The 2026 Shamus Awards Finalists

The finalists for 2026 The Private Eye Writers Of America Shamus Awards, for private eye novels and short stories first published in the United States in 2025, have just been announced. The winners will be announced at the 2026 Bouchercon‘s Opening Ceremonies in Calgary, Alberta.

BEST PI HARDCOVER

The Big Empty by Robert Crais (G.P. Putnam’s Sons)

Photograph by Brian Freeman (Blackstone Publishing)

Hatchet Girls by Joe R. Lansdale (Little, Brown and Company)

Gray Dawn by Walter Mosley (Little, Brown and Company)

Mirage City by Lev AC Rosen (Minotaur Books)

BEST FIRST P.I. NOVEL

Chase Harlem by Elise Burke Brown (Rising Action Publishing)

Miles in Time by Lee Mathew Goldberg (Wise Wolf Books)

Where the Bones Lie by Nick Kolakowski (Datura Books)

Shadow of the Eternal Watcher by Josh Mendoza (Inkshares)

The Witch’s Orchard by Archer Sullivan (Minotaur Books)

BEST ORIGINAL PAPERBACK P.I. NOVEL

The Hook and the Eye by Raymond Benson (Ian Fleming Publications)

Sunday or the Highway by Cindy Fazzi (Thomas & Mercer)

City Lights by Claire M. Johnson (Level Best Books)

Midnight Streets by Phil Lecomber (Titan Books)

Catch Me on a Blue Day by M.E. Proctor (Shotgun Honey Books)

BEST P.I. SHORT STORY

“The Roosevelt Affair” by Adam Meyer (Crimeucopia – Not So Frail Detective Agency, Murderous Ink Press)

“The One Cry” by F.H. Batacan (Accidents Happen, Soho Crime)

“Dr. Bones” by Libby Cudmore (Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, May/June)

“Hours on the Phone” by Gregory Fallis (Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, July/August)

“The Shadows” by Charles John Harper (Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, May/June)

Forthcoming Books from Head of Zeus

 January 2026

Robert Ludlum's Bourne's Revenge is by Brian Freeman. Killing is part of Jason's job. But this time it's personal. When his lover, Johanna, is murdered, Jason Bourne finds himself drawn into a murky world as he pursues a revenge more personal than anything he has felt before. But can he unravel the reasons behind Johanna's death in time, or will more people die unnecessarily?

Are you ready to enter the darkness? Discover the origins of Agent Pendergast... FBI Special Agent Dwight Chambers has lost everything. His partner, his wife, and his footing at the Bureau. Now, he’s been assigned to mentor a new recruit who just might be the final nail in his coffin. A.X.L. Pendergast is an enigmatic young agent with a complicated past. His recklessness soon drags Chambers into chaos and gets them both suspended. For Pendergast, this is a chance to investigate a peculiar murder in Mississippi. With Chambers grudgingly in tow, the two agents discover a string of grisly, ritualistic killings that defy any known pattern. Thanks to Pendergast’s unorthodox brilliance, they manage to find the killer. Then the true horror begins. Pendergast: The Beginning is by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child.

February 2026

The Harvey Girl is by Dana Stabenow. Welcome to the gilded age where not everything glitters. 1890. The New Mexico Territory is a lawless frontier where criminals steal money and land alike with impunity. Everyone wears a six-gun and is ready and willing to draw it. In the new city of Montaña Roja, Fred Harvey’s growing empire is threatened by the robberies plaguing his newest Harvey House restaurant. To get justice, he needs a skilled detective to go undercover and procure answers to questions the law will not ask. The assignment falls to Clare Wright, a young Pinkerton agent. Disguised as one of Harvey’s famous hostesses, Clare travels west where she risks being exposed at every step of her investigation. To get answers – and to get out alive – there are only two things she can trust: her instincts, and her derringer.

March 2026

When Joe Pickett is shot down his daughters step up. Marybeth Pickett gets the call she has always dreaded: her husband Joe is unconscious after being shot in the head. He was found slumped behind the wheel of his pickup at a crossroads linking the ranches of three powerful families. Each have reasons to want the Wyoming Game Warden dead, but with no witnesses, no one knows who pulled the trigger. As Joe clings to life, Marybeth keeps watch while their daughters – Sheridan, Lucy, and April – play the role their father cannot, investigating each family to expose long-held grudges and reveal the truth. But the sisters must be careful – because if this was a warning, what might the attackers do to the people Joe loves most? The Crossroads is by C J Box.

The Dark Time is by Nick Petrie. When Peter Ash's friend June Cassidy asks him for a deeply personal favour, it leads him into the murderous depths of a sinister organisation. A journalist - a close friend of June's - has been receiving serious death threats, threats which extend to her teenage daughter. Peter must leave Wisconsin for Washington, heading to Seattle to make sure both mother and daughter are safe. When aspects of the threats, already credible, prove true, Peter must dig deep to discover the perpetrators. His search reveals a doomsday cult led by a shadowy figure with a death-wish to cause untold mayhem.  To save innocent people, Peter is willing to face the ultimate sacrifice. But will one man be enough to stop the carnage?

A decades-old murder. A haunting legacy. A plot for revenge. Stella Darnell knows her partner Jack is hiding something. After following him one evening, she discovers he’s been consulting a psychic in a desperate attempt to reach his dead mother. A sceptic by nature, and feeling betrayed by his lies, Stella fears what this means for their relationship. Seeking distraction, she accepts DI Toni Kemp’s invitation to join her for a holiday in a small village in Gloucestershire. But the visit is derailed when a body is discovered at a shrine where a woman died decades earlier. Drawn into the investigation, Stella must confront the legacy of a once-famous psychic whose shadow still hangs over Prestbury – while in the darkness, someone bent on revenge waits patiently for the perfect moment to strike... The Shrine is by Lesley Thomson.

Diplomat Eric Petrosian has returned to Sarajevo, twenty years after the horrors of the Srebrenica massacre which took the life of his friend. The spectre of war again hangs over the Balkans. The Bosnian Serb leader is now threatening to pull Bosnia apart in a bloody struggle for control. Pulling the strings from the shadows is a ruthless organised crime figure. As Eric is dragged deeper into the political maelstrom, he uncovers an ambitious plot of blackmail and treachery and faces an impossible choice: use that information to atone for the past – or use it to shape the future. The Wolf of Sarajevo is by Matthew Palmer.

May 2026

Even paradise has shadows.  July 2025. Tash and Mark host a birthday weekend for their son, Dom, at their luxury villa on a Greek island, inviting a select list of people to celebrate. As the drinks flow, the unthinkable happens when Tash’s sister drowns, vanishing without a trace. No one suspects foul play – except for Tash.  July 2026. One year on, Tash hosts a party for the same guests who were there when Emma died. She's learned that they're all hiding something - even Dom's behaviour has changed since that night. She knows that answers lie on the island and no one is leaving until she gets the truth. But if the villa holds the secrets to what happened, it also hides a killer.. Her Perfect Escape is by Rachel Wolf.

The Spy and the Snake is by M J Robotham. One mission. One fake husband. One very real problem. Maggie Flynn has finally earned her place at of MI5—but with promotion comes paperwork. No more disguises, no more danger, just meetings, memos, and the quiet realisation that life feels a little too safe. With her daughter away at university and her spirited mother pursuing her own adventures, Maggie’s days in London are starting to feel decidedly ordinary. So when the chance arises to return to the field, she doesn’t hesitate. The assignment: fly to Budapest and pose as the wife of a notorious British defector in order to smuggle him back to the UK. It should be a straightforward operation. But Maggie Flynn has never done straightforward—and what’s waiting in Budapest is anything but routine. As Cold War tensions simmer and shadows linger on every corner, Maggie finds herself navigating a city steeped in secrets—and drawn to a mysterious stranger who may endanger the mission… or steal her heart.

June 2026

The Red Verdict is by James Comey.US Attorney Nora Carleton must confront a murderous espionage plot aimed at stealing cutting-edge American technology. The unmissable new legal thriller from the former director of the FBI. When an influential defense company executive sprinkles hot pepper flakes on his penne vodka at an exclusive restaurant in Morningside Heights, Manhattan, little does he know that the first bite will be the last thing he ever tastes.  The fatal meal has been spiked with Novichok, a potent poison guaranteed to do maximum damage to its victims. The FBI investigates the murder and soon discovers a Russian-originated plot aimed at stealing cutting-edge drone technology from US defense contractors. US Attorney Nora Carleton and her team must put together the case of their lives to get a jury to convict the perpetrators - but in a modern world wrought with division, can they secure the verdict they hope for?

They had the perfect marriage. Until she was found alive… 2020. During a friend’s birthday trip, Kaleigh Creedy’s life was torn apart when she and her two friends, Emma and Leila, were violently attacked in the middle of the night. Only Kaleigh managed to escape. 2025. Now married to a famous footballer and a rising star in her own right, the former beauty queen has tried to put the terror of that night behind her. But just when Kaleigh thinks she’s safe, the unthinkable happens… Emma is found alive, and her version of events doesn’t match Kaleigh’s. Her perfect life is unravelling, the tabloids are circling, but who will you believe? Scandal is by Kelly Mancaruso and Kristina Mancaruso.

Books to Look Forward to from Head of Zeus

 July 2021

Cabin Fever is by Alex Dahl. Alone and isolated in a vast Scandinavian forest, a therapist begins to read her client's novel manuscript, only to discover the main character is terrifyingly familiar... You are her therapist. Kristina is a successful therapist in central Oslo. She spends her days helping clients navigate their lives with a cool professionalism that has got her to the top.She is your client. But when her client Leah, a successful novelist, arrives at her office clearly distressed, begging Kristina to come to her remote cabin in the woods, she feels the balance begin to slip.But out here in the woods. When Leah fails to turn up to her next two sessions, Kristina reluctantly heads out into the wilderness to find her.Nothing is as it seems. Alone and isolated, Kristina finds Leah's unfinished manuscript, and as she reads she realises the main character is terrifyingly familiar...

A blockbuster thriller set against one of the most horrific scenes in the Second World War. On Sunday 22nd June 1941 at 03.05, three-and-a-half million Axis troops burst into the Soviet Union along a 1,800-mile front to launch Operation Barbarossa. The southern thrust of the attack was aimed at the Caucuses and the oil fields beyond. Kyiv was the biggest city to stand in their way. Within six weeks, the city was under siege. Surrounded by Panzers, bombed and shelled day and night, Soviet Commissar Nikita Krushchev was amongst the senior Soviet officials co-ordinating the defence. Amid his cadre of trusted personnel is British defector Bella Menzies, once with MI5, now with the NKVD, the Soviet secret police. With the fall of the city inevitable, the Soviets plan a bloody war of terror that will extort a higher toll on the city's inhabitants than the invaders. As the noose tightens, Bella finds herself trapped, hunted by both the Russians and the Germans. Kyiv is by Graham Hurley.

Robert Ludlum's ™ The Bourne Treachery is by Brian Freeman. Three years ago, Jason Bourne embarked on a mission in Estonia with his partner and lover, a fiery Treadstone agent codenamed Nova. Their job was to rescue a Russian double agent, recently been smuggled out of St. Petersburg in the midst of an FSB manhunt. They failed. Their charge died at the hands of a shadowy assassin. Now, three years later, everything has changed. Nova is gone, killed in a mass shooting in Las Vegas. Bourne is a lone operative working in the shadows for Treadstone. He's awaiting his next assignment when his handler bring him shocking news.The Estonian mission was a set up. The double agent is still alive, deep in hiding from the Russian State Intelligence Agency. In order to find her, Bourne will have to come face to face with the errors of his past - and the death of the woman he love. And with the body count rising. he comes to an invevitable conclusion: Some secrets should stay buried.

Lone wolf Evan Ryder works for a clandestine, black-ops arm of the Department of Defence, dedicated to protecting America and its people. Or at least, she did. Having thwarted the international fascist syndicate known as Nemesis, Evan has returned to Washington D.C. to discover her division shut down, and her dead sister's children missing. Among the supporters of Nemesis were a cabal of American billionaires, whose influence reaches to the highest office in the country: the President of the United States. If Evan is to take them on and hunt down her family's kidnappers, she will have to learn to work with her former boss Ben Butler, and navigate their tricky past. The search will take them from the ports of Istanbul to an ancient church deep within the Carpathian Mountains of Romania. And all the while, an unimaginable enemy stalks in the shadows, an adversary whose secretive past will upend Evan's entire world - and might just annihilate her. The Kobalt Dossier is by Eric Van Lustbader.

August 2021

The Soul Breaker is by Sebastien Fitzek. The Soul Breaker destroys his victims. He doesn't kill them, or mutilate them. But he leaves them completely dead inside, paralysed and catatonic. His only trace a note left in their hands. There are three known victims when suddenly the abductions stop. The Soul Breaker has tired of his game, it seems. Meanwhile, a man has been found in the snow outside an exclusive psychiatric clinic. He has no recollection of who he is, or why he is there. Unable to match him to any of the police's missing people, the nurses call him Casper. Casper makes little progress regaining his memory, but he grows restless and wants to leave the clinic to piece together the few clues to his life. But the weather has taken a turn for the worse, and the clinic becomes completely cut off to the world outside. No one is able to reach the clinic, and its staff and patients cannot leave. So when the head psychiatrist is found trembling, naked and distraught, with a slip of paper clasped in her hands, it seems somehow the Soul Breaker has returned...

September 2021

The Man on Hackpen Hill is by J S Monroe. It isn't unusual for crop circles to appear overnight on Hackpen Hill. In this part of Wiltshire, where golden wheat fields stretch for miles, the locals have got used to discovering strange mathematical patterns stamped into the earth. But this time, it's different. Not only because this particular design of dramatic spiralling hexagons has never been seen before. But because of the dead body positioned precisely in the centre of the circle. DI Silas Hart, of Swindon Police, is at a loss. Only Jim, a scientist at secretive government laboratory Porton Down, knows the chilling truth about the man on Hackpen Hill. And he wants Bella, a trainee journalist on her first ever story, to tell the world. But Silas has other ideas - and a boss intent on a cover up. As Bella and Jim race against time, dark forces conspire against them, leading them to confront the reality of their own past and a world in which nothing is as it seems.

October 2021

Lemon is by Kwon Yeo-sun. In the summer of 2002, nineteen-year-old Kim Hae-on was murdered in what became known as the High School Beauty Murder. There were two suspects: Shin Jeongjun, who had a rock-solid alibi, and Han Manu, to whom no evidence could be pinned. The case went cold. Seventeen years pass without justice, and the grief and uncertainty take a cruel toll on her younger sister, Da-on, in particular. Unable to move on with her life, Da-on tries in her own twisted way to recover some of what she's lost, ultimately setting out to find the truth of what happened. Told at different points in time from the perspectives of Da-on and two of Hae-on's classmates, Lemon is a piercing psychological portrait that takes the shape of a crime novel.

November 2021

'Good morning. It's 7.35 AM. And you're listening to your biggest nightmare.' This morning a dangerous psychopath is playing an old game with new rules. He's taken six people hostage at Berlin's leading radio station. Every hour, a telephone will ring somewhere in Berlin. Maybe it will be in your house. Or your office. And if you pick up and answer with the new slogan, then a hostage will be set free. Sounds fair, doesn't it? Police psychologist Ira Samin is rushed to the scene, where she must negotiate live on air. With the nation listening, the kidnapper makes an impossible demand. Can she give him what he wants? And all the while, somewhere in the city... a telephone is ringing. Amok is by Sebastien Fitzek.

Dohany Street is by Adam Lebor. Budapest, January 2016. The Danube is grey and half-frozen, covered with ice, and the city seems to have gone into hibernation. But not for Detective Balthazar Kovacs. He has been called out to investigate the disappearance of a young Israeli historian, Elad Harari. Harari was working in the archives of the city's Jewish museum, researching what happened to the assets of the Hungarian Jews murdered in the Holocaust. His work could bring justice to the families of those who died, but it seems not everyone welcomed his probing into the country's darkest period. Balthazar soon finds that there are powerful forces out to sabotage his investigation, as bizarre warnings escalate to violent attacks. When they finally make their demand, Balthazar will be forced to make an impossible decision: give up real evidence of horrific wrongdoing in Hungary's past, or see the young historian die.

Books to Look Forward to from Head of Zeus

July 2020

The Englishman is by David Gilman.  A clandestine war on the desert border of Mali and Algeria; murder and kidnap on the suburban streets of West London; a Moscow CID police inspector investigating the assassination of four of her fellow officers by the Russian mafia; a young MI6 officer facing the possibility that a long-running operation has been fatally compromised: connecting them all is the Englishman - Dan Raglan, outsider, exile, one-time member of the French Foreign Legion, fully trained killer. Raglan's quest for answers will become a quest for vengeance. It will lead him to the winter-ravaged wasteland of the Sverdlovskaya Oblast and Penal Code #74, a place that holds Russia's most brutal murderers. A place of death and retribution. How will he get in? More importantly, how will he get out?

Have you seen Lucia Blix? Lucia went home from school for a playdate with her new friend Josie. Later that evening, Lucia's mother Elisa dropped her overnight things round and kissed her little girl goodnight. That was the last time she saw daughter. The next morning, when Lucia's dad arrived to pick her up, the house was empty. No furniture, no family, no Lucia. Playdate by Alex Dahl puts a microscope on a seemingly average, seemingly happy family plunged into a life-altering situation. Who has taken their daughter, and why?

Robert Ludlum’s The Bourne Evolution is by Brian Freeman.  After the death of his wife in a

mass shooting, secret agent Jason Bourne is convinced that there is more to her murder than it seems. Worse, he believes that the agency that trained him is behind the killing. Bourne goes rogue, leaving Treadstone behind and taking on a new mission to infiltrate and expose an anarchist group, Medusa. But when a congresswoman is assassinated in New York, Bourne is framed for the crime, and he finds himself alone and on the run. In his quest to stay one step ahead of his enemies, Bourne teams up with a journalist, Abbey Laurent, to figure out who was behind the frame-up, and to learn as much as he can about the ever-growing threat of the mysterious Medusa group. As more and more enemies begin to hunt Bourne, it's a race against the clock to discover who led him into a trap... and what their next move may be.

Hunter Killer is by Brad Taylor.  They're one step ahead. They're killing his team. He's coming for them. The Taskforce were once apex predators, an unrivalled hunting machine that decimated those out to harm the USA, but they may have met their match. While Pike is preparing to join the team on a counter-terrorist mission in South America, a friend is killed in South Carolina. The authorities believe it was an accident, but Pike suspects the attack was meant as a message to him.   When he loses contact with the team in South America, Pike becomes convinced the Taskforce is under attack. His men are the closest thing to family he has, which means he will do anything - even ignore direct orders to stand down - to find them.

August 2020

The Package is by Sebastien Fitzek.  All you've done is taken in a parcel for a neighbour. You have no idea what you've let into your home.  Emma's the one that got away. The only survivor of a killer known in the tabloids as 'the barber' - because of the trophies he takes from his victims. Or she thinks she was. The police aren't convinced. Nor is her husband. She never even saw her tormentor properly, but now she recognises him in every man. Questioning her sanity, she gives up her job as a doctor in the local hospital and retreats from the world. It is better to stay at home. Quiet. Anonymous. Safe. He won't find her here. And all she did was take a parcel for a neighbour. She has no idea what she's let into her home.

September 2020

The Night of the Flood is by Zoe Somerville.  An atmospheric literary thriller set in north Norfolk in the shadow of the Cold War, in which a love triangle turns murderous. Summer, 1952. Verity Frost, stranded on her family farm on the Norfolk coast, is caught between two worlds: the devotion of her childhood friend Arthur, just returned from National Service, and a strange new desire to escape it all. Arthur longs to escape too, but only with Verity by his side. Into their world steps Jack, a charismatic American pilot flying secret reconnaissance missions off the North Sea coast. But where Verity sees adventure and glamour, Arthur sees only deception. As the water levels rise to breaking point, this tangled web of secrets, lies and passion will bring about a crime that will change all their lives.

'Danny ‘Abs’ Cruikshank was the biggest reality star in the UK – the lovable star of hit reality show Laid In Essex! But during a weekend break, Abs and his friends were questioned by police after they were the last people to see a missing girl alive. Three years later, the man who captured the hearts of millions of TV viewers is reduced to opening a Quid Store on the high street. And when one of Abs’s mates is murdered, it’s clear someone is targeting him and his friends. DI Sasha Dawson and her team must race against the clock to find the killer before they strike again, and discover what happened to Rhiannon Jenkins on the night she vanished… The truth may save Abs - or bury him. The Woman in the Wood is by M.K. Hill.'

Fate: Death Notice 2 is by Zhou Haohui.  After the death of 'Eumenides', a former police student who was sending 'death notices' to unpunished criminals before brutally murdering them, the Chengdu Police Department assumed that the killing spree would stop. But the murders continue, leading the 4/18 task force to the terrifying truth: Eumenides had a protege. Captain Pei Tao and his task force redouble their efforts to catch this new opponent, but relationships become fraught. Can they trust each other?

October 2020

Marry in haste... Murder at leisure? London, 1888: Susannah rushes into marriage to a young and wealthy surgeon. After a passionate honeymoon, she returns home with her new husband wrapped around her little finger. But then everything changes. Thomas's behaviour becomes increasingly volatile and violent. He stays out all night, returning home bloodied and full of secrets. The gentle caresses she enjoyed on her wedding night are now just a honeyed memory. When the first woman is murdered in Whitechapel, Susannah's interest is piqued. But as she follows the reports of the ongoing hunt for the killer, her mind takes her down the darkest path imaginable. Every time Thomas stays out late, another victim is found dead. Is it coincidence? Or is her husband the man they call Jack the Ripper?  People of Abandoned Character is by Clare Whitfield.

November 2020

Passenger 23 is by Sebastien Fitzek.  On average 23 people a year disappear from the world's cruise ships. They are written off as accidents or suicides. But what if they're not?   Five years ago Martin Schwarz, a police psychologist, lost his wife and son. They were holidaying on a cruise ship when they simply vanished. A lacklustre investigation was unable to shed any light on what happened - murder-suicide being the coroner's verdict. It is a verdict that has haunted Martin ever since, blighting his life. But then he is contacted by an elderly woman, a writer, who claims to have information regarding their fate and wants him to come on board The Sultan of the Seas immediately.   She explains that his wife and son are not the only mother and child pair to have disappeared. Only a few months ago another mother and daughter also vanished. She believes there may be a serial killer on board.   But when the missing daughter reappears - carrying the teddy bear of Martin's missing son - it becomes apparent that the truth could be much, much worse...

A Galway Epiphany is by Ken Bruen.  Jack Taylor. He's the world's worst detective. Cases get solved not because of him, but despite him. He's an alcoholic, an addict, rude, obnoxious. And in very bad shape. And yet... He gets the job done... somehow, and he desperately wants to connect even though he'd never admit it. But now, He's getting old. Losing his hearing. Has a limp. You ask, Jesus, how much longer can he go on? Indeed.

Eleven guests. Three nights. One murderer...In a crumbling old mansion in the English countryside, eleven people gather, each one famous in their field. They have been invited for a three-day house party, to celebrate the launch of a ground breaking virtual reality game that promises to unite the worlds of technology, politics and the environment. DCI Marten Jansen has been summoned to join the house party. His instructions are to offer police protection in case of an outside attack. Instead, he finds simmering tensions, long-buried secrets - and a murderer in their midst...  Into the Fire is by Rachael Blok

The return of Cab Bolton

Today’s guest blog is by Brian Freeman.  Brian Freeman is an international bestselling author of psychological suspense novels.  His books have been sold in 46 countries and 20 languages.  Brian’s debut thriller, Immoral, won the Macavity Award and was a nominee for the Edgar®, Dagger, Anthony, and Barry awards for best first novel. 

Readers first met Cab Bolton in my sixth novel The Bone House — which was also my first novel not to feature Duluth police lieutenant Jonathan Stride.  I originally envisioned The Bone House as a stand-alone, but readers soon demanded to see more of this quirky Florida detective.

Well, after the pure stand-alone Spilled Blood (which won the 2013 Thriller Award for Best Hardcover Novel) and the new Stride novel The Cold Nowhere, Cab Bolton is finally back in an all-new thriller Season of Fear.

So how does Cab Bolton differ from the intense, introspective Jonathan Stride?

“Sarcasm doesn’t suit you,” Cab Bolton’s mother tells him.  “And yet I stick with it,” he replies.

 Cab isn’t your typical cop.  For one thing, he doesn’t look much like a cop. Imagine a young Peter O’Toole…absolutely amazing blue eyes, spiky blonde hair, skin so perfect you want to know what moisturizer he uses.  He’s crazy-tall and wouldn’t be caught dead in anything but an expensive suit.  He’s got money, thanks to his Hollywood mother, so he’s a cop not because he HAS to be but because he WANTS to be.  He enjoys the game.

The challenge.  He’s clever, and he’s good at it.  However, Cab may as well wear a sign that says: Does not play well with others.  He hates authority.  He doesn’t like rules.  He’s still figuring out what he wants to do with his life.  And for most of his 35 years, he’s been playing a game of hopscotch, jumping from place to place.  Other cops call him Catch-a-Cab Bolton, because he always has one foot out of town.

 He loves women (okay, he has that in common with Stride), but he doesn’t trust them.  He’s been betrayed by women before, and he grew up with a mother who didn’t know the meaning of commitment herself.  So his relationship with his girlfriend Lala is on-again, off-again.  There are fireworks in bed and fireworks when they argue.  Don’t make bets on a long-term affair for them.

His other relationship — with his actress mother Tarla — is just as problematic.  He lived on the other side of the world from her for years, but now she’s back in his life and trying to control it.  Tarla made Cab who he is, and he’s not entirely sure he likes that.  She also keeps secrets from him — like not telling him who his father was or why he has the odd name Cab.  So when people ask, he just makes up stories.

One thing about Cab…he’s genuinely charming.  Handsome.  Funny.  Sharp.  He banters with friends and enemies alike.  He’s secure about who he is and who he’s not.  He takes life seriously and himself not at all.  Which makes him impossible not to like.

Season of Fear also takes me to a new setting in hot, humid central Florida.  Most of my earlier

books (except the Vegas-based Stripped) have taken place in the American Midwest, with its dirt roads, bitter winters, and dark forests.  I love the drama of those settings, and I like to give readers a “you are there” feel, where they are dropped into the middle of every scene and can taste, touch, feel, and smell it happening all around them.

However, Florida weather is typically so darn nice that writers just seem to have fun with it.  Many of the great Florida writers are satirists (think Hiaasen) who deliciously profile the offbeat, Jimmy Buffett-meets-Lindsay Lohan attitude of Miami and the Keys.  Me, I wanted to see if I could export my love of dark settings to a place called the Sunshine State.  Needless to say, some really bad weather is headed for the coast.

Cab is a Florida detective, but will he stay that way?  Don’t count on it.  You can’t separate Jonathan Stride from his hometown of Duluth, but Cab doesn’t have the same roots.  He doesn’t have a hometown at all, and chances are, he’ll show up in other settings going forward.

Some readers are already asking: Will Jonathan Stride ever meet Cab Bolton? Will they — like Harry Bosch and Mickey Haller — turn out to have some secret family connection that bridges my two series?  No, I don’t think so.  Cab and Stride are opposites of each other in many ways.  Stride is the emotional hero — driven by his relationships, passionate (sometimes too passionate) about the victims he’s trying to help.  Cab isn’t comfortable with emotions.  He doesn’t like to go there, because usually, he doesn’t like what he sees.  And if Stride always seems tangled in a web of women, Cab is a loner at heart.  I think Cab and Stride would be oil and water if I put

them together in a book.

 

More information about Brian and his books can be found on his website.  You can also follow him on Twitter @bfreemanbooks and find him on Facebook.

Season of Fear by Brian Freeman is out now in hardback, £16.99 (Quercus)

Books to Look Forward to from Quercus

The Dark is by V M Giambanco and is due to be published in September 2014.  Seattle Homicide Detective Alice Madison is bound to jailed murderer John Cameron and attorney Nathan Quinn by a debt that cannot be repaid, by a nightmare that changed their lives forever.  When the remains of Quinn's younger brother - murdered when he was a boy - are discovered in a shallow grave, Madison vows to follow the trail of brutal deaths that leads to the truth.  A sadistic killer stalks the investigation, as Madison's own demons threaten her future career with the police and darkness closes in.  How far is she prepared to go to save a life?

Graham Weber has been the director of the CIA for less than a week when a Swiss kid in a dirty T-shirt walks into the American consulate in Hamburg and says the agency has been hacked, and he has a list of agents' names to prove it.  This is the moment a CIA director most dreads.  Weber turns to a charismatic (and unstable) young man named James Morris who runs the Internet Operations Centre.  He's the CIA's in-house geek.  Weber launches Morris on a mole hunt unlike anything in spy fiction one that takes the reader into the hacker underground of Europe and America and ends up in a landscape of paranoia and betrayal.  Like the new world of cyber-espionage from which it's drawn, The Director is a maze of deception and double dealing, about a world where everything is written in zeroes and ones and nothing can be trusted.  The CIA has belatedly discovered that this is not your father’s Cold War, and Weber must play catch-up, against the clock and an unknown enemy, in a game he does not yet understand.  The Director is by David Ignatius and is due to be published in June 2014.

The Arc of the Swallow is by Sissel-Jo Gazan and is due to be published in November 2014.When controversial Immunology Professor Kristian Storm is found hanged in his office his assistant Marie Skov refuses to believe that he has committed suicide. Grappling with Storm’s disputed legacy, she uncovers a scandal behind vaccination programmes in West Africa, leading her behind the scene of the cut-throat pharmaceutical industry.

The Root of all Evil is the second book in the Commissario Michele Balistreri series  by Roberto

Costantini and is due to be published in August 2014.  Tripoli, 1960s. During the years in which post-colonial Libya fell prey to the sprawling greed of the West, Michele Balistreri suffered a succession of blows that would scar him for life.  The death of his mother; the unspeakable horror that befell his best friend's family; his father's role in Gaddafi's ascent to power; and the innocent blood pact that would corrupt the course of his future.  Rome, 1982. In the wake of a ruinous blunder, a ground-down Commissario Balistreri escapes his regrets through sex, alcohol, and gambling.  His sole responsibilities are now a stilted investigation into the death of a South American student, and a tiresome obligation - as a gratitude to the man who saved his career - to a rising television starlet needing protection from the pitfalls of fame.  As the risks to this girl, Claudia Teodori, begin to rise along with her reputation, the sorrows of Balistreri's past also start to push back into his present.  Both of their fates are inextricably linked - and this driven, obsessive young woman must help this damaged detective fight a foe that follows her and refuses to forget him.

  

Research is by Philip Kerr and is due to be published in July 2014.  The rolling strip across the bottom of the screen shouts the news: BESTSELLING NOVELIST JOHN HOUSTON'S WIFE FOUND MURDERED AT THEIR LUXURY APARTMENT IN MONACO.  Houston is the richest writer in the world, a book factory publishing many bestsellers a year - so many that he can't possibly write them himself. He has a team that feeds off his talent; ghost writers, agents, publishers.  So when he decides to take a year out to write something of quality, a novel that will win prizes and critical acclaim, a lot of people stand to lose their livelihoods.  Now Houston, the prime suspect in his wife's murder, has disappeared.  He owns a boat and has a pilot's licence - he could be anywhere and there are many who'd like to find him.  First there's the police. If he's innocent, why did he flee?  Then again, maybe he was set up by one of his enemies.  The scenario reads like the plot of one of Houston's million-copy-selling thrillers...

A suspicious device is found inside a suitcase near a nursery in Holon, Tel Aviv.  The children are

taken to safety; a man is caught fleeing the scene.  Then comes the phone call: ‘thee suitcase is only the beginning.’  And it is.  Chaim Sara's son is glad not to be at nursery that day.  He has been bullied - there are bruises.  Chaim, taking care of both his children since the sudden absence of his wife, watches with anticipation as the police search for clues.  Inspector Avraham is thrust into the investigation, still haunted by the failure of his last case.  Witnesses are unforthcoming; suspects are eliminated.  Then a frightening act of violence shifts his understanding.  The suitcase has alerted him to a greater danger; one more private, and deeply disturbing.  No one believes in it but him.  And he will do anything to stop it in its tracks.  A Possibility of Violence is by D A Mishani and is due to be published in September 2014.

Bavaria, Germany, 1947.  At the end of the war, Afra Zauner returns to her parents' cottage on the edge of Mauther Forest.  Unmarried, and pregnant. As she struggles to raise her child, her father's shame, her mother's fury, and the loud whispers of the neighbours begin to weigh upon her.  She doesn't believe in her sin.  But everyone else does.  And someone brings judgement down upon her.  Many years later, Hermann Muller is throwing a drunk out of his tavern.  A traveller, who won't stop ranting about a murder left unsolved, about police who never investigated.  Out of curiosity, the file is reopened.  And in the cold light of hindsight, a chilling realisation creeps upon the community.  No one ever atoned for Afra's death.  But her story is waiting to be told. The Dark Meadow is by Andrea Maria Schenkel and is due to be published in August 2014.

Lake Wales, Central Florida.  Ten years ago, a political fundraiser became a bloodbath when a hooded assassin carried out a savage public execution.  Three men were massacred, casting a dark shadow over the Sunshine State.  A decade on, history is threatening to repeat itself.  The widow of one victim, herself now running for governor, has received an anonymous threat - a newspaper clipping from that fateful day, along with the chilling words 'I'm back.’  Florida detective Cab Bolton agrees to investigate the threat against this candidate, Diane Fairmont: an attractive politician who has a complicated history with Cab's mother, Hollywood actress Tarla Bolton - and with Cab himself.  But by doing so, Cab is entering dangerous waters.  Fairmont's political party is itself swamped in secrecy - a fact that, unknown to Cab, has led one of its junior staff to start asking very sensitive questions about the death of a party employee.  Both Cab and this young researcher, Peach Piper, are digging up the kind of dirt that ten years can't wash away.  And as the powerful crosswinds of state politics swirl around Cab and Peach, and the threat of a tropical storm hangs over Florida, this whirlwind of pressure and chaos will ultimately unearth a poisonous conspiracy, and reawaken a killer who has lain dormant for a decade.  Season of Fear is by Brian Freeman and is due to be published in July 2014.

Arab Jazz is by Karim Miské and is due to be published in August 2014.  Kosher sushi, kebabs, a second hand bookshop, and a bar: the 19th arrondissement in Paris is a cosmopolitan neighbourhood where multicultural citizens live, love, and worship alongside one another.  This peace is shattered when Ahmed Taroudant's melancholy daydreams are interrupted by the blood dripping from his upstairs neighbour's brutally mutilated corpse.  The violent murder of Laura Vignole, and the roast pork placed next to her, set imaginations ablaze across the neighbourhood, and Ahmed finds himself the prime suspect.  However detectives Rachel Kupferstein and Jean Hamelot have plenty to go on, as they uncover a volatile underworld of drug trafficking and religious fundamentalism.  In this his debut novel, Karim Miské demonstrates a masterful control of setting, as he moves seamlessly between the sensual streets of Paris and the synagogues of New York to reveal the truth behind a horrifying crime.

A devastating analysis of the human capacity for violence and redemption. 1957: a pacifist goes to war.  2008: a policeman on the warpath.  Set between Paris and Algeria, the overlapping fates of these two men reveal a dark conspiracy to mask the blackest chapter of French history, which can only be undone by the most unlikely hero: a thuggish ex-boxer who’ll do anything for cash . . . Loser’s Corner is by Antonin Varenne and is due to be published in December 2014.

Stockholm, September 2011.  Carina Dymek is on a fast track for promotion at the Swedish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, when she is approached by a stranger and given a USB stick containing a report to circulate in her department.  Unwittingly, she delivers a time bomb of classified information that sends her career up in flames and puts her on the radar of the security service, Sapo.  Tasked with investigating how Dymek gained access to the confidential report, the formidable Bente Jensen of Sapo is quietly approached by the British MI6, who have an undisclosed interest in the leak. She finds out that Dymek's boyfriend is an Egyptian Swedish national.  But it's MI6 who link his family to an extreme faction within the Muslim Brotherhood in Cairo. The case explodes into an international manhunt.  Liaising with the ruthless MI6, Bente uncovers the secretive plans contained in that leaked report: plans for an omnipotent Europe-wide Intelligence Service.  Forces hone in on Dymek, while Bente begins to suspect she is a red herring caught in a far wider net: one in which social media is abused for intelligence and civil rights are sacrificed to national security.  Into a Raging Blaze is by Andreas Norman and is due to be published in July 2014.

Four lives are about to come crashing together...Devastated by the murder of his sister in Soho seven years ago, Mark Davis travels to London to carry out an act of violence that he believes will avenge her death.  PhD student Stella is returning to London with her partner Paula to visit a fertility clinic.  But Stella is hiding a secret that could tear their lives apart.  Recovering alcoholic Seb has left his wild days behind him.  As he helps his wife prepare to launch her restaurant in Soho, he feels that his life is finally back on track. But a chance encounter with a stranger brings back tragic memories and puts his family in serious danger.  Kerstin Engel is a brilliant but troubled research analyst.  Haunted by the events of 7/7 when she narrowly escaped death, she has spent the last seven years carrying out a self-imposed penance.  But an unseen enemy lies in wait and threatens to destroy her career and her mind.  As crowds gather in Soho to mark the restaurant launch, a terrifying sequence of events brings these characters together and the last days of summer to a shocking end.  Summer Lies Bleeding is by Nuala Casey and is due to be published in August 2014.

Poisoned Ground is by Barbara Nadel and is due to be published in September 2014.  Ex-soldier Lee Arnold and his Muslim assistant Mumtaz Hakim run a detective agency in London's ethnically diverse, crime-ridden East End.  An Egyptian woman, Salwa, whose husband is in Belmarsh on terrorism charges, approaches Mumtaz.  Salwa convinces Mumtaz of her husband's innocence and persuades her to go undercover to prove it.  But Salwa is not what she seems.  Trapped in an old tunnel that leads to the London docks, will Mumtaz escape with her life?

The Bosch Deception is by Alex Connor and is due to be published in July 2014. A TRUTH CONCEALED.  Brabant, 1473. A clandestine brotherhood hides a secret that could bring down the Catholic Church.  Their chosen hiding place - the art of Hieronymus Bosch. A TERRIBLE CONSPIRACY. London, 2014. An excommunicated priest approaches both the Church and the art world, claiming to possess an artefact that will destroy their reputations.  A TICKING CLOCK. This man, Nicholas Laverne, is poised to end over 500 years of silence and injustice.  Yet, unknown to Nicholas, he has just summoned a killer intent on silencing him.

You'd know if someone close to you was capable of lethal violence, right?  Dead wrong.  Accused of grassing up a fellow officer and driven brutally out of home and job, Grace Fisher is thankful to survive some dark times and find haven with the Major Investigation Team in Essex.  One female student is missing, last seen at a popular bar in Colchester.  When a second student, also out drinking, is murdered and left grotesquely posed, the case becomes headline news.  Someone is leaking disturbing details to a tabloid crime reporter.  Is it the killer?  Or a detective close to the case? With another victim, and under siege by the media, the murder enquiry hits a dead end.  The review team brought in to shake things up is headed by Grace's old DCI.  Who is going to listen to her now?  Good Girls Don’t Die is the first in a new series by Isabelle Grey featuring Detective Grace Fisher.  It is due to be published in September 2014.

London,  1657. All that is known of the Seeker is that he is utterly loyal to Cromwell, and that nothing can be hidden from him.  In  a fashionable coffee house, a murder takes place and a lawyer, Elias Ellingworth, found holding a knife over the bleeding body.  Despite the damning evidence, the Seeker is not convinced of Ellingworth’s guilt.  He will stop at nothing to bring the real killer to justice.  The Seeker is by S G Maclean and is the first in a new historical thriller series featuring Damian Seeker, one of Cromwell’s most trusted and feared adherents.  The Seeker is due to be published in October 2014.

In Mark Sullivan’s latest high-octane blockbuster, robin Monarch must seek out and steal a mysterious and much-coveted elixir of life, while at the same time attempting to reclaim something – or, more accurately, someone – cruelly stolen from him.  The perilous trail begins in the deepest recesses of the Brazilian rainforest, and will lure Monarch into a deadly trap where his nemesis will be waiting, and where the fate of those dearest to him will be decided.  Thief is due to be published in December 2014.

Two hours to get away, 22 more to survive.  Security consultant and private investigator Michael Sander is tasked with the investigation of a video that seems to show two people being hunted to their deaths.  His job is to find out who they are, and why they were murdered.  But this isn’t just another case, and these deaths are only one piece of the puzzle.  Michael is investigating the darkest reaches of humanity, uncovering crimes that reach further than he ever imagined.  Trophy is by Steffen Jacobsen and is due to be published in October 2014.

Talking to Ghosts is by Hervé Le Corre and is due to be published in July 2014.  With his son Pablo's kidnapping still unsolved, and his marriage ruined by the torment of hope, the brutal murder of a single mother in her own home is an almost welcome diversion for Commandant Vilar.  The woman leaves behind a son, Victor, thrown into the foster system with only his mother's urn for company.  Struggling with bullies, trauma and the first pangs of teenage love, Victor carries a secret that followed his mother to her grave.  Struggling for leads, Vilar is shaken when the colleague investigating Pablo's kidnapping disappears.  When a sadistic caller claims to have information about his son, Vilar is torn between duty and a desperate chance of redemption.