Caroline Dawson survived the town gossips who whispered behind her back. She survived the slow death of her husband, Roscoe Lancaster, the richest man in the county and her senior by three decades. But she feared she might not survive Rink Lancaster, her husband's son. Years before she married, when she and Rink were teens, he introduced Caroline to her first tremulous taste of love -- and then broke her heart. Now he's back. Rink says he wants to settle his father's estate, but his storm of emotions is undeniable and more dangerous than ever -- and what he really wants is to settle the score with Caroline.

    Fleeing into the night, Billy cannot shake the horrific memory of the savage violence, nor the pursuit of a cold-blooded killer. For wherever Billy turns --- from Hollywood Boulevard to the boardwalks of Venice --- he is haunted by the chuck chuck sound of a knife sinking into flesh. As LAPD homicide detective Petra Connor desperately searches for the murderer, as the media swarms mercilessly around the story, the vicious madman stalks closer to his prey. Only Petra can save Billy. But it will take all her cunning to uncover a child lost in a fierce urban labyrinth --- where a killer seems right at home ...

    The years pass but no one looks any older. One night a doctor tells the story of a young woman who gives birth to a baby in the most horrible way! Evil psychic powers, obsession and the supernatural in the most ordinary, everyday places. A spine-chiller from the master of horror.

    In a suspenseful collection of stories featuring fierce women--including one never-before-published novella--New York Times bestseller Laura Lippman showcases why she is one of today's top crime writers.The award-winning master of psychological suspense is in top form in this collection of diverse and diabolically clever stories.In the never-before-published "Just One More," a married couple--longing for that old romantic spark--creates a playful diversion that comes with unexpected consequences.Lippman's beloved Baltimore PI Tess Monaghan keeps a watchful eye on a criminally resourceful single father in "Seasonal Work," while her mother, Judith, realizes that the life of "The Everyday Housewife" is an excellent cover for all kinds of secrets.In "Slow Burner," a husband's secret cell phone proves to be a dicey temptation for a suspicious wife.A father's hidden past piques the curiosity of a young snoop in "The Last of Sheila-Locke Holmes."Plus seven other brilliantly crafted stories of deception, murder, dangerous games, and love gone wrong--irrefutable evidence that Laura Lippman's riveting fiction will more than satisfy any crime reader.

    . . or so she thinks. A chance encounter with a returned war hero--now prominent investment CEO--is the very last thing she wants or needs, or is it?When the handsome and deliciously kinky CEO shows her that there are other ways to satisfy her needs (and he knows all of them), she finds herself in the middle of a sexual awakening, a true romance and a happily ever after. This is a rollicking must-read for all fans of How to Make Love Like a Porn Star.

    Ten years ago, Magnolia Steele fled Franklin, Tennessee after an incident that left her with hazy memories and a horror of the place where she had been born and bred. Though her abrupt departure destroyed most of her treasured relationships, she vowed never to return . . . until she has no choice. When Magnolia’s breakout acting role in a Broadway musical ends in disgrace, there’s only one place she can go. She finds herself on her momma’s porch, suitcase in hand. Drama follows Magnolia around like a long lost friend. She reluctantly agrees to help her momma’s catering company at a party for a country music star, only to find herself face-to-face with a sleazy music agent from her past. After a very public spat, Magnolia not only finds him dead but herself center stage in the police’s investigation. Now she must scramble to prove her innocence, relying on the help of acquaintances old and new. But the longer Magnolia stays in Franklin, the more she remembers about the big bad incident that chased her away. The past might not be finished with her yet, and what she doesn’t remember could be her biggest danger.

    But to those who collect them, the map trade can be a cutthroat business, inhabited by quirky and sometimes disreputable characters in search of a finite number of extremely rare objects. Once considered a respectable antiquarian map dealer, E. Forbes Smiley spent years doubling as a map thief —until he was finally arrested slipping maps out of books in the Yale University library. The Map Thief delves into the untold history of this fascinating high-stakes criminal and the inside story of the industry that consumed him. Acclaimed reporter Michael Blanding has interviewed all the key players in this stranger-than-fiction story, and shares the fascinating histories of maps that charted the New World, and how they went from being practical instruments to quirky heirlooms to highly coveted objects. Though pieces of the map theft story have been written before, Blanding is the first reporter to explore the story in full—and had the rare privilege of having access to Smiley himself after he’d gone silent in the wake of his crimes. Moreover, although Smiley swears he has admitted to all of the maps he stole, libraries claim he stole hundreds more—and offer intriguing clues to prove it. Now, through a series of exclusive interviews with Smiley and other key individuals, Blanding teases out an astonishing tale of destruction and redemption. The Map Thief interweaves Smiley’s escapades with the stories of the explorers and mapmakers he knew better than anyone. Tracking a series of thefts as brazen as the art heists in Provenance and a subculture as obsessive as the oenophiles in The Billionaire’s Vinegar, Blanding has pieced together an unforgettable story of high-stakes crime.

    Even American businessman Leon Bauer has been drawn into this shadow world, doing undercover odd jobs and courier runs for the Allied war effort. Now as the espionage community begins to pack up and an apprehensive city prepares for the grim realities of post-war life, he is given one more assignment, a routine job that goes fatally wrong, plunging him into a tangle of intrigue and moral confusion.Played out against the bazaars and mosques and faded mansions of this knowing, ancient Ottoman city, Leon's attempt to save one life leads to a desperate manhunt and a maze of shifting loyalties that threatens his own. How do you do the right thing when there are only bad choices to make? Istanbul Passage is the story of a man swept up in the aftermath of war, an unexpected love affair, and a city as deceptive as the calm surface waters of the Bosphorus that divides it.Rich with atmosphere and period detail, Joseph Kanon's latest novel flawlessly blends fact and fiction into a haunting thriller about the dawn of the Cold War, once again proving why Kanon has been hailed as the "heir apparent to Graham Greene" (The Boston Globe).

    To the Incan people, it is still the ultimate symbol of their spirit. To William Race, an American linguist enlisted by the U.S. Army to decipher the clues to its location, it's the ultimate symbol of the apocalypse...Carved from a rare stone not found on Earth, the idol possesses elements more destructive than any nuclear bomb--a virtual planet killer. In the wrong hands it could mean the end of mankind. And whoever possesses the idol, possesses the unfathomable--and cataclysmic--power of the gods...Now, in the foothills of the Andes, Race's team has arrived--but they're not alone. And soon they'll discover that to penetrate the temple of the idol is to break the first rule of survival.Because some treasures are meant to stay buried..and forces are ready to kill to keep it that way...

    I don't want to think of him, but I can't help it, and sometimes at night my old heart beats so hard and so fast I think it will tear itself right clear of my chest." A haunting recollection of a mysterious boyhood event, The Man in Black Suit read by John Cullum leads off this masterful collection from Stephen King. Other dark tales include: All That You Love Will Be Carried Away read by Peter Gerety, in which a man checks into a Lincoln, Nebraska Motel 6 to find the meaning in his life; That Feeling, You Can Only Say What It Is in French read by Becky Ann Baker presents the ultimate case of déejàa vu; and The Death of Jack Hamilton read by Arliss Howard -- a blistering tale of Depression-era outlaws on the run. Whether writing about encounters with the dead, the near dead, or about the mundane dreads of life, Stephen King's The Man In The Black Suit: Four Dark Tales is intense, eerie and instantly compelling.

    Suddenly, a series of crib deaths—indistinguishable from SIDS except for the fevered testimony of one distraught mother with connections in high places—draws the attention of the police and the national media and raises the possibility of the inconceivable: could there be a serial infant murderer on the loose? Orphaned as a child, out of place as an adult, gifted with delicate and terrifying powers of intuition, Lena finds herself playing a critical role in the case. But then there is the mystery of her own childhood to solve....Could the improbable deaths of a half-dozen babies be somehow connected to her own improbable survival? The beauty and originality of Diana Abu-Jaber's writing are here accompanied by deft, page-turning narrative tension and atmosphere, tugging the reader to an unforgettable conclusion.

    For a certain sum of money, Samuel Carver will arrange a death. A ruptured gas line, an automobile crash, a fall from a window; anything can look like an accident. But when Carver is to carry out a job in a tunnel in Paris, and when the job goes wrong for him, and when he is pursued by the very forces that hired him, Carver must execute his most daring feat yet. A thriller of the grandest and most exhilarating sort, The Accident Man races above and below the streets of Paris, across Europe, and through storms at sea. It is also a startling introduction to a hero engaged in acts of moral violence. With the dissolution of world powers, with everything and anything for sale, how does one justify death? Samuel Carver--a clouded man of determined action--will come to understand the prices to be paid. Fans of James Bond, the Jason Bourne films, and Lee Child will thrill at Samuel Carver's violent and uncertain world.

    Just a bad dream, he thinks. She's had them before. Yet he can't help but worry when she cries out again as he pads down the hallway. Stepping through her doorway, he expects to find her sitting up in bed, frightened by a nightmare.But the nightmare is his. It's real. And it's just beginning...Something is burning Ash's daughter alive. Something horrible that is spreading beyond the walls of their home, and taking no prisoners.Thirty seconds later, Ash will discover his daughter isn't the only one in his family infected, and as his world spins, coming apart at the seams, a team of armed men in biohazard suits bursts into his house.But these aren't the good guys.They haven't come to save Ash's family. They've come to separate them, to finish what they started.The problem is Ash refuses to disappear. He wants only one thing: to find those responsible.Because humanity is on the brink of execution.And man is pulling the trigger.

    She finds herself coping with her troubled fourteen-year-old nephew and the shocking possibility that he is connected to the murder. Then the presiding judge accuses Lara of impropriety and social services try to take her nephew away. Suddenly Lara realises she is no longer the judge, but the judged. When the investigation uncovers shocking facts about the life her sister was leading, Lara is horrified to realise that she may have been the intended target. Now not only Lara's job, but her life is on the line ...

    Showcasing many of the organization’s bestselling authors as well as rising stars in the genre, here are twenty-five brand-new, never-before-published stories packed with murder, mystery, and mayhem.• A cunning criminal thinks he can use a child to take the rap for his crimes.• A hospital intern turned body snatcher• A priest who comes face-to-face with his wife’s murderer on death row• A Confederate soldier comes home to his love, but changed by more than just the war . . . he comes back wrong.• The discovery of a flying saucer in the ocean depths brings one man to the brink of a massive revelation.• A dying man’s last request proves to his ex-wife that he’s still rotten to the core.• A clandestine operative finds himself caught in a wicked game of confusion . . . but who is calling the shots? No matter what type of thriller you listen to, you’ll find something here that will entertain you . . . and perhaps a new writer you’ll cherish for years to come.