Books to Look forward to from Penguin and Michael Joseph

King Henry V - the great Lion of England - is long dead. In 1437, after years of regency, the pious and gentle Henry VI, the Lamb, comes of age and accedes to the English throne. His poor health and frailty of mind render him a weakling king - Henry depends on his closest men, Spymaster Derry Brewer and William de la Pole, Duke of Suffolk, to run his kingdom. Yet there are those, such as the Plantagenet Richard, Duke of York, who believe England must be led by a strong king if she is to survive. With England's territories in France under threat, and rumours of revolt at home, fears grow that Henry and his advisers will see the country slide into ruin. With a secret deal struck for Henry to marry a young French noblewoman, Margaret of Anjou, those fears become all too real. As storm clouds gather over England, King Henry and his supporters find themselves besieged abroad and at home. Who, or what, can save the kingdom before it is too late?  War of the Roses: Stormbird is by Conn Iggulden and is due to be published in October 2013.  It is the start of a new series.

 

Tell No Lies is by Greg Hurwitz and was published in August 2013.  Sharing a room with

criminals is an occupational hazard for probation counsellor Daniel Brasher. But he's ready to move on; he's looking forward to leaving it behind for good. That was the plan at least. Until, before leaving work for the evening, Daniel finds a letter in his pigeonhole. Inside is a note: 'admit what you've done or you will bleed for it. you have 'till november 15 at midnite' But the message was meant for someone else and picked up late by Daniel. With the deadline past, the intended recipient is already dead. Further warnings herald a series of gruesome, seemingly inexplicable murders. Then a note is addressed to Daniel himself. And with the clock ticking he must discover who wants him dead. And why, or become the next victim.

Husband and wife team Sam and Remi Fargo are in Mexico when they come upon an astonishing discovery – the skeleton of a man clutching an ancient sealed pot, and within the pot a  Mayan book larger than anyone has ever seen.  The book contains astonishing information about the Mayans, their cities, and about mankind itself. The secrets are so powerful that some people would do anything to possess them – as the Fargos are about to find out.  Before their adventure is done, many men and women will die for that book – and Sam and Remi may just be among them.  The Mayan Secrets is by Clive Cussler and Thomas Perry and is due to be published in November 2013.

Refusal is by Feliz Francis and is due to be published in September 2013. Sir Richard Stewart, chairman of the horse racing authority, wants Sid Halley to look into some suspicious race results, but Sid gave up the investigating business six years ago and he thought nothing could make him go back. He thought wrong. The following day, Sir Richard is found dead and Sid receives a threatening call from a man with an Irish accent. The man insists that Sid Halley should investigate the alleged race-fixing and it is only when his six-year-old daughter goes missing that Sid realises that he may pay the ultimate price for his refusal. With his life in tatters and his family in mortal danger, Sid is forced to act. Maybe he has underestimated the evilness of his foe, but has his foe underestimated the guile and determination of Sid Halley? Extreme situations demand extreme solutions and Sid is desperate to get his life back, or die trying...

When someone wants to find you badly enough, vanishing is no longer an option. Sarah Keller

is a young single mother living in Oklahoma with her five-year-old daughter, Zoe. Her day job is to hunt out people on the run and bring them to justice. So imagine how it looks when a school bus accident sends Zoe to the ER and tests reveal Sarah can't be Zoe's mother. Sarah has been living a lie for years and finally the truth is coming out. Who is she? Who were Zoe's parents? And why does Zoe's identity bring the FBI down on Sarah's tail in mere minutes? The FBI is the least of her worries, though. Sarah needs to keep Zoe off the grid, but with a sinister religious cult also on the trail, where on earth can they hide? Something deadly lurks in Sarah's past and its resurfacing brings terror to all it touches.  The Shadow Tracer is by M G Gardiner and is due to be published in October 2013.

Never Coming Back is by Tim Weaver and was published in August 2013.  A secret that will change lives forever. It was supposed to be the start of a big night out. But when Emily Kane arrives at her sister Carrie's house, she finds the front door unlocked and no one inside. Dinner's cooking, the TV's on. Carrie, her husband and their two daughters are gone. When the police draw a blank, Emily asks missing persons investigator David Raker to find them. It's clear someone doesn't want the family found. But as he gets closer to the truth, Raker begins to uncover evidence of a sinister cover-up, spanning decades and costing countless lives. And worse, in trying to find Emily's missing family, he might just have made himself the next target…

Alex Grecian's The Black Country sees the Scotland Yard Murder Squad return in a gruesome historical thriller. When members of a prominent family disappear from a coal-mining village - and a human eyeball is discovered in a bird's nest - the local constable sends for help from Scotland Yard's new Murder Squad. Inspector Walter Day and Sergeant Nevil Hammersmith respond, but they have no idea what they're about to get into. The villagers have intense, intertwined histories. Everybody bears a secret. Superstitions abound. And the village itself is slowly sinking into the mines beneath it. Not even the arrival of forensics pioneer Dr. Bernard Kingsley seems to help. In fact, the more the three of them investigate, the more they realize they may never be allowed to leave. The Black Country is due to be published in September 2013.

Atlantis: Revelation is by Marcus Blake and is due to be published in October 2013.   For millennia, mankind has searched for Atlantis - the ancient lost city, sunk without a trace - and found nothing more than myth. A young man drifts, unconscious, into a quiet Haitian harbour. He wakes to find he can only remember one thing - his name, Achilles. Helped by Marta, a beautiful smuggler, he begins a desperate search for his identity. But soon they are running for their lives, pursued by a covert government agency who will stop at nothing to track them down. The agency knows something Achilles doesn't: he is no ordinary young man. Soon, Achilles will find himself at the centre of a deadly game between two civilizations; the world above, and the world below. What if a place of myth, legend and fables...was real? This is Atlantis: Revelation.

Darkness First by James Hayman is the third book in the McCabe and Savage series and is due to be published in December 2013. In the dark shadows of a summer evening a young woman named Tiffany Stoddard is brutally slain by a remorseless killer's razor sharp blade. Learning that her closest childhood friend was nearly killed in the same incident, Portland Detective Maggie Savage rushes to the scene to join the State Police investigation. Maggie soon discovers the killer's name is Conor Riordan. There's only one problem. Conor Riordan doesn't exist. The only person who can provide a clue as to who Riordan really is, is the victim's eleven-year-old sister, Tabitha. And now Tabitha has turned up missing. Soon Maggie and her long time partner, Detective Sergeant Michael McCabe, find themselves in a desperate race against time to find the missing child before she becomes a vicious killer's next victim.