Traditional Police

Nothing's certain except death and taxes. Catching tax evaders for Emperor Vespasian looks like a plum position for Marcus Didius Falco, who has teamed up with his old boss, Anacrites, the crotchety chief spy of Rome. Soon, however, Falco is bogged down in bureaucracy, stuck at his stylus, and longing for a good murder to investigate. He gets one when someone kills Leonidas, the empire's official executioner.

Life is good for DI Dan Hellier until the discovery of two headless, handless bodies buried in a bog on Dartmoor. How can he identify the victims when nobody has reported them missing? The tension mounts when the death of a young man plunges Hellier into the murky world of the Garrett family. Could the peaceful, family-run Animal Rescue Centre really be a cover for murder and other criminal activity? Hellier is about to learn just how far people will go to get what they want, as he races to catch a murderer before it’s too late.

When the townspeople of Lochdubh begin receiving poison-pen letters, no one takes them very seriously, even if they are full of wild accusations. But Hamish fears that they might lead to something deadly. His instincts prove correct when the town's postmistress is found hanging from a rope with a poison-pen letter at her feet. Though it appears to be a suicide, Hamish suspects something more sinister. Attempting to trace the letters, the last thing Hamish needs is any distractions, but soon Jenny Ogilvie arrives in Lochdubh determined to seduce him.

Newly promoted Detective Superintendent Banks finds himself taking on the coldest of cases: a 50-year-old assault allegedly perpetrated by beloved celebrity Danny Caxton. Now Caxton stands accused at the center of a media storm, and it's Banks' job to discover the shocking truth. As more women step forward with accounts of Caxton's manipulation, Banks must piece together decades-old evidence - as the investigation leads him down the darkest of paths....

A shooting incident at a private school just north of Edinburgh. Two 17-year olds killed by an ex-Army loner who has gone off the rails. As Detective Inspector John Rebus puts it, 'there's no mystery'... exceptthe why. This question takes Rebus into the heart of a shattered community. Ex-Army himself, Rebus becomes fascinated by the killer, andfinds he is not alone. Army investigators are on the scene, and won't be shaken off. The killer had friends and enemies to spare - ranging from civic leaders to the local Goths - leaving behind a legacy of secrets and lies.

When Harold Merefield returned home in the early hours of a winter morning from a festive little party at that popular nightclub, the Naxos, he was startled by a gruesome discovery. On his bed was a corpse. There was nothing to show the identity of the dead man or the cause of his death. At the inquest, the jury found a verdict of ‘death from natural causes’ - perhaps they were right, but yet?

The once-charismatic Billy Maples was last seen in a club named Dust, before his murder in a trendy London hotel. Proving as inscrutable - and challenging - to Jury as the case is the beautiful chief inspecting officer. Before his death, Maples was a patron of London's finest art galleries and caretaker of author Henry James' house in Rye. It's there where Jury installs Melrose Plant, who takes his job to heart, as Jury closes in on the dark secrets behind Maples' friends and family.

Ninety-one-year-old Alice Hoffman died alone in her top floor flat. Social services say she slipped through the cracks in a failing system. But detectives Arthur Bryant and John May of the Peculiar Crimes Unit have their suspicions. Mrs. Hoffman was not as innocent as she appeared. A former government security expert, she had once worked for their own unit, but there's no one left who can remember her. When they uncover a link between her and a diplomat desperate to leave the country, it begins to look as if someone might have committed an impossible murder.

A friend in his cigar club asks Antoine Verlaque to visit Rene Rouquet, a retired postal worker who has found a rolled-up canvas in his apartment. As the apartment once belonged to Paul Cezanne, Rouquet is convinced he's discovered a treasure. But when Antoine arrives at the apartment, he finds Rene dead, the canvas missing, and a mysterious art history professor standing over the body. When the painting is finally recovered, the mystery only deepens.

Why would a killer ignore expensive jewellery and take a pair of turtledoves as the only bounty? This is only one of the questions that piques Chief Inspector Domenic Jejeune's interest after a senior attaché with the Mexican Consulate is found murdered alongside the director of a local bird sanctuary. The fact that the director's death has opened up a full-time research position hasn't eluded Jejeune either. Could this be his escape from policing?

August, 1940. On the streets of London, locals watch with growing concern as German fighter planes plague the city’s skyline. But inside the famous Ritz Hotel, the cream of society continues to enjoy all the glamour and comfort that money can buy during wartime - until an anonymous man is discovered with his throat slashed open. Detective Chief Inspector Coburg is called in to investigate, ably assisted by his trusty colleague, Sergeant Lampson.

When the San Angelo drifts into port in the Thames Estuary, telephones begin to ring across the capital and an intricate series of events is set in motion. Beset by dreadful storms in the Bay of Biscay, the ship, along with the 'mixed cargo' it carries, is late. Unaware of the machinations of avaricious importers, wayward captains and unscrupulous traders, Harry Reed and June Harvey are thrust together by a riverside accident, before being swept into the current of a dark plot developing on the dockside.

Net curtains twitch furiously, and neighbours have observations to make to Chief Inspector Purbright and Sergeant Love about the inhabitants of 14, Beatrice Avenue. Nice Gordon Periam, the mild-mannered tobacconist, and his rather less nice (in fact a bit of a bounder) lodger Brian Hopjoy had apparently shared the house amicably. But now neither man is to be found, and something very disagreeable seems to be lurking in the drains.... Then a couple of government spooks turn up, one with an eye for the ladies - the drama is acquiring overtones of a Bond movie!

When a local woman tells Sergeant Hamish Macbeth that she doesn't remember what happened the previous evening, he doesn't begin to worry. She had been out drinking, after all, and he'd prefer not to be bothered with such an arrogant and annoying woman. But when her body is discovered, Hamish is forced to investigate a crime that the only known witness - now dead - had forgotten.

When a former soldier and recluse murders two 17-year-old students at a posh Edinburgh boarding school, Inspector John Rebus immediately suspects there is more to the case than meets the eye.

A man falls to his death in Western Scotland. From a distance another man watches. He approaches the body, tucks a book into the dead man's pocket, and leaves. When the Scottish police show visiting detective chief inspector Domenic Jejeune the book, he recognises it as a call for help. Back in Saltmarsh the brutal murder of a researcher has everyone looking at the man's controversial studies as a motive.

A peaceful demonstration in the normally quiet town of Eastvale ended with 50 arrests---and the brutal stabbing death of a young constable. But Chief Inspector Alan Banks fears there is worse violence in the offing. For CID superintendent Richard "Dirty Dick" Burgess has arrived from London to take charge of the investigation, fueled by professional outrage and volatile, long-simmering hatreds.

Sam Baron writing as SJ Blake "You're just a young woman. What makes you think you can bring down a cabal of some of the richest, most powerful men in the world?" "I have justice on my side." Your name is Dani McKay. Daughter of a famous, bestselling author. You've never been the same since your shocking abduction twelve years ago. When you spot your kidnapper at your mother’s book signing in Berlin, you're determined to get answers. But by going after him, you open a Pandora’s Box of shocking revelations about your family and put yourself and your mother’s life in peril! Because ...

The death of unpopular Herbert Terrell seems accidental - although this expert mountain climber plunged off a mere hill in Czechoslovakia. The saddest part of the tragedy is that no one cares, not his ex-wife, his step daughter Tossa at Oxford, or his colleagues at a British scientific institute...until Tossa is shocked into emotion by a mysterious note suggesting Terrell was murdered.

The house called Sunset has been Marcia's summer home for her entire life. Both of her parents died there, and she and her brother spent their youth exploring its rambling hallways and seaside grounds. They love the old house, but Marcia's sister-in-law has never taken to it. Juliette loathes the sea, and soon comes to loathe her husband as well. After they divorce, Juliette pays a final visit to Sunset, demanding alimony. She is there for a few tense days before she disappears. It takes them a week to find her body.