The Search


Vishal Anand - 2021
    ACP Rathore is investigating the homicide. As the events begin to unleash Rathore digs upon secrets too dark and dangerous. As he proceeds, the question becomes more and more haunting - Who Killed Roger? Michael Rodriques, the Deputy Chief Minister of Goa? Shirley Fernandes, Roger's wife? One or more of the other artists? Or, an individual for whom Roger refused to perform? The Search is the most astonishingly impudent, ingenious and altogether a fast-paced murder mystery ever written by an Indian author.Note: This is an expanded version of the short story Who Killed Roger.

Prediction: Big Data, big danger


Tony Batton - 2019
    Their hopes rest on a new quantum super computer, one capable of interpreting patterns in the oceans of intelligence data. There’s just the small challenge of building it. Gregory Jenson, CEO of ZAT Systems, is tasked by MI5 to create the computer, but ghosts in his past could thwart matters before he even begins. Young lawyer, Michael Adams, is given the task of helping Jenson, but he soon has problems of his own. And they’ll soon learn that a hidden player wants to use the new system for their own plans – someone incredibly well-informed, and prepared to go to any lengths to achieve their goals. And if they succeed, the recovery of the nuclear reactor will be the least of everyone’s problems.

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


J.D. Kirk - 2020
    

The Reluctant Detective


Adrian Spalding - 2019
    He just wanted a quiet life. Something his mother was not going to allow. There again he never for one moment imagined he would have to look into the death of a 90-year-old lady who was gambling away her family fortune. The Hayden Detective Agency has no need of clients. The very existence of the Agency allows Martin Hayden to claim his large monthly allowance from the family fortune - without lifting a finger. Martin’s biggest problem is his interfering mother, who understands her idle son too well. She takes steps to find him not just clients but also a personal assistant to keep an eye on him. Under pressure from the women in his life, Martin agrees to take on his first client. How hard can it be to follow a 90-year-old woman who spends her time losing money at roulette tables? As it turns out harder than Martin ever thought possible, especially with the old lady dying in strange circumstances. Soon the Reluctant Detective is grappling with shady estate agents, an intellectual artist, missing charity money and an irritating Indian waiter. Luckily for Martin there is help in the form of Colin, a transvestite who, apart from having very good fashion sense, is an expert at breaking into houses.

Old Habits


John Carson - 2019
    Women were being abducted and murdered, then their corpses were displayed in open shallow graves. Marshall's FBI partner, Jessie Kent, was taken. During the hunt for her, Marshall tracked the killer down, but he was shot five times and left for dead. Less than an hour later, the killer took his own life. None of the remaining victims were ever found. Until now. A female detective comes down to Marshall's home town to ask for his help. Somebody has found the decomposed victims and is displaying them. Despite no longer being with the FBI, Marshall sees this as a chance to find Jessie, and take her home for a proper burial. And to lay to rest the feelings of guilt he's been carrying for the past four years. He agrees to go back with Dani Fox, but it's soon clear somebody doesn't want him back in town. He's warned off, but he ignores it. Then the killings start. Somebody has just accelerated the game from displaying corpses to adding new victims. And this time, he's making it personal...

Cold Land: A Mystery Thriller


John Oakes - 2017
    The agency has fallen on hard times and jumps at the chance to have a Texas Ranger in its ranks. Jake soon realizes the Bureau of Criminal Apprehension is staffed with a collection of undesirables dumped from other state and local agencies, but he has no choice but to help chase down leads on a fraud investigation. An investigation that turns up a freshly murdered corpse. Partnering out of necessity with one of the BCA's odd ducks, Jake doggedly pursues answers in the stabbing death of a local fraudster. His search for truth takes him into rural Minnesota where nothing he encounters is as it first seems. After navigating newly released convicts, illicit affairs and a secretive family pretending to be Native Americans, Jake gets closer to the murderer than he even realizes. After infiltrating a heist teeming with potential suspects, Jake fits the pieces of the puzzle together. But just as he identifies the killer, one last under cover role has his mental state unraveling before his eyes. Cold Land is a slow-burning mystery with a thrilling conclusion, but is also a tale of loss, identity and the will to survive. Its gripping turns and vivid characters will leave you thinking long after the tale is told.

The Warden's Son


C.G. Cooper - 2019
    I was ten. I made a new best friend. And, I became a murderer. Yep. You heard right. The summer of 1987 was the ninth stop for yours truly on the great prison tour of my childhood. Every year a new town and a new prison to explore. I wasn’t yet a murderer. Not at the beginning. Just the plain old son of a warden in jeans with permanent grass stains and threadbare sneakers that wore me more than I wore them. Life as the son of a Federal prison warden never felt weird until I turned 10. I was still a naive little waif until that nasty summer when everything changed. Now I sit here in my suit, so far removed from the boy of 1987 Virginia that I feel like I’m perfectly qualified to judge him. But when the window’s open, all I have to do is get a breeze from which I can detect the gluey stink of split black locust, or hear the froggy grind of a woodcock’s call, and then I’m no longer qualified. There I am, back under the hot sun, at the edge of the creek stinking of heat and moss. I am that boy again. And I can make out the line of Redcoats marching in ramrod-straight formation along a pink-feathered sea of mountain laurel in the distance..." What happens when a ten-year-old boy becomes friends with an inmate? Jimmy Allen's about to find out, and the crash of reality will stick with him for an eternity. The author of the USA Today bestselling Corps Justice series pens a coming of age story about youth, strength and the bravery of bonds between friends.

The Thursday Murder Club / The Man Who Died Twice


Richard Osman
    

Lynchpin: The Best Laid Schemes of Mice and Men


Siddharth Maheshwari - 2021
    A sinister plan, of a shrewd calculating mastermind, has set the wheels of doom in motion. He is now pulling the lynchpins across the country and making it fall into disarray. He is using everyone in his path to achieve his goals. Within thirty days he intends to control the nation’s soul. As chaos grips the country, it’s a race against time for DSP Ranbir Roy of the Intelligence Bureau and Inspector Vikram Aditya Singh to stop him before anarchy dooms the country. The pieces are set, the board is laid out but what happens when your own pawns move against you? What will be the end game?

The Tiger Gets New Teeth


Amit Bagaria - 2021
    The NP had done remarkably well in elections in four states. It was the party’s heroic return. It was an even larger triumph for the Dalal family, who had survived several calls for their ouster from party leadership. The fireworks started at 11:59 and four bottles of champagne were uncorked, as the ‘Nationalists’ and few staff members watched the night sky from the garden below.BOOM. Huge explosions razed most of 10, Lokpath, the entire Dalal lineage reduced to body parts and blood splatter on the grass. Though the explosion was restricted to the property, the tremors would soon be felt throughout the country.Naresh Mistri was woken up at 1:08 a.m. His national security team had reached his residence. The PM saw the news on TV. Even BP’s staunchest supporters would suspect the party. First the dreadful electoral performance and now this! It could be the biggest threat to his political career. As the world’s gaze would firmly be on Mistri, would he lose his greatest asset of all, public opinion?The IB and RAW had more often than not failed to provide intelligence on such attacks. And there was no ‘national’ police force that could investigate and solve this crime and bring the culprits to justice quickly. No, the PM had to turn to someone else. He said, “I want ISSCO to investigate this.”Realising that India needed an agency like the USA’s FBI, Russia’s FSB, and UK’s MI5, which could work with surprise, speed, and intensity, Mistri had three months ago approved ISSCO, a covert, privately run but government-funded intelligence and security organisation. He had told ISSCO they were to do everything that IB, RAW, DIA, NIA, and NSG said couldn’t be done, and do it better, faster, and quieter.

Line of Succession: The Price of Power


Michael Vandor - 2014
    Senator Kathleen Canfield has made history through her election as Vice President of the United States. Beautiful, full of vigor and wit, she has been anointed by the media as "the female JFK". However, as events propel her toward the presidency, elements in the government set in motion plans to ensure that she never reaches the Oval Office. Canfield's journey will ultimately take her to the White House during a time of world crisis (the Balkan conflict), where she will battle forces within her own administration and government to lead a nation from the brink of war. The price she must pay for the power of the presidency will be the life of a member of her very own family. Stylishly written, this political thriller delivers a unique flavor that crosses lines between Tom Clancy and Danielle Steel. Opening with an assassination attempt on the Vice President, the story is fast paced, steaming downhill from cover to cover.

The Two Towns


J.J. Salkeld - 2014
     It is DC Jane Dixon's first week on Kendal's CID team. Her new boss, DI Andy Hall, gives her an open file to review, and it's a far from straightforward case. A woman has died in suspicious circumstances in a Windermere caravan park, and although her husband is suspected there's not a shred of solid evidence against him. Can Jane move the case forward, or will a cold-blooded killer really get away with murder? The rest of the team is busy too, because a vulnerable teenager from a troubled family has gone missing from home. There's nothing to suggest that the boy has been abducted, so what could have caused him to run away from home? DS Ian Mann, a tough ex-military man, and DC Ray Dixon are both heavily involved in the investigation. This story introduces key members of the investigative team, as well as many of the themes that are developed in the full-length Lakeland Murders novels: including a strong sense of place, and an understanding that while justice usually prevails it is rarely complete, or completely fair. Reader reviews for the full-length novels in the Lakeland Murders series include: 'Well developed, realistic, relatable characters, great plot, believable detailed scenes, good action sequences. Recommend to those that appreciate British detective novels. Always devour Lakeland murder mysteries.' 'Love J J Salkeld's books, his understanding of police procedure, his ability to draw his characters out into real people is, I believe, up there with the best of them and it is good to find crime stories set in Cumbria for a change.' 'Salkeld is good. Not just as a writer of gripping detective stories; but even more for his feisty exposure of the lunacies of institutions, hierarchies, and power. A refreshing and enlightening anarchist - much needed in these jaded, compliant and consumptive times.'

It Was You


Jade Lee Wright - 2018
    Everything I did, I did for her..."When Regan Pen discovers that her long-term boyfriend has been cheating on her with over eight women, she packs her bags and leaves the sunny island in Spain that she had called home for a year. She returns to South Africa where she is given the chance to start over in life. Reassemble herself. Now is her time to be selfish. Find a new career, get a home of her own. Become whoever she wants to be... but when her best friend, Peyton, is brutally murdered, Regan is forced to put her life on hold to take responsibility for her friends thirteen year old daughter, Harley. As the police battle to solve the murder of Peyton and her unborn child, Regan becomes convinced that her Godchild is not the sweet, innocent little girl everyone seems to think she is. Could Harley have been so consumed by her jealousy and fear of not being the epicenter of her mothers universe that it lead to murder? If so, is Regan safe in her own home?

Murderer's Fete


Roger Keevil - 2011
    Throw into the mix a celebrated author, a dodgy solicitor, and a sponging relative, and Constable and Copper really have their work cut out!'MURDERER'S FETE' WAS FIRST PUBLISHED IN 2012 UNDER THE TITLE 'FETED TO DIE'

Catch as Catch Can (Merseyside Crime, #1)


Malcolm Hollingdrake - 2021
    Together with new colleague Skeeter Warlock, Decent quickly discovers there’s a sinister link between them all, one that will bring them face-to-face with some uncomfortable home truths.Catch as Catch Can is the first in the Merseyside Crime Series from Malcolm Hollingdrake – bestselling author of the Harrogate Crime Series.