Librarian Sylvia Ashe knows nothing about her past, having grown up without a father and a mother who refused to discuss him. When she stumbles upon a diary that suggests she's descended from magicians, she's skeptical. After all, magicians are special, and she's just an ordinary woman who loves books. She seeks answers from a member of the most prominent family of magicians, but she quickly learns that finding the truth won't be easy, especially when he turns out to be as artless as her, and more compelling and dangerous than books.

England, 1914. Joanna Blalock's keen mind and incredible insight lead her to become a highly skilled nurse, one of the few professions that allow her to use her finely tuned brain. But when she and her 10-year-old son witness a man fall to his death, apparently by suicide, they are visited by the elderly Dr. John Watson and his charming, handsome son, Dr. John Watson Jr. Impressed by her forensic skills, they invite her to become the third member of their investigative team.

Hugh Legat is a rising star of the British diplomatic service, serving at 10 Downing Street as a private secretary to the Prime Minister, Neville Chamberlain. Paul von Hartmann is on the staff of the German Foreign Office - and secretly a member of the anti-Hitler resistance. The two men were friends at Oxford in the 1920s, but have not been in contact since. Now, when Hugh flies with Chamberlain from London to Munich, and Hartmann travels on Hitler's train overnight from Berlin, their paths are set on a disastrous collision course.

A disgraced British colonel bequeaths a mysterious letter to his only son. The moment Adam Scott opens the yellowing envelope, he sets into motion a deadly chain of events. Within days, he’s running for his life, pursued by the KGB, the CIA, and his own countrymen. Powerful men plot his destruction and Adam is betrayed and abandoned even by those he holds most dear.

Across the bottom of the screen the ticker tape announced in large black letters 'Governor Reynolds Murdered'. Apparently his body had been discovered earlier that morning, lying in his garage. He had been shot twice. One shot to the upper chest, the other hitting his shoulder. 'Police believe that the weapon used was a 38 revolver,' the reporter said. Kendall froze. Anthony Shaw had also been killed by a 38 calibre bullet. Kendall was not quite sure of what it all meant. What connection was there between Anthony Shaw, and the State Governor, and the business mogul, Ian Duncan. And what about Senator Mackenzie? Where did he fit in? And who or what was Latimer?

Charles Lenox, Victorian gentleman and armchair explorer, likes nothing more than to relax in his private study with a cup of tea, a roaring fire and a good book. But when his lifelong friend Lady Jane asks for his help, Lenox cannot resist the chance to unravel a mystery. Prudence Smith, one of Jane's former servants, is dead of an apparent suicide. But Lenox suspects something far more sinister: murder, by a rare and deadly poison.

Why was an elegant lady brutally murdered the night before 9/11? Why was a successful New York banker not surprised to receive a woman's left ear in the morning mail? Why did a top Manhattan lawyer work only for one client, but never charge a fee? Why did a young woman with a bright career steal a priceless Van Gogh painting? All these questions and more are answered in Jeffrey Archer's novel, False Impression, but not before a breathtaking journey of twists and turns.

A counter-terrorist operation, code-named Wildlife, is being mounted on the British crown colony of Gibraltar. Its purpose: To capture and abduct a high-value jihadist arms buyer. Its authors: An ambitious Foreign Office Minister, a private defense contractor who is also his bosom friend, and a shady American CIA operative of the evangelical far-right. So delicate is the operation that even the Minister’s personal private secretary, Toby Bell, is not cleared for it. Three years later, a disgraced Special Forces Soldier delivers a message from the dead.

When a strange child follows her home on the train from London, Ella Bridges feels bound to help her. However, she soon discovers the child is not what she seems. Having recently moved into a large home on Linhay Island, affectionately known locally as the Yellow Cottage, Ella finds herself at the center of a murder investigation thanks to a special gift from the previous house owner.

From an early age, it is clear that Alexander Karpenko is destined to lead his countrymen. But when his father is assassinated by the KGB for defying the state, Alexander and his mother will have to escape Russia if they hope to survive. At the docks, they have an irreversible choice: board a container ship bound for America or one bound for Great Britain. Alexander leaves the choice to a toss of a coin....

Narrated by acclaimed British actor Edward Petherbridge, The Last Moriarty is set in London, 1895. On a cold November morning, a young American actress visits 221B Baker Street, desperate for Sherlock Holmes to protect her from the threats of a mysterious, menacing man who has recently appeared in her life. Holmes agrees to help, even though he has just promised the Prime Minister to solve the murder of John D. Rockefeller's security agent before the incident can derail an upcoming British-American summit.

In December 1893, Sherlock Holmes-adoring Londoners eagerly opened their Strand magazines-- anticipating the detective's next adventure-- only to find the unthinkable: his creator, Arthur Conan Doyle, had killed their hero off. London spiraled into mourning -- crowds sported black armbands in grief -- and railed against Conan Doyle as his assassin.

An “invisible” is CIA-speak for the ultimate intelligence nightmare: The terrorist who, because he or she is an ethnic native of the target country, can cross its borders unchecked, move around that country unquestioned, and infiltrate its institutions with ease. An invisible on mainland Britain was the worst possible news. For Liz Carlyle, an MI5 Intelligence Officer, this report from MI6 marks the start of an operation that will test her to the limit and put her own life in jeopardy.

The recent death of one of the descendants of Dr. Watson has brought to light his personal papers. These include a number of stories that Dr. Watson suppressed at the time for various reasons. As all involved are long dead, the inheritor has agreed to the publication of a set of eight of the most interesting adventures.

Two people have been targeted. Shots have been fired. Who stands to inherit? Who has the most to lose? Evangeline "Evie" Parker, Countess of Woodridge, thinks it's nothing but an accident, but then an attempt is made on her host's life. Suddenly, all the guests attending the Duke of Hetherington's house party think they are being targeted. Who will be next? Evie and her new chauffeur form an unlikely alliance to discover as much as they can before the killer can get it right.

A modern woman in 1907, Lady Dunbridge is not about to let a little thing like the death of her husband ruin her social life. She's ready to take the dazzling world of Gilded Age Manhattan by storm. From the decadence of high society balls to the underbelly of Belmont horse racing, romance, murder, and scandals abound. Someone simply must do something. And Lady Dunbridge is happy to oblige.

A Brilliant new translation of the great writer's least Kafkaesque novel, based on a German-language text that was produced by a team of international scholars and that is more faithful to Kafka's original manuscript than anything we have had before. With the same expert balance of precision and nuance that marked his translation of Kafka's The Castle, the award-winning translator Mark Harman now restores the humor and particularity of language to Amerika.

The first audiobook which appeared in Georges Simenon's famous Maigret series, in a gripping new translation by David Bellos.Inevitably Maigret was a hostile presence in the Majestic. He constituted a kind of foreign body that the hotel's atmosphere could not assimilate. Not that he looked like a cartoon policeman. He didn't have a moustache and he didn't wear heavy boots. His clothes were well cut and made of fairly light worsted. He shaved every day and looked after his hands. But his frame was proletarian. He was a big, bony man.

When Aline Griffith was born in Pearl River, New York, in 1923, one might have guessed from her exceptional beauty that a career as an actress or model might be in her future. Few would have imagined that twenty-one years later, she would find herself in Spain as a deep-cover OSS agent, infiltrating the highest levels of Spanish society, or that five years later still, she would marry a Spanish grandee and become one of the most watched, most admired, most fascinating women of international society. This is the story of Aline, Countess of Romanones, a story of courage, beauty and success that is far more exciting than any fictionalized thriller.

Charles Lenox, Victorian gentleman and armchair explorer, likes nothing more than to relax in his private study with a cup of tea, a roaring fire and a good book. But when his lifelong friend Lady Jane asks for his help, Lenox cannot resist the chance to unravel a mystery. Prudence Smith, one of Jane's former servants, is dead of an apparent suicide. But Lenox suspects something far more sinister: murder, by a rare and deadly poison.

Washington, D.C., 1861: As the United States teeters on the brink of civil war, Colonel Charles P. Rook organizes security in the nation’s capital and monitors the death threats pouring into the White House. He surrounds Abraham Lincoln with bodyguards, covers rooftops with sharpshooters, and investigates rumors of conspiracy fomented by secessionists. Yet amid the chaos and confusion, a mysterious killer slips into the teeming city.

The recent death of one of the descendants of Dr. Watson has brought to light his personal papers. These include a number of stories that Dr. Watson suppressed at the time for various reasons. As all involved are long dead, the inheritor has agreed to the publication of a set of eight of the most interesting adventures.

France, July 1944: a month after the Allied landings in Normandy, and the liberation of Europe is under way. In the Pas-de-Calais, Nathalie Mercier, a young British Special Operations executive secret agent working with the French Resistance, disappears. In London, her husband, Owen Quinn, an officer with Royal Navy Intelligence, discovers the truth about her role in the Allies' sophisticated deception at the heart of D-Day.

During intermission at the famed La Fenice opera house in Venice, Italy, a notoriously difficult and widely disliked German conductor is poisoned—and suspects abound. Guido Brunetti, a native Venetian, sets out to unravel the mystery behind the high-profile murder. To do so, he calls on his knowledge of Venice, its culture, and its dirty politics. Along the way, he finds the crime may have roots going back decades—and that revenge, corruption, and even Italian cuisine may play a role.

Maisie Dobbs got her start as a maid in an aristocratic London household when she was thirteen. Her employer, suffragette Lady Rowan Compton, soon became her patron, taking the remarkably bright youngster under her wing. Lady Rowan’s friend, Maurice Blanche, often retained as an investigator by the European elite, recognized Maisie’s intuitive gifts. The outbreak of war changed everything. Ten years after the Armistice, in the spring of 1929, Maisie sets out on her own as a private investigator, one who has learned that coincidences are meaningful, and truth elusive.

Corporate auditor Sam Keller, careful to a fault, has decided to live it up for a change. And what better spot for business-class hedonism than the boomtown of Dubai, where resort islands materialize from open ocean, fortunes are made overnight, and skiers crisscross the snowy slopes of a shopping mall. But when a colleague is murdered during a night on the town, Sam soon finds himself waist-deep in a bewildering, lethal mix of mobsters, prostitutes, and crooked cops.

October, 1962, in Cuba: Soviet ships off-load what intelligence reveals to be nuclear missiles. In Washington, President Kennedy and his advisers are in furious debate over how long they can wait to discover what the Soviets intend before dropping the first bomb. And, in Ithaca, New York, Margo Jensen - a 19-year-old Cornell sophomore - is swept up in a bizarre concatenation of circumstances that will make of her the back-channel liaison between Soviet Premier Khrushchev and Kennedy.

Veteran con artist Roy spots an obvious easy mark when he meets Betty, a wealthy widow, online. In no time at all, he's moved into Betty's lovely cottage and is preparing to accompany her on a romantic trip to Europe. Betty's grandson disapproves of their blossoming relationship, but Roy is sure this scheme will be a success. He knows what he's doing. As this remarkable feat of storytelling weaves together Roy's and Betty's futures, it also unwinds their pasts.

Welcome to Alderley, a magnificent mansion in the heart of the West Country where a grand house party is taking place. The preparations have been made, the guests have been invited, and the staff are on hand. What could possibly go wrong? Let the entertainment begin. The theft of the diamond necklace and the antique pistols might all be explained, but the body in the lake - that really was a puzzle. 'Don't expect me to solve anything,' Inspector Wilkens announced modestly when he arrived to sort out the unpleasantness.

The king's coronation brings hope. Until a murderer strikes. Spring 1661: After years of civil war followed by Oliver Cromwell's joyless rule as Lord Protector, England awaits the coronation of King Charles II. The mood in London is one of relief and hope for a better future. But when two respectable gentlemen are found in a foul lane with their throats cut, it becomes apparent that England's enemies are using the newly re-established post office for their own ends.