaped the shadow of his father, who was also a sheriff — and no stranger to the drug trade himself…

Drake is on Hunt’s trail when a big drug deal in the mountains goes awry and so begins a terrifying race against time. Although Hunt evades Drake’s attempts at capture the traffickers soon unleash a merciless hired killer to reclaim what’s theirs. As the chase closes in and loyalties are tested, Drake’s quest for justice contends with a hitman’s quest for blood, and Hunt must face a terrible choice…

• Read an article by Urban Waite

Old Enemies

Simon & Schuster Ltd 2011, Paperback, 432 pages, £12.99

Old Enemies, by Michael Dobbs

In the Swiss Alps a teenage girl is thrown from a helicopter and her boyfriend is brutally abducted to Trieste, a city filled with undercurrents of past hatreds.

Ruari, son of Irish media owner J J Breslin, is in desperate danger, at the mercy of ruthless kidnappers making impossible demands. His terrified mother contacts the only person she knows can help her son: Harry Jones, her former lover, who she walked out on many years ago. Now memories of their passionate affair, the guilt, hurt, anger and humiliation, come flooding back.

Time is running out for Ruari and Harry, torn between his loyalties, is quickly drawn into a political game played for high stakes. Far higher than he realizes…

Lasting Damage

Hodder & Stoughton 2011, Hardcover, 448 pages, £12.99

Lasting Damage, by Sophie Hannah

It’s 1.15 a.m. Connie Bowskill should be asleep. Instead, she’s logging on to a property website in search of a particular house: 11 Bentley Grove, Cambridge. She knows it’s for sale; she saw the estate agent’s board in the front garden less than six hours ago.

Soon Connie is clicking on the ‘Virtual Tour’ button, keen to see the inside of 11 Bentley Grove and put her mind at rest once and for all. She finds herself looking at a scene from a nightmare: in the living room, in the middle of the carpet, there’s a woman lying face down in a huge pool of blood. In shock, Connie wakes her husband Kit. But when Kit sits down at the computer to take a look, he sees no dead body, only a pristine beige carpet in a perfectly ordinary room…

Look out for a chance to win copies of Lasting Damage on Wednesday here on Bookdagger!

The Red Coffin

Faber and Faber 2011, Paperback, 368 pages, £12.99

The Red Coffin, by Sam Eastland

Russia On the Brink of War – Stalin’s Secret Weapon Sabotaged …

It is 1939. In the Soviet Union, years of revolution, fear and persecution have left the country unprepared to face the onslaught of Nazi Germany. For the coming battles, Stalin has placed his hopes on the F-34 tank – a thirty-ton steel monster known as the ‘Red Coffin’ to those men who will soon be using it.

But the design is not yet complete. And when Colonel Nagorski, the weapon’s secretive and eccentric architect, is found murdered, Stalin sends for Pekkala, his most trusted investigator. Once the favourite of the tsar, Pekkala is now in the service of the man who was once his greatest enemy.

A Detective Whose Loyalty is Torn Between the Present and the Past …

Pekkala is not the only one whose loyalty is divided. A sinister group calling itself the White Guild, made up of former soldiers of the tsar, may be behind the death of Colonel Nagorski.

While Soviet engineers struggle to complete the design of the tank, Pekkala must track down the White Guild and expose their plans to propel Germany and Russia into conflict.

Russia’s Most Famous Detective is Pitted Against its Most Formidable Adversary Yet …

Two For Sorrow (Josephine Tey Mystery 3)

Faber and Faber 2011, Paperback, 496 pages, £7.99

Two for Sorrow, by Nicola Upson

London, 1903. Two women are hanged in Holloway Prison for killing babies. More than thirty years later, their crimes resurface with shocking consequences.

When Josephine Tey sets out to write a novel about Amelia Sach and Annie Walters, the notorious Finchley baby farmers, she can have little idea that the research for her book will be needed to help solve a modern-day killing – the sadistic murder of a young seamstress, found dead in the Motley sisters’ studio, amid preparations for a star-studded charity gala.

The girl’s death seems to be the result of a long-standing domestic feud, but Josephine’s friend, Inspector Archie Penrose, is unconvinced; and when a second young woman is involved in an horrific accident soon afterwards, the search begins for a vicious killer who will stop at nothing to keep the past where it belongs.

Moving between the decadence and glamour of a private women’s club, the bleak surroundings of Holloway prison, and the deprivation of London’s slums, Two for Sorrow is a dark and unsettling exploration of the way in which the crimes of the past destroy those left behind – long after justice is done.

American Assassin

Simon & Schuster Ltd 2010, Paperback, 448 pages, £12.99

American Assassin, by Vince Flynn

Before he was considered a CIA-super agent, before he was thought of as a terrorist’s worst nightmare, and before he was both loathed and admired by politicians on Capitol Hill, Mitch Rapp was a star college athlete with an untapped instinct for violence.

Tensions in the Middle East are simmering when Central Intelligence Angency Director Irene Kennedy pays a visit to Syracuse University, where she hopes to recruit none other than Mitch Rapp, a student who has quickly climbed up the academic and athletic ranks. At first glance, he appears like any other smart, good-looking American college kid. Under the surface, however, a tempest rages. Tragedy entered Mitch’s life a year before when 35 of his classmates, including his girlfriend, perished on Pan Am flight 103. Since then, Mitch has grieved their senseless deaths and has felt helpless in his desire for revenge. When Kennedy arrives on campus, his career path is suddenly laid out for him.

Nine months later, after gruelling training, Mitch finds himself in Istanbul on his first assignment, which is to assassinate the Turkish arms dealer who sold the explosives used in the Pan Am attack. Mitch hits his target but quickly sees, for the first time, what revenge means to the enemy. When Mitch’s mentor and a fellow recruit are kidnapped and tortured by a dangerous group of Islamic jihadists, he must stop at nothing to save them.

• Read an extract

The Company of Shadows

Simon & Schuster Ltd 2011, Paperback, 384 pages, £7.99

Company of Shadows, by Ruth Newman

Flicking through her friends’ holiday snaps, Kate Benson receives a sudden shock. For there in the background is her husband, Charlie. Dark hair, blue eyes, familiar smile: there’s no mistaking him. But that’s impossible. Because Charlie died exactly a year ago.

Determined to track down the man in the photograph, Kate follows the trail from Miami to Sicily, where her husband drowned in mysterious circumstances. But when she discovers serious discrepancies in the original investigation, Kate starts to question whether she ever really knew the man she loved so much.

Was Charlie murdered? Was their marriage as perfect as Kate remembers? Who are the people following her? Who can she trust? And is Kate herself to be trusted? Because there are secrets in her past too . . .

The Oath (Knights Templar Mysteries 29)

Simon & Schuster Ltd 2011, Paperback, 544 pages, £7.99

Oath, by Michael Jecks

1326. In an England riven with conflict, knight and peasant alike find their lives turned upside down by the warring factions of Edward II, with his hated favourite, Hugh le Despenser, and Edward’s estranged queen Isabella and her lover, Sir Roger Mortimer. Yet even in such times the brutal slaughter of an entire family, right down to a babe in arms, still has the power to shock. Three further murders follow, and bailiff Simon Puttock is drawn into a web of intrigue, vengeance, power and greed as Roger Mortimer charges him to investigate the killings.

Michael Jecks brilliantly evokes the turmoil of fourteenth-century England, as his well-loved characters Simon Puttock and Sir Baldwin de Furnshill strive to maintain the principles of loyalty and truth.

The Spellmans Strike Again (Spellman Mysteries 4)

Simon & Schuster Ltd 2011, Paperback, 400 pages, £6.99

The Spellmans Strike Again, by Lisa Lutz

At the ripe old age of thirty-two, former wild child Isabel “Izzy” Spellman has finally agreed to take over the family detective business. The transition won’t be smooth.

First among her priorities as head of Spellman Investigations is to dig up some dirt on the competition, slippery ex-cop Rick Harkey. Next, faced with a puzzling missing-person’s case she recruits an actor friend, Len, to infiltrate the home of an ageing millionaire as an undercover butler.

Meanwhile, Izzy is being blackmailed by her mother to commit to regular blind dates with promising professionals – an arrangement that doesn’t thrill Connor, Izzy’s soon to become Ex-boyfriend No. 12.

At Spellman headquarters, it’s business as unusual. Doorknobs and light fixtures are disappearing every day, Mom’s been spotted crying in the pantry and just when it looks like things can’t go more haywire, little sister Rae’s internship researching pro bono legal cases leads the youngest Spellman to launch a campaign that could spring an innocent man from jail – or land Rae in it.

It just goes to show, however many Spellman Family Rules are put in place in an attempt to hold the family together, Izzy will never be able to follow Rule No. 1: Act Normal.

The Shadow of Your Smile

Simon & Schuster Ltd 2011, Paperback, 336 pages, £7.99

The Shadow of Your Smile, by Mary Higgins Clark

At age eighty-three and in failing health, Olivia Morrow knows she has little time left. The last of her line, she faces a momentous choice: expose a long-held family secret, or take it with her to her grave.

Olivia has in her possession letters from her deceased cousin Catherine, a nun, now being considered for beatification by the Catholic Church. These letters reveal that, at the age of seventeen, Catherine gave birth to a son and gave him up for adoption and they identify the father as Alex Gannon, a world-famous doctor, scientist and inventor of medical patents.

Now, two generations later, thirty-one year old paediatrician, Dr. Monica Farrell, Catherine’s granddaughter, stands as the rightful heir to what remains of the Gannon family fortune. But in telling Monica who she really is and getting what is lawfully hers, Olivia would have to betray Catherine’s wishes and reveal the story behind Monica’s ancestry. As the pressure of Olivia’s impending choice weighs down on her, little does she realize that Alex Gannon’s grand-nephews – who are currently exploiting the Gannon inheritance to fund their profligate lifestyles – will stop at nothing to silence Olivia and prevent Monica from learning the secret, even murder.

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The Obelisk

Simon & Schuster Ltd 2011, Paperback, 336 pages, £12.99

The Obelisk, by Howard Gordon

Gideon Davis, whose behind-the-scenes negotiating skills have earned him the role of peacemaker in conflicts around the globe, knows more about hush-hush discussions in Capitol corridors than he does about hand-to-hand combat. But his more practical, tactical skills become vital when he’s called upon by family friend and government big-wig Earl Parker to bring in a rogue agent – Gideon’s own brother Tillman.

Gideon is transported from a DC awards dinner to the jungles of the oil-rich nation of Mohan, where Tillman has promised to give himself up. But on his arrival the plan goes immediately awry. Gideon must evade hostile locals to make his way to The Obelisk – a multi-million-dollar, state-of-the-art oil rig that has been seized by terrorists. Both Tillman, who doesn’t seem to have surrender in mind, and Earl Parker are aboard the ill-fated rig – Tillman working undercover and Parker as a hostage. As tensions rise, Gideon launches a hazardous one-man rescue.

Cabal (Aurelio Zen 03)

Faber and Faber 2010, Paperback, 416 pages, £7.99

Cabal, by Michael Dibdin

When, one dark night in November, Prince Ludovico Ruspanti fell a hundred and fifty feet to his death in the chapel at St. Peter’s, Rome, there were a number of questions to be answered. Inspector Aurelio Zen finds that getting the answers isn’t easy, as witness after witness is mysteriously silenced – by violent death. To crack the secret of the Vatican, Zen must penetrate the most secret place of all: the Cabal.

Vendetta (Aurelio Zen 02)

Faber and Faber 2011, Paperback, 416 pages, £7.99

Vendetta, by Michael Dibdin

Inspector Zen has a problem: an impossible murder, recorded on the closed-circuit video of Oscar Burolo’s top-security Sardinian fortress. As Zen gets to work, he is once again plunged into a menacing and violent world where his own life is soon at risk.

Ratking (Aurelio Zen 01)

Faber and Faber 2010, Paperback, 464 pages, £7.99

Ratking, by Michael Dibdin

Police Commissioner Aurelio Zen had crossed swords with the establishment before – and lost. But from the depths of a mundane desk job in Rome he is unexpectedly transferred to Perugia to take over an explosive kidnapping case involving one of Italy’s most powerful families.

‘Tremendously exciting. This novel is both subtle and horrific.’ Ruth Rendell

All He Saw Was The Girl

Faber and Faber 2011, Paperback, 304 pages, £12.99

All He Saw Was The Girl, by Peter Leonard

Rome: McCabe and Chip, two American exchange students, are about to become embroiled with a violent street gang, a beautiful Italian girl and a flawed kidnapping plan.

Detroit: Sharon Vanelli’s affair with Joey Palermo, a Mafia enforcer, is about to be discovered by her husband, Ray, a secret service agent.

Brilliantly plotted and shot through with wry humour, All He Saw Was the Girl takes place as these two narratives converge in the backstreets of Italy’s oldest city. A thrilling ride, it once again displays Peter Leonard’s genius for exploring the wrong turns that life can take.

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The Wild Zone

Pocket Books 2010, Paperback, 384 pages, £7.99

The Wild Zone, by Joy Fielding

This is how it starts. With a joke.

Two brothers, Will and Jeff, and their friend, Tom, are out one night at their favourite bar when they decide to make a bet on who can be the first to seduce a mysterious young woman drinking by herself. Pretty, dark-haired Suzy has an innocent, girlnext-door appeal. ‘Just waiting for Prince Charming to hit on her,’ jokes Jeff. Little do they know the secrets she hides from the outside world, particularly those having to do with the daily horror she experiences under the watchful eye of her abusive husband. Little do they know she wants him killed. Little do they know another bet is on: who’s man enough to slay the villain and rescue the damsel in distress?

Another challenge is born, only this one proves to be lethal . . .

Cold Heart

Simon & Schuster Ltd 2010, Paperback, 496 pages, £7.99

Cold Heart, by Lynda La Plante

Movie mogul Harry Nathan’s lonely death in a Beverley Hills swimming pool is the beginning of a trail of lust and conspiracy leading to the darkest corners of the international art world.

Private investigator Lorraine Page faces her toughest fight ever as she takes on the case for fading starlet Cindy Nathan, Harry’s third wife. Lorraine believes the grieving widow’s story. Unlike her ex-colleagues in the police department who have already charged Cindy with murder…

Orchid Blue

Faber and Faber 2010, Paperback, 304 pages, £12.99

Orchid Blue, by Eoin McNamee

January 1961, and the beaten, stabbed and strangled body of a nineteen-year-old Pearl Gambol is discovered, after a dance the previous night at the Newry Orange Hall. Returning from London to investigate the case, Detective Eddie McCrink soon suspects that there may be people wielding influence over affairs, and that the accused, the enigmatic Robert McGladdery, may struggle to get a fair hearing. Presiding over the case is Lord Justice Curran, a man who nine years previously had found his own family in the news, following the murder of his nineteen-year-old daughter, Patricia.

In a spectacular return to the territory of his acclaimed, Booker-longlisted The Blue Tango, Eoin McNamee’s new novel explores and dissects this notorious murder case which led to the final hanging on Northern Irish soil.

The Maul and the Pear Tree

Faber and Faber 2010, Paperback, 400 pages, £7.99

The Maul and the Pear Tree, by P. D. James and T. A. Critchley

In 1811 John Williams was buried with a stake in his heart. Was he the notorious East End killer or his eighth victim in the bizarre and shocking Ratcliffe Highway Murders? In this vivid and gripping reconstruction P. D. James and T. A. Critchley draw on public records, newspaper clippings and hitherto unpublished sources, expertly sifting the evidence to shed new light on this infamous Wapping mystery.

‘James and Critchley evoke the horror of a dark, wintry London where ill-prepared authorities struggle to bring a major murder case to its conclusion.’ Crime Times

‘A model demonstration of how to assess fragmentary and often tantalising evidence … It makes an enthralling story.’ New York Times

Unholy Awakening

A female corpse is found in the town of Lotingen. The girl’s neck has been ripped open, all the blood drained from the body. Hanno Stiffeniis hastens to investigate a case more terrifying than murder. Would any human being kill in such a gruesome fashion?

Emma Rimmele has come to Lotingen to bury her mother. A beautiful woman travelling with a coffin in her baggage, Emma attracts gossip like a magnet. When a corpse is discovered near the house where she is living, speculation about the mysterious stranger reaches fever pitch. When two more ravaged bodies are found, fingers point accusingly in her direction. One word is heard on every tongue. Vampire.

Magistrate Hanno Stiffeniis defends Emma Rimmele against the hideous accusation. Has he fallen under the vampire’s spell, as his neighbours believe? News arrives from a nearby town. A French officer’s throat has been ripped out. Another French soldier has bled to death. The horror of Lotingen is happening elsewhere. Colonel Lavedrine, a criminologist in the Grand Armée, is ordered to collaborate with Hanno Stiffeniis. Two years earlier, they had worked together to solve a murder (Days of Atonement, 2007), despite fierce clashes of character and opinion.

Once again, each man is drawn into the forbidden world of the other. Stiffeniis takes his chance among French soldiers vying for power, while Lavedrine must tread dark graveyard paths in pursuit of a curse which has plagued Prussia for centuries.

They are seeking a cold-blooded killer.

A killer thirsting for warm blood from a pulsing vein.

• Win a copy in the August Competition

All the Colours of the Town, by Liam McIlvanney

When Glasgow journalist Gerry Conway receives a phone call promising unsavoury information about Scottish Justice Minister Peter Lyons, his instinct is that this apparent scoop won’t warrant space in the Tribune. But as Conway’s curiosity grows and his leads proliferate, his investigation takes him from Scotland to Belfast. Shocked by the sectarian violence of the past, and by the prejudice and hatred he encounters even now, Conway soon grows obsessed with the story of Lyons and all he represents. And as he digs deeper, he comes to understand that there is indeed a story to be uncovered – and that there are people who will go to great lengths to ensure that it remains hidden.

Compelling, vividly written and shocking, All the Colours of the Town is not only the story of an individual and his community, it is also a complex and thrilling enquiry into loyalty, betrayal and duty.

Captured, by Neil Cross

Even though he is still young, Kenny has just weeks to live. Before he dies, he wants to find his childhood best friend Callie Barton and thank her for the kindness she showed him when they were at school together.

But when Kenny begins his search, he discovers that Callie Barton has gone missing. Although cleared of any involvement, her husband Jonathan seems to be hiding something.

Kenny has no choice but to take matters into his own hands. And knowing that time is running out on him, he’s prepared to do whatever it takes…

• Read the first chapter of Captured
• Win a copy in the August Competition

House of the Lost, by Sarah Rayne

When novelist Theo Kendal inherits the remote Norfolk house in which his cousin Charmery was murdered, he believes it will bring him closer to the truth about her death. It will also be the ideal place to finish his new book.

But the bleak Fenn House is a lonely and sometimes uncomfortable place to spend the winter. And the strangest thing is that Theo’s new novel seems to be writing itself – and heading in an unplanned direction. Theo finds himself describing a young boy called Matthew who lives in constant fear of a visit from the cold-eyed men. Struggling to understand the dangerous secrets that surround him and his family, Matthew inhabits a terrifying world where people die in macabre circumstances, where they can be imprisoned without trial or reason, their identities wiped from the world forever.

And then Theo discovers that Matthew and his family really existed, part of a dark and violent segment of recent history that threatens to reach across the years to tear his life apart.

And somehow it all connects to the death of his cousin Charmery.

• Watch author Sarah Rayne talk about House of the Lost

Paint it Black, by PJ Parrish

Florida’s scenic Sereno Key has been shaken to the core by a ritualistic serial killer who is targeting black men, leaving his victims faceless and marked with spray paint. Finished as a cop in Michigan, Louis Kincaid is persuaded to take the case as a PI and he joins forces with rookie FBI profiler, Emily Farantino.

But without a badge Louis is trying to work in limbo, not knowing where his limits end, and the suspect’s rights begin. Hindered by a false confession, an incompetent county sheriff, and the killer’s changing pattern, Louis is still struggling to deal with his demons from his previous case.

Before long it becomes clear that these gruesome murders are no ordinary hate crimes, and Louis finds himself the next victim of a predator more twisted than he ever imagined…

Free Country, by Jeremy Duns

It is May 1969, and MI6 double agent Paul Dark stands alongside mourners at the funeral of Sir Colin Templeton; the former head of the organisation, the man he knew simply as ‘Chief’ — and the man he killed in cold blood.

Dark has got away with it, evading the attentions of both his fellow British spies and the KGB operatives to whom he long ago pledged loyalty. But that precarious security is about to be shattered, launching Dark back into the heart of an international conspiracy and making him a target for both exposure and assassination.

Desperate to escape his predicament, Dark gambles everything on one last throw of the dice, exposing his Soviet handler to the British. But before long, he finds he has no choice but to go on the run again, taking him to the labyrinthine backstreets of Rome. The race is on to stop a deadly plot that dates back to the early years of the Cold War.

• Download Paul Dark’s Dossier

The Predator of Batignolles, by Claude Izner

The fifth Victor Legris Mystery.

In the turbulent Parisian summer of 1893,Victor Legris has vowed to give up the dangerous hobby of amateur sleuthing to concentrate on selling books.

But a murderer is at large in Paris, intent on revenge for events that took place many years before during the Commune.

And when a bookbinder friend of Victor’s becomes the latest victim of the mysterious Leopard, the young bookseller feels impelled to resume his detective work and uncover the identity of the Batignolles predator.

• Read an extract from The Predator of Batignolles

Summoned to the trailer of a Hollywood star who’s receiving death threats, former stuntman-turned-private investigator, David Spandau, assumes this will be another routine case. It turns out to be anything but. A-list actor Bobby Dye has become entangled with B-list gangster Richie Stella, who just wants to make a movie – and you can’t make a movie without a star. But as Richie and his cohorts are about to find out, the movie business makes the cocaine and heroin racket look like child’s play. Meanwhile, Spandau finds himself drawn ever deeper into the crazy world of Bobby Dye, one of the handsomest, most idolized men on the planet – and also one of the loneliest. All Bobby wants is someone to talk honestly to him – but can he really cope with the blunt and bitter truth?

The Executioner, by Chris Carter

Inside a Los Angeles church, on the altar steps, lies the blood-soaked, decapitated body of a priest. Carefully positioned, legs stretched out, arms crossed over the chest, the most horrifying thing of all is that the priest’s head has been replaced by that of a dog. Later, the forensic team discover that, on the victim’s chest, the figure 3 has been scrawled in blood.

At first, Detective Robert Hunter believes that this is a ritualistic killing. But as more bodies surface, he is forced to reassess. All the victims died in the way they feared the most. Their worst nightmares have literally come true. But how could the killer have known? And what links these apparently random victims.

Hunter finds himself on the trail of an elusive and sadistic killer, somone who apparently has the power to read his victims’ minds. Someone who can sense what scares his victims the most. Someone who will stop at nothing to achieve his twisted aim.

The Sacred Stone, by The Medieval Murderers

1067. In the desolate wastes of Greenland, a group of hunters discover a strangely-shaped meteor which has fallen from the sky. At first, the mysterious ‘sky-stone’ seems to bring them good luck, healing a lame boy and guaranteeing a good catch of furs. But violence and murder soon follow in fortune’s wake, as the villagers fight and struggle amongst themselves to get control of the precious stone.

Over the next six hundred years, the Sky-Stone falls into the hands of crusading knights, the wicked Sheriff of Devon, a group of radical young kabalists, the dying King Henry III and a band of travelling players. Each time, the stone brings treachery, discord and violent death to those who seek to possess it.

The Oath, by  Michael Jecks

1326. In an England riven with conflict, knight and peasant alike find their lives turned upside down by the warring factions of Edward II, with his hated favourite, Hugh le Despenser, and Edward’s estranged queen Isabella and her lover, Sir Roger Mortimer. Yet even in such times the brutal slaughter of an entire family, right down to a babe in arms, still has the power to shock. Three further murders follow, and bailiff Simon Puttock is drawn into a web of intrigue, vengeance, power and greed as Roger Mortimer charges him to investigate the killings.

Michael Jecks brilliantly evokes the turmoil of fourteenth-century England, as his well-loved characters Simon Puttock and Sir Baldwin de Furnshill strive to maintain the principles of loyalty and truth.

Two for Sorrow, by Nicola Upson

London, 1903. Two women are hanged in Holloway Prison for killing babies. More than thirty years later, their crimes resurface with shocking consequences… When Josephine Tey sets out to write a novel about Amelia Sach and Annie Walters, the notorious Finchley baby farmers, she can have little idea that the research for her book will be needed to help solve a modern-day killing – the sadistic murder of a young seamstress, found dead in the Motley sisters’ studio, amid preparations for a star-studded charity gala. The girl’s death seems to be the result of a long-standing domestic feud, but Josephine’s friend, Inspector Archie Penrose, is unconvinced; and when a second young woman is involved in an horrific accident soon afterwards, the search begins for a vicious killer who will stop at nothing to keep the past where it belongs. Moving between the decadence and glamour of a private women’s club, the bleak surroundings of Holloway prison, and the deprivation of London’s slums, Two for Sorrow is a dark and unsettling exploration of the way in which the crimes of the past destroy those left behind – long after justice is done.

Beautiful Malice, by Rebecca James

So. Were you glad, deep down? Were you glad to be rid of her? Your perfect sister? Were you secretly glad when she was killed?

Following a horrific tragedy that leaves her once-perfect family devastated, Katherine Patterson moves to a new city, starts at a new school, and begins a new life of quiet anonymity.

But when Katherine meets the gregarious and beautiful Alice Parrie her plan to live a solitary life becomes difficult. Katherine is unable to resist the flattering attention that Alice pays her and is so charmed by her contagious enthusiasm that the two girls soon become firm friends.

But being friends with Alice is complicated – and as Katherine gets to know her better she discovers that although Alice can be charming, she can also be selfish. Sometimes, even, Alice is cruel.

Eye of the Red Tsar, by Sam Eastland

It is the time of the Great Terror.

Inspector Pekkala – known as the Emerald Eye – was once the most famous detective in all Russia, the favourite of the Tsar. Now he is the prisoner of the men he once hunted.

Like millions of others, he has been sent to the gulags in Siberia and, as far as the rest of the world is concerned, he is as good as dead. But a reprieve comes when he is summoned by Stalin himself to investigate a crime. His mission – to uncover the men who really killed the Tsar and his family, and to locate the Tsar’s treasure. The reward for success will be his freedom and the chance to re-unite with the woman he would have married if the Revolution had not torn them apart. The price of failure – death.

Set against the backdrop of the paranoid and brutal country that Russia became under the rule of Stalin, Eye of the Red Tsar introduces a compelling new figure to readers of crime fiction.

Snowblind,

When it was first published in the mid-seventies, Snowblind established itself as an essential piece of true crime writing. The story of the legendary Zachary Swan, a mover in the cocaine trade in the sixties who set the standard for all who followed, Sabbag’s riveting account is a compulsive insight into an underworld populated by crazy characters and riven by paranoia. The result is an illuminating and wild book that influenced a generation of writers and smugglers.

A flat-out ballbuster. It moves like a threshing machine with a fuel tank of ether.
Hunter S. Thompson

One of the first books about the cocaine trade and it is still among the best.
Norman Mailer

Silent Scream, by Lynda La Plante

Hot young British film star Amanda Delany had the world at her feet. Never one for the quiet life, she’d had a string of affairs with famous actors, making perfect fodder for the tabloids… Then came a commission to write a tell-all memoir.

When Amanda is found brutally murdered, the suspects are lining up – from jealous ex-flatmates to famous lovers to a corrupt agent. As DCI James Langton leads his team in an extensive enquiry, they discover the sad truth behind Amanda’s successful façade. An autopsy reveals that she was addicted to drugs and starvation diets. Amanda’s parents are a cold, unemotional couple who hushed up the fact that their daughter once almost died from a botched abortion. And it is revealed that her massive earnings were being swallowed up in a City fraud.

Meanwhile, DI Anna Travis is up for promotion, but her boss DCI James Langton is blocking her, with an accusation of professional misconduct. This latest case, her toughest challenge so far, could make or break Anna’s career.

• Read an extract from Silent Scream

Siberian Education, by Nicolai Lilin

Set in a small and tight-knit community of ‘honest criminals’ in a remote part of Russia, this is a tale of an extreme boyhood – exotic, violent and completely unique. Told from the perspective of a boy gaining his ‘education’ as a member of the Mafia-like Urkas in Transnistria, we get a glimpse inside the strict codes of honour and the rituals of this bizarre community. Besides having a deep distrust of outsiders – especially the police – the community is split into ‘honest’ and ‘dishonest’ criminals and crime is all-pervasive. Even their youngest children are taught to understand violence and when it is appropriate to use it. By the age of six, Nicolai Lilin is given his first ‘pike knife’ by an uncle and by the age of twelve he has been convicted of attempted murder.

A huge bestseller in Lilin’s current home country, Italy, Siberian Education is an extraordinary snapshot of a violent world.

• Watch an interview with the author

Blind Fury, by Lynda La Plante

Close to a motorway service station, the body of a young woman is discovered. She appears to have no family, no friends, no one to identify her. DI Anna Travis is brought onto the team of investigators by DCS James Langton, who already suspects that this recent case could be linked to two unsolved murders. As more evidence is discovered the team realise that they are contending with a triple murder investigation — and no suspect.

Anna’s blood runs cold when she receives a letter from a murderer she helped to arrest. He makes contact from prison insisting that he can track down their killer, but will only talk to Anna herself. Does he really have an insight into another killer’s mind, or is he merely intent on getting into hers?

No Angel, by Jay Dobyns

In 2001 Jay Dobyns infiltrated a Hells Angels chapter operating in Arizona, in a highly secretive ATF investigation code named Operation Black Biscuit. The aim was simple: to examine the criminal underbelly of the world’s most famous biker group, and bring a major case against them. The reality, however, was much more complicated. In the twenty-one months that he spent inside the club, Dobyns became seduced by the outlaw lifestyle: seduced by the physical menace that comes with wearing the patch; seduced by riding his Harley down the highway at 100 miles an hour, eight bikes to a column, one bike’s wheels 18 inches from the next; and seduced by the intense bonds he forms within the club, where friends lay down their lives for each other. No Angel is a thrilling, adrenaline-fuelled ride of a book, which lifts the lid on the world’s most infamous underworlds.

The Genesis Plague, by Michael  Byrnes

At the dawn of civilization… An exotic stranger appears in a Mesopotamian village and is venerated as a goddess… until she unleashes a horror beyond anything humankind has ever known.

At the sunset of civilization… A mercenary unit in northern Iraq, led by Sergeant Jason Yaeger, has trapped radical Islam’s most wanted target in a mysterious cave that sits at the heart of the Genesis story. When a Marine platoon seeks to control the extraction mission, a threat far more ominous is found lurking beneath the mountains.

Meanwhile in Boston, Massachusetts, Agent Thomas Flaherty helps archaeologist Brooke Thompson escape assassination by a Las Vegas televangelist intent on using the cave’s deepest secret to bring the Middle East to its knees.

King Arthur’s Bones, by The Medieval Murderers

1191. During excavation work at Glastonbury Abbey, an ancient leaden cross is discovered buried several feet below ground. Inscribed on the cross are the words: Hic iacet sepultus inclitus rex arturius … Here lies buried the renowned King Arthur. Beneath the cross are skeletal remains. Could these really be the remains of the legendary King Arthur and his queen, Guinevere?

As the monks debate the implications of this extraordinary discovery, the bones disappear – spirited away by the mysterious Guardians, determined to keep the king’s remains safe until the ancient legend is fulfilled and Arthur returns to protect his country in the hour of its greatest need.

A missing right hand. A gang of ruthless bodysnatchers. Brother accused of killing brother. As the secret of the bones’ hiding place is passed from generation to generation, those entrusted to safeguard Arthur’s remains must withstand treachery, theft, blackmail and murder in order to keep the legend intact.

Hailey’s War, by Jodi Compton

Twenty-four-year-old Hailey Cain has dropped out of the US Military Academy for reasons she won’t reveal. She has had to leave Los Angeles and it would be too big a risk for her to return. Now working as a bike messenger in San Francisco, Hailey keeps a low profile, until her high school best friend Serena Delgadillo makes a call that will turn her whole life upside-down.

Serena is the head of an all-female gang on the rough streets of LA. She wants Hailey to escort the cousin of a recently murdered gang member across the border to Mexico. It’s a mission that will nearly cost Hailey her life, causing her to choose more than once between loyalty and lawlessness, and forcing her to confront two very big secrets in her past…

An Unsuitable Job for a Woman, by P.D. James

Meet Cordelia Gray: twenty-two, tough, intelligent and now sole inheritor of the Pryde Detective Agency. Her first assignment finds her hired by Sir Ronald Callender to investigate the death of his son Mark, a young Cambridge student found hanged in mysterious circumstances. Required to delve into the hidden secrets of the Callender family, Cordelia soon realizes it is not a case of suicide, and that the truth is entirely more sinister.

Do not on any account miss this if you want both a good read and some absolutely superb writing.
John Braine

The Skull Beneath the Skin, by P.D. James

Hired to protect a beautiful but neurotic actress, Cordelia Gray soon becomes embroiled in a case as dangerous to her own life as it is mysterious.

Clarissa Lisle hopes to make a spectacular comeback in a production of ‘The Duchess of Malfi’, to be played in Ambrose Gorringe’s sinister castle at Courcy Island. Cordelia is there to ensure her safety following the appearance of a number of poison-pen letters. But it soon becomes clear that all are in danger. Trapped within the walls of the Gothic Castle, the treacherous past of the island re-emerges, and everyone seems to have a motive for sending Clarissa ‘down, down to hell’.

Marking the return of Cordelia Gray, The Skull Beneath the Skin is a complex mystery which more than lives up to its predecessor, An Unsuitable Job for a Woman.

A Taste for Death, by P.D. James

Two men lie in a welter of blood in the vestry of St Matthew’s Church, Paddington, their throats brutally slashed. One is Sir Paul Berowne, a baronet and recently resigned Minister of the Crown, the other an alcoholic vagrant. Dalgliesh and his team, set up to investigate crimes of particular sensitivity, are faced with a case of extraordinary complexity as they discover the Berowne family’s veneer of prosperous gentility conceals ugly and dangerous secrets.

Death of an Expert Witness, by P.D. James

When a young girl is found murdered in a field, the scientific examination of the exhibits is just a routine job for the staff of Hoggatt’s forensic science laboratory. But nothing could have prepared them for the brutal death of one of their own. When the senior biologist is found dead in his laboratory Commander Dalgliesh is called to the bleak fens of East Anglia, where the murderer is lying in wait to strike again.

Innocent Blood, by P.D. James

At eighteen, Philippa Palfrey, the confident adopted daughter of a celebrated academic, exercises her right to find the names of her real parents. What she uncovers is a terrible secret that will for ever change her life.

The Genesis Plague

At the dawn of civilization… An exotic stranger appears in a Mesopotamian village and is venerated as a goddess… until she unleashes a horror beyond anything humankind has ever known.

At the sunset of civilization… A mercenary unit in northern Iraq, led by Sergeant Jason Yaeger, has trapped radical Islam’s most wanted target in a mysterious cave that sits at the heart of the Genesis story. When a Marine platoon seeks to control the extraction mission, a threat far more ominous is found lurking beneath the mountains.

Meanwhile in Boston, Massachusetts, Agent Thomas Flaherty helps archaeologist Brooke Thompson escape assassination by a Las Vegas televangelist intent on using the cave’s deepest secret to bring the Middle East to its knees.

King Arthur’s Bones, by The Medieval Murderers

1191. During excavation work at Glastonbury Abbey, an ancient leaden cross is discovered buried several feet below ground. Inscribed on the cross are the words: Hic iacet sepultus inclitus rex arturius … Here lies buried the renowned King Arthur. Beneath the cross are skeletal remains. Could these really be the remains of the legendary King Arthur and his queen, Guinevere?

As the monks debate the implications of this extraordinary discovery, the bones disappear – spirited away by the mysterious Guardians, determined to keep the king’s remains safe until the ancient legend is fulfilled and Arthur returns to protect his country in the hour of its greatest need.

A missing right hand. A gang of ruthless bodysnatchers. Brother accused of killing brother. As the secret of the bones’ hiding place is passed from generation to generation, those entrusted to safeguard Arthur’s remains must withstand treachery, theft, blackmail and murder in order to keep the legend intact.

Hailey’s War, by Jodi Compton

Twenty-four-year-old Hailey Cain has dropped out of the US Military Academy for reasons she won’t reveal. She has had to leave Los Angeles and it would be too big a risk for her to return. Now working as a bike messenger in San Francisco, Hailey keeps a low profile, until her high school best friend Serena Delgadillo makes a call that will turn her whole life upside-down.

Serena is the head of an all-female gang on the rough streets of LA. She wants Hailey to escort the cousin of a recently murdered gang member across the border to Mexico. It’s a mission that will nearly cost Hailey her life, causing her to choose more than once between loyalty and lawlessness, and forcing her to confront two very big secrets in her past…

Willing Flesh, by Adam Creed

Christmas is coming and D. I. Staffe is trying to make a go of it with his on-off girlfriend, Sylvie, when a murdered woman is discovered in a swanky City hotel room – she is Elena Danya, a blonde and beguiling high-end prostitute.

As Staffe becomes obsessed with Danya, a friend of hers, an altogether more down-at-heel working girl, is found dead and their mutual aristocratic friend and bad-girl, Arabella, goes missing.

The evidence begins to point to a voyeuristic predator, Graham Blears, but Staffe is not convinced and is increasingly drawn away from the city and towards the roots of a tangled ménage involving a City banker, a Russian oligarch and a Turkish playboy, forcing himself down into the higher echelons of the British establishment, whose barricades begin to stonewall the investigation.

When his Chief, Pennington, cuts him loose, Staffe becomes the hunted instead of the hunter, with grave consequences for the women who are close to him.

Win a copy in the May competition!

The Black Monastery, by Stav Sherez

People used to come to the small Greek island of Palassos for the historic ruins. Now they come to take drugs and party all night. But the horrific ritual murder of a boy in the grounds of an old monastery brings back memories of two similar deaths in the mid-1970s, and of a mysterious cult who once dwelt in the island’s interior, memories the island has tried hard to forget.

As Nikos, the police chief who has been persuaded back to his home island for the final years of his career, begins his investigation, two Brits arrive on the island: the bestselling crime writer Kitty Carson, on a break from the pressures of work and her strained marriage, and Jason an aspiring writer with a secret of his own. When a second body is discovered – further endangering the island’s lucrative tourist trade – these three characters are thrown together, as the gruesome secrets of the past begin to emerge.

Brilliantly paced, and featuring a memorable cast of characters, The Black Monastery is a blistering portrait of paradise gone wrong.

• Listen to an interview with the author.

No Angel, by Jay Dobyns

In 2001 Jay Dobyns infiltrated a Hells Angels chapter operating in Arizona, in a highly secretive ATF investigation code named Operation Black Biscuit. The aim was simple: to examine the criminal underbelly of the world’s most famous biker group, and bring a major case against them. The reality, however, was much more complicated. In the twenty-one months that he spent inside the club, Dobyns became seduced by the outlaw lifestyle: seduced by the physical menace that comes with wearing the patch; seduced by riding his Harley down the highway at 100 miles an hour, eight bikes to a column, one bike’s wheels 18 inches from the next; and seduced by the intense bonds he forms within the club, where friends lay down their lives for each other. No Angel is a thrilling, adrenaline-fuelled ride of a book, which lifts the lid on the world’s most infamous underworlds.

• Win a copy in the May competition!

Siberian Education, by Nicolai Lilin

Set in a small and tight-knit community of ‘honest criminals’ in a remote part of Russia, this is a tale of an extreme boyhood – exotic, violent and completely unique. Told from the perspective of a boy gaining his ‘education’ as a member of the Mafia-like Urkas in Transnistria, we get a glimpse inside the strict codes of honour and the rituals of this bizarre community. Besides having a deep distrust of outsiders – especially the police – the community is split into ‘honest’ and ‘dishonest’ criminals and crime is all-pervasive. Even their youngest children are taught to understand violence and when it is appropriate to use it. By the age of six, Nicolai Lilin is given his first ‘pike knife’ by an uncle and by the age of twelve he has been convicted of attempted murder. A huge bestseller in Lilin’s current home country, Italy, Siberian Education is an extraordinary snapshot of a violent world.

• Watch an interview with the author.

A Matter of Life and Death, by Sue Armstrong

A Matter of Life and Death profiles some of the world’s most eminent and pioneering pathologists. This is a hidden world, yet one we will all inevitably encounter at some time in our lives, for pathology lies at the cornerstone of modern medicine. It is pathologists who are responsible for recognising new diseases such as AIDS, SARS or Bird Flu, and for diagnosing which cancer a patient is suffering from. And it is pathologists who must explain the cause of death at the autopsy table. A Matter of Life and Death tells fascinating stories of mysterious illnesses and miraculous scientific breakthroughs. But it is also crammed full of extraordinary characters – from the forensic anthropologist with his own Body Farm in Tennessee to the doctor who had a lung and heart transplant and ended up using her own lungs for research.

A Matter of Life and Death: Inside the Hidden World of the Pathologist

A Matter of Life and Death profiles some of the world’s most eminent and pioneering pathologists. This is a hidden world, yet one we will all inevitably encounter at some time in our lives, for pathology lies at the cornerstone of modern medicine. It is pathologists who are responsible for recognising new diseases such as AIDS, SARS or bird flu, and for diagnosing which cancer a patient is suffering from. And it is pathologists who must explain the cause of death at the autopsy table. A Matter of Life and Death tells fascinating stories of mysterious illnesses and miraculous scientific breakthroughs. But it is also crammed full of extraordinary characters – from the forensic anthropologist with his own Body Farm in Tennessee to the doctor who had a heart-and-lung transplant and ended up using her own lungs for research.

The Last Train to Scarborough, by Andrew Martin

A riveting new adventure for Jim Stringer, Andrew Martin’s celebrated ‘Steam Detective’.

It is March 1914, and Jim Stringer is uneasy about his next assignment.

It’s not so much the prospect of a Scarborough lodging house in the gloomy off-season that bothers him, or even the fact that the last railwayman to stay in the house has disappeared without trace. It’s more that his governor, Chief Inspector Saul Weatherhill, seems to be deliberately holding back details of the case – and that he’s been sent to Scarborough with a trigger-happy assistant. The lodging house is called Paradise, but, as Jim discovers, it’s hardly that in reality. It is, however, home to the seductive and beautiful Amanda Rickerby, a woman evidently capable of derailing Jim’s marriage – and a good deal more besides. As a storm brews in Scarborough, it becomes increasingly unlikely that Jim will ever ride the train back to York.

Winterland, by Alan Glynn

The worlds of business, politics and crime collide when two men with the same name, from the same family, die on the same night – one death is a gangland murder, the other, apparently, a road accident. Was it a coincidence? That’s the official version of events. But then a family member, Gina Rafferty, starts asking questions.

Devastated by her loss, Gina’s grief is tempered, and increasingly fuelled, by anger. The more she hears that it was all a coincidence – that gangland violence is commonplace; that people die on our roads every day of the week – the less she’s prepared to accept it. Told repeatedly that she should stop asking questions, she becomes more determined than ever to establish a connection between the two deaths – and in doing so she embarks on a path that will push certain powerful people to their limits.

A Razor Wrapped in Silk,by R. N. Morris

St. Petersburg. 1870. A child factory worker is mysteriously abducted. A society beauty is sensationally murdered. Two very different crimes show up the deep fissures in Russian society during the late tsarist period. The first is barely noticed by the authorities. The latter draws the full investigative might of St Petersburg’s finest, led by magistrate Porfiry Petrovich.

The dead woman had powerful friends – including at least one member of the Romanov family – so when the tsar’s notorious secret police become involved, it seems that both crimes may have a political – not to say revolutionary – aspect, which takes Porfiry inside the Winter Palace for a confrontation with the Tsar himself. The usually incisive magistrate grows increasingly unsure what to believe, who to trust and how to proceed. His very life appears to be in danger, though from whom he can’t be sure.

Shroud for a Nightingale, by P.D. James

The young women of Nightingale House are there to learn to nurse and comfort the suffering. But when one of the students plays patient in a demonstration of nursing skills, she is horribly, brutally killed. Another student dies equally mysteriously and it is up to Adam Dalgliesh to unmask a killer who has decided to prescribe murder as the cure for all ills.

The Black Tower, by P.D. James

Commander Dalgliesh is recuperating from a life-threatening illness when he receives a call for advice from an elderly friend who works as a chaplain in a home for the disabled on the Dorset coast. Dalgliesh arrives to discover that Father Baddeley has recently and mysteriously died, as has one of the patients at Toynton Grange. Evidently the home is not quite the caring community it purports to be. Dalgliesh is determined to discover the truth of his friend’s death, but further fatalities follow and his own life is in danger as he unmasks the evil at the heart of Toynton Grange.

Devices and Desires, by P. D. James

When Commander Adam Dalgliesh visits Larksoken, a remote headland community on the Norfolk coast in the shadow of a nuclear power station, he expects to be engaged only in the sad business of tying up his aunt’s estate. But the peace of Larksoken is illusory. A serial killer known as the Whistler is terrorising the neighbourhood and Dalgliesh is drawn into the lives of the headlanders when it quickly becomes apparent that the Whistler isn’t the only murderer at work under the sinister shadow of the power station.

Unnatural Causes, by P. D. James

Superintendent Adam Dalgliesh had been looking forward to a quiet holiday at his aunt’s cottage on Monksmere Head, one of the furthest-flung spots on the remote Suffolk coast. With nothing to do other than enjoy long wind-swept walks, tea in front of the crackling wood fire and hot buttered toast, Dalgliesh was relishing the thought of a well-earned break.

However, all hope of peace is soon shattered by murder. The mutilated body of a local crime writer, Maurice Seaton, floats ashore in a drifting dinghy to drag Adam Dalgliesh into a new and macabre investigation.