A concrete floor three hundred feet up in the Aurora Tower condo development in SoHo has collapsed, hurling three workers to their deaths. The developer, Roth Properties (owned by the famously abrasive Simon Roth), faces a vast tangle of legal problems, including allegations of mob connections. Roth’s longtime lawyers, the elite midtown law firm of Blake and Wolcott, is assigned the task of cleaning up the mess. Much of the work lands on the plate of smart, cynical, and sea­soned associate Duncan Riley; as a result, he falls into the pow­erful orbit of Leah Roth, the beautiful daughter of Simon Roth and the designated inheritor of his real estate empire. Meanwhile, Riley pursues a seemingly small pro bono case in which he attempts to forestall the eviction of Rafael Nazario and his grandmother from public housing in the wake of a pot bust. One night Rafael is picked up and charged with the mur­der of the private security cop who caught him, a murder that took place in another controversial “mixed income” housing development being built by . . . Roth Properties. Duncan Riley is now walking the knife edge of legal ethics and personal morality. Blind Man’s Alley is a suspenseful and kaleidoscopic journey through a world where the only rule is self- preservation. The New York Times Book Review said of A Cure for Night that “[Peacock] heads toward Scott Turow country . . . he’s got a good chance to make partner.” This taut, topical, and socially alert thriller delivers on that promise.

    Without Prejudice is a compulsive story of race and the dangers that can lie in the past.

    In his remarkable new thriller, Emerson fuses together a gripping drama with unforgettable scenes of peril that, in this realm, can explode at any second.Jason Gun, a risk-taking rookie firefighter who grew up on the wrong side of the tracks, has found in his firehouse the family he never had as a child. Then, in one ill-fated turn of events, it all begins to go wrong.A bizarre accident brings a thrill-seeking woman into Engine Company 29–and into Jason’s life. Suddenly, his future on the job is at risk. Two fellow firefighters know that he missed a call because of some sexual heroics at the wrong time and place. Now, deeply in their debt, he will find out what kind of men his partners really are.When these two firefighters come upon a fortune in missing bearer bonds–money found in a dead man’s house–Jason is forced to become an accessory to their crime. And when evidence of their greed, foolishness, and thievery begins to emerge, Jason is witness to an even darker deed.Suddenly, the twenty-four-year-old, who only wanted to do the right thing, is trapped behind a wall of silence. Trying to undo his mistake, Jason moves further into the darkness, where a beautiful young woman might just be his emotional rescue–or yet one more very wrong move. Unfortunately for Jason, the worst isn’t behind him. Like a fire hit by wind, the killing has raged out of control.Capturing the thin line that separates a hero from a criminal, and an enemy from a friend, Earl Emerson’s new novel is a gripping tale of a man’s dangerous fall from grace–and of his fierce battle for redemption.

    More chilling is that the victim was the subject of one of Nick's old crime stories-and that's not Nick's last link to a killer's cold-blooded revenge. Because Nick and his daughter have caught the sniper's eye as well.

    When the thirty-six pounds of gold he steals from a lab turns out to be radioactive, down-and-out thief Tony Catell has to stay one step ahead of the FBI while trying desperately to find someone willing to take it off his hands.

    What do you do?Well, if you're David Lindsay from Arbroath, you get the hell out of there and don't return. Not for at least fifteen years. Until Nicola Cruickshank - yes, that Nicola, the girl you always fancied but never had the guts to approach - gets in touch and asks - no, demands - that you go back for a school reunion. To the place where it happened. The place you've been running from for fifteen years. Of course you go. Not to belatedly lay your mate to rest, but because you still fancy Nicola.The thing is, if you are David Lindsay, then returning to Arbroath isn't going to lay any ghosts to rest. And when someone else takes a dive off the cliffs - an act the locals have taken to calling 'tombstoning' - while David's there, he has a choice: run away again, or finally find out why people keep dying around him . . .

    Joe Bailey is the Spirit Basher. Formerly a professional magician, he's become an ace police detective in Atlanta, debunking phony psychics and spiritualists who prey on the gullible. And he's just caught his first sensational murder case.The victim is someone Joe knew. Dr. Robert Nelson was a professor at Landwyn University, head of the parapsychology program. He was killed in his own home, a sculpture of massive chrome spikes driven through his body and into a wall. A sculpture that no one could possibly have lifted. But Nelson's girlfriend claims to know the murderer: an eight-year-old boy. Jesse Randall is not just any child. Some people say he can move objects using nothing more than his will. Nelson had been studying the boy, and Jesse's anger at the professor was erupting in "shadow storms" — violent telekinetic activity — while Jesse slept. Nelson's girlfriend swears that one of these episodes was responsible for Nelson's brutal death. Joe is far from convinced. He's certain that Jesse's power is a hoax and Nelson's killer is a master of deception. Driven to seek out the truth that surely lies behind the psychic fakery, Joe must rely on his wits to separate what's real from what's illusion — even if it means drawing Jesse's anger on himself. Soon mysterious incidents thrust him and his own child into grave peril. Are they examples of Jesse's shadow storms? Or deadly warnings from someone who cannot allow the Spirit Basher to discover the truth? Joe cannot abandon his search for answers. And he'd better find them fast before whoever — or whatever — impaled Robert Nelson like an insect does the same to him and his daughter.

    Revisiting the past, though, is a dark and dangerous game in small-town America. When a careless sexual episode leads to the suicide of the town’s first lady, Johnny finds himself the target of a revenge campaign that threatens to tear apart the fragile world he’s built among the gold-bearing mountains of Northern California.Left an unexplained piece of land when his father mysteriously disappears, Johnny must unravel its secrets in a desperate bid to protect those he loves. But his efforts to do this have deadly consequences and will ultimately force him to confront not only his own failings, but the very nature of guilt.A searing meditation on the futility of trying to right the wrongs of the past, Empty Mile blends elements of thrilling urban noir with the wide-open spaces of outdoor adventure in a story that reflects America’s contemporary uncertainty about itself.

    J. Rozan. Set in New York in the unforgettable aftermath of September 11, Absent Friends brilliantly captures a time and place unlike any other, as it winds through the wounded streets of New York and Staten Island...and into a maze of old crimes, damaged lives, and heartbreaking revelations. The result is not only an electrifying mystery and a riveting piece of storytelling but an elegiac novel that powerfully explores a world changed forever on a clear September morning.In a novel that will catch you off guard at every turn, and one that is guaranteed to become a classic, S. J. Rozan masterfully ratchets up the tension one revelation at a time as she dares you to ponder the bonds of friendship, the meaning of truth, and the stuff of heroism.

    Orphaned at birth, a gifted musician, he’s stuck in a California backwater, helping his Salvadoran aunt care for his damaged brother, an ex-marine badly wounded in Iraq. When immigration agents arrest his uncle, the family has nowhere else to turn. Roque, badgered by his street-hardened cousin, agrees to bring the old man back, relying on the criminal gangs that control the dangerous smuggling routes from El Salvador, through Guatemala and Mexico, to the U.S. border. But his cousin has told Roque only so much. In reality, he will have to transport not just his uncle but two others: an Arab whose intentions are disturbingly vague and a young beauty promised to a Mexican crime lord. Roque discovers that his journey involves crossing more than one kind of border, and he will be asked time and again to choose between survival and betrayal—of his country, his family, his heart.

    Detective Tony Marino wants to close this case before another woman disappears. Especially when he meets a fatherless little boy whose mother is being stalked. Single mom Erin O'Malley tells Tony about her anonymous caller's heavy breathing and unnerving silences. And the feeling of being watched--constantly. Now, after years of thinking he had nothing to offer a wife and child, Tony will do anything to protect the family that feels like his own. Because Erin "is" next on the killer's list.

    Yet Brek longs for her lost life, and the cause of her death remains a mystery. Searching for answers, Brek attempts to re-create the world she once knew and visits her family in their dreams; but it is her first client in heaven, a young convict, who holds the secret-a shocking crime long repressed. Guided by her mentor, Luas, a lawyer who has been prosecuting souls for thousands of years, Brek embarks on a quest traversing heaven and earth to bring her killer to justice, uncovering an interlocking past that places her own soul in jeopardy. Entering the courtroom to face her killer at the Final Judgment, Brek must make a momentous choice that will alter her eternity. POSTHUMOUS PRAISE FOR FORGIVING ARARAT: "This glorious, triumphant work leads its readers from the wrathful lands of the east...and back to the Garden of Eden." -John Steinbeck, author of Grapes of Wrath and East of Eden. "With mythical prose at times approaching verse, Forgiving Ararat works a miracle, bridging the chasm between life and death." -Emily Dickinson, author of Poems. "At the center of Forgiving Ararat is the Trial each of us must one day face-and the profound metamorphosis each of us must undergo to win." -Franz Kafka, author of The Trial and The Metamorphosis. "This book is the next 'Lovely Bones '" -Anonymous Recently Departed Reader

    But how can the police suspect the station's owner, a man who's been like a father to Gabby? She's determined to clear her friend's name, and will recruit anyone she can find to help. Even the mysterious newcomer in town, handsome businessman Clark McKay. Gabby doesn't quite trust Clark, but she can't crack the case alone. Especially when the killer threatens them both--either back down from the investigation...or be silenced forever.

    But for a man who's never held down a legitimate job and who faces the daily temptation of returning to the drugs and violence of his past, it isn't going to be easy.When Monty foils a robbery in his new home, killing the intruders, it doesn't make staying on the straight and narrow any easier. He soon finds he has both a small-time crime boss and a star police sargeant looking for ways to ruin him and run him out of town.It's going to take all of the tricks this aging, streetwise ex-con has up his sleeves to prove his innocence and protect his family, all the while avoiding the seductive allure of the life he left behind.

    At twenty-seven, Marissa’s moved beyond the trauma and is working under a new name as a freelance photographer. But when she accepts a job covering a string of macabre murders in Portland, it’s impossible for Marissa not to remember.Everything is eerily familiar. The same underground lairs. Sad trinkets and toys left behind, identical to those Marissa had as a child. And then there is the note meant just for her that freezes Marissa’s blood: See you soon, Missy.To determine the killer’s next move, Marissa must retrieve her long-forgotten memories and return to a past she’s hidden away. But she won’t be facing her fears alone. Someone is waiting for her in the dark.