Best of
Crime

1985

The Further Adventures of Sherlock Holmes: After Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (Classic Crime)


Richard Lancelyn GreenS.C. Roberts - 1985
    This anthology of stories featuring the character of Sherlock Holmes follows on from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's stories which ended with Holmes at Reichenbach Falls.

Wiseguy


Nicholas Pileggi - 1985
    "Wiseguy" is Henry Hill's story, in fascinating, brutal detail, the never-before-revealed day-to-day life of a working mobster - his violence, his wild spending sprees, his wife, his mistresses, his code of honor.

Miss Marple: The Complete Short Stories


Agatha Christie - 1985
    There are short stories too.Jane Marple is from the village of St Mary Mead and applies her skills of observation and deduction to a wide variety of mysteries. Several of the supporting characters appear in many of these stories, including her nephew Raymond West, Dolly and Arthur Bantry of Gossington Hall, and Sir Henry Clithering formerly of Scotland Yard. The twenty stories are: 1. The Tuesday Night Club; 2. The Idol House of Astarte; 3. Ingots of Gold; 4. The Bloodstained Pavement; 5. Motive v. Opportunity; 6. The Thumbmark of St Peter; 7. The Blue Geranium; 8. The Companion; 9. The Four Suspects; 10. A Christmas Tragedy; 11. The Herb of Death; 12. The Affair at the Bungalow; 13. Death by Drowning; 14. Miss Marple Tells a Story; 15. Strange Jest; 16. The Case of the Perfect Maid; 17. The Case of the Caretaker; 18. Tape-Measure Murder; 19. Greenshaw's Folly; and 20. Sanctuary.Librarian's note: this title includes all 20 Miss Marple short stories. They are taken from four earlier collections: "The Thirteen Problems," "The Regatta Mystery and Other Stories," "Three Blind Mice and Other Stories," and "Double Sin and Other Stories." Entries for each short story, the 12 Miss Marple novels, and these other collections, are located elsewhere on Goodreads. Readers can find individual entries for the short stories by searching Goodreads for: "a Miss Marple Short Story."

Miss Marple Omnibus Volume 1: The Body in the Library / The Moving Finger / A Murder is Announced / 4:50 from Paddington


Agatha Christie - 1985
    The Body in the Library - the body of one young woman is found in the Bantry library and another in a deserted quarry nearby. 2. The Moving Finger - when hate mail attacks almost everyone in Lymstock, one recipient commits suicide. Or did she? 3. A Murder is Announced - the Chipping Cleghorn Gazette announces in the personal column the time and place of a murder. 4. 4.50 from Paddington - Mrs. McGillicuddy sees a man strangle a woman as trains cross, but only Jane believes her. She sends a housekeeper.Librarian's note: this entry is for the collection, "Miss Marple Omnibus Volume 1." Entries for each of the 12 novels and 20 stories in the Miss Marple series can be found elsewhere on Goodreads.

The Talented Mr. Ripley / Ripley Under Ground / Ripley's Game


Patricia Highsmith - 1985
    In achieving for himself the opulent life that he was denied as a child, Ripley shows himself to be a master of illusion and manipulation and a disturbingly sympathetic combination of genius and psychopath. As Highsmith navigates the mesmerizing tangle of Ripley's deadly and sinister games, she turns the mystery genre inside out and takes us into the mind of a man utterly indifferent to evil.The Talented Mr. RipleyIn a chilling literary hall of mirrors, Patricia Highsmith introduces Tom Ripley. Like a hero in a latter-day Henry James novel, is sent to Italy with a commission to coax a prodigal young American back to his wealthy father. But Ripley finds himself very fond of Dickie Greenleaf. He wants to be like him--exactly like him. Suave, agreeable, and utterly amoral, Ripley stops at nothing--certainly not only one murder--to accomplish his goal. Turning the mystery form inside out, Highsmith shows the terrifying abilities afforded to a man unhindered by the concept of evil.Ripley Under GroundIn this harrowing illumination of the psychotic mind, the enviable Tom Ripley has a lovely house in the French countryside, a beautiful and very rich wife, and an art collection worthy of a connoisseur. But such a gracious life has not come easily. One inopportune inquiry, one inconvenient friend, and Ripley's world will come tumbling down--unless he takes decisive steps. In a mesmerizing novel that coolly subverts all traditional notions of literary justice, Ripley enthralls us even as we watch him perform acts of pure and unspeakable evil.Ripley's GameConnoisseur of art, harpsichord aficionado, gardener extraordinaire, and genius of improvisational murder, the inimitable Tom Ripley finds his complacency shaken when he is scorned at a posh gala. While an ordinary psychopath might repay the insult with some mild act of retribution, what Ripley has in mind is far more subtle, and infinitely more sinister. A social slight doesn't warrant murder of course-- just a chain of events that may lead to it.

When the Bough Breaks


Jonathan Kellerman - 1985
    It's a good one!We meet Dr. Morton Handler who practiced a strange brand of psychiatry. Among his specialties were fraud, extortion, and sexual manipulation. Handler paid for his sins when he was brutally murdered in his luxurious Pacific Palisades apartment. The police have no leads, but they do have one possible witness: seven-year-old Melody Quinn.Psychologist Dr. Alex Delaware's job is to unlock the terrible secret buried in Melody's memory. As the sinister shadows in the girl's mind begin to take shape, Alex discovers that the mystery touches a shocking incident in his own past. This connection is only the beginning, a single link in a forty-year-old conspiracy. And behind it lies an unspeakable evil that Alex Delaware must expose before it claims another innocent victim: Melody Quinn.

Gunshot Wounds: Practical Aspects of Firearms, Ballistics, and Forensic Techniques


Vincent J.M. Di Maio - 1985
    The book describes practical aspects of ballistics; wound ballistics; the classification of various wounds caused by handguns, rifles, and shotguns; autopsy technique and procedure; and laboratory analysis relating to weapons and gunshot evidence.

The Convict and Other Stories


James Lee Burke - 1985
    These masterful stories are at once poignant portrayals of the rugged, conflicted Southern man as well as explorations of themes long familiar to Burke's readership: loss and hard-won courage, betrayal and friendship, violence and heroism, and the inveitability of death.

The Five Great Novels of James M. Cain


James M. Cain - 1985
    Cain is the third member of the trio who had such enormous influence, not only on the writing of detective fiction, on film and the way America was viewed. Like Chandler and Hammett, Cain wrote about crime, but unlike them he wrote from teh point of view of the criminal and with a sense of bitter, even savage realism which is entirely his own.

Stoner McTavish


Sarah Dreher - 1985
    From Boston s Beacon Hill to Grand Teton National Park, follow the adventures of Stoner McTavish--lesbian, travel agent, reluctant detective--as she battles villainy, terror, and the elements to save the woman of her dreams.

The Doctor and the Damned


Albert Haas - 1985
    They become heroes of the Free French until betrayal delivers them to the Gestapo and separate death camps.

The Goonies Storybook


James Kahn - 1985
    They live in a small fishing village called the Goon Docks.And each one has taken the Goony Oath to stick together until the world ends.Now the Goonies face their biggest challenge ever-to save the Goon Docks from being torn down. Things are looking desperate...until Mikey finds the treasure map of One-Eyed Willy, a pirate who disappeared long ago. If the Goonies can find his hidden treasure, they can buy back the Goon Docks.But it won't be easy. One-Eyed Willy hid the treasure well, in the watery caverns along the coastline. And the Goonies aren't the only ones looking for it. A gang of criminals is after it too-and they'll stop at nothing to get it.

Elmore Leonard's Dutch Treat: The Hunted, Swag, Mr. Majestyk


Elmore Leonard - 1985
    Dutch Treat by Leonard, Elmore

The Lord Peter Wimsey Companion


Stephan P. Clarke - 1985
    In the years since the First Edition was published in 1985, the number of entries has increased from 7,509 to 9,819, with 11,853 cross-references in the index. The Second Edition also includes 246 photos, illustrations, maps and diagrams, as well as calendars covering the years of the Wimsey canon.

The Black Mask Boys: Masters in the Hard-Boiled School of Detective Fiction


William F. Nolan - 1985
    

Sometimes a Shining Moment


Eliot Wigginton - 1985
    

Crime and Human Nature/the Definitive Study of the Causes of Crime


James Q. Wilson - 1985
    

Inspector Saito's Small Satori


Janwillem van de Wetering - 1985
    

Death of Innocence: The True Story of an Unspeakable Teenage Crime


Peter Meyer - 1985
    Then in a few horrifying moments, the tranquility of the day was shattered by rape, torture and murder. A small Vermont town and the entire nation was stunned - these gruesome crimes had been committed not by hardened criminals but by two young boys, fifteen and sixteen years old.One of America's finest investigative journalists, Peter Meyer, recounts this provocative true story of terror in the small Vermont town of Essex Junction. He powerfully recreates this tragic case and its complex emotional aftermath - the statewide manhunt, the trial, and the chilling results that sent one teenage killer to prison for life and set the other free after two and a half years. Here is the shocking story.

Torpedo Volume Two


Enrique Sánchez Abulí - 1985
    Abuli portrays the characters with humor and poignancy, and Jimmy Palmiotti's translations provide a true sense of New York in the 1930s. Jordi Bernet's art, of course, is lovely, but Torpedo is Bernet's masterpiece -- the closest the graphic novel medium has ever come to The Godfather.

Political Murder: From Tyrannicide to Terrorism


Franklin L. Ford - 1985
    Mainland Greece suffered few political murders in the violent century of Pericles. The Romans, despite their bloody record under the Empire, avoided assassination for almost four hundred years under the Republic. There was a third such "remission" during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, Europe's high Middle Ages, matched by yet another extending from 1650 to 1789. In the interval between, the sixteenth century was an especially violent time in countries such as Scotland, the Netherlands, and France. Assassination and terrorism increased again after 1815, but the nineteenth century did not come close to equaling the twentieth in the number of brutal episodes.Ford's exploration of calculated, personalized assassination draws on history, literature, law, philosophy, sociology, and religion. Addressing the vast array of cases and combing thousands of years of history, he asks most of all whether assassination works. Does it, in even a minority of cases, produce results consistent with the aims of those who attempt it? Can it forestall evil acts or prevent irreparable damage inflicted by misguided leaders? Or is it "bad politics" in every sense of the term? The questions are large ones, and this book offers a sophisticated basis for seeking answers.

Ill Wind


William L. Heath - 1985
    

The Prince and the Premier


David Hickie - 1985
    The story of Perce Galea, Bob Askin and the others who gave organised crime its start in Australia.

A Martyr for the Truth: Jerzy Popieuszko


Grażyna Sikorska - 1985
    

Blood Ties


A.J. Quinnell - 1985
    On the high seas they are destined to meet on a voyage that spans continents. A captivating novel of quest, adventure and love.