Search Results for: Born a Crime

Classic police procedural by a ‘born storyteller’ (Sunday Times), who combined natural flair with his experience in the police to truly authentic effect.

There was an extra body in the morgue – a body stripped of all identification and with its face badly battered. But when Inspector Martineau was called to the scene he had a pretty good idea whose it was.

That was, however, just the beginning. A big payroll robbery, a group of out-of-town mobsters and some odd behaviour in a local night spot all attract Inspector Martineau’s attention. While, at a funeral parlour, the quick are considerably more active and dangerous a problem than the dead.

It’s 1927 and New Orleans-born novelist Jeff Caldwell is called back to that most colourful of American cities by a frantic letter from Dave Hobart, a boyhood friend.

Dave owns a fabulous and foreboding 16th-century English manor house moved from England to New Orleans at the whim of his eccentric grandfather. But Delys Hall has been nicknamed Deadly Hall. Some terrible things have happened there – including murder – and there are rumours of hidden treasure and a ghost.

‘The plot’s the thing … it is a sort of gleeful game’ New York Times Book Review

An exclusive J.D. Robb short story.

Lieutenant Eve Dallas doesn’t believe in ghosts. But everyone else is spooked by the supposedly haunted abandoned nightclub where a very recent corpse has just shown up – alongside the bones of the famous missing singer, Bobbie Bray. As grandson of the original owner, Radcliff C. Hopkins was planning to reopen the nightclub and cash in on its notoriety. But his grandfather is rumoured to be the one who killed Bobbie. Did Bobbie’s ghost finally get her revenge, or is there a more earthly explanation?

Set between Memory in Death and Born in Death.

Trieste in 1906 is of vital strategic importance and one of the world’s greatest seaports. But assorted nationalist movements are threatening to pull the place apart and the militarist regime has trouble keeping a lid on things.


Amid all the chaos the British consul goes missing, and Special Branch Seymour is sent to find him. Born to an immigrant family in London’s East End, Seymour has an acute linguistic ear – crucial in turn-of-the-century Trieste. As he attempts to solve the riddle of the consul’s disappearance, Seymour discovers dark and disturbing corners of the city and finds that it holds the secrets of his own family’s past.

Classic police procedural by a ‘born storyteller’ (Sunday Times), who combined natural flair with his experience in the police to truly authentic effect.

When a respected and successful businessman claims that he is being blackmailed by Inspector Martineau, and provides evidence to support his allegations, the policeman’s superiors have no choice but to suspend him from duty.

Martineau must go to work to clear his name, but the trail is a complex and dangerous one. The inspector has many enemies, not least Dixie Costello, whom he helped to put in jail and who is now once more at large. But is the trail a false one? And are all of Martineau’s colleagues to be trusted?

John Raven and his wife Kirstie are holidaying in Lisbon at Ilona Szecheyi’s villa when Ilona’s father Stephen reveals his well-guarded secret: shortly before the communist occupation of Hungary in 1945, he was entrusted with 17 million in government gold bullion. Now, thirty-seven years later, the courts have awarded him full ownership of the money – and the current Hungarian regime is not pleased.

They will stop at nothing to get it back, and when blackmail and murder strike, Raven can’t pull out fast enough before he becomes the main suspect . . .

‘Donald MacKenzie is a born storyteller’ Guardian

Family always comes first. Until now.

Get ready for the ultimate summer read with the explosive new novel from Sunday Times No.1 bestseller and ‘undisputed queen of crime writing’ (Guardian) Martina Cole.

Diana Davis has been head of the family business since the death of her husband, an infamous bank robber. She’s a woman in a man’s world, but no one messes with her.

Her only son, Angus, is a natural born villain, but he needs to earn Diana’s trust before she’ll allow him into the business.

Once he’s proved he has the brains to run their clubs in Marbella, he is given what he’s always wanted. It’s the beginning of a reign of terror that knows no bounds.

But Angus has a blind spot: his wife, Lorna, and their three kids, Angus Junior, Sean and Eilish. And as the next generation enters the business, Angus has a painful truth to learn. Even when it comes to family, he must show no mercy…

‘She’s a total one-off’ Guardian

‘The stuff of legend’ Mirror

‘Superstar crime writer’ This Morning

‘There really is only one Martina Cole’ Closer

‘The undisputed Queen of crime writing’ Erwin James

In 1955, aged twenty-three and fresh from a Master’s in English Literature, Joe Gores knew he wanted to be a writer. In the meantime, he had to pay the bills.

He became a repo man for L. A. Walker, later going into partnership with Walker’s San Francisco manager, Dave Kikkert. The inspiration for Gores’s DKA Files series was born.

Gores fictionalises his repo man days in these twelve ‘cases’. Some of the stories were published in Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine, and were written throughout a distinguished career. Gores won an Edgar Award in 1969 for A Time for Predators, and wrote TV scripts for Columbo, Kojak and Magnum, PI among others.

The behind-the-scenes story of the quintessential film noir and cult classic, Billy Wilder’s Double Indemnity-its true crime origins and crucial impact on film history-is told for the first time in this riveting narrative published for the film’s 80th anniversary.

From real crime to serial to novel to movie, the history of Double Indemnity is as complex and exciting as the plot of any to hit the screen during film noir’s classic period. Born of a true crime that inspired reporter and would-be crime writer James M. Cain’s novella, Hollywood quickly bid on the rights but throughout the 1930s a strict code of censorship made certain that no studio could green-light a murder melodrama based on real events. Then World War II loosened some strictures, and director-writer Billy Wilder-before his prime as director of sparkling comedies-could hire hardboiled novelist Raymond Chandler and revamp the story enough to pass the censors.

Overcoming strong resistance, Wilder then lined up a star cast led by the incomparable Barbara Stanwyck in her unforgettable turn as the ultimate femme fetale, alongside Fred MacMurray, cast against type as her partner in crime, and Edward G. Robinson as a bloodhound claims adjuster. With these skilled actors set against a low-key look, Wilder’s final film became one of the earliest studio noirs to gain critical and commercial success (nominated for 7 Oscars!), to influence the entire noir movement, and to impact filmmakers and audiences to this day.

Authors Alain Silver and James Ursini tell the complete history of Double Indemnity in their latest and most provocative work on film noir: From the Moment They Met It Was Murder.

The star of JUSTIFIED returns in a stunning new novel from ‘the greatest crime writer who ever lived’ [Dennis Lehane].

US Marshal Raylan Givens, star of the series JUSTIFIED, and protagonist of RIDING THE RAP, PRONTO and the story ‘Fire in the Hole’, is back in action, this time with a federal warrant to serve on a dope dealer named Angel Arenas, a man ‘born in the U.S. but a hundred percent of him Hispanic’. The state troopers are impressed when the marshal struts into the convict’s hotel room without drawing his gun, but Raylan soon finds that Angel’s already been the victim of another crime, one that’s way bigger than a few pot plants, and clearly the work of a professional …

RAYLAN shows Elmore Leonard at the height of his powers, as we follow one of his favourite protagonists through a series of adventures with unlikely villains. As ever, the work is filled with unexpected twists and the most vibrant, crackling dialogue currently available in the English language.

Cold cases get hot in this unputdownable mystery from Jennifer Lynn Barnes, no.1 New York Times bestselling author of The Inheritance Games series. Perfect for fans of A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder.

Cassie Hobbes has a gift for profiling people. Her talent has landed her a spot in an elite FBI programme. After barely escaping a confrontation with an unbalanced killer obsessed with her mother’s murder, Cassie hopes she and the rest of the team can stick to solving cold cases from a distance.

But when victims of a brutal new serial killer start turning up, the Naturals are pulled into an active case that strikes too close to home: the killer is a perfect copycat of one of their incarcerated fathers – a man he’d do anything to forget. Forced deeper into a murderer’s psyche than ever before, will the Naturals be able to outsmart his brutal mind games before he twists them into his web for good?

Born smart. Born tough. Born FBI.

‘The Naturals is Criminal Minds for the YA world, and I loved every page’ – Ally Carter, New York Times bestselling author

The search for a missing boy gives Myron Bolitar far more than he bargained for…
From the bestselling author of SIX YEARS.

The boy was born and raised on the Main Line. But he vanished on Philadelphia’s mean streets – last seen in a down-town cheater’s hotel. For sports agent Myron Bolitar, his client, superstar Linda Coldren, comes first, and that means unravelling the mystery of her son’s kidnapping.

But when Myron goes after the missing boy, he crashes through a crowd of low-lifes, blue bloods and liars on both sides of the social divide. And when family skeletons start coming out of the closet, Myron is about to find out how deadly life can get…

Classic police procedural by a ‘born storyteller’ (Sunday Times), who combined natural flair with his experience in the police to truly authentic effect.

Hell is a City is the first of Maurice Procter’s Inspector Martineau series and was made into taut, fast-paced film in 1959 by Hammer Studios, set against the grimy back streets and rain-streaked bright lights of Manchester.

When hardened criminal Don Starling escapes from jail, killing a prison guard in the process, Inspector Philip Martineau knows he will stop at nothing to make good his escape. The two men have known each other since childhood, and Starling blames Martineau for his incarceration a decade earlier. As the story hurtles to its conclusion, the two men meet in a final, violent confrontation.

Will he ever find the life he longs for?

Born to a mother who died in childbirth and an uninterested father, Niall McAndrew grows up a solitary child, without a home to call his own. His only friend is Bridget, a young girl forced prematurely into womanhood.

Niall has brains, spirit and ambition, as well as being blessed with handsome good looks. But his loveless childhood has left its mark. Can he ever find the happiness he yearns for?

A moving and uplifting tale of a young boy with big dreams…

From the bestselling author of Far From My Father’s House and Miss Appleby’s Academy comes a rags-to-riches tale of one man’s determination to succeed. Perfect for fans of Maggie Hope and Diane Allen.

The third book in the Jasmine Sharp series, from author Christopher Brookmyre.

One crime brought them together . . .

Private investigator Jasmine Sharp should have wanted him dead.

Yet somehow, Jasmine bonded with Glen Fallan, the man who killed her father before she was born. Now he has been arrested for the murder of a local gangster, and Jasmine must finally enter his violent domain to seek answers.

. . . a second will break them apart

Detective Superintendent Catherine McLeod is in fear for her life.

When she discovers a symbol daubed on the head of Fallan’s alleged victim, it unearths secrets that will threaten everything Catherine holds dear.

One murder. Two women. A lifetime of lies revealed.

The cloistered walls of Shrewsbury Abbey have always protected Brother Cadfael from the raging Civil War. But when fighting escalates between Empress Maud and King Stephen, the war takes a deadly step closer to him. Taken prisoner in the battle for Maud’s land is Olivier de Bretagne, Brother Cadfael’s own son- born as a result of a brief encouter thirty years earlier. Now Brother Cadfael resolves to plead for his son’s release at a peace conference scheduled to take place in Coventry; but there is no sign of Olivier there. After much soul searching, Cadfael makes the difficult decision to break his monastic vows, leaving Coventry without permission- because he knows he must do everything in his power to find his son.

Cold cases get hot in this unputdownable mystery from Jennifer Lynn Barnes, no.1 New York Times bestselling author of The Inheritance Games series. Perfect for fans of A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder.

Cassie is a natural at reading people. Piecing together the tiniest details, she can tell you who you are and what you want. But it’s not a skill that she’s ever taken seriously until the FBI come knocking: they’ve begun a classified programme that uses exceptional teenagers to crack infamous cold cases, and they need Cassie.

What Cassie doesn’t realise is that there’s more at risk than a few unsolved murders – especially when she’s sent to live with a group of teens whose gifts are as unusual as her own. Soon, it becomes clear that no one in the Naturals program is what they seem. And when a new killer strikes, danger looms close. Caught in a lethal game of cat and mouse with a killer, the Naturals are going to have to use all of their gifts just to survive . . .

Born smart. Born tough. Born FBI.

‘The Naturals is Criminal Minds for the YA world, and I loved every page’ – Ally Carter, New York Times bestselling author

Cold cases get hot in this unputdownable mystery from Jennifer Lynn Barnes, no.1 New York Times bestselling author of The Inheritance Games series. Perfect for fans of A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder.

Three casinos. Three bodies. Three days.

After a string of brutal murders in Las Vegas, Cassie Hobbes and the Naturals are called in to investigate. But even with the team’s unique profiling talents, these murders seem baffling: unlike many serial killers, this one uses different methods every time. All of the victims were killed in public, yet the killer does not show up on any security feed. And each victim has a string of numbers tattooed on their wrist. Hidden in the numbers is a code – and the closer the Naturals come to unraveling the mystery, the more perilous the case becomes.

Meanwhile, Cassie is dealing with an equally dangerous and much more painful mystery. For the first time in years, there’s been a break in her mother’s case. As personal issues and tensions between the team mount, Cassie and the Naturals will be faced with impossible odds – and impossible choices.

Born smart. Born tough. Born FBI.

‘The Naturals is Criminal Minds for the YA world, and I loved every page’ – Ally Carter, New York Times bestselling author

Cold cases get hot in this unputdownable mystery from Jennifer Lynn Barnes, no.1 New York Times bestselling author of The Inheritance Games series. Perfect for fans of A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder.

All of your burning questions are answered in this shocking conclusion to the Naturals series – now with a bonus Naturals novella, Twelve, in print for the first time!

When Cassie Hobbes joined the FBI’s Naturals program, she had one goal: uncover the truth about her mother’s murder. But now, everything Cassie thought she knew about what happened that night has been called into question. Her mother is alive, and the people holding her captive are more powerful – and dangerous – than anything the Naturals have faced so far. As Cassie and the team work to uncover the secrets of a group that has been killing in secret for generations, they find themselves racing a ticking clock. When the bodies begin piling up, it soon becomes apparent that this time, the Naturals aren’t just hunting serial killers.

They’re being hunted.

Born smart. Born tough. Born FBI.

‘The Naturals is Criminal Minds for the YA world, and I loved every page’ – Ally Carter, New York Times bestselling author

Seventeenth-century Tokyo is the setting for Rowland’s first book in a murder mystery series featuring Sano Ichiro the Senior Police Commander in the district of Edo. Ichiro is a samurai whose academic background puts him at odds with most of his peers.

When beautiful, wealthy Yukiko and low-born artist Noriyoshi are found drowned together in what seems to be a shinju, or ritual double suicide, everyone believes the cause was their forbidden love. Everyone, that is, but Sano Ichiro.

Despite the official verdict and being warned off by his superiors, the shogun’s Most Honourable Investigator of Events, Situations and People suspects this double death was not only a tragedy – it was murder. Risking his family’s good name and his own life, Sano will search for the killer across every level of society, determined to find answers to a mystery no one else seems to want solved . . .

The third book in the New York Times bestselling Longmire series, featuring Sheriff Walt Longmire.

Walt Longmire has been the Sheriff in Wyoming’s Absaroka County for 25 years, but nothing could have prepared him for the savage attack on his daughter, Cady, a Philadelphia lawyer who has unwittingly become embroiled in a political cover-up.

As Walt and his best friend, Henry Standing Bear, scour the city for clues, he gets help from his deputy Victoria Moretti and her family of Philly police. But Longmire wasn’t born yesterday. He’s willing to pull out all the stops to find Cady’s attacker and show the big city that this old-timer has a few moves left in his saddlebag of tricks.

‘Johnson’s pacing is tight and his dialogue snaps’ Entertainment Weekly

When Isabel’s god-daughter, Emily, turns up after years of no contact and in need of help, she feels duty-bound to take her under her wing. To her surprise, Emily is determined to be independent and takes a job as nanny. Emily’s charge turns out to be the illegitimate child of the naïve daughter of a well-to-do couple and a ne’er-do-well conman who disappeared before the baby was born. And now he is back, intent on exploiting his parental status in return for cash.

Before she knows it, Emily is caught up in his botched attempts at blackmail, trying desperately to protect her charge from harm, while also shielding Isabel from becoming entangled in the drama. But when events beyond her control force her to act instinctively, with horrendous effect, all their lives are put terribly at risk.

DS Benjamin Chambers and DC Adam Winter are hunting a twisted serial killer who recreates famous works of art using the bodies of his victims. But after Chambers almost loses his life, the case goes cold – the killer lying dormant, his collection unfinished.

Jordan Marshall has excelled within the Met Police, driven by a loss that defined her teenage years. She obtains new evidence, convincing both Chambers and Winter to revisit the case. However, this new investigation reawakens their killer, the team in desperate pursuit of a monster hell-bent on finishing what he started at any cost.

Praise for Daniel Cole:

‘A brilliant, breathless thriller’ M.J. Arlidge

‘Superb thriller writing’ Peter Robinson

‘A star is born. Killer plot. Killer pace’ Simon Toyne

An inheritance comes with its own sinister dangers…
‘Joan Aiken’s triumph with this genre is that she does it so much better than others’ New York Times Book Review

Annette, an increasingly amnesiac magazine editor who has inherited an unexpected fortune, leaves London for a new life in a cottage in the country, but falls prey to a series of strange characters who threaten to deprive her of not just her money, but her sanity too. There’s a world-famous artist with a dark secret; a New Zealander on an archaeological dig; and a strange neighbour wheeling an invalid ‘child’ on a lonely road…

Set in the picturesque Sussex town where the author was born and spent her early years in a haunted house, this gothic thriller builds to a terrifying climax as the heroine pits her wits against the sinister forces that surround her.