Book picks similar to
Stud Poker by John Francome


mystery
thriller
horse-racing
fiction

The Talbot Odyssey


Nelson DeMille - 1984
    At first Talbot is suspected of killing European agents. Then a street-smart ex-cop uncovers a storm of espionage and murder on the streets of New York, while in a Long Island suburb a civic demonstration against the Russian mission masks a desperate duel of nerves and wits.Engineered by Talbot, a shadow world of suspicion and deceit is spilling onto the streets -- leading to a new Soviet weapon and a first-strike war plan threatening the foundations of American government.For the U.S., time is running out. For Talbot, the time is now.

The Fan


Peter Abrahams - 1995
    Knife salesman Gil Renard’s job is hanging by a thread and he just sold his most prized possession to stay afloat. All that keeps Gil going, in the face of divorce, destitution, and desperation, is rooting for the Sox–and the team’s new savior, Bobby Rayburn. But when his idol sinks into the worst slump of his career, Gil realizes he alone has the power to restore the slugger’s mojo. At the lowest point he has ever known, Gil finds his mission in life–a mission he will carry out no matter what it takes or who gets hurt.

Nobody True


James Herbert - 2003
    He had no body to go back to. But who murdered him? The serial killer terrorizing the city--or someone closer? True had no enemies, at least none that he knew of.To discover the truth, James True must track down his killer. The initial horror of True's experience is followed by an even greater terror . . . . his family are the murderer's next targets.Without a body, True has no substance and no real power. No one can see him, no one can hear him, and no one except his murderer even knows his spirit still exists.How can he save his family?

Fat Tuesday


Sandra Brown - 1997
    Marriage and career over, he focuses on nemesis Pinkie Duvall, flamboyant lawyer who saves killers from justice. Burke kidnaps Remy, Pinkie's trophy wife. Their attraction is electric. Remy will do anything to save her innocent sister, still in her alumni convent school. On Fat Tuesday, masks are stripped away.

The Lady Vanishes


Ethel Lina White - 1936
    Feeling terribly alone and afraid, she finds comfort in the company of a strange woman she knows only as "Miss Froy." But comfort soon turns to horror when Miss Froy mysteriously vanishes without a trace. Fearing madness, risking death, Iris desperately tries to solve the sudden disappearance of her traveling companion-a woman no one else on the journey remembers seeing at all!

Cold Eye


Giles Blunt - 1989
    Nicholas Hood likes to paint imaginary murder scenes. His paintings fail to inspire, a browsing detective tells him, because Hood has obviously never witnessed a real murder. Enter Andre Bellisle, an exquisitely accoutred, pockmarked dwarf who helpfully directs Hood to places where deaths occur. As Bellisle predicts, Hood's paintings of these deaths take New York by storm. Of course there's a price to be paid for Bellisle's information--but not the traditional one. To learn what that is, the reader is swept along on a superbly rendered descent into modern-day hell. Blunt is a TV writer whose literary debut is sensational. Paperback rights to Avon.Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Mallory's Oracle


Carol O'Connell - 1994
    Adopted off the streets as a little girl by a police inspector and his wife, she is still not altogether civilized now that she is a sergeant in the Special Crimes section. With her ferocious intelligence and green gunslinger eyes, Mallory (never Kathleen, never Kathy) operates by her own inner compass of right and wrong, a sense of justice that drives her in unpredictable ways. She is a thing apart.And today, she is a thing possessed. Although more at home in the company of computers than in the company of men, Mallory is propelled onto the street when the body of her adoptive father, Louis Markowitz, is found stabbed in a tenement next to the body of a wealthy Gramercy Park woman. The murders are clearly linked to two other Gramercy Park homicides Markowitz had been investigating, and now his cases become Mallory's, his death her cause. Prowling the streets, sifting through his clues, drawing on his circle of friends and colleagues, she plunges into a netherworld of light and shadow, where people are not what they seem and truth shifts without warning. And a murderer waits who is every bit as wild and unpredictable as she....Filled with deep, seductive atmosphere and razor-sharp prose, Mallory's Oracle is gripping, resonant suspense of tantalizing complexity—a genuinely unforgettable novel.

No Place Like Home


Mary Higgins Clark - 2005
    Ten-year-old Liza Barton shoots her mother while trying to protect her from her violent husband -- Liza's stepfather. While the death is ruled accidental, the tabloids still compare Liza to the child murderess Lizzie Borden.Liza's adoptive parents change her name to Celia and try to erase all traces of her past. Widowed after a brief marriage in which she had a son, Jack, she remarries a young lawyer. Celia is happy until, on her birthday, he presents her with a gift -- the house where she killed her mother. On moving in, they find the words LITTLE LIZZIE'S PLACE - BEWARE painted in red letters on the lawn. When the real estate agent who sold the house to her husband is murdered, she becomes a suspect. As she struggles to prove her innocence, Celia and her little son are being stalked by the killer.

The Genesis Code


John Case - 1997
    His sister and young nephew have died in a fire in their home near Washington, D.C. Yet Lassiter soon learns a chilling fact: His loved ones were brutally murdered before the blaze was set. . . .The mysterious suspect's identity only raises more questions. Then Lassiter uncovers another crime--another innocent mother and child murdered. The more he unearths, the larger the web of conspiracy grows, as his search for answers leads him on a dangerous international chase toward a truth that will shock him--and the world--to the very bone. . . .From the Paperback edition.

Total Eclipse


Liz Rigbey - 1995
    Liz Rigbey has created a superb novel of passio n, deception, and illusion.

The Collaborator


Gerald Seymour - 2009
    She is an Italian accountancy student in London, and her boyfriend Eddie teaches at a language school. But the prime reason Immacolata Borelli came to Britain was to look after her gangster brother, wanted for multiple murders back home in Naples. For the Borelli clan are major players in the Camorra, a crime network more close-knit and ruthless than the Sicilian Mafia. Mario Castrolami is a senior Carabinieri investigator of the Camorra, his career dedicated to destroying the corruption and violence of the clans. When Immacolata calls from London to say she is prepared to collaborate with justice - to betray her own family - he knows she is setting in motion a terrifying and unpredictable series of events. The Borellis will not lose their criminal empire without a vicious fight. They will use anything and anyone to prevent her from giving evidence against them. Even Eddie, and Eddie's life.

Fox Five


Zoë Sharp - 2011
    All feature her ex-Special Forces soldier turned self-defence expert and bodyguard, Charlotte ‘Charlie’ Fox.In A Bridge Too Far, we meet Charlie before she’s become a professional in the world of close protection. When she agrees to hang out with the local Dangerous Sports Club, she has no idea it will soon live up to its name.Postcards From Another Country has Charlie guarding the ultra-rich Dempsey family against attempted assassination – no matter where the danger lies.A finalist for the CWA Short Story Dagger, Served Cold puts another tough woman centre stage – the mysterious Layla, with betrayal in her past and murder in her heart.Off Duty finds Charlie taking time away from close protection after injury. She still finds trouble, even in an out-of-season health spa in the Catskill Mountains.And finally, Truth And Lies puts all Charlie’s skills and ingenuity to the test as she has to single-handedly extract a news team from a rapidly escalating war zone.Also included: Excerpt from KILLER INSTINCT: Charlie Fox book one, Meet Charlie Fox, Meet Zoë Sharp, info on the other books in the Charlie Fox series.

Close Your Eyes


Darren O'Sullivan - 2018
    He doesn’t know his secret.When Daniel woke up from a coma he had no recollection of the life he lived before. Now, fourteen years later, he’s being forced to remember.A phone call in the middle of the night demands he return what he stole – but Daniel has no idea what it could be, or who the person on the other end is. He has been given one warning, if he doesn’t find out his family will be murdered.Rachael needs to protect her son. Trapped with no way out she will do anything to ensure they survive. But sometimes mothers can’t save their children and her only hope is Daniel’s memory.Perfect for fans of Holly Seddon, Gillian Flynn and BA Paris.From the best-selling author of Our Little Secret comes a new psychological thriller with a shocking twist.

A Bleeding of Innocents


Jo Bannister - 1993
    Adding stress to the already understaffed force, a young nurse is brutally murdered in her car with her husband as the only witness. Is there a shotgun killer walking the streets, or is her distraught husband guilty of more than he'll admit?After another horrible shooting murder, it's clear there's a serial killer on the loose. Detective Chief Inspector Frank Shapiro's two most independent officers, an angry Irishman and an ambitious female officer, must forge an unlikely alliance to stop the bloodshed-and stay alive.

The DCI Jack Logan Collection Books 1-3: A Scottish Crime Fiction Series


J.D. Kirk - 2020