Police Procedural Thriller

The dead man is the manager of Tahiti's Paradise Coffee Plantation, producer of the most expensive coffee bean in the world, the winey, luscious Blue Devil. Nothing tangible points to foul play behind his fall from a cliff, but FBI agent John Lau, a relative of the coffee-growing family, has his suspicions. What he needs is evidence, and who better to provide it than his friend, anthropologist Gideon Oliver, the Skeleton Detective? Gideon is willing to help, but surprisingly - and suspiciously - both the police and the other family members refuse to okay an exhumation order.

A 40-year-old skeleton is found encased in a concrete slab at a recently decommissioned nuclear energy site. It becomes a case for the Vermont Bureau of Investigation (VBI) and its leader, Joe Gunther, since they have the resources and the ability to investigate an old, very cold, missing persons case that has now been reclassified as murder. The victim was Hank Mitchell, and Gunther must chase down old rumors and speculations.

Joe Gunther, a Brattleboro, Vermont cop, is the head of the new Vermont Bureau of Investigation (VBI). In The Marble Mask, the VBI's first case takes the force north to Stowe, where a 50-year-old corpse has turned up in a crevasse on Mt. Mansfield. When the frozen stiff turns out to have been a big-time Canadian crime boss named Jean Deschamps who disappeared after World War II, Joe and his gang cross the border to work with the Mounties, the Surete, and the local cops in Sherbrooke.

When a skeleton is discovered in the hidden crypt of a deconsecrated church, everyone is convinced the bones must be those of Conor Devitt, a local man who went missing on his wedding day six years previously. But the postmortem reveals otherwise.

It has been almost a decade since Duluth said good-bye to its innocence. The city creeps ever closer to the 10th anniversary of the year in which it found itself both gripped by murder and united in terror and during which the pillar of its community, DS Jonathan Stride, had his home and heart torn to ribbons by the claws of cancer. Cat Mateo, an orphan with a knack for landing on her feet, has bid farewell to a life on the streets. This once-stray teenager owes her rescue to Detective Stride, the father figure she holds close to her heart.

Kaely Quinn's talents as an FBI behavior analyst are impossible to ignore, no matter how unorthodox her methods. But when a reporter outs her as the daughter of an infamous serial killer, she's demoted to field agent and transferred to St. Louis. When the same reporter who ruined her career claims to have received an anonymous poem predicting a string of murders, ending with Kaely's, the reporter's ulterior motives bring his claim into question. But when a body is found that fits the poem's predictions, the threat is undeniable.

Bo Tully, sheriff of Blight County, Idaho, has dealt with small-town crime throughout his long, storied career. Now, contemplating retirement after years on the job, Tully is faced with perhaps his most perplexing case yet. When area bald eagles start getting picked off by a ghost-like killer, and when a prominent local rancher is murdered by an arrow with eagle fletching, things gets complicated fast. In this fast-paced whodunit, Tully has a vast array of suspects to choose from, including the rancher's gorgeous, bird-loving wife, who mysteriously leaves for a ranch in Mexico the day of the murder.

Detective Boone Drake has just masterminded the most massive sting in Chicago history, bringing down the heads of not only the biggest street gangs in the city but also the old crime syndicate. The story is the biggest in decades, and the Chicago Police Department must protect the key witness at all costs. Despite top secret plans to transfer the witness ahead of his testimony before the grand jury, an attempt is made on his life.

WHEN WAS THE LAST TIME YOU LIED? The first lie: MONSTERS DON’T EXIST. When the body of a man is discovered in the Boston Common, Martina finds herself entering a horrific nightmare. She discovers evidence of the unimaginable: the resurgence of ancient methods of persecution being carried out by a Puritan-indoctrinated serial killer who believes the devil walks among us. The second lie: YOU WOULD KNOW A MONSTER IF YOU SAW ONE. After the first victim is dismissed as gang-related, Martina fears there is more to the murder than meets the eye. Her instincts are soon proven correct when another...

The name's John Taylor. I work the garish streets of the Nightside - the hidden heart of London where it's always three a.m., where inhuman creatures and otherworldly gods walk side by side in the endless darkness of the soul. I have a talent for finding things. People...property...no problem. But now I'm after something different. A local diva called the Nightingale has cut herself off from her family and friends, and I've been hired to find out the reason. I'm also wondering why her suicide-prone fans think she has a voice to die for. Literally.

A legend among Vermont cops, Joe Gunther has solved more local whodunits than a whole squad of detectives. But his latest case takes him and his team off their Brattleboro home turf, 42 miles west, to chip-on-its-shoulder, blue-collar Bennington. On the edge of town, Gunther encounters the lifeless body of Michelle Fisher. Her corpse, pale and seemingly at peace, offers him no clues about who she was or how she died. There are no signs of violence, no disorder. Snapshots and postcards show a woman who laughed hard and lived harder.

On opening day of dove season in Blanco County, Jimmy Ray Gladstone is confronted, then shot, by an attractive stranger with an unusual physical characteristic. But who is she, and how did she know about the robbery Jimmy Ray and his brother Russell had been planning? Game Warden John Marlin will have to figure it out on his own, because the sheriff’s office is stretched thin, Jimmy Ray has a head injury and isn’t making much sense, and Russell is nowhere to be found.

Readers of Robert Dugoni, Kendra Elliot, and Ann Cleeves will be captivated by Kay Jennings’ sensational 7th installment in the Port Stirling Mystery series. A body hanging from a rafter. An estranged husband bent on revenge. Police Chief Matt Horning and State Department Special Agent Fern Byrne return in a thrilling tale of international intrigue that begins with a heartbreaking death on a mysterious island in the Pacific Ocean, and ends up on powerful desks in Washington, D.C. West Coast billionaire Rohn Reid calls his old friend, the U.S. Secretary of State, to tell him he’s just ...

After her rescue of nearly 50 kidnapped children made international headlines, Amara Alvarez gets what she's worked for: a transfer to San Antonio's Homicide Division. Reality sets in quickly, though, as her first case, the suspicious death of a teenager at a crowded local water park, brings chaos to her personal life. As the investigation moves forward, and she increases the pressure on the suspects, Amara finds herself under attack by cybercriminals. Her every move is being potentially watched online, and she's forced to resort to unconventional methods to find the killer.

John Mountjoy has escaped from prison and kidnapped the chief constable's daughter. The only person he'll parley with is Detective Peter Diamond, who arrested him four years earlier for the murder of a young journalist. Mountjoy, who still maintains his innocence, has a simple request for Diamond. All the detective has to do is find the real killer and clear Mountjoy's name, and the hostage will be free to go.

The Department of Sensitive Crimes, renowned for taking on the most obscure and irrelevant cases, led by Ulf Varg, their best detective, is always prepared to take on an investigation, no matter how complex. So when Ulf is approached by the girlfriend of Trig Oloffson, who claims her beau (the infamous bad boy of Swedish letters) is being blackmailed, Ulf is determined to help. It turns out that this wild bear of a man may be more of a teddy.

A popular young girl disappears without a trace, her skeletal remains discovered three years later in the ashes of a burned-out house. There's a suspect and compelling circumstantial evidence of his guilt, but no concrete proof. When he isn't indicted, he returns to mock the girl's family. And this isn't the first time he's been suspected of the murder of a young girl; nearly 20 years ago he was tried and released due to lack of evidence. Detective Chief Inspector Kusanagi of the Homicide Division of the Tokyo Police worked both cases.

New York Times and USA Today best-selling author Andrea Kane brings fans a brand new series with her romantic thriller The Girl Who Disappeared Twice. Forensic Instincts—a team of independent maverick investigators comprised of a techie-genius, a former Navy SEAL/FBI agent, a psychic, and a retired FBI dog—must rescue a kidnapped five-year-old girl. But with so many people who could have benefited from the girl’s abduction, tracking down the culprit will push the team to the limit.

Thirteen years ago, Assemblyman Derrick Bell was murdered in his home by an intruder. His wife, Noelle Marshall, was left for dead. The crime was unsolved, but it wasn’t forgotten. Today the FBI is tackling a fresh perspective on the case and looking to Noelle, now a detective for the Deschutes County sheriff’s office, for new clues. It is reopening everything Noelle thought was behind her. Memories of her escape from a traumatic childhood. A marriage that wasn’t the perfect love story she’d been promised. And a husband whose charm and privilege hid a dark side.

Detective Superintendent MacNeice is returning from a pilgrimage to his wife's grave when he's called to a crime scene of singular and disturbing beauty. A young woman in evening dress lies gracefully posed on the floor of a pristine summer cottage so that the finger of one hand regularly interrupts the needle arm of a phonograph playing Schubert's Piano Trio. The only visible mark on her is the bruise under her chin, which MacNeice recognizes: It is the mark that distinguishes dedicated violinists.