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When the body of a boy is found in the filthy sewers of Bluegate Fields, Inspector Pitt is called to investigate. The boy was clearly upper class, so what was he doing in one of London's most dangerous slums? The boy's parents refuse to answer police queries. What are these proper, prosperous people hiding? With the help of his wife and helpmate, Charlotte, Inspector Pitt intends to find out.
Show moreJohn Updike’s twentieth novel, like his first, The Poorhouse Fair (1959), takes place in one day, a day that contains much conversation and some rain. The seventy-eight-year-old painter Hope Chafetz, who in the course of her eventful life has been Hope Ouderkirk, Hope McCoy, and Hope Holloway, answers questions put to her by a New York interviewer named Kathryn, and recapitulates, through the story of her own career, the triumphant, poignant saga of postwar American art. In the evolving relation between the two women, the interviewer and interviewee move in and out of the roles of daughter and mother, therapist and patient, predator and prey, supplicant and idol. The scene is central Vermont; the time is the early spring of 2001.
Show moreAmsterdam, 1659: On the worlds first commodities exchange, fortunes are won and lost in an instant. Miguel Lienzo, a sharp-witted trader in the citys close-knit community of Portuguese Jews, knows this only too well. Once among the citys most envied merchants, Miguel has suddenly lost everything. Now, impoverished and humiliated, living in his younger brothers canal-flooded basement, Miguel must find a way to restore his wealth and reputation. Miguel enters into a partnership with a seductive Dutchwoman who offers him one last chance at success, a daring plot to corner the market of an astonishing new commodity called coffee. To succeed, Miguel must risk everything he values and face a powerful enemy who will stop at nothing to see him ruined. Miguel will learn that among Amsterdams ruthless businessmen, betrayal lurks everywhere, and even friends hide secret agendas. From the Trade Paperback edition.
Show moreFrom the author who “ranks among the best of the younger American spy novelists” (The Washington Post) comes a stunning thriller of ancient and modern betrayal. Munich: The writer Benjamin Stern entered his flat to see a man standing there, leafing through his research, and said, “Who the hell are you?” In answer, the man shot him. As Stern lay dying, the gunman murmured a few words in Latin, then gathered the writer’s papers and left. Venice: The art restorer Gabriel Allon applied a dab of paint carefully to the Bellini, then saw the boy approaching, a piece of paper in his hand. It would be about Stern, he knew. They would want him to leave right away. With a sigh, the Mossad agent finished his work, then began to pack his brushes. Vatican City: The pope known as Paul VII–“Pope Accidental,” to his detractors–paced in his garden, thinking about the things he knew and the enemies he would make. He believed he understood why God had chosen him for this job, but the road in front of him was hard and exceedingly perilous. If he succeeded, he would revolutionize the Church. If not, he might very well destroy it–and himself. In the weeks to come, the journeys of all these men will come together, following a trail of long-buried secrets and unthinkable deeds, leaving each one forever changed. Intrigue will dominate their lives and death stalk their paths, all of them in the shadow of the Confessor. Filled with rich characters, remarkable prose, and an intricately woven plot suffused with surprise and intensity, this is an uncommonly powerful work by a new master of the art.
Show moreOn a quiet day, away from the hustle of Richmond, in a small cottage on the Virginia coast, Dr. Kay Scarpetta receives a disturbing phone call from the Chesapeake police. Thirty feet deep in the murky waters of Virginia's Elizabeth River, a scuba diver's body is discovered near the Inactive Naval Shipyard. As the police begin searching for clues, the wallet of investigative report Ted eddings is found. Unnerved by the possible identity of the victim, Scarpetta orders the crime scene roped off and left alone until she arrives. What was he doing there, searching for Civil War relics as the officer suggested or was there a bigger story? As she rifles through the multitude of clues, a second murder hits much closer to home. This new development puts Scarpetta and her coleagues hot on the trail of a military conspiracy. Filled with lurid details that Cornwell's legions of fans have come to expect, Cause of Death is a breathtaking mystery further enhanced by C. J. Critt's gripping narration.
Show moreNew York Times best-selling author of Out of the Shadows and Touching Evil, Kay Hooper delivers a thrilling paranormal mystery with Whisper of Evil. Forced by a sense of duty and a need to reconcile the past, a woman with psychic powers faces a far greater challenge than she'd ever expected. A stalker? In Silence? These are the questions on Nell Gallagher's mind as she drives through the empty streets of her hometown. Three successful, respected members of the community'each harboring a dark secret'have fallen to a killer's murderous vengence. When Nell teams up with former high school sweetheart Max Tanner, they realize that the very skills that drove her away from Silence have become the town's only hope for salvation. But even as she pieces together the puzzle of the killer's imagination, he may already be so close that she won't even see her own death coming. This exciting book will hold new and longtime Hooper fans in a spell of suspense. Every gripping chapter is filled with white-knuckled tension, as the killer preys upon his victim's ulnerabilities and lures them in for the kill. Alyssa Bresnahan's electrifying narration will have listeners everywhere fearful of the dark.
Show moreWhen Inspector Banks of Yorkshire investigates whether an abusive husband might be guilty of an unsolved string of murders, his suspicions are aroused by the details of the man's marriage. Is the suspect's wife a victim or could she be his accomplice? Popular with fans of P.D. James and Ruth Rendell, Edgar Award-winning author Peter Robinson has earned honors and critical praise for his Inspector Banks novels.
Show moreHorror novelist Michael Anthony decides to move his family from NYC to the small Missouri town where he was raised by his eccentric grandmother. Moving into the house left to him, they find something already residing in the walls.
Show moreEver since a mysterious, fatal accident in the ravine, university student Pepper Merlino's world has become a place of fear. Her artist neighbor, Joe Strozza, is tormented by nightmares. Eleven-year old Billy Beck, who witnessed the accident, has run from
Show moreA simple case of blackmail gets lethally complicated when "Nameless" exposes a nasty scam that involves junior accounts executive Jay Cohalan, his unhappy wife, and a mistress with a serious drug problem. It's the kind of case Nameless likes, because bleeders-the blackmailers, extortionists, small-time grifters, and other opportunists who prey on the weak and gullible-sit near the top of his most-worthless-human-beings list. But soon Nameless finds his client shot dead in the middle of a four-poster bed, and only by a hair's breadth escapes a similar fate. During a relentless hunt for his unknown assailant in San Francisco's shadowy underworld, he encounters bleeders of every ilk, and, in a climax as powerful as it is unexpected, finally confronts his own demons.
Show moreThree perplexing puzzles-and three inimitable Wimsey solutions-told with wit, humor, and suspense. Narrator Ian Carmichael, the quintessential Lord Peter, provides great entertainment with his talented performance of these three stories. In "Striding Folly," a frightening dream provides a haunting premonition. A house numbered thirteen is in a street of even numbers, and a dead man was never alive in "The Haunted Policeman." And "Talboys" sees Lord Peter's own children accused of theft.
Show moreBased on an unsolved 1969 homicide, this latest Kinsey Millhone case puts her on the trail of the murderer of a young "Jane Doe, " whose body was discovered 18 years ago near a quarry off California's Highway 1. The original detectives want one last shot to solve the case, and they turn to Kinsey to help identify the girl and find her killer.
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