Sebastian
von Eschburg, scion of a wealthy, self-destructive family, survived his
disastrous childhood to become a celebrated if controversial artist. He casts a provocative shadow over the Berlin
scene; his disturbing photographs and installations show that truth and reality
are two distinct things. When Sebastian
is accused of murdering a young woman and the police investigation takes a
sinister turn, seasoned lawyer Konrad Biegler agrees to represent him - and hopes
to help himself in the process. But
Biegler soon learns that nothing about the case, or the suspect, is what it
appears. The Girl Who Wasn't There is
by Ferdinand Von Schirach and is due to be published in January 2015.
Sergeant
Hamish Macbeth is alarmed to receive a report from a woman in the small village
of Cronish in the Scottish Highlands.
She has been brutally attacked and the criminal is on the loose. But upon further investigation, Hamish
discovers that she was lying about the crime.
So when the same woman calls him back about an intruder, he simply
marvels at her compulsion to lie. This
time, though, she is telling the truth.
Her body is found in her home and Hamish must sort through all of her
lies to solve the crime. Death of a Liar is by M C Beaton and is
due to be published in February 2015.
The Scrivener is by Robin Blake and is
due to be published in March 2015. The year is 1742, and the people of Preston
are looking forward to their ancient once-every-twenty-years festival of
merriment and excess: the Preston Guild.
But the prospect darkens as the town plunges into a financial crisis
caused by the death of pawnbroker and would-be banker Philip Pimbo, apparently
shot behind the locked door of his office.
Is it suicide? Coroner Titus
Cragg suspects so, but Dr Luke Fidelis disagrees. To untangle the truth, Cragg must dig out the
secrets of Pimbo's personal life, learn the grim facts of the African slave
trade, search for a missing Civil War treasure and deal with the machinations of
his old enemy Ephraim Grimshaw, now the town's mayor. Outwardly mild-mannered as ever but
passionate for justice, Cragg relies once again on the help and advice of his
analytical friend Fidelis, his astute wife Elizabeth and the contents of a
well-stocked library.
Dead Girl Walking is by Chris Brookmyre
and is due to be published in January 2015.
Life
is dangerous when you have everything to lose. Famous, beautiful, and talented, Heike Gunn
has the world at her feet. Then, one
day, she simply vanishes. Jack Parlabane
has lost everything: his journalism career, his marriage, and his
self-respect. A call for help from an
old friend offers a chance for redemption - but only if he can find out what
happened to Heike. Pursued by those who
would punish him for past crimes, Parlabane enters the world of Heike's band,
Savage Earth Heart, a group at breaking point.
Each of its members seems to be hiding something, not least its newest
recruit Monica Halcrow, whose possible relationship with Heike has become a
public obsession. Monica's own story,
however, reveals a far darker truth.
Fixated on Heike from day one, she has been engulfed by paranoia,
jealousy, and fear, as she discovers the hidden price of fame. From Berlin to Barcelona, from the streets of
Milan to remote Scottish islands, Parlabane must find out what happened before
it's too late, all while the walls are closing in on him...
In
his dark and fetid prison cell, serial killer Daniele de Robert is plans his
retribution. The betrayals he has
suffered haunt his dreams until, one night, he escapes. In a small, beautiful village in the Tuscan
countryside a prominent lawyer and his wife are murdered. As the police inspect the scene they find
nine terrifying photographs: nine women, slaughtered. It is Florentine Police Chief Michele Ferrara's
worst nightmare: a case involving the untouchable men and women at the top of
Italian society, a dark and powerful cult which knows no bounds, and mounting
victims. Amongst a web of obsession, manipulation, and violence, Ferrara must
face his demons. Death Under a Tuscan Sun is an incredibly gripping and atmospheric
work of detective fiction, written with incomparable authenticity by former
Florentine police chief Michele Giuttari.
It is due to be published in March 2015.
Death Comes to the Ballet Russes is by
David Dickinson and is due to be published in January 2015. London, 1912, and the famed Ballet Russes
have come to London to perform.
Anticipation is high, for Diaghilev's troupe is renowned throughout
Europe. At the end of their famed performance
of Thamar at the Royal Opera House, the Georgian queen stabs her
prince to death and throws him into the river.
But life mirrors art when the prince is found truly dead, stabbed
through the heart in the orchestra pit below stage. But the corpse is not the dancer in the
programme. It is his understudy. Powerscourt is summoned to investigate. But who was the intended victim - the understudy,
or the star of the Ballets Russes? And
the Ballet Russes are not the only Russian visitors in London this season. Lenin, Europe's most dangerous revolutionary,
has sent some bank robbery money to be changed into pounds. There are stolen jewels from St Petersburg to
be sold. And there are other darker
forces abroad too and Powerscourt has to look death in the face before he can
solve the mystery of Death at the Ballet Russes.
Malice is by Keigo Higashino and is
due to be published in February 2015. Acclaimed
bestselling novelist Kunihiko Hidaka is brutally murdered in his home on the
night before he's planning to leave Japan and relocate to Vancouver. His body is found in his office, in a locked
room, within his locked house, by his wife and his best friend, both of whom
have rock solid alibis. Or so it
seems. Police Detective Kyochiro Kaga
recognizes Hidaka's best friend from years ago when they were both
teachers. Kaga went on to join the
police force while Nonoguchi became a full-time writer, though with not nearly
the success of his friend Hidaka. When
Kaga suspects something is a little bit off with Nonoguchi's statement, he
investigates further, ultimately executing a search warrant on Nonoguchi's
apartment. There he finds evidence that
shows that the two writers' relationship was very different than they claimed...In
a brilliantly realized tale of cat and mouse, the detective and the writer
battle over the truth of the past and how events that led to the murder really
unfolded. Which one of the two writers
was ultimately guilty of malice?
The
mutilated body of a senior banker is found on a remote Kent beach. Could the man's death be linked to the
scandal engulfing his employer, a global investment bank created by the CIA to
help it track terrorism financing? Kate
Pendragon, a financial analyst seconded to MI5, discovers that the bank is
close to collapse, something that threatens to bring down the CIA. Elsewhere, intelligence is gathered on an
Islamic terrorist cell intent on triggering a nuclear catastrophe to rig the
world's financial markets - rigged, it would appear, by the Americans. But will rogue agents in the CIA really allow
the disaster to happen in order save their bank? Pendragon believes the intelligence community
on both sides of the Atlantic could be falling for a sophisticated hoax. Only, no one is listening to her. And the clock is ticking... Toxic is the debut novel by Jamie Doward
and is due to be published in March 2015.
The Cheapside Corpse is by Susanna
Gregory and is due to be published in January 2015.
London in the spring of 1665 is a city full
of fear. There is plague in the stews of
St Giles, the Dutch fleet is preparing to invade, and a banking crisis
threatens to leave Charles II's government with no means of paying for the
nation's defence. Amid the tension,
Thomas Chaloner is ordered to investigate the murder of Dick Wheler, one of the
few goldsmith-bankers to have survived the losses that have driven others to
bankruptcy - or worse. At the same time,
a French spy staggers across the city, carrying the plague from one parish to
another. Chaloner's foray into the world
of the financiers who live in and around Cheapside quickly convinces him that
they are just as great a threat as the Dutch, but their power and greed thwart
him at every turn. Meanwhile, the plague
continues to spread across the city, and the body count from the disease and
from the fever of avarice starts to rise alarmingly ...
The Domino Killer is by Neil White and
is due to be published in June 2015.
When a series of shocking and seemingly random murders shocks
Manchester, criminal lawyer Joe Parker and his police detective brother, Sam,
must work together to solve the case.
And before they know it, they're in way over their heads...
The
Honorable Daisy Dalrymple-Fletcher is on a convalescent trip in the
countryside, visiting old school friends.
The three of them, all unmarried, have recently bought a house
together. They are a part of the
generation of 'superfluous women', brought up expecting marriage and a family,
but left without any prospects after more than 700,000 British men were killed
in the Great War. Daisy and her husband
Alec - Detective Inspector Alec Fletcher, of Scotland Yard - are invited for
Sunday lunch, where one of the women mentions a wine cellar below the house
which remains resolutely locked. Alec
picks the lock but when he eventually opens the door, what greets them is not a
cache of wine, but the stench of a dead body.
And with that, what was a pleasant Sunday lunch becomes a much darker
affair. Now Daisy's three friends are
the suspects in a murder and her husband Alec is a witness. So before the local detective, Superintendent
Crane, can officially bring charges against her friends, Daisy is determined to
use all her resources and skills to solve the mystery behind this perplexing
locked-room crime. Superfluous
Women is by Carola Dunn and is due to be published in March 2015.
When
Julian Schaeffer is shot in front of his son in a London park, suspicion falls
on his estranged wife. The woman has a
seemingly watertight alibi, but Carlyle – trying to make the best of a
difficult relationship with his new sergeant, Umar Sligo – won’t stop digging. Focused on the Schaeffer case, the inspector
is not too interested when Daniel Sands is hauled in to Charing Cross, accused
of kidnapping. Then he discovers Sands’s
backstory and finds himself propelled forward in a quest for justice for two
fathers and their destroyed families. Sins of the Father is by James Craig and
is due to be published in February 2015.
Keep the Midnight Out is by Alex Gray
and is due to be published in March 2015.
When the body of a red-haired young man is washed up on the shore of the
beautiful Isle of Mull, Detective Superintendent Lorimer's tranquil holiday
away from the gritty streets of Glasgow is rudely interrupted. The body has been bound with twine in a
ghoulishly unnatural position and strongly reminds Lorimer of another murder: a
twenty year old Glasgow case that he failed to solve as a newly fledged
detective constable and which has haunted him ever since. As local cop DI Stevie Crozier takes charge
of the island murder investigation, Lorimer tries to avoid stepping on her
toes. But as the similarities between
the young man's death and his cold case grow more obvious, Lorimer realises that
there could be a serial killer on the loose after all these years. As Keep the Midnight Out switches
dramatically between the Mull murder and the Glasgow cold case two decades
earlier, DC Lorimer tries desperately to catch a cold-hearted killer. Has someone got away with murder for decades?
Molly's
sixth sense is warning her - danger and death lie ahead! A woman private eye in a man's world, Molly
Murphy is having a hard time succeeding in running her detective agency in New
York. That's why she agrees to go
undercover for the NYPD to expose a pair of spiritualist sisters as con
artists...even though the offer of work has come from police captain Daniel
Sullivan. Sullivan had once won Molly's
heart - until she discovered he has a socialite fiancée and an upcoming society
wedding. Still, needs must, and so Molly
finds herself posing as an Irish cousin at the uptown mansion of Senator Barney
Flynn. Flynn's invalid wife hopes the
psychic sisters can contact her dead son, kidnapped and lost in a sensational
crime, and after a spooky séance, Molly isn't so sure the sisters are
fake...,but she's certain the police bungled the kidnapping case. But very soon her questions are leading her
to danger...and it doesn't take a psychic to tell Molly that if she continues
she may very well end up dead! In Like Flynn is by Rhys Bowen and is
due to be published by January 2015..
Barcelona,
1952: General Franco's fascist government is at the height of its oppressive
powers, casting a black shadow across the city.
When wealthy socialite Mariona Sobrerroca is found dead in her mansion
in the exclusive Tibidabo district, the police scramble to seize control of the
investigation. Ana Marti Noguer, an
eager young journalist, is surprised to be assigned this important story,
shadowing Inspector Isidro Castro. But
Ana soon realises that a bundle of strange letters unearthed at the scene point
to a sequence of events dramatically different from the official version. She enlists the help of her cousin Beatriz, a
scholar, and what begins as an intriguing puzzle opens up a series of
revelations that implicate the regime's most influential figures. The two women have placed themselves in
mortal danger. As the conspiracy
unfolds, Ana's courage and Beatriz's wits will be their only weapons against
the city's corrupt and murderous elite. The Whispering City is by Sara Moliner
and is due to be published in February 2015.
After
a showdown with the notorious Yemeni terrorist known as The Panther, life seems
to be getting quieter for maverick Federal Agent John Corey. Professionally side-lined, away from his
wife, and partnered up with a young, good-looking rookie named Tess, Corey is
saddled with a dead-end job running easy surveillance on a group of Russian
U.N. delegates in New York City. But
then his subjects slip the net, Tess seems to be acting suspiciously, and an
old, dangerous foe reappears. With
Russia resurgent and a clear and present danger in his own back yard, suddenly
Corey's life hits the fast lane once again.
A Quiet End is by Nelson
DeMille and is due to be published in June 2015.
The Crooked House is by Christobel Kent
and is due to be published in January 2015.
Alison
is as close to anonymous as she can get: with no ties, no home, a
backroom job, hers is a life lived under the radar. She's a nobody; she has no one and that's how
she wants it. But once Alison was
someone else: once she was Esme Grace, a teenager whose bedroom sat at the top
of a remote and dilapidated house on the edge of a bleak estuary. A girl whose family, if not happy, exactly,
was no unhappier than anyone else's - or so she thought. Then one night a terrible thing happened in
the crooked house, a nightmare of violence out of which Alison emerged the only
witness and sole survivor and from which she has been running ever since. Only when she meets academic Paul Bartlett
does Alison realise that if she's to have any chance of happiness, she has to
return to her old life and confront the darkness that worked its way inside her
family and has pursued her ever since.
Strikingly atmospheric and compelling, this psychological thriller is
about one woman's search for the truth in a closed community full of dark
secrets.
Kevin,
a Ph.D. student in chemistry, is stunned by the news that his graduate advisor,
Michael Ward, has died in a fire. Then
Kevin receives a cryptic email message from Ward, sent just before his
death. According to the message, Ward
was being chased by someone intent on obtaining a notebook with the results of
a supposedly failed experiment Kevin and Ward had worked on together. Before Kevin can make sense of the message,
Ward's attackers try to kill him.
Labelled a crank by the police, Kevin escapes the gun-wielding
assailants and unwittingly draws his girlfriend, a medical student named Erica
Jensen, into their sights. Their flight
leads them to the notebook, which reveals that Kevin unknowingly participated
in one of the most important discoveries of the century, a chemical process
called Adamas worth billions of dollars.
Alone and on the run from deadly assassins, Kevin and Erica have to stay
alive long enough to prove to the world that Adamas actually works... The
Catalyst is by Boyd Morrison and is due to be published in February 2015.
In
1358, over a century after its foundation in Cambridge, the college of
Michaelhouse is facing a serious shortfall of funds and competition from
upstart’s rivals such as Zachary Hostel.
Their problems are made no easier by the hostility of the town's
inhabitants who favour the university moving away to the Fens. This simmering tension threatens to break
into violence when a well-known tradesman is found dead in one of the
colleges. Matthew Bartholomew knows he
was poisoned but cannot identify the actual substance never mind the killer. He also worries that other illnesses and
deaths may have been caused by the effluent from his sister's dye works. Torn between loyalties to his kin and to his
college, he fears the truth may destroy both his personal and professional
life, but he knows he must use his skills as a physician to discover the truth
before many more lose their lives entirely.
A Poisonous Plot is the
twenty-first book in the Brother Matthew Bartholomew series by Susanna Gregory
and it is due to be published in June 2015.
Breaking Creed is by Alex Kava and is due
to be published in January 2015. Ryder
Creed
and his dogs have been making national headlines after intercepting
several major drug stashes being smuggled through Atlanta's airport. But their newfound celebrity has also
garnered some unwanted attention. When
Creed and one of his dogs are called in to search a commercial fishing vessel,
they discover a secret compartment. But
the Colombian cartels' latest shipment isn't drugs. This time, its cargo is human. To make matters worse, Creed helps one of the
cartel's drug mules escape - a fourteen-year-old girl who reminds him of his
younger sister who disappeared fifteen years ago. Meanwhile, FBI agent Maggie O'Dell is
investigating a series of murders - the victims tortured, killed, and dumped in
the Potomac River. Maggie suspects they
are the work of a cunning and brutal assassin.
But by the time she uncovers a hit list with Creed's name on it, it
might be too late...
Lori
Maddox chooses to spend the year after university travelling and visits China
where she finds casual work as a private English tutor. Back in Manchester, her parents Joanna and
Tom, who separated when Lori was a toddler, follow her adventures on her blog,
‘A slacker’s guide to China’. It seemed
like Lori was having a great time, but when Joanna and Tom hear nothing for
weeks they become increasingly concerned.
It is impossible to find out anything from 5,000 miles away so they
travel out to Chengdu in search of their daughter. Landing in a totally unfamiliar country,
Joanna and Tom are forced to turn detective, following in their daughter’s
footsteps, tracing the people she mentioned in her posts. It’s an unbearably difficult challenge, made
harder as all the reasons for the breakdown of their relationship twenty years
earlier resurface with a vengeance. When
a woman’s remains are discovered close to the last sightings of Lori, it
appears they have found their daughter and a murder inquiry is launched. But nothing could prepare them for the shocks
still in store . . . Half the World Away is by Cath
Staincliffe and is due to be published in June 2015.
Obsession in Death is by J D Robb and is
due to be published in February 2015. A
crisp winter morning in New York. In a
luxury apartment, the body of a woman lies stretched out on a huge bed. On the wall above, the killer has left a
message in bold black ink: FOR LIEUTENANT EVE DALLAS, WITH GREAT ADMIRATION AND
UNDERSTANDING. Eve Dallas is used to unwanted
attention. Famous for her high-profile
cases and her marriage to billionaire businessman Roarke, she has learned to
deal with intense public scrutiny and media gossip. But now Eve has become the object of a
singular and deadly obsession. She has an
'admirer', who just can't stop thinking about her. Who is convinced they have a special
bond. Who is planning to kill for her -
again and again...With time against her, Eve is forced to play a delicate - and
dangerous - psychological dance. Because
the killer is desperate for something Eve can never provide - approval. And once that becomes clear, Eve knows her
own life will be at risk - along with those she cares about the most.
Pearl
Nolan always wanted to be a detective but Life, and a teenage pregnancy, got in
the
way of a police career and instead she built up a successful restaurant in
her coastal home town of Whitstable - famous for its oyster festival held every
July. Now, at 39, and with son Charlie
away at university, Pearl finds herself suffering from empty nest syndrome until
she discovers the body of local oyster fisherman, Vinne Rowe, wrapped around an
anchor. Is it an unfortunate accident,
or murder? Pearl seizes the opportunity
to prove her detection skills and discover the truth but she soon finds herself
in conflict, and competition, with attractive Canterbury city police detective,
Inspector Mike McGuire. It isn't long,
however, before another body is discovered and Pearl finds herself trawling the
past for clues, triggering poignant memories of another emotional summer more
than twenty years ago ... The Whitstable
Pearl Mystery is by Julie Wassmer and is due to be published in March 2015
A
complex case ...When DI Wesley Peterson is summoned to investigate a killing,
he assumes that the case is a routine matter.
But soon dark secrets and deadly deceptions start to emerge from the
victim's past, and Wesley begins to realise that a simple incident of
cold-blooded murder is altogether more calculated and complicated that he could
ever imagine. Tracing back through time
...Meanwhile, archaeologist Neil Watson is pulled from the historic Paradise
Court to a ruined village from the First World War. Even with the help of the attractive and
enigmatic Lucy, Neil cannot shake the feeling that something is missing from
his explorations: a cryptic clue that might have been lost when Sandrock
tumbled into the sea many years ago. A
clue that could help Wesley solve his most puzzling case to date. DI Wesley Peterson is standing on the edge ...As
more victims fall prey to a faceless killer, Wesley sees the investigation
affecting him more personally than ever before.
And when his precious family becomes a target, Wesley has no time to
lose. Just like the fallen village of
Sandrock, Wesley will have to stand tall if he is to withstand the coming storm
... The Death Season is by Kate Ellis
and is due to be published in January 2015.
