Books to Look forward to from Little Brown and Constable and Robinson

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.

Books to look forward to from Hodder & Stoughton and Mulholland Books

In London's smoky taverns, a conspiracy is brewing: a group of wealthy young Catholic dissidents plot to assassinate Elizabeth, free Mary Queen of Scots - and open England to Spanish invasion.  But the conspirators have been infiltrated by Sir Francis Walsingham's top intelligencer, John Shakespeare. Shakespeare, however, is torn: the woman he loves stands accused of murder.  In a desperate race against time he must save her from the noose and the realm from treachery.  And then it dawns that both investigations are inextricably linked - by corruption very close to the seat of power ... Holy Spy is by Rory Clements and is due to be published in February 2015.

After moving with her family from London to Devon, Justine Merrison notices that her daughter Ellen is growing increasingly withdrawn.  When probed, Ellen tells Justine that her best friend at her new school, George Donbavand, has been unfairly expelled.  But when Justine investigates, the school’s headmistress tells her that she must be mistaken: George Donbavand has not been expelled, because there has never been a boy with that name at the school.  Ellen insists that George is real, but the teachers suddenly appear very nervous - as if they're hiding something.  And then the phone calls start.  Someone keeps ringing Justine demanding that she stop trying to scare and intimidate them.  But what's even stranger is that the mystery caller addresses Justine as 'Sandie', which is not and has never been her name...  A Game for all the Family is by Sophie Hannah and is due to be published in April 2015.

In the 1970s, a terrifying serial killer stalked the streets of Tynemouth.  The press called him the Joker.  The crimes stopped - but the man was never caught.  And now he's back.  A body has been found in a sleazy motel room, murdered in exactly the same way as the Joker's first victims.  Is it a copycat?  A trick?  Or is the Joker at work once more?  It's only DI Jack Brady's first day back - and this will be his most twisted case yet.  As Brady digs into both the old murders and the new, he must confront revenge, betrayal, love and lies...and a truly ruthless killer.  Dead Man Walking is by Danielle Ramsay and is due to be published in March 2015.

Last Words is by Michael Koryta and is due to be published in June 2015.  Still mourning the death of his wife, private investigator Mark Novak accepts a case that may be his undoing.  On same day his wife died, the body of a teenage girl was pulled from the extensive and perilous cave system beneath Southern Indiana.  Now the man who rescued the girl, who was believed to be her killer, begs Novak uncover what really happened.  The only problem is in small-town Midwest, cold cases stay cold.  Garrison is much like any place in America, proud and fortified against outsiders.  So Mark is forced to delve beneath the town's secrets, and more frighteningly match wits with the man who knows the caverns better than anyone.  A man who seemed to lose his mind.  A man who seems to know Mark Novak all too well.

Solitude Creek is by Jeffery Deaver and is due to be published in May 2015.  As an investigator with the California Bureau of Investigation, Kathryn Dance is used to putting criminals behind bars.  But when she's suspended after a dangerous gang member she interviews - and deems innocent - is proven guilty and escapes in a violent shoot out, she begins to question her judgement.  With her badge removed and forced to act as a consultant, Dance must turn her hand to another pressing case: a terrifying stampede of panicked music fans at a concert venue which left half a dozen people dead.  When her investigations suggest that the stampede was deliberately instigated by assailant Anthony Marsh - a hired criminal renowned for using people's herd mentality as a weapon - Dance must use her skills to aid Chief Detective Michael O'Neil in a race against the clock to find Marsh before he makes his next deadly strike.

Gone is by Rebecca Muddiman and is due to be published in January 2015.  250,000 people go missing in the UK every year.  91% of those reported to police are found within 48 hours.  99% of cases are solved within a year.  And 1% stay gone.  Eleven years ago, troubled teenager Emma Thorley went missing.  The police assumed she was a runaway.  But now a body has been found in woods near Blyth.  DI Michael Gardner knows he didn't take Emma's disappearance seriously enough back then, and is determined to make up for it now.  But when he and DS Nicola Freeman start to reinvestigate, they discover that nothing is as simple as it seems.  As news of the discovery travels, the past will come back to haunt all those involved.  Because there are consequences when good people do bad things, and some secrets cannot stay buried forever...

The Passage and Lost.  Four days into a five-day singles cruise on the Gulf of Mexico, the ageing ship Beautiful Dreamer stops dead in the water.  With no electricity and no cellular signals, the passengers and crew have no way to call for help.  But everyone is certain that rescue teams will come looking for them soon.  All they have to do is wait.  That is, until the toilets stop working and the food begins to run out.  When the body of a woman is discovered in her cabin the passengers start to panic.  There's a murderer on board the Beautiful Dreamer...and maybe something worse.  Day Four is by Sarah Lotz and is due to be published in April 2015.

Young Willie is on the run, having fled his Texas home when an infamous local landowner murdered his father.  A man named Loving takes him in and trains him in the fine arts of shooting, riding, reading, and gardening.  When Loving dies, Willie renames himself Nat Love in tribute to his mentor and heads west.  In Deadwood, South Dakota Territory, Nat becomes a Buffalo Soldier and is befriended by Wild Bill Hickok.  After winning a famous shooting match, Nat's peerless marksmanship and charm earn him the nickname Deadwood Dick, as well as a beautiful bride.  But the hellhounds are still on his trail, and they brutally attack Nat Love's wife, driving him to a final, deadly showdown that will be one for the history books.  Paradise Sky is by Joe R Lansdale and is due to be published in June 2015.

London,  1728.  A young man is dragged to the Tyburn gallows.  His name is Tom Hawkins and he is innocent.  Somehow he has to prove it, before the noose tightens around his neck.  It’s all Tom’s fault.  He should never been told the most dangerous criminal in London that he was looking for adventure.  He should never have offered to help the king’s mistress with her brutal husband.  And most of all, he should never have trusted the calculating Queen.  She promises a royal pardon if he holds his tongue, but there is nothing more silent than a hanged man.  The currently untitled novel by Antonia Hodgson is due to be  published in February 2015.

When a married couple is found dead in their Jacuzzi and their adopted five year old daughter has vanished, Inspector Malin Fors, the troubled but brilliant star of the Linköping police force, is put in charge of the case.  But this a haunting case where the borders have become blurred: those between the living and the dead, between good and evil.  As the investigation forces Malin to confront his own demons, will she hold out long enough to find the missing girl before it’s too late? Water Angels is by Mons Kallentoft and is due to be published in April 2015.

Afraid is by Mandasue Heller and is due to be published in January 2015.  When fifteen-year-old Skye's mother finally does something so shocking that it can't be hushed up, the police turn her over to the social workers - and that's when the nightmare begins.  No one will let her talk to her father; the woman who is supposed to be helping her dumps her in a terrifying 'home' that's more like a jail.  But she still has one friend to turn to: the sympathetic girl she's met in an internet chat room, the one who seems to have a home life as unhappy as Skye's.  And Jade offers her a safe place to stay ...Alone in Manchester, nearly penniless, Skye is willing to trust Jade.  Even when it isn't Jade who turns up at the rendezvous, but a grown-up man who says he's Jade's brother ...

Deadly Election by Lindsey Davis is due to be published in April 2015.  We first met Flavia Albia, Falco's feisty adopted daughter, in The Ides of April.  Albia is a remarkable woman in what is very much a man's world: young, widowed and fiercely independent, she lives alone on the Aventine Hill in Rome and makes a good living as a hired investigator.  An outsider in more ways than one, Albia has unique insight into life in ancient Rome, and she puts it to good use going places no man could go, and asking questions no man could ask.  When a body is discovered inside a large chest that's about to go under the hammer at the Falco family auction house, Albia throws herself into the investigation.  For one thing, it'd be nice to beat her adoptive father at his own game.  For another, it'll give her yet another chance to work with Manlius Faustus, the man she just can't quite get enough of.  But when Faustus then invites her to get involved in the Roman elections, Albia discovers links between the politician they're working for and the murder she's investigating.  And those links implicate none other than Faustus. 

The 16th Amendment to the Constitution legalized federal income tax, but what if there were problems with the 1913 ratification of that amendment?  Problems that call into question decades of tax collecting, and could even bring down the US economy. Cotton Malone, once a member of an elite intelligence division within the Justice Department known as the Magellan Billet, is now retired.  But when his former-boss, Stephanie Nelle, asks him to track a rogue North Korean who may have acquired some top secret Treasury Department files-the kind that could bring the United States to its knees-Malone is vaulted into a harrowing twenty-four-hour chase that begins on the water in Venice and ends in the remote highlands of Croatia. The Patriot Threat is by Steve Berry and is due to be published in May 2015.

Swedish Lapland: 1717; a group of disparate settlers struggles to forge a new life in the

shadow of the grim mountain Blackasen whose dark mythology lies at odds with the repressive, almost feudal control exerted by the church.  Into this setting, Maija, her husband, and two daughters arrive, yearning to forget the traumas that caused them to abandon their native Finland and start anew.  Not long after their arrival, their teenage daughter Frederika stumbles across the savagely mutilated body of a fellow settler, Eriksson, in a picturesque glade.  The locals are quick to dismiss the culprit as wolf or bear.  Maija, however, is unconvinced and compelled by the ghosts of her past she determines to investigate a murder.  As the seasons change and a harsh winter known as a 'Wolf Winter' descends, Maija begins a dangerous quest to unearth the secrets that both her neighbours and the church have conspired to bury. Now as the snow begins to fall, she will come to know the full cost of survival demanded from those who would live in the shadow of Blackasen - and the terrible truth about those who have paid the price. Wolf Winter is by Cecilia Ekbäck and is due to be published in January 2015.

Ten ears after the peace deal between Britain and Germany, international tensions are rearing their heads.  Especially in Africa, where the British, Portuguese and expanding German colonies rub against each other.  Burton Cole is back in England, desperate to find his lover, Madeleine.  When he discovers that her husband has had her deported to Madagaskar, the African island converted by the Nazis into a vast prison camp for the Jews, he jumps at the chance to join a secret mission to go there and make contact with Jewish nuclear scientists.  But Burton is heading into more danger than he could possibly imagine.  The Madagaskar Plan is by Guy Saville and is due to be published in July 2015.

Beecher White, a humble archivist at the U.S. National Archives by day, has a secret: he belongs to the Culper Ring, a network of spies founded by George Washington during the American Revolution.  Over the course of his time working for the Culper Ring, White has discovered countless secrets and saved more lives than he knows - including the President's.  And then, one day, White makes an alarming discovery on the White House grounds: a severed arm buried in the Rose Garden.  As he investigates, he realizes it's a message...one that may have dire repercussions for the President.  But that's not all - the message also turns Beecher's personal life upside-down, pointing him towards the dark truth about his father's death.  The President’s Shadow is by Brad Meltzer and is due to be published in June 2015.

Every student needs a part-time job.  Hers is hunting criminals.  Sarie Holland is a good kid.  An Honours student.  She doesn't even drink.  So when a narcotics cop busts her while she's doing a favour for a friend, she has a lot to lose.  Desperate to avoid destroying her future, Sarie agrees to become a CI - a confidential informant.  Armed only with a notebook, she turns out to be as good at catching criminals as she is at passing tests.  But it's going to take more than one nineteen-year-old to clean up Philadelphia.  Soon Sarie is caught in the middle of a power struggle between corrupt cops and warring gangs, with nothing on her side but stubbornness and smarts.  Which is bad news for both the police and the underworld.  Because when it comes to payback, CI #137 turns out to be a very fast learner...  Canary is by Duane Swierczynski and is due to be published in February 2015.

They found the boy by the swimming pool, dolls floating on its surface.  Inside the house, his professor lay dead.  But Hugo claims to remember nothing...and his mother is one of Commandant Servaz's oldest friends.  When Servaz receives Marianne's desperate phone call, he is drawn back to Marsac - the town where he studied, and where his daughter is now at university too.  It brings back memories...and as more people die in strange and unsettling circumstances, it becomes clear that if he is to close the case, Servaz must reopen old and terrible wounds.  It will be his most dangerous - and his most personal - investigation yet. A Song for Drowned Souls is by Bernard Minier and is due to be published in June 2015.

Black River is by Tom Harper and is due to be published in May 2015.  When Kel MacDonald joins an expedition looking for a legendary lost city in the Peruvian Amazon, he's expecting the adventure of a lifetime.  But things are not what they seem.  Paramilitaries, drug cartels, and wildcat prospectors all want what the jungle has to offer - while untamed local tribes will fight desperately to protect their way of life.  Maps of the region have been doctored.  And what exactly happened to the previous expedition, a government vaccination program that went upriver and never returned?  Soon finding the lost city is the least of their troubles.  The jungle hides deadly secrets that must be hidden at all costs.  And someone in the group wants to make sure they never get out.

In the midst of post-war Boston two old friends are trying to scrape a living.  WWII veteran

Cal is getting by: heroin addict Dante is trying – and mostly failing –to kick the habit.  But when the girl they fought over in their hardscrabble youth is found murdered, they take it upon themselves to track down her killer.  Their investigation leads them from the drug-ravaged neighbourhood they know to gangsters and corrupt politicians.  And as their quest gets ever more dangerous, it seems clear that even if they can find answers, they may end up losing themselves.  Serpents in the Cold is by Thomas O’Malley & Douglas Graham Purdy and is due to be published in January 2015.

Having survived his assignment in Arabia, imperial agent Cassius Corbulo now spends most of his time on women and wine.  But, after narrowly escaping an assassination attempt, Cassius is called back into action and sent north, tasked with smashing a counterfeiting gang.  After tracking the criminals to the city of Berytus, Cassius’s investigations are hampered by civil unrest and uncooperative officials.  Under pressure from his superiors, Cassius closes in on the counterfeiters.  But the gang will stop at nothing to protect their profits, leading Cassius and his companions in a deadly pursuit across the slopes of Mount Lebanon.  Agent of Rome: The Emperor’s Silver is by Nick Brown and is due to be published in June 2015.

At the Ruin of the World is by John Henry Clay and is due to be published in May 2015.  The Roman Empire is on the brink of extinction.  This is felt most keenly in Gaul, which is besieged on all sides by barbarians: the Huns and the Goths.  As the Empire starts to crumble, enemies to approach and battles begin to be fought, the lives of four people are drawn into this conflict: the poet and courtier Sidonius, soldier Ecdicius, low-born but crafty Arvandus, and the beautiful but enigmatic Attica.

It's Ella's senior year of high school and she and her best friend Linds plan to make it the best year ever.  At Brock Cochran's end of summer pool party, the girls vow to have as much fun as possible before they head off to different colleges in the fall.  But when Ella is mysteriously attacked on her way home from the party, everything changes.  Ella's carefree senior year plans disintegrate as she finds herself at the centre of an attempted murder investigation.  Ella is determined to move on; to get her life back to normal, but she can't seem to shake the feeling that she's still being watched.  Suddenly, the people closest to her seem the most suspicious, like the elusive Jensen Carver.  In her seemingly safe West Virginia town, Ella starts to wonder who she can actually trust.  The Dead List is by Jennifer L Armentrout and is due to be published in April 2015.

Lizzie Snow was first introduced in the final book of Sarah Graves's previous series, Bat in the Belfry, in which she helped Jake Tiptree find who killed a girl and left her body in a church steeple.  Now Lizzie has taken over as Eastport's police chief, and is quickly finding the job - and her life - more complicated than she expected.  Then she learns that someone seems to be killing retired detectives in the state... and that she has been followed from Boston to Maine by a mysterious stalker whose chilling intentions will drive her to the edge.  Winter at the Door is due to be published in January 2015.

A historical novel of suspense, seasoned with recipes and remedies for broken hearts, The Penny Heart draws on age-old themes of cooking, trickery and revenge.  Manchester 1809.  Would-be industrialist Michael Croxon chases young street hawker Mary Jebb into a wretched warren after she cons his brother out of his money.  In an unguarded moment he develops a suppressed attraction to the girl.  After he bears witness in court against her, Mary sends him a Penny Heart token from the prison hulks bearing a strange verse, the reverse announcing that she will be transported for 7 years.  Two years later, in order to build a manufactory, Michael has married awkward Jane Moore, who is overjoyed at her luck, but soon disappointed to learn it was only to gain her land.  Meanwhile, Mary escapes from Botany Bay to be shipwrecked on the wild coast of New Zealand, where she loses her lover and the last of her scruples.  Using her conning skills, Mary returns home and adopts the identity of 'Peg', the Croxon's cook at their lonely Hall.  After Mary helps Jane compile a book of husband-pleasing recipes, Jane's new womanly wiles seem to earn Michael's affection.  But when Jane discovers two matching Penny Heart love tokens that tell of banishment to the ends of the earth, she enters a world of deceit and double-crossing, and uncovers a tale of revenge that culminates in murder.  The Penny Heart is by Martine Bailey and is due to be published in May 2015.

Every life is uncertain.  Every choice is a danger.  Set on the dark side of Los Angeles, this is a masterful collection of edge-of-your-seat tales: a prison guard must protect an inmate being tried for heinous crimes.  A father and son set out to rescue a young couple trapped during a wildfire after they cross the border.  An ex-con trying to make good as a security guard stumbles onto a burglary plot.  A young father must submit to blackmail to protect the fragile life he's built.  Sweet Nothing is by Richard Lange and is an intense and gripping journey through real lives with big problems.  It is due to be published in February 2015.

Lives Lost is by Britta Bolt and is due to be published in June 2015.  A minute can make all the difference...Pieter Posthumus is enjoying a quiet drink in his favourite bar when the screaming starts.  A minute later, the owner of the guesthouse next-door rushes in: one of her tenants has been murdered.  Marloes, the guesthouse owner, is an odd but kind soul.  Posthumus cannot believe it when she is arrested - for both her tenant Zig's murder and another death years before.  He knows there are questions unanswered: what is the link between the two cases?  Why are people so keen to think Marloes is guilty?  And why did Zig paint just one picture every year - a copy of a Dutch master, but with one peculiar twist?  As his investigation progresses, he comes to see that a few minutes can mean all the difference in the world: between saving a life and taking one; between innocence and guilt.  And that sometimes asking questions leads to a truth that's hard to bear.

Northern Ireland, 1993.  For high-flying MI5 officer Avery Chance the real war has only just

begun.  When Chance is abducted by the IRA's notorious Nutting Squad, her hopes lie in the hands of a young SAS recruit who must risk everything to bring her home.  Twenty years after his act of self-sacrifice in Belfast ex-SAS legend John Bald is a scarred shadow of his former self.  But when a face from the past appears and rescues him from deep trouble, Bald is offered one last shot at redemption.  His target is Kurt Pretorius, a ruthless mercenary operating deep in the wilds of war-ravaged Somali.  In a world where rogue mercenaries operate beyond the reach of the law, Kurt Pretorius has transformed himself into a god.  It is up to Bald to stop Pretorius before he turns Somalia into a terrorist haven.  But Bald quickly finds himself sucked into a twisted game of survival, where the stakes could not be higher - and the price of failure is his life...With time running out, Bald must kill Pretorius before he brings down everyone around him.  It's a mission Bald was born to do.  Because sometimes, the only way to beat your deadliest enemy...is to be like your deadliest enemy. Silent Kill is by Chris Ryan and is due to be published in January 2015.

Breaking News!!! Anthony Horowitz to pen new James Bond novel inspired by oiginal unseen Fleming material!

Ian Fleming Publications Ltd., The Ian Fleming Estate, the Orion Publishing Group, and HarperCollins US and Canada are delighted to announce that international bestselling and award-winning writer Anthony Horowitz is at work on an official new James Bond novel. Currently dubbed Project One, the novel is due for worldwide release on 8^th September 2015.

The new book by Horowitz – a lifelong fan of Ian Fleming – will be set in the 1950s and will be unique among the modern James Bond novels, in that a section will contain previously unseen material written by Fleming to which Horowitz has had exclusive access.

Jessie Grimond, great-niece of Ian Fleming, said: “In the 1950s Ian Fleming wrote several episode treatments for a James Bond television series. But it never came to be made and he ended up turning most of the plots into the short stories that are now in the collections For Your Eyes Only and Octopussy and The Living Daylights. However, there are a few plot outlines which he never used and which, till now, have never been published, or aired. Given that Anthony is as brilliant a screenwriter as he is a novelist, we thought it would be exciting to see what he would do with one of them.”

The treatment chosen by Horowitz, which will serve as a starting point for his novel, is entitled Murder on Wheels, and follows Bond on a mission into the world of motor racing. Familiar characters in the TV treatment include ‘M’ and Miss Moneypenny.

One of the country’s most prolific and successful writers, Horowitz has over 40 books to his name. His recent Sherlock Holmes novel, The House of Silk, sold in more than 35 countries, whilst his bestselling teen spy series, Alex Rider, has sold more than 19 million copies worldwide. As a TV screenwriter he created both Midsomer Murders and the BAFTA-winning Foyle’s War.

Horowitz said: "It's no secret that Ian Fleming's extraordinary character has had a profound influence on my life, so when the estate approached me to write a new James Bond novel how could I possibly refuse? It's a huge challenge – more difficult even than Sherlock Holmes in some ways – but having original, unpublished material by Fleming has been an inspiration. This is a book I had to write."

Lucy Fleming, niece of Ian Fleming, said: “We are thrilled that Anthony has taken on the Bond mantle, and can’t wait to read his novel. Anthony is a brilliant writer, as his millions of fans around the world demonstrate. He has an exceptional skill for writing spy thrillers in particular, and it is this coupled with the original Fleming material and his knowledge of and enthusiasm for Bond, which makes for a really exciting proposition.”

Malcolm Edwards, Deputy CEO and Group Publisher, Orion Publishing Group, said: “James Bond and Anthony Horowitz is a match made in publishing heaven. Anthony is a writer of exceptional skill and I have no doubt he will deliver a book that will resonate and delight Bond fans around the globe. For our part, we will publish the book in a way that celebrates the legacy of literary Bond and mount a campaign that will make publication day one of the biggest publishing events of 2015.”

Jonathan Burnham, Senior Vice President and Publisher, HarperCollins US, said: “HarperCollins is thrilled to be publishing the new James Bond novel in the United States and Canada. Anthony Horowitz is an author of exceptional skill and range – his Sherlock Holmes novel, House of Silk, displayed his amazing ability to reanimate fictional characters to create a new and powerful narrative.  The combination of this talent, his inventiveness and brilliance as a novelist, and his access to hitherto unpublished Fleming material, makes this a uniquely exciting event for all James Bond fans.”

 The book will be published by Orion Publishing Group in the UK, and by HarperCollins in the United States. The book rights were sold in the English language by Jonny Geller of Curtis Brown, on behalf of Ian Fleming Publications Ltd and The Ian Fleming Estate. International rights will be offered at the forthcoming Frankfurt Book Fair on October 6.

 Further announcements about the project will follow in 2015.

 

-End-

 

For media enquiries including requests for new images of Anthony Horowitz please contact Alice Ingall, Anwen Hooson or Katie Brown at Riot Communications at: the Riot Communications office on 020 3174 0118; alice@riotcommunications.com /07887 527 504;  anwen@riotcommunications.com / 07899 79885; andkatie@riotcommunications.com / 07748 592 813

 For enquiries regarding English language rights please contact Jonny Geller via Kirsten Foster at Curtis Brown (Kirsten.foster@curtisbrown. co.uk / 020 7393 4492) and for enquiries regarding international rights please contact Melissa Pimentel (Melissa@curtisbrown.co.uk / 020 7393 4429)

 The official hashtag for the campaign is #NewBondBook

 NOTES TO EDITORS

 Anthony Horowitz

• Horowitz is one of the country’s most successful writers, working across many media forms, including books, TV series, films, plays and journalism. His most recent novel, The House of Silk was a Sunday TimesTop 10 bestseller and will be followed up by his new Sherlock Holmes novel Moriarty, publishing on 23^rdOctober 2014 in the UK and on 9^th December 2014 in the US. As well as his bestselling teen spy series Alex Rider, the first of which was adapted into the 2006 feature film Stormbreaker, his other work for children includes the series The Power of Five and The Diamond Brothers. Further screenwriting credits include Poirot and the widely acclaimed mini-series Collision and Injustice. Horowitz has recently joined the board of the Old Vic and regularly contributes to a wide variety of national newspapers and magazines. In January 2014 he was awarded an OBE for his services to literature. He lives in London.
• Walker Books will be celebrating 15 years of Alex Rider in 2015.
   
  James Bond Books

• Over 100 million James Bond books have been sold worldwide.
• Ian Fleming wrote 14 James Bond books: Casino Royale (1953); Live and Let Die (1954); Moonraker(1955); Diamonds Are Forever (1956); From Russia with Love (1957); Dr. No (1958); Goldfinger (1959);For your Eyes Only (1960); Thunderball (1961); The Spy Who Loved Me (1962); On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1963); You Only Live Twice (1964); The Man With The Golden Gun (1965); and Octopussy and The Living Daylights (1966).
• Fleming’s other works include the children’s favourite, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (1964), which was made into a film and stage musical; The Diamond Smugglers (1957); and a collection of travel writings called Thrilling Cities (1963).
• Vintage Publishing, a division of Penguin Random House, currently holds the license to publish Ian Fleming’s entire James Bond backlist in print and ebook format, along with Fleming’s two non-fiction titles in the English language worldwide excluding USA/Canada.
• Other previous authors of official James Bond novels include: Kingsley Amis, John Gardner, Raymond Benson, Sebastian Faulks, Jeffery Deaver and William Boyd.
• Steve Cole is the author of the new series of ‘Young Bond’ books, the first of which, Shoot to Kill, will be published by Doubleday on 6^th November 2014.
   
  Ian Fleming Publications Ltd and The Ian Fleming Estate

Ian Fleming Publications Ltd. is run by the Fleming family and owns the copyright in Ian Fleming’s fiction and non-fiction books. The Ian Fleming Estate is also run by the Fleming family and owns the copyright in Ian Fleming’s personal letters, some journalism and other non-Bond writing. www.ianfleming.com

Orion Publishing Group:

• The Orion Publishing Group is one of the UK’s leading publishers with a list of award-winning fiction and non-fiction under three main imprints: Orion Books, Weidenfeld & Nicolson and Gollancz.
• Orion Books has an excellent record of Sunday Times Top Ten Bestsellers. The Orion fiction list encompasses crime and thrillers, contemporary women’s fiction and historical novels. Major authors include: Linwood Barclay, Maeve Binchy, Michael Connelly, Anthony Horowitz, Erica James, Cathy Kelly, Kate Mosse and Ian Rankin. The Orion Publishing Group is part of Hachette UK, which is a leading UK trade publishing group. Hachette UK is owned by Hachette Livre, the world’s second largest trade and educational publisher.
   
  HarperCollins US:

HarperCollins Publishers is the second largest consumer book publisher in the world, with operations in 18 countries. With nearly two hundred years of history and more than 65 unique imprints around the world, HarperCollins publishes approximately 10,000 new books every year, in over 30 languages, and has a print and digital catalog of more than 200,000 titles. Writing across dozens of genres, HarperCollins authors include winners of the Nobel Prize, the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Award, the Newbery and Caldecott Medals and the Man Booker Prize. HarperCollins, headquartered in New York, is a subsidiary of News Corp and can be visited online at corporate.HC.com