On an ordinary spring day, Special Agent Faith Mitchell of the Georgia Bureau of Investigation returns home to a nightmare. Expecting to find her mother minding Faith’s new baby daughter Emma, she is horrified to discover Emma locked in the shed, her mother’s safe open, her gun missing and a trail of blood to the front door. Without waiting for back-up, Faith enters the house to a scene of carnage. It has been torn apart and a man lies dead in a pool of blood. She stumbles across two more intruders, and within minutes they too are shot dead. And when the Atlanta police force turns up, Faith has some difficult questions to answer. But she has some desperate questions of her own. What were the killers searching for? Ex-Atlanta police chief Evelyn Mitchell was once under investigation by Faith’s partner Will Trent. Is her mother directly involved this time, and where is she now? With Faith suspended from duty, Will, together with the help of Dr Sara Linton, must piece together the fragments of a brutal and complicated case and catch a deeply troubled and vicious murderer with only one thing on his mind. To keep on killing until the truth is finally revealed.
Fallen is by Karin Slaughter and is due to be published in July 2011.
Ruth Rendell’s Inspector Wexford returns in
The Vault. A retired Wexford finds that his special skills are needed to help solve an old case. Don’t forget, Wexford said,I have lived in a world where the improbable happens all the time. However, the impossible has happened. Chief Inspector Reg Wexford has retired. He and his wife, Dora, now divide their time between Kingsmarkham and a coach house in Hampstead, belonging to their actress daughter, Sheila. Wexford takes great pleasure in his books, but, for all the benefits of a more relaxed lifestyle, he misses being the law. But a chance meeting in a London street, with someone he had known briefly as a very young police constable, changes everything. Tom Ede is now a Detective Superintendent, and is very keen to recruit Wexford as an adviser on a difficult case. The bodies of two women and a man have been discovered in the old coal hole of an attractive house in St John’s Wood. None carries identification. But the man’s jacket pockets contain a string of pearls, a diamond and a sapphire necklace as well as other jewellery valued in the region of £40,000. It is not a hard decision for Wexford. He is intrigued and excited by the challenge, and, in the early stages, not really anticipating that this new investigative role will bring him into physical danger.
The Vault is due to be published in August 2011.
The Fear Index is a chilling contemporary thriller from Robert Harris set in the competitive world of high finance. Dr Max Hoffman is a legend. An American physicist once employed on the Large Hadron Collider in Switzerland, he now uses a revolutionary and highly secret system of computer algorithms to trade on the world’s financial markets. None of his rivals is sure how he does it, but somehow Hoffman’s hedge fund built around the standard measure of market volatility: the VIX or Fear Index generates astonishing returns for his investors. Then, late one night, in his house beside Lake Geneva, an intruder disturbs Hoffman and his wife while they are asleep. Set entirely over the course of a single day,
The Fear Index follows Hoffman’s quest to find out who is trying to destroy him, even as the world’s financial markets head for collapse.
The Fear Index is due to be published in September 2011.
Flash and Bones is the fourteenth book to feature Temperance Brennan. In the run-up to the biggest NASCAR race week of the year, Dr Temperance Brennan is called to a landfill site backing onto the Charlotte speedway track in North Carolina. Someone has discovered a barrel of hardened asphalt with a human hand poking through the top. With the country’s press trained on Charlotte, it is up to Tempe to try to release and identify the body in the barrel. But there is more than one potential victim: the brother of a girl who went missing with her boyfriend ten years before comes forward, and the trail he sets in motion leads Tempe to one of America’s largest fascist organisations. But before she can discover anything, the FBI confiscate the body and destroy it. What terrible secret could they be hiding? As tension at the speedway mounts, Tempe tries to unravel the conspiracy of lies surrounding the missing couple, the body in the barrel, and the horrific death at the track of yet another victim...
Flash and Bones is by Kathy Reichs and is due to be published in September 2011.
The Silenced is the fourth book in the Jonathan Quinn series and takes him to Paris and London on the trail of a man known only as The Ghost. But the hunter becomes the hunted when Quinn finds that someone is stalking his family. Professional cleaner Jonathan Quinn has a new client and a odd job: find and remove the remains of a body hidden twenty years ago inside the walls of a London building, before the building is demolished. But Quinn and his team are being watched. Suddenly caught in the crossfire between two dangerous rivals, Quinn must unravel the identity of the body and why it still poses so great a threat even in death. Because a plot stretching from the former Soviet Union to Hong Kong, from Paris to London, from Los Angeles to Maine is rapidly falling apart. And Quinn hasn’t just been hired to tie up loose ends he is one.
The Silenced is by Brett Battles and is due to be published in July 2011.
Into Dust is the second crime thriller to feature Detective Inspector Ned Bale and police dog handler extraordinaire, Kate Baker by Jonathan Lewis. The Minister for Defence is blown to smithereens in his car on a lonely road in the Brecon Beacons, where he has a weekend hideaway. DI Ned Bale is on the crime scene within seconds, but neither he nor forensics can work out how on earth the crime was committed, let alone who did it, or with what motive. That is until one fingerprint is found on one tiny fragment of the explosive timing device. The fingerprint of Ned Bale’s closest ally in the Force, dog handler Kate Baker. But how on earth could her fingerprint be on a terrorist’s bomb. Far away on bomb disposal duty in Afghanistan, Kate has to be questioned. But Kate herself has become involved with someone extremely plausible, attractive and dangerous.
Into Dust is due to be published in September 2011.
Joe Clayton thought the dangers of his undercover career were behind him. He was wrong. One grey October morning, while working in a quiet Bristol street, he hears the voice of the man who has sworn to destroy him. Minutes later Joe is running for his life again. Desperate for sanctuary, he heads for the small Cornish town of Trelennan, and the home of Diana Bamber, widow of a former police colleague. But Diana reacts strangely to his arrival, and gradually Joe discovers that Trelennan is far from the idyllic, law-abiding resort it claims to be. The town is in the grip of one man. Leon Race doesn’t welcome strangers, especially ex-cops who start asking questions about missing women. Soon Joe is caught up in another undercover role, but as he penetrates the web of secrets that ensnares the town’s elite, his own secret is at risk of discovery. And all the time his old enemy is circling...
Blood Falls is by Tom Bale and is due to be published in October 2011.
The Secret Chamber is by Patrick Woodhead and is due to be published in November 2011. People have been disappearing in what the explorer Stanley called the black heart of Africa - the impenetrable forests of northern Congo. But when a brilliant young English doctor vanishes, alarm bells really start to ring. Intelligence chief Jack Milton sends a message to his godson Luca Matthews ("The Forbidden Temple" hero) in the Himalayas asking him to go to Africa and find Joshua. Reluctantly Luca obeys, but he is no longer the man he once was, traumatised by his part in the death of his best friend, his legendary climbing nerve shot to pieces. Meanwhile in Africa, mining troubleshooter and brilliant flying pilot, Beatrice (Bear) Makuru, also wants to brave the northern wilderness. Coltan is the mineral without which no mobile phone or computer would work. Explosions have been wrecking coltan mines. Bear needs to find out why. Her journey with Luca to Africa's black heart is the beginning of an utterly terrifying sequence of events, uncovering a secret so simple yet so startling that it could rock the foundations of the civilised world.
Detective Inspector January David is on the hunt for an elusive serial killer but the leads are drying up. The first victim was taken on Halloween and as the months develop more ritualistic murders are discovered. So far, five innocents, each struck down in a public place, have been left dead. Brooke Derry should have been the sixth but she miraculously survives. Meanwhile, January’s personal life is in turmoil as he battles the demons which have haunted him all his life. He’s desperately seeking his missing sister and his private hell is only intensified by the corruption within his own team. When the killer’s picture is leaked to the press, hysteria grips London as the public sees the face of evil and fears they will be next. But no one, including DI David, realises that an unknown vigilante has also seen the front pages and has tracked down the killer and is now holding them captive. January is in pursuit of not just one lost soul, but two . . .
The Two is the second novel in the January David series and is by Will Carver. It will be published in November 2011.
Full Circle is by Mark Pearson and will be published in October 2011. No matter how fast you run, no one can escape the past . . . Jack Delaney is looking forward to spending Christmas with Kate Walker and his daughter, but the past has a way of ruining the best-laid plans. Some years earlier, Delaney’s testimony was crucial in putting Michael Robinson, a violent serial rapist, behind bars. However, new DNA evidence secures an appeal. And Robinson walks free. Only to be discovered dead three days later. Robinson is not the first rapist to have perished in mysterious circumstances. And DI Sally Cartwright is beginning to work on the theory that there may be a vigilante at work. As the body count rises, the spotlight of suspicion falls on Delaney. The circle closes . . .
James Patterson has four books due out. In
Now You See Her due to be published in August 2011. To save her own life, Nina Bloom vanished. Now, to rescue an innocent man, she confronts the killer she thought she had escaped forever. A successful lawyer and loving mother, Nina Bloom would do anything to protect the life she’s built in New York including lying to everyone, even her daughter, about her past. But when an innocent man is framed for murder, she knows that she can’t let him pay for the real killer’s crimes. Nina’s secret life began eighteen years ago. She had looks to die for, a handsome police-officer husband, and a carefree life in Key West. When she learned she was pregnant with their first child, her happiness was almost overwhelming. But Nina’s world is shattered when she unearths a terrible secret that causes her to run for her life and change her identity. Now, years later, Nina risks everything she’s earned to return to Florida and confront the murderous evil she fled. In a story of wrenching suspense, James Patterson gives us his most head-spinning, action-filled story yet - a Hitchcock-like blend of unquenchable drama and pleasure. In
Kill Alex Cross the President’s children have been kidnapped and Alex Cross races to save them before it’s too late. The President’s son and daughter are abducted, and Detective Alex Cross is one of the first on the scene. But someone very high up is using the FBI, Secret Service, and CIA to keep him off the case and in the dark. A deadly contagion in the water supply cripples half of the capital, and Cross discovers that someone may be about to unleash the most devastating attack the United States has ever experienced. As his window for solving both crimes narrows, Alex makes a desperate decision that goes against everything he believes and one that may alter the fate of the entire country.
Kill Alex Cross will be published in September 2011.
Kill Me If you Can also by James Patterson is due to be published in November 2011. Matthew Bannon, a poor art student living in New York City, finds a duffel bag filled with diamonds during a chaotic attack at Grand Central Station. Plans for a worry-free life with his gorgeous girlfriend Katherine fill his thoughts until he realises that he is being hunted, and that whoever is after him won’t stop until they have reclaimed the diamonds and exacted maximum revenge. Trailing him is the Ghost, the world’s greatest assassin, who has just pulled off his most high-profile hit: killing Walter Zelvas, a top member of the international Diamond Syndicate. There’s only one small problem: the diamonds he was supposed to retrieve from Zelvas are missing.Now, the Ghost is on Bannon’s trail but so is a rival assassin who would like nothing more than to make the Ghost disappear for ever. James Patterson will also publish
The Christmas Wedding as well in November 2011.
