Since the Gold Rush, California prospectors have siphoned off the waters of isolated Tufa Lake, exposing the fragile, otherworldly mineral formations of the lake basin. Now a local environmental group seeks to block the latest incursion by developers-a massive mining operation funded by TransPacific, a US-Hong Kong interest that seems to be behind a series of break-ins, disappearances, and shady land deals. Into this stark, lunar landscape treads San Francisco PI Sharon McCone, searching for a local eccentric now missing after a suspicious land deal. When the bullet-ridden corpse of an investor surfaces in the lake's silvery waters, McCone finds herself on a twisted trail that leads to San Francisco and then back to where it all began-the eerie desert mesas where a murderer prepares to kill again.
In remote Northern California, private investigator Sharon McCone goes undercover to investigate the murders of two indigenous women in this gripping, atmospheric mystery in the New York Times bestselling series.
When the bodies of two Indigenous women are found in the wilderness of northern California, it is only the latest horrific development in a string of similar crimes in the area. Despite all evidence to the contrary, officials rule the deaths isolated incidents, which soon join the ranks of countless other unsolved cases quickly dismissed by law enforcement.
In a town where too many injustices are tolerated or brushed under the rug, only a few people remain who refuse to let a killer walk free. But Private Investigator Sharon McCone is one of those few. She is hired by an organization called Crimes against Indigenous Sisters to go undercover in Meruk County-a community rife with secrets, lies, and corruption-to expose the truth.
In an isolated cabin in the freezing, treacherous woods, McCone must work quickly to unravel a mystery that is rooted in profound evil-before she becomes the killer's next target.
Sharon McCone returns in New York Times bestselling author Marcia Muller's thrilling new mystery!On a foggy summer morning, private investigator Sharon McCone receives a call from her former neighbors, the Curleys. Their usually dependable daughter Chelle hasn't been answering their calls for weeks. Would Sharon check on her?Sharon arranges to visit the building Chelle had been living in and rehabbing in southwest San Francisco. Once it was a nightclub and bar, she learns, and a favorite destination for the city's elite during Prohibition. But there's something sinister about the space, and Sharon quickly discovers why. Lurking behind a divider screen is a ghastly art gallery: portraits and caricatures of mass murderers, long ago and recent. Jack the Ripper. The Zodiac and Zebra killers of the 1970s. Charles Manson and his girls. Scott Peterson, who killed his pregnant wife, Laci, and dumped her body into the Bay on Christmas Eve. What, an alarmed Sharon wonders, was Chelle doing in this chamber of horrors? And where is she now?New York Times bestselling author Marcia Muller is at her page-turning best in THE BREAKERS, as she digs into a particularly disturbing corner of San Francisco's history--one that Sharon McCone may not escape alive..."[Marcia Muller's] stories crackle like few others on the mystery landscape." --San Francisco Examiner & Chronicle"Muller undoubtedly remains one of today's best mystery writers." --Associated Press
In New York Times bestselling author Marcia Muller's captivating new mystery, private detective Sharon McCone's investigation hits closer to home than ever before...
THE COLOR OF FEAR
When a knock on the door in the middle of the night wakes Sharon, she's wholly unprepared for the horrifying news: her father has been the victim of a vicious, racially-motivated attack.
A nationally recognized Shoshone artist, Elwood had been visiting Sharon for the holidays, browsing for gifts in San Francisco's exclusive Marina district when he was set upon by a mob of angry young men. Now he lies in a coma, hovering between life and death.
With little progress on the investigation from the overworked, short-handed police, Sharon resolves to track down Elwood's attackers herself. But when Sharon begins receiving hate-filled, racist threats from a shadowy group, it becomes clear that her pursuit of justice may be putting her own life in jeopardy...
Complacency can make a person careless, and Sharon McCone, who makes crime her business, should know that better than most. One minute she's riding high with her detective agency expanding, her bank account growing, and her only "problem" a marriage proposal from her lover, Hy Ripinsky, that's kicking up her longtime fears of commitment. The next minute, in the time it takes for a single phone call to bring bad news, she stands to lose everything.
McCone is stunned to learn that a favorite employee, streetwise and savvy Julia Rafael, has been charged with credit-card fraud. She thinks there must be a mistake-until she finds the goods charged to the stolen credit card in the firm's mailroom. As she starts to dig into the facts of the case, McCone realizes that someone is out to ruin her business, blacken her reputation, and harm those close to her....
Reaching back into her past to look for answers, she must come to grips with the violent twists and turns of her career, the choices she's faced, and the enemies she's made. How does the formerly trustworthy Julia fit into the big picture? And how does this new crisis tie into the recent murder of a popular Mission District fund-raiser? But when someone breaks into her car, invades her home, and upsets every aspect of her life, McCone knows one thing for sure: Now it's her turn to prove how tough she really is, and how far she'll go to get justice...and some payback of her own.
A hard, four-hour drive north of San Francisco leads to sparsely populated Soledad County, a combination of spectacular seashore, inland forests, and small towns steeped in gold-mining history. One of those towns is Cyanide Wells, now an artsy community, whose name comes from the miners' use of cyanide to refine ore and the time the area's water supply was tragically poisoned.
To Matthew Lindstrom, that sinister legacy is ironically appropriate for the place he finally expects to find his ex-wife, Gwen. Fourteen years earlier, her baffling disappearance branded him a murderer and destroyed his reputation and career as a photographer. Suddenly, after all this time, an anonymous phone caller tells him that Gwen is alive - and well aware of what she has done. Matt comes to Cyanide Wells looking for answers...and revenge.
Here, where the surrounding thick forest conceals twisted paths and old sins, Matt works to uncover the details of Gwen's new life. But before he can confront her, his ex vanishes once more. With his future again threatened by suspicion, Matt must join forces with Carly McGuire - a local woman with secrets of her own - and begin a hunt through Soledad's untamed landscape and an interior geography of betrayal and darkness. There perhaps lies the truth about past crimes and Gwen's fate...as well as Matt's own.
For the firm of Carpenter and Quincannon, Professional Detective Services, stopping extortionists is not only grand, but excitingly lucrative.
When a pleasant afternoon's bicycling through Golden Gate Park with a friend ends with the revelation of threatening letters, followed by a gunshot in a mansion garden, Sabina Carpenter knows this is a case that demands her immediate and undivided attention.
The questions her partner John Quincannon has to unravel are not difficult: Wrixton, a wealthy banker, has met his extortionist's first demand, but the order to pay another $5,000 is too much to face. The banker's real problem is something he doesn't want to reveal. That was fine with the detective, and when he was informed that some private letters were involved and Wrixton absolutely needed them back, there was nothing more Quincannon needed in the way of background. As with so many of San Francisco's elite, the bedroom doors never seemed to stay shut.
That was the easy part; far more difficult was the matter of the dead courier, murdered most foully in a locked room within a locked room, creating a trail that will take John Quincannon through most of San Francisco's less savory places and end with a riverboat trip that is anything but a relaxing cruise.
The Dangerous Ladies Affair is the next thrilling installment in this charming historical mystery series from MWA Grand Masters Marcia Muller and Bill Pronzini.
Missing bearer bonds, a family tragedy, arson, and murder-it's all in a day's work for Sharon McCone in the new series installment from bestselling author Marcia Muller.
Settled into their new home after they lost their house in a fire and fully established in their new shared offices, private investigator Sharon McCone and her business partner husband Hy are finally starting to feel comfortable. That calm is shattered when Hy's former colleague Gage Renshaw-a shady troublemaker who they presumed dead-reappears, and it's unclear what he wants from his prosperous former associate.
Meanwhile, Sharon has a new client with a desire to get rid of the derelict house that's disturbing the local homeowners' association. However, the abandoned house holds its share of secrets, and soon Sharon is contending with more than a simple eyesore as she searches for the individual who is obsessed with destroying her life. "Muller...never changes, except to get better. She consistently maintains her award-winning style. This series is highly recommended for mystery fans of all ages. Sharon is timeless, and Muller always surrounds her with an engaging cast of characters to keep the iconic PI in top form."-Booklist
Can the true identity of the Sherlock Holmes imposter be revealed at last?
Sabina Carpenter and John Quincannon are no stranger to mysteries. In the five years since they opened Carpenter and Quinncannon, Professional Detective Services, they have solved dozens, but one has eluded even them: Sherlock Holmes or, rather, the madman claiming his identity, who keeps showing up with a frustrating—though admittedly useful—knack for solving difficult cases.
Roland W. Fairchild, recently arrived from Chicago, claims the man is his first cousin, Charles P. Fairchild III. Now, with his father dead, Charles stands to inherit an estate of over $3 million, if Sabina can find him and if he can be proved sane. Sabina is uncertain of Roland’s motives but agrees to take the case.
John, meanwhile, has been hired by the owner of the Golden State brewery to investigate the “accidental” death of the head brewmaster, who drowned in a vat of his own beer. When a second murder occurs and the murderer escapes from under his nose, John sets out to find the trail of the criminals—and to ensure he keeps his reputation for catching them.
But while John is certain he can catch his quarry, Sabina is less certain whether she even wants to catch hers. Holmes has been frustrating but useful and even kind. She is quite certain he is mad but quite uncertain what will happen when he is confronted with the truth. Does every mystery need to be solved?
“A doubly impossible crime only adds to the enjoyable plot.”—Publishers Weekly on The Bughouse Affair
Drug lords, missing millionaires, corrupt cops … just another day for Carpenter and Quincannon Detective Services.
Two missing bodies and two separate investigations take Carpenter and Quincannon from the heights above San Francisco Bay to the depths of Chinatown’s opium dens.
For John Quincannon, this is a first: searching a Chinatown opium den for his client’s husband, missing in the middle of a brewing tong war set to ignite over the stolen corpse of Bing Ah Kee.
Meanwhile, his partner, Sabina Carpenter, unsure of the dark secrets her suitor might be concealing, searches for the corpse of a millionaire, stolen from a sealed family crypt and currently being held for ransom.
With the threat of a tong war hanging over the city—a war perhaps being spurred on by corrupt officials—Carpenter and Quincannon have no time to lose in solving their cases. Is there a connection between the two body snatchers? Or is simple greed the answer to this one?
And why is the enigmatic Englishman who calls himself Sherlock Holmes watching so carefully from the shadows?
“Muller and Pronzini make beautiful mystery music together.”—Atlanta Journal Constitution, praise for the authors
When new clients Jay and Camilla Givens come to Sharon McCone with Camilla’s stories of devil worshippers performing human sacrifices in San Francisco, the detective is skeptical, to say the least. However, when she discovers that Jay is involved with the treasure hunting group the Night Searchers, she starts looking into what exactly he and the other participants are up to after dark. As she digs deeper into the Searchers, Sharon joins their ranks in order to find out more—while someone is searching for her.
A debutante’s missing body, murder most foul, and weird spectral lights in the fog make for a thrilling gaslight-era tale of mystery and detection.
In 1895 San Francisco young debutantes don’t commit suicide at festive parties, particularly not under the eye of Sabina Carpenter. But Virginia St. Ives evidently did, leaping from a foggy parapet in a shimmer of ghostly light. The seemingly impossible disappearance of her body creates an even more serious problem for the firm of Carpenter and Quincannon, Professional Detective Services.
Sabina didn’t want to take the case, but her partner John Quincannon insisted it would serve as entrée to the city’s ultra rich and powerful. That means money, and Quincannon loves the almighty dollar—which is why he is hunting the bandit who robbed the Wells Fargo office of $35,000.
Working their separate cases—while Sabina holds John off with one light hand—the detectives give readers a tour of the city the way it was. From the infamous Barbary Coast to the expensive Tenderloin gaming houses and brothels frequented by wealthy men, Quincannon follows a danger-laden trail to unmask the murderous perpetrators of the robbery. Meanwhile, Sabina works her wiles on friends and relatives of the vanished debutante until the pieces of her puzzle start falling into place. But it’s an oddly disguised gent appearing out of nowhere who provides the final clue to both cases—the shrewd “crackbrain” who believes himself to be Sherlock Holmes.
“Muller and Pronzini’s latest entry in their mystery series featuring Carpenter and Quincannon excels at evoking the time period of 1895 San Francisco…Social hierarchy plays a key role in both how the characters interpret the clues, and how the other characters treat the two detectives. An appearance by a detective who could be Sherlock Holmes adds to the puzzle.”—RT Book Reviews
