Book picks similar to
The Reluctant Detective by Sinclair MacLeod


crime
mystery
mystery-m
mysteries-thrillers-suspense

One Last Step


Sarah Sutton - 2020
     Two hikers go missing along the Appalachian Trail, leaving only a bloodstained forest behind them, and when another hiker collapses on someone’s porch in New Hampshire, murdered by crossbow, the local police realize they have a serial killer on their hands––and need to call in the FBI. FBI Agent Tara Mills is young, brilliant and new to the force. With a promising career in front of her, she faces the ultimate test when she is assigned the case. It soon proves to be more challenging than she ever could have imagined––an impossible riddle that leaves even her seasoned partner stumped. Meanwhile, something about the case stirs a darkness within her––a tortured past that even her long-term boyfriend doesn’t fully understand. As nightmares consume her, she only hopes that her past will not come back to ruin her once again. As more hikers go missing, and with her job on the line, Tara finds herself on a race against time as she combs through the forest’s trails. Peeling back each layer, she soon realizes that she is up against a true diabolical mastermind. And just when she thinks she has it all figured out, her instincts lead her to the most shocking truth of all. Book #2 in the series––ONE LAST BREATH––is also now available for pre-order!

Castle Cay


Lee Hanson - 2010
    Who could have killed rising artist Marc Solomon, and what does Castle Cay, the Solomon's mysterious Caribbean island, have to do with it? Before long, Julie's sixth-sense pulls a hidden string that unravels a deadly conspiracy...and her own troubled past.

Field of Blood


Denise Mina - 2005
    The vicious murder of a young child provides rookie journalist Paddy Meehan with her first big break when the suspect turns out to be her fiance's 11-year old cousin. Launching her own investigation into the horrific crime, Paddy uncovers lines of deception deep in Glasgow's past, with more horrific crimes in the future if she fails to solve the mystery. Infused with Mina's unique blend of dark humor, personal insights and social injustice, the story grips the reader while challenging our perceptions of childhood innocence, crime and punishment, and right or wrong.

Courthouse Cowboys: A Modern Tale of Murder in Montana


P.A. Moore - 2011
    The trial involving the disabled teen with Klinefelter's syndrome was featured on Dateline, NBC, City Confidential, Discovery, TLC, Rolling Stone, and Sports Illustrated. As you follow Paige Defalco's one woman quest for justice in small town Montana, you'll ride with her in the front car of the roller coaster, wondering if this former cynical prosecutor turned defense attorney will recover the soul she misplaced, 'somewhere between the Catholic Church and the Courtroom.'Thanks for checking it out and please let me know, through your honest review, what you think!P.A. Moore

Quinn Checks In


L.H. Thomson - 2012
    A missing Dutch master. A thrilling whodunit...Liam Quinn has a second chance. Released after four years in prison for art forgery, a connection helps him get a job as an expert insurance investigator. But a gallery robbery is about to throw his new plans for a loop...Quinn is a good man who has made mistakes. His large Irish American family are leery of his past, and having two police officers in the family doesn't help. The entire department mistrusts him, and half the town wants his head.His chance for retribution rests on recovering a multi-million-dollar missing painting... if the local mob doesn't kill him first.Wit, action and backstory... what more could you want?" -- J. Michael Orenduff, author of "The Pot Thief" mysteries.More than 500,000 readers have already discovered the entire series of Liam Quinn mysteries!

Trust No One


Debra Webb - 2020
    She’s locked in a bitter struggle with her ex-husband and teenage daughter, and her reckless new partner is anything but trustworthy.Still, she has a job to do: there’s a killer at large, and a pregnant woman has gone missing. Once Devlin and her partner get to work, they quickly unearth secrets involving Birmingham’s most esteemed citizens. Each new layer of the investigation brings Devlin closer to the killer and the missing woman, who starts looking more like a suspect than a victim.But just as answers come into view, the case twists, expands, and slithers into Devlin’s personal life. There’s a much more sinister game at work, one she doesn’t even know she’s playing—and she must unravel the truth once and for all to stop the killer before she loses everything.

Ghost of a Chance


Cate Dean - 2016
    His search leads him to Holmestead, and a stubborn, fascinating American who has acquired the box that once contained the rare jar.When the missing jar turns up, clutched in the hand of the very dead local historian, Martin becomes the prime suspect. He and that dead historian were bitter rivals.With his future on the line, Martin turns to Maggie for help, and they join forces to find the real killer.Maggie Mulgrew Mysteries:Ghost of a ChanceWritten on the Wind - coming August 2016Check out all my books here: amazon.com/author/catedean

The Babbling Brook Naked Poker Club: Book One


Ann Warner - 2016
    But when Brookside turns out to be a setting for art theft, dodgy dealings, and naked poker it becomes vastly more interesting. Josephine investigates the unusual goings on with friend and handwriting expert, Lill Fitzel. And the two befriend a young woman Josephine tries to prevent from making the same mistakes she has made.

No Game For a Dame


M. Ruth Myers - 2011
     Moving through streets where people line up at soup kitchens, Maggie draws information from sources others overlook: The waitress at the dime store lunch counter where she has breakfast; a ragged newsboy; the other career girls at her rooming house. Her digging gets her chloroformed and left in a ditch behind the wheel of her DeSoto. She makes her way to an upscale bordello and gets tea – and information – from the madam herself. A gunman puts a bullet through Maggie’s hat. Her shutterbug pal on the evening paper warns her off. A new cop whose presence unsettles her thinks she’s crooked. Before she finds all the answers she needs, she faces a half-crazed man with a gun, and a far more lethal point-blank killer. If you like Robert B. Parker's hard boiled Spencer series and strong women sleuths, don't miss this one-of-a-kind Ohio detective from a time in United States history when dames wore hats -- but seldom a Smith & Wesson.

She's Gotta Be Mine


Jennifer Skully - 2004
    Instead, she reinvents herself and the new Bobbie Jones—new haircut, new name, new attitude—follows her soon-to-be ex to the small Northern California town of Cottonmouth. What better way to show him—and his sweetheart—what he’s missing in the brand new Bobbie Jones than taking up with the town’s local bad boy—who’s also reputed to be a serial killer. Nick Angel is devilishly handsome and sexy as all get-out. In a word, perfect.It’s all going exactly according to plan...until a real murder rocks the little town of Cottonmouth. Of course, Nick didn’t do it...did he?“She’s Gotta Be Mine”, previously published as “Sex and the Serial Killer”,

Iced


D.B. Morgan - 2010
    As a snowstorm takes over the sleepy little town of Alder Springs, Wolf battles the elements as well as the killer, and must search for his girlfriend’s missing daughter along the way.

Meredith & Hodge Boxset: Books 1-3


M.K. Turner - 2021
    However, nothing gets in the way of them solving a case. Discover them and their world in this three book box set, containing over 1300 pages of murder, mystery, twists and turns and find out why over 60,000 readers have downloaded M K Turner’s popular series. Misplaced Loyalty – Assisted suicide or euthanasia? Meredith calls it murder! Ill Conceived – Why is an apparently innocent young woman prime suspect in a motiveless, senseless murder? The Wrong Shoes – Why did a pair of shoes set off a string of murders and a kidnapping? Want the answers? Buy the box set now!

Concrete Pearl


Vincent Zandri - 2011
    She's also had to rebuild her family business from the bottom up thanks to bad luck and bad fines. So it's easy to see why OSHA, breathing down her neck on her latest job at Albany's PS 20, has the contractor on edge. She's used to putting out fires, but this is about to be a full-on explosion--three hundred students at risk for exposure to deadly asbestos--and the asbestos removal contractor, Jimmy Farrell, is nowhere to be found. The clues--Jimmy's cleared-out office, his impounded car, his "gone fishing" story to his wife--point to something more troubling, possibly foul play. Armed with a framing hammer in lieu of a gun, Spike must sleuth her way through a world of deception, greed, and murder if she's going to nail a killer.

The Third Girl


Nell Goddin - 2015
    She’s looking for peace, beautiful gardens, and pastry—a slower, safer life than the one she’d been living outside of Boston. But you know what they say about the best intentions… Molly has barely gotten over jet-lag before she hears about a local student’s disappearance. In between getting her old ramshackle house in order and reveling in French food, Molly ends up embroiled in the case, along with the gendarmes of Castillac. And unlike the Nancy Drews she loved as a child, this mystery stirs up emotions she thought had been put to rest..and terrifies the residents of her beloved village.

Murder in an Irish Village


Carlene O'Connor - 2016
    Nowadays twenty-two-year-old Siobhán O’Sullivan runs the family bistro named for her mother, along with her five siblings, after the death of their parents in a car crash almost a year ago.   It’s been a rough year for the O’Sullivans, but it’s about to get rougher. One morning, as they’re opening the bistro, they discover a man seated at a table, dressed in a suit as if for his own funeral, a pair of hot pink barber scissors protruding from his chest.   With the local garda suspecting the O’Sullivans, and their business in danger of being shunned—murder tends to spoil the appetite—it’s up to feisty redheaded Siobhán to solve the crime and save her beloved brood.