Book picks similar to
Black Hearts and Slow Dancing by Earl Emerson
mystery
mysteries
earl-emerson
pacific-northwest
Until Proven Guilty
J.A. Jance - 1985
Beaumont's kid, and the determined Seattle homicide detective won't rest until her killer pays dearly. But the hunt is leading Beaumont into a murky world of religious fanaticism, and toward a beautiful, perilous obsession all his own. And suddenly Beau himself is a target -- because faith can be dangerous...and love can kill.
The Alpine Advocate
Mary Daheim - 1992
What she really needs for her paper, though, is a big story. And she gets it--when handsome Mark Doukas, grandson of rich, old Neeny Doukas is murdered. Emma discovers that trying to get straight answers out of Neeny and his thin-lipped son is like poking a nest of sleeping rattlesnakes. What begins with an innocent story about the murdered man, ends with Emma conducting the most interesting, and probably the last, interview of her career from the wrong end of a .38....
Saving Grace: A Victorian Mystery
Hannah Howe - 2018
During and after dinner he had nothing to excite him save the receipt of a letter which somewhat annoyed him, and that his wife consumed rather more wine than he considered to be good for her health. Immediately after retiring to his room he was seized with symptoms of irritant poisoning, and despite every effort made on his behalf, he succumbed to its effects. An inquest was held, which vexed the minds of the Coroner’s jury to a degree without precedent in Coroners’ Inquest Law, and an open verdict was returned. However, the matter will not rest there, for after questions in Parliament, a second inquest has been called under suspicion that Mr Charles Petrie was murdered. * * * Who poisoned Charles Petrie? Dr James Collymore, a man familiar with poisons, a man harbouring a dark secret that, if exposed, would ruin his career; Florrie, the maid who supplied Charles with his bedtime drink; Bert Kemp, a disgruntled groom, who used poisons in his work, who four months previously had predicted Charles’ dying day; Mrs Jennet Quinn, a lady’s companion with a deep knowledge of poisons, and a deep fear of dismissal; or Grace Petrie, Charles’ wife of four months, a woman with a scandalous past, a woman shunned by polite society. With crowds flocking to the courtroom and the shadow of suspicion falling upon Grace in the shape of the hangman’s noose, could dashing young advocate, Daniel Morgan, save her?
Family Honor
Robert B. Parker - 1999
Sunny Randall is a Boston P.I. and former cop, a college graduate, an aspiring painter, a divorcée, and the owner of a miniature bull terrier named Rosie. Hired by a wealthy family to locate their teenage daughter, Sunny is tested by the parents’ preconceived notion of what a detective should be. With the help of underworld contacts she tracks down the runaway Millicent, who has turned to prostitution, rescues her from a vicious pimp, and finds herself, at thirty-four, the unlikely custodian of a difficult teenager when the girl refuses to return to her family.But Millicent’s problems are rooted in much larger crimes than running away, and Sunny, now playing the role of bodyguard, is caught in a shooting war with some very serious mobsters. She turns for help to her ex-husband, Richie, himself the son of a mob family, and to her dearest friend, Spike, a flamboyant and dangerous gay man. Heading this unlikely alliance, Sunny must solve at least one murder, resolve a criminal conspiracy that reaches to the top of state government, and bring Millicent back into functional young womanhood.
Dead on the Island
Bill Crider - 1991
Galveston private investigator Truman Smith is asked to find a friend's missing daughter.
The Edge of the Crazies
Jamie Harrison - 1995
Local sheriff Jules Clement manages the town's tensions fairly well...until someone blasts a hole in screenwriter George Blackwater's office window--and in George himself.As more of the town's prominent citizens start turning up dead, the pressure on Jules keeps rising. It starts to look like this rookie sheriff may not survive the next election...if he lives to see it.
A Man With One of Those Faces
Caimh McDonnell - 2016
Together they must solve one of the most notorious crimes in Irish history......or else they’ll be history.A Man With One of Those Faces is the first book in Caimh McDonnell's Dublin Trilogy, which melds fast-paced action with a distinctly Irish acerbic wit.
Telling Lies
Wendy Hornsby - 1992
for the gunmanWhen Maggie MacGowen was a girl, her sister Emily lived the life of a leftist radical on the run from the FBI. Twenty-two years after the FBI finally caught her, Emily lives in Los Angeles, a doctor at a free clinic that tends to the city’s down and out. When one of her old radical buddies comes out of hiding and surrenders to the police, their long-ago crimes become front-page news. Emily calls Maggie, now a documentary filmmaker, and asks her to come visit. By the time Maggie arrives in Los Angeles, Emily is nearly dead. The bullet, delivered point-blank in broad daylight, sent Emily into a coma. It seems a random act of violence, but Maggie digs deeper. She finds dark secrets in her sister’s past, and a conspiracy that won’t end until all those who ask questions are silenced.
The Final Judgment
Richard North Patterson - 1995
His distraught girlfriend is the prime suspect. Her aunt, Caroline Masters, about to take up a top job in the US Court of Appeals, decides to defend the young woman in the murder trial. But this will be Caroline's first contact with her family in almost twenty years, and as she prepares the case and goes through the trial, long forgotten secrets re-surface, putting Caroline against not only the police and prosecution, but also against her father (a retired judge), her sister and the memory of her young self when she, too, lost a boyfriend in suspicious circumstances. The Final Judgement is a powerful, poignant, page-turning legal thriller that confirms Richard North Patterson as among the very best writers in the bookselling area.
Who In Hell Is Wanda Fuca?
G.M. Ford - 1995
With the help of "the Boys" -- a group of aging winos who are his modern day "Baker Street Irregulars" -- Leo fights Native American tribal politics, industrial pollution, and psychotic grannies to fulfill his obligation to a friend.
Mrs. Pollifax Three Complete Mysteries: The Unexpected Mrs. Pollifax / The Amazing Mrs. Pollifax / The Elusive Mrs. Pollifax
Dorothy Gilman - 1993
Her childhood ambition to be a spy leads her to CIA Carstairs, who revives her from suicidal boredom. In Mexico, Albania, Turkey, and Bulgaria, the courier relies on only English language, friendliness, kindness, ingenuity and determination to achieve exploits that astonish her handlers, enemies, and new allies. 1 The Unexpected Mrs Pollifax - In a Mexico City Parrot bookstore for microfilms, General Perdido kidnaps Emily and debonair John Farrell to remote Albania. 2 The Amazing Mrs Pollifax - Emily rescues decades-undercover Magda from killer mole in Turkey, allies with photographer Colin, piratical Sandor, psychic gypsy Anyeta. 3 The Elusive Mrs Pollifax - Emily, sent with 8 passports to Bulgaria, aided by aged Resistance leader Tsanko and athletic young Debby, eludes vicious General Ignatov, frees wrongfully imprisoned including kidnapped rich student Philip Trenda.
Death by Station Wagon
Jon Katz - 1993
He’s got a wife and two kids, a mortgage and a station wagon, and an office in the American Way Mall tucked between a furniture store and a sneaker emporium. And he’s got a modest caseload of the kind a quiet suburban town generates: deadbeat dads, insurance malingerers...until now. Two popular high school students have been found dead on a deserted estate. The police call it murder-suicide, a case of love gone sour, but the dead boy’s friends think otherwise—and they’ve hired Kit to prove the cops wrong. Soon bizarre acts of violence and murder terrorize the town, and Kit begins to uncover corrosive secrets beneath suburbia’s placid surface. The closer Kit comes to answers, the more perilous the case becomes, till Kit stands in danger of losing his detective license... and his life.
Loose Ends
D.D. VanDyke - 2013
As a straightforward case takes unexpected twists, Cal must quell a growing fear that an anguished mother may never see her child again. With a shadowy crime lord lurking behind every unexpected clue, Cal struggles to tie up loose ends before evil claims its next victim.Loose Ends is book one in a new P. I. mystery series from D. D. VanDyke. Set against the rich backdrop of the San Francisco Bay Area, Cal Corwin novels brim with intrigue and fully fleshed characters from cops and criminals to hit men, oddball family and unexpected allies.