January 2024
Cover the Bones is by Chris Hammer. No one is ever innocent in paradise. A small town. A closely guarded secret, stretching back decades. And blood in the water. A body has washed up in an irrigation canal, the artery running through Yuwonderie, a man-made paradise on the border of the Outback. Stabbed through the heart, electrocuted and dumped under cover of night, there is no doubt that detectives Ivan Lucic and Nell Buchanan are dealing with a vicious homicide. The victim is Athol Hasluck, member of one of the seven dynasties who have controlled every slice of bountiful land in this modern-day Eden for generations. But this is not an isolated incident. Someone is targeting the landed aristocracy of this quiet paradise in the desert. Secrets stretching back decades are rising to the surface at last - but the question remains, who stands to gain most from their demise? Can Ivan and Nell track down a killer before the guilt at the heart of these seven families takes the entire town down with it?
Everything she is about to tell them is a lie... Evie Porter has everything a girl could want: a doting boyfriend, a house with a picket fence, a fun group of friends. The only catch: Evie Porter doesn't exist. First comes the identity. Once she's given a name and location by her employer, she learns everything there is to know about the town and the people in it.Then the mark: Ryan Sumner. The last piece of the puzzle is the job. For Evie, this job feels different. Ryan has gotten under her skin and she's started to picture another kind of life for herself - one where her boss doesn't pull the strings. But Evie can't make any mistakes. Because the one thing she's worked her entire life to keep clean, the one identity she could always go back to - her real identity - just walked right into this town. A woman, who looks just like her, has stolen her name - and she wants more. As Evie's past begins to catch up with her, can she stay one step ahead to save her future? First Lie Wins is by Ashley Elston
In a harsh Alaskan landscape, four solitary are brought together by a desperate hunt to find a missing child. A blizzard rages in an isolated corner of Alaska. Few inhabitants live in this desolate place. Scattered across the vast, white expanse, they shelter in solitude from the tempest and the extreme cold. But amid this storm and far from home, a woman walks alone with the child. She stops for a moment to re-tie the laces of her boots filled with snow. Instants later she looks up and the child under her care has vanished. In desperation she searches for him, knowing that every minute that goes by in this snowstorm is a threat to both of their lives. Soon she is joined in the hunt by the other neighbours. And as the search intensifies to save the missing child from certain death, she too will become the object of pursuit. Blizzard is by Marie Vingtras.
Finlay Donovan Jumps the Gun is by Elle Cosimano. Finlay Donovan is ready to bite the bullet. She's done with her accidental life of crime. But first, there's the small matter of her debt to the Russian mob. Her task should be simple: locate a rogue hitman before the cops do. The catch? This killer might be a cop himself. From inside the citizens' police academy, run by distractingly hot Detective Nicholas Anthony, Finlay needs to sleuth out her target - and some fresh ideas for her new crime novel. Can she get to her edits and the hitman in time? She'll give it her best shot.
February 2024
The question - For the last ten years, the small town of West Wilmer has been struggling to answer one question: on the night of the crash that killed his sister, why did it take Grant Dean twenty-seven minutes to call for help? If he'd called sooner, Phoebe might still be alive. The Secret - As the anniversary of Phoebe's death approaches, Grant is consumed by his memories and the secret that's been suffocating him for years. But he and Phoebe weren't the only ones in the car that night. Becca was there too - she's the only other person who knows what really happened. Or is she? The Truth - Everyone remembers Phoebe, but local girl June also lost someone that night. Her brother Wyatt has been missing for ten years and, now that her mother is dead, June has no one left - no family, no friends. Until someone appears at her door. Someone who knows what really happened that night. And they are ready to tell the truth. With a shocking twist that will leave you breathless, Twenty-Seven Minutes is by Ashley Tate and is a gripping story about what happens when grief becomes unbearable, dark secrets are unearthed, and the horrifying truth is revealed.
Mayday is by Grethe Bøe. Fighter pilot Ylva Norvahl has returned to her hometown, Bodø, in Norway's frozen north where tension is escalating across the border with Russia. NATO has launched the "Arctic Blizzard" excercise, mobilising 60,000 soldiers, many of them American. All it takes is one false move to trigger a major political crisis, or even a war. When her plane is forced down over Russian territory, Ylva and the veteran U.S. Major John Evans must race against time across a frozen landscape to avoid capture by the Russian Spetsnaz special forces in pursuit. Complicating their journey is Evans' involvement with an American military contractor Titans Security which has its own agenda across international frontiers. As the hunt closes in, Ylva uses her local Sami knowledge to survive in the excruciating cold, and her family history reveals dark secrets of its own in this geopolitical game of chess.
Bus driver Dave Kellock is a pillar of the community in Portobello, Edinburgh. But he's got a terrible secret. His past is dragged into the present when an unexpected passenger steps onto his bus: the woman he killed almost twenty years earlier. Dave's still reeling from the shock of it when police turn up at his door, accusing him of an entirely different crime. As he battles to track down a dead woman and maintain his hard-won reputation, Dave makes a terrifying realisation. Wherever he goes, someone is watching. In Her Shadow is by Emma Christie.
'Please take care of my baby. But don't try to find me. You'll put him in danger.' Profiler and therapist Kez Lanyon is shocked when she finds a baby on the backseat of her car, with an unsigned note asking her to take care of him. Kez has a pretty good idea who the mother is - Brandee, a popular social media star with a troubled background, who once lived in Kez's house. Brandee recently dropped out of the limelight and if the internet rumours are true, Kez knows Brandee's life is in danger. Kez is torn. Should she simply take care of the baby as she's been asked, or should she risk her whole family by using contacts from her previous job to save this young woman? Time is running out for Brandee. Can Kez find her before it's too late? Every Smile You Fake is by Dorothy Koomson.
Four Our Sins is by James Oswald. The wages of sin is death. The partial collapse of a disused Edinburgh church reveals a dead body in the rubble, his head badly smashed by falling masonry. Soon identified as an old ex-con - Kenny Morgan - his death is put down to a heart attack and deemed non-suspicious. Tony McLean is approached by a notorious crime lord who suggests the police should be looking into Morgan's death more closely. Despite struggling with his recent retirement, he is reluctant to involve himself. But when a second man is found dead in another disused church, his forehead branded with a cross, this time it is clearly murder. There's a killer stalking the streets of Edinburgh. Is it time for McLean to get back to doing what he does best?
March 2024
A remote hotel, five guests, one murder. During a broiling heatwave, the inner circle of a high-profile charity attend a critical meeting at White Ash Ridge, a small hotel nestled in the Australian wilderness. As the temperature rises, a body is found lying in the thick bush, bludgeoned to death. One of the four remaining guests is a murderer - but who, and why, is a mystery. Detective Dana Russo knows the national spotlight will be sharply focused on the case. The charity was formed when the founders' teenage son was killed after intervening in a vicious assault - sparking public outrage and a damning verdict on the police investigation. But under huge pressure and with few clues - plus suspects who instinctively distrust the police - how can Dana unravel the truth? White Ash Ridge is by S R White.
There's blood on the water. No one is safe... 1999. A young Detective Constable Louise Mangan crosses the Thames one misty morning in pursuit of a killer. She finds a tranquil community on a leafy island close to Hampton Court Palace, but soon realises that all is not as it seems. There is something evil at play in this quiet suburb, and this junior detective's questions seem only to scratch the surface. Twenty years later, a horrific fire brings Detective Chief Superintendent Mangan back to that same island. Soon, she discovers that murder was just a drop in these dark waters. The river runs deep, and the tide is rising at last. Will the truth rise with it? Death on the Thames is by Alan Johnson.
Blood Ties is by Veronica Llaca. Once upon a time, there was a woman the press called the Hyena-Woman. Infant Annihilator. Witch. Child-Chopper. Butcher of Little Angels. Monster. The Ogress of Colonia Roma. Julián and I called her Mother. When the writer Ignacio Suárez is sent photographs of two murdered women, mirroring a passage of his very own detective novel, he drops everything to uncover who is responsible. What no-one suspects is that the origin of these crimes lies in the forgotten, real-life story of FelÃcitas Sánchez, the midwife turned child-killer who became known in the 1940s as "The Ogress of Colonia Roma". Diary entries and newspaper articles come together in this gripping tale to reveal how the woman called FelÃcitas, who grew up in a small community in La Huasteca, Mexico, became the infamous child trafficker and murderer in the country's capital, and how her long-ago crimes are linked to a wave of killings.
Cheater is by Karen Rose. Homicide Detective Kit McKittrick finds herself standing over a dead body in the Shady Oaks retirement centre. Frank Flynn has been stabbed and his room ransacked. Though he kept his background quiet at the centre, Kit recognises Frank from the San Diego Police Department. Had the former detective been following a trail that led to his murder? When the head of security is also found dead, it points to a conspiracy right at the heart of Shady Oaks. The one person who might be able to help uncover the truth is just who Kit has been avoiding: Dr Sam Reeves. As a volunteer at the centre and a friend of the victim, the forensic psychologist could be just what her case needs. But without access to CCTV of the day of the murder, how will Kit catch her killer? And can she do so before anyone else is put in danger?
April 2024
They say you can't always get what you want. But you can take it. Anna wants a fresh start. She doesn't believe she deserves it, but after three years behind bars she has finally paid her dues. Most of them, anyway. Lucy craves the attention of the only man she can't have, her alluring Oxford professor. He's married - not for the first time. Maybe she should be next in line? Marie the recluse has been locked up for too long. She's not ready to be free, but some rules are meant to be broken. Everyone wants a perfect life. But not everyone is prepared to take it. Unless someone decides to teach them a lesson. A Lesson in Cruelty is by Harriet Tyce.
A Plague of Serpents is by K J Maitland. London, 1608. Three years after the Gunpowder Treason, the King's enemies prepare to strike again. Daniel Pursglove is tasked by royal command with one final mission: he must infiltrate the Serpents - a secret group of Catholics plotting to kill the King - or risk his own execution. But other conspirators are circling, men who would blackmail Daniel for their own dark ends. In the Serpents' den, nothing is quite as it seems. And when Daniel spies a familiar face among their number, the game takes a dangerous turn. As plague returns to London, tensions reach breaking point. Can Daniel escape the web of treason in which he finds himself ensnared - or has his luck finally run out?
May 2024
Winter 1953. Beneath a pitch-black Leningrad sky, two bodies lie near the towering statue of Lenin outside the Finland Station. 'Nothing sinister, here, just a simple hit and run,' an officer in the MGB secret police assures militia detective Revol Rossel. Now he knows it's murder. Only recently released from a brutal Siberian labour camp and determined to find his missing sister at last, Rossel wants nothing to do with this new case. But his alcoholic, broken superior officer, Captain Liphukin, seizes upon it as his salvation – a last chance to be a true Soviet hero .Along with sharp-witted Sergeant Lidia Gerashvili, and Major Nikitin, the interrogator who once cut off Rossel's fingers, Rossel sets off on the trail of a murderer whose crimes surpass those of even the deranged tsar Ivan the Terrible. A trail leading to a dark, hidden episode in Bolshevik history filled with unspeakable horrors. There is only one eyewitness – Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov, better known as Lenin, whose giant right hand stretches out towards the frozen River Neva. Lenin, Rossel thinks, seems to be pointing at someone. But who? Man of Bones is by Ben Creed.
Faith is by Linda Calvey. Wakefield, 1964. Life is hardly rosy for Annie Wills – an unhappy upbringing and then married too young with husband Gary soon proving a lazy coward unable to hold down a job, his fists always ready to vent his anger on the world. The one shining star in Annie's life is her perfect little girl, Maria. When Gary foolishly ends up in debt to local crime family, the Waltons, the only way for Annie to keep a roof over their heads is to work at one of the Waltons' drinking clubs. There, for the sake of Maria, Annie does the unthinkable and keeps men happy, night after night. Maria grows into a stunning teenager who catches the eye of Fred Walton, volatile son of family boss, Ted. Despite Annie's desperate efforts to protect Maria from this seedy world, the young couple fall into a relationship and inevitably Maria falls pregnant. Fred is furious at the news, lashing out again and again with his hand, his ring with its secret razor tip leaving Maria with deep, livid scars criss-crossing one side of her beautiful face. Annie knows the marks on her daughter's face will never fade but they will be nothing compared to the trauma Maria will hold deep inside. Annie and Maria simply cannot stay in town. With Maria's face wrapped in bandages, they flee to London. Joyce, a fellow prostitute from the Walton's bar who has recently moved to Stepney, shows mother and daughter the only generosity and kindness they've ever known and helps them find a new life in the East End. But the secrets left behind in Wakefield fester. And while Annie and Maria may be finished with their hometown, the Waltons are far from finished with them.
June 2024
A young man has been murdered on the notorious Paradise estate in London. The police have their assumptions; out-of-work private investigator Dylan Kasper, more than familiar with the neighbourhood, has his own. Kasper takes it upon himself to get to the bottom of the killing. He soon discovers the reason the boy was killed that the police will never find - or want to find. A highly incriminating piece of evidence tying an illegal production company to the government and police alike. But this is just the beginning. Kasper has made a name for himself getting under the skin of the most brutal killers in the capital. When those dearest to Kasper are suddenly thrust into view, he will have to make an impossible choice. Will the inhabitants of Paradise feel safe at last, if the price must be paid in blood? A Killing in Paradise is by Elliot F Sweeney.
Knock, Knock is by Michelle Yeahan. When a serial killer moves in next door to a say at home mum, he has no idea how much trouble he is in... After all there is no lengths she wouldn't go to.
A ghost train, lost in Time, hurtles through the night... Two members of Team 236 are trapped on board. Not ideal under any circumstances but catastrophic when they're at each other's throats. Hot on their heels, but never quite able to catch up, can Lt Grint and his team overcome all obstacles in their way and save their fellow officers before the train disappears for good? Nor is TPHQ without its own problems as Matthew risks his sanity to track them through the Time Map. And a Mikey-experiment goes horribly wrong, exposing something better left concealed for all Time. What are the Time Police hiding? And what will they do to keep their secret? Killing Time is by Jodi Taylor.
Also published in June is an untitled Berlin thriller by Simon Scarrow.
Music to Die For at the Seaview Hotel is by Glenda Young. The A64 are reuniting for the gig of a lifetime at Scarborough's Open Air Theatre, and Helen Dexter is overjoyed when they book into her Seaview Hotel. However, as old tensions rise within the band, it's clear each musician has something to hide. Why is lead singer Starr running away from her past? Why is Pete the drummer secretive about where he's been for the last forty years? And when guitarist Dave breaks his legs in a freak window-cleaning accident, a new guitarist arrives, causing even more discord for all. Then, as the band rehearse for their comeback gig, a dead body is found. Can Seaview Hotel landlady Helen Dexter and her rescue greyhound Suki hit the right note and solve the crime?
