Crime Thriller Short Stories

When grandmother Maureen Phelan is surprised in her home by a stranger, she clubs the intruder with a Holy Stone. The consequences of this unplanned murder connect four misfits struggling against their meager circumstances. Ryan is a fifteen-year-old drug dealer desperate not to turn out like his alcoholic father, Tony, whose feud with his next-door neighbor threatens to ruin his family. Georgie is a sex worker who half-heartedly joins a born-again movement to escape her profession and drug habit.

Seventeen-year-old Amish boy Noah Kline is struck by a car as he walks alongside a dark country road late one night in Painters Mill. Seriously injured, he lapses into a coma. Initially, Chief of Police Kate Burkholder believes it’s a straightforward hit-and-run, a driver that panicked and fled. But evidence soon emerges that the incident wasn’t accidental at all - and Kate uncovers a story of teenage passion and jealousy that may have led to attempted murder.

One wrong move, and she'll be feedin' the fishes... When Bubbles Marlowe discovers a jaw-dropping bounty on a pair of stolen diamonds, she agrees to find the jewels and bring the thief to justice. But she soon realizes she’s not the only one after the infamous ice, and the competition is brutal. The case takes a turn for the depraved when she finds out the true reason the diamonds were stolen. By the time she gets wise, she’s in way over her head… **Neon Goldfish is the third stand alone mystery novella in the HoloCity Case Files series, a companion collection to the Bubbles in Space ...

Tasha After my father was killed, Mark came into my life. Now, I can't imagine life without him. But when the man responsible for my father's murder escapes, I'm determined to take matters into my own hands. Mark I love Tasha more than life itself. After the loss of my wife and child three years ago, no one understands vengeance more than I do. But Tasha is determined to step into a whole new world that she has only gotten a taste of. However, can she handle the repercussions after she pulls the trigger? Once you take a life, something inside you changes. But no one will take my Tasha from ...

The second novel and first quick-listen title from Sunday Times and New York Times best-selling author Cathy Glass. My Dad's a Policeman is a dramatic and engaging story of a young boy with an alcoholic mother. Lonely, bullied and desperate for a life of happiness and security he tells everyone he meets his dad's a policeman. Fast paced and compelling, this short story from Cathy Glass follows the experiences of a Ryan, a small and lonely 12-year-old boy who struggles to fit in.

Two hitmen in a depressed rust belt town struggle with a job gone wrong. A girl witnesses a horrifying accident and carries it with her for the rest of her life. Medical students bring a severed foot to a college party. Five-time Pulitzer Prize finalist Joyce Carol Oates has made a career of exploring the forbidden corners of human experience, and the stories collected here, spanning her first three decades as a writer, are among her most unsettling and unforgettable works to date.

A woman discovers her boyfriend is cheating on her. Instead of breaking up with him, she decides to get revenge. On their wedding day.

On the 20th anniversary of the publication of Barry Gifford's international best seller, Wild at Heart, as well as the anniversary of the Palme d'Or–winning film adaptation by director David Lynch, Sailor & Lula: The Complete Novels presents all of the novels and novellas that comprise the saga of Sailor Ripley and Lula Pace Fortune, "the Romeo and Juliet of the South".

Heart-pounding Fear. Chilling Anguish. Heartbreak. Priceless Love. The Ultimate Sacrifice. All in less than a minute. Sometimes precious moments is all there is. Between one heartbeat and the next, Susa is plunged into a devastating nightmare, wounded and broken, yet desperate hope filled her heart and soul. Nothing in her life had ever prepared her for this. Adam Manning arrives at a crime scene and quickly sees that not everything is as it seems. Unknown to the town’s small police force, neither is he. If you enjoy clean mystery romance and inspirational women’s fiction filled with ...

Jack 'No Middle Name' Reacher, lone wolf, knight errant, ex-military cop, lover of women, scourge of the wicked and righter of wrongs, is the most iconic hero for our age. This is the first time all Lee Child's shorter fiction featuring Jack Reacher has been collected into one volume. A brand-new novella, Too Much Time, is included, as are those previously published only in ebook form: Second Son, James Penney's New Identity, Guy Walks into a Bar, and Deep Down.

Complete with fascinating biographies by Tony Medawar of all the featured authors, this latest volume in the annual Bodies from the Library series once again brings into the daylight the forgotten, the lost and the unknown, and is an indispensable collection for any bookshelf.

In 1980s Vigata, a restless Inspector Montalbano brings his bold investigative style to eight enthralling cases. From jilted lovers and deadly family affairs to assassination attempts and murders in unexpected places, Death at Sea is the perfect collection to escape into Andrea Camilleri's unforgettable slice of Sicily.

Everyone comes from someplace. Everyone has somewhere they feel safe. Some people have found their home and are content where they are. Others feel trapped and yearn to go somewhere else. Many are somewhere else and yearn to go back. But even in these safest of places, sometimes…crime hits home. What happens then?

A collection of 15 stories, 11 of which have never been previously published, from the early career of best-selling American master Elmore Leonard.

It's autumn in Painter's Mill, and 14-year-old Katie Burkholder has been tasked with picking apples in Zimmerman's Orchard with her brother. It's just another day filled with chores - until her best friend, Mattie, arrives to help. Somehow boredom transforms into fun and games whenever the girls are together. The innocent fun comes to an end when Billy Marquardt and his gang of friends interrupt. Katie is no prude, but she knows better than to associate with the older English boys.

From the New York Times best-selling duo comes a gripping and suspenseful short story about a blind detective who uses her heightened senses to discover life-threatening secrets.

"The Case of the Irate Witness," the mystery which is the star of this collection of 4 novelettes, is the only one that the incomparable Erle Stanley Gardner ever wrote featuring Perry Mason in short story form. Each of the stories revolves around the subject of stolen jewels and each story is a gem in itself.

Young Heathrow Airport employee John Woods seems to have it all – a career he loves and the girl of his dreams. But all is not what it seems in this aviation love triangle... John’s life is turned upside down when his beloved Sandra announces she’s leaving him for a dashing pilot employed by the same international airline John works for. When John is blamed for a mid-air incident that has catastrophic consequences for one of the airline’s aircraft, he and Sandra are reunited in a way neither could ever have imagined.

It started with a haunting image: a Ford Explorer, iridiscent in the moonlight and alone on a desolate stretch of beach. Its owner, Melissa Gibbons, has gone missing. Her husband says she flew the coop. But Los Angeles Deputy DA Rachel Knight is convinced otherwise: Melissa Gibbons has been murdered. So begins the confounding case that Rachel must present before a disbelieving jury. A dissatisfied heiress and her philandering husband - what really happened?

Jo Nesbø is known the world over as a consummate mystery/thriller writer. Famed for his deft characterization, hair-raising suspense and shocking twists, Nesbø’s dexterity with the dark corners of the human heart is on full display in these inventive and enthralling stories.