The Crossing Places


Elly Griffiths - 2009
    Ruth Galloway is in her late thirties and lives happily alone with her two cats in a bleak, remote area near Norfolk, land that was sacred to its Iron Age inhabitants—not quite earth, not quite sea. But her routine days of digging up bones and other ancient objects are harshly upended when a child’s bones are found on a desolate beach. Detective Chief Inspector Nelson calls Galloway for help, believing they are the remains of Lucy Downey, a little girl who went missing a decade ago and whose abductor continues to taunt him with bizarre letters containing references to ritual sacrifice, Shakespeare, and the Bible. Then a second girl goes missing and Nelson receives a new letter—exactly like the ones about Lucy. Is it the same killer or a copycat murderer, linked in some way to the site near Ruth’s remote home?

The Massive, Vol. 1: Black Pacific


Brian Wood - 2013
    Collecting issues #1–#6 of the series, plus three eight page stories from Dark Horse Presents.

Opus


Satoshi Kon - 2011
    But before he became a director, he was a manga artist, and Dark Horse is honored to remember Kon with the release of Satoshi Kon’s OPUS,an omnibus collection of a two-volume manga from 1996, created by Kon on the eve of his first film. OPUS contains the mastery of both realism and surrealism that would make Kon famous in Perfect Blue,as a manga artist planning a shocking surprise ending to his story gets literally pulled into his own work—to face for himself what he had planned for his characters!OPUS is Kon's metafictional tale of Chikara Nagai, a creator under pressure to finish his latest graphic novel, Resonance, who finds that the harshest critic of the shock ending he's got planned is the character who'll have to die in it! Nagai's stregths and weaknesses as a creator are tested beyond their limits as his present and his past, and the worlds of the manga and of reality, become the levels of a maze he may never escape... let alone get a chance to resolve the story!

No Mercy, Vol. 1


Alex de Campi - 2015
    Build schools in a Central American village; get to know some of the other freshmen. But after tragedy strikes, a handful of once-privileged US teens must find their way home in a cruel landscape that at best doesn't like them, and at worst, actively wants to kill them. And then, of course, there are the secrets the kids are keeping from each other. From third-grade spelling bee champ Alex de Campi (Archie vs Predator, Grindhouse) and Eisner/LA Times Book Award winner Carla Speed McNeil (Finder) comes a highly episodic thriller of teenagers in peril.

The Complete Father Brown


G.K. Chesterton - 1929
    Chesterton's endearing amateur sleuth has entertained countless generations of readers. For, as his admirers know, Father Brown's cherubic face and unworldly simplicity, his glasses and his huge umbrella, disguise a quite uncanny understanding of the criminal mind at work.This Penguin omnibus edition contains* The Innocence of Father Brown* The Wisdom of Father Brown* The Incredulity of Father Brown* The Secret of Father Brown* The Scandal of Father Brown

The Cartoon History of the Universe I, Vol. 1-7: From the Big Bang to Alexander the Great


Larry Gonick - 1980
    An entertaining and informative illustrated guide  that makes world history accessible, appealing,  and funny.

The Mitford Murders


Jessica Fellowes - 2017
    There she will become nursery maid, chaperone and confidante to the Mitford sisters, especially sixteen-year-old Nancy - an acerbic, bright young woman in love with stories.But then a nurse - Florence Nightingale Shore, goddaughter of her famous namesake - is killed on a train in broad daylight, and Louisa and Nancy find themselves entangled in the crimes of a murderer who will do anything to hide their secret . . .'A glorious indulgence. Dazzling' - Daisy Goodwin'Inventive, glittering, clever, ingenious' - Susan Hill'Fascinating, I loved it' - Julian Fellowes'An enthralling mystery' - Juliet Nicolson'Audacious, breathtaking' - Alex Gray

Mystery Society


Steve Niles - 2010
    Nick Hammond and Anastasia Collins are the Mystery Society -- and bring new meaning to "underground cult" status! Stealthily avoiding the authorities, this skulduggery duo spend their time and money righting wrongs committed in the world's underbellies.

Basketful of Heads


Joe Hill - 2020
    After an escaped group of criminals breaks into the house that June and Liam are watching, Liam is taken by them. June grabs a strange Viking axe and flees from the intruders. When one of the attackers finds her, she swings the axe and takes off his head, which rolls away and begins to babble in terror. For June to uncover the truth, she'll need to hear the facts straight from the mouths of her attackers, with...or without their bodies attached. Collects issues #1-7.

Black Hole


Charles Burns - 2005
    We learn from the out-set that a strange plague has descended upon the area's teenagers, transmitted by sexual contact. The disease is manifested in any number of ways—from the hideously grotesque to the subtle (and concealable)—but once you've got it, that's it. There's no turning back. As we inhabit the heads of several key characters—some kids who have it, some who don't, some who are about to get it—what unfolds isn't the expected battle to fight the plague, or bring heightened awareness to it, or even to treat it. What we become witness to instead is a fascinating and eerie portrait of the nature of high school alienation itself—the savagery, the cruelty, the relentless anxiety and ennui, the longing for escape. And then the murders start. As hypnotically beautiful as it is horrifying, Black Hole transcends its genre by deftly exploring a specific American cultural moment in flux and the kids who are caught in it—back when it wasn't exactly cool to be a hippie anymore, but Bowie was still just a little too weird. To say nothing of sprouting horns and molting your skin…

Devil's Peak


Deon Meyer - 2004
    A young woman makes a terrible confession to a priest. An honorable man takes his own revenge for an unspeakable tragedy. An aging inspector tries to get himself sober while taking on the most difficult case of his career. From this beginning, Deon Meyer weaves a story of astonishing complexity and suspense, as Inspector Benny Griessel faces off against a dangerous vigilante who has everything on his side, including public sympathy. A gruesome abuse case has hit the newsstands, and one man has taken it upon himself to stand up for the children of Cape Town. When the accused is found stabbed through the heart by spear, it's only the beginning of a string of bloody murders - and of a dangerous dilemma for detective Griessel. The detective is always just one step behind as someone slays the city's killers. But the paths of Griessel and the avenger collide when a young prostitute lures them both into a dangerous plan - and the two find themselves with a heart-stopping problem that no system of justice could ever make right.

Hellblazer, Vol. 1: Original Sins


Jamie Delano - 2011
    This is the first of a series of new Hellblazer editions starring Vertigo’s longest running antihero, John Constantine, England’s chain-smoking, low-rent magus.This first collection is a loosely connected series of tales of John’s early years where Constantine was at his best and at his worst, all at the same time.Collecting: Hellblazer 1–9; material from Swamp Thing 76-77

Maggie the Mechanic


Jaime Hernández - 1987
    The 25th anniversary Love and Rockets celebration continues with this, the first of three volumes collecting the adventures of the spunky Maggie, her annoying best friend and sometime lover Hopey, and their circle of friends, including their bombshell friend Penny Century, Maggie's weirdo mentor Izzyas well as the wrestler Rena Titanon and Maggie's handsome love interest, Rand Race. Maggie the Mechanic collects the earliest, punkiest, most heavily sci-fi stories of Maggie and her circle of friends, and you can see the artist (who drew like an angel from the very first panel) refine his approach: Despite these strong shifts in tone, the stunning art and razor sharp characterizations keep this collection consistent, and enthralling throughout. (Note: A number of these stories were not collected in the hardcover Locas.)