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Books : Crime, Thrillers & Mystery : Mystery : Hard-Boiled
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The blockbuster that began the Jon Stanton series:
Amazon Kindle Top 100 for over six weeks
#1 Police Procedural in the UK and US
#1 Hard-Boiled Mystery in the UK and US
#1 Mystery in the US for eight weeks
THE MOST VICIOUS MURDER IN A CITY'S HISTORY . . .
A killer stalks the city of San Diego, brutally slaying women on the fringes of society. The body of a young woman torn apart in her bedroom makes even the hardened detectives of the San Diego PD's Homicide Unit tremble with disgust and rage.
A DETECTIVE WITH A TROUBLED PAST . . .
For SDPD homicide detective Jon Stanton, the young woman is more than just another case. His former partner, Eli Sherman, was the original detective assigned to the case; before he was discovered to be one of San Diego's most ruthless serial killers.
A FINAL CHANCE AT REDEMPTION . . .
Stanton was unable to see Eli Sherman for what he was and blames himself for the murders he committed while on the force. Near death, Stanton swears that he will never wear the badge again. But with a depraved killer eluding the best San Diego PD has to offer, he must once again fight to uncover a killer that leaves no evidence behind, and that has turned his attention to new prey . . .
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Victor Methos holds degrees in philosophy and ethics
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"The French call this time l'heure bleu – The Blue Hour. The time between dawn and sunrise when the sun is below the horizon, and the world is awash with a hazy blue shadowed hue that suspends us between the accepted divisions of light and dark. It should have been beautiful. For me, it was now only beautifully deadly..."
Take one decidedly anti-social alcoholic female British ex-cop with an attitude - Alex Churchill...
Add a tough, no-nonsense enigmatic American Private Eye who isn't quite all he appears - Gideon Wade...
Enmesh them in a dark and deadly web of international intrigue engineered by a shadowy criminal organisation for whom human life is just another commodity to be cynically traded for power and profit...
Then dive for cover as fists fly, blood spills and all hell breaks loose!
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“Well, Mr Kendall, let us say you purchased twenty thousand shares in Rockford Metals today and sold them on Friday, you should make a profit of twenty, twenty-two per cent. Something like that,” Collier said. He paused and shook his head. “In other words, you'll make quite a killing.”
He paused once again and smiled. “But somehow, Mr Kendall, I don't think you came here to talk about investments, did you?”
Kendall smiled and shook his head. No, he hadn't. He had quite a different kind of killing on his mind … the killing of Robert Andrews.
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Who killed Sophie Washington?
Early one cold November morning in the run-down seaside resort of Whitley Bay, the body of a young girl is discovered. Found abandoned five minutes walk from her home, her face has been mutilated beyond recognition.
DI Jack Brady, just back on active duty after recovering from a vicious shooting incident, is on the edge. Struggling to deal with his marriage break-up and his tortured past, his problems intensify when long-standing friend and colleague DI James Matthews confidentially reveals that he was with the victim the night of her murder.
Brady's loyal deputy, the clean-cut, Detective Sergeant Harry Conrad and the attractive and highly-respected police psychologist, Dr Amelia Jenkins are assigned with Brady to solve the victim's murder. But the investigation becomes increasingly compromised as Brady realises that Matthews is holding something back from him that could be vital to the case.
As Brady delves ever deeper into Sophie's life, he comes to realise that the three men who should have protected her during her short life are the chief suspects in her murder: her teacher, her step-father and a police detective.
Brady finds himself unravelling a metaphorical thread that eventually makes him re-evaluate not only the seemingly blameless life of the victim, but more disturbingly, Matthews's motivation and ultimately his own
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"Dani Amore is a sensation among Kindle owners who love fast-paced thrillers."
--Mystery Tribune
DEATH BY SARCASM introduces mystery readers to Mary Cooper, a Los Angeles area private detective who masks her true, caring nature with a razor-sharp, heavily sarcastic sense of humor.
In DEATH BY SARCASM, Mary learns that her uncle, a former stand-up comedian has been murdered. She is asked to assist in finding the killer by both the police and family members. Mary quickly discovers that her uncle's death was just the opening act for a bloody rampage. As Mary investigates, she exposes a dark and deadly legacy with mysterious links to her own past.
DEATH BY SARCASM careens through Hollywood, Catalina Island and the posh mansions of Malibu, with nonstop action and unforgettable characters.
SALE PRICE FOR A LIMITED TIME ONLY!
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Double-glazing salesman Alan Slater is in trouble. He hasn't had a good sales lead in months. His wife rightly suspects him of playing around. His best mate Les Beale has turned into a bigoted, boozed-up headcase. And that's the least of it.
When a rigged poker game has fatal consequences, Alan finds himself not only responsible for the clean-up, but also for Beale's escalating debt to a man who won't take “broke” for an answer.
As Beale's life spirals out of control, he becomes ever more desperately reliant on Alan to save his skin. But Alan isn't about to be dragged into the gutter by anyone, least of all his bad-beat, dead money former mate.
After all, there's no such thing as a compassionate double-glazing salesman.
Praise for DEAD MONEY
"Brimming with pitch-black humour and written with a claustrophobic mania to rival the finest noir exponents, it's compelling and finely honed stuff." – The Big Issue
"There’s not a beat missed or a word wasted in this beautifully bleak, absolutely pitch-black humorous look at a man in a deadly downward spiral." – Musings of an All Purpose Monkey
"a tight and pacy read, the prose stripped to the bone and the dialogue pitch-perfect. Fans of Colin Bateman and Elmore Leonard will find it hits their sweet spot. Cohen brother lovers; one for you too." – Loitering With Intent
"rings so true in character and atmosphere that you’ll be unsticking your sole from the carpet as you press the button two stops after you were supposed to get off" –Bookrambler
"dark, nasty, funny, and painfully human" – Spinetingler Magazine
"Dead Money is on the money, mainline Ray Banks, and sets expectations high for what the future brings for Banks' newest publisher, Blasted Heath" – Grift Magazine
"a great story. It's tight as hell and it's so deliberate that it's a complete joy to read... I loved DEAD MONEY" – Dead End Follies
"a pitch perfect novel" – Crime Fiction Lover
"an intensive masterclass in how to write ... People have been telling me to read Ray Banks for a long time. Now I understand why." – Helen FitzGerald
"Banks writes in a clean style, looped with inky black humor, and the plot goes at a lightning pace, heaping dread upon dread." – On The Book Beat
"DEAD MONEY is a quick read and a thoroughly enjoyable one, a Guy Ritchie film in prose, minus a lot of the showing off." – Kate of Mind
Praise for Ray Banks:
"Ray Banks writes with harshness, humour and elegance, and his punchy dialogue teems with vigorous authenticity." – The Times
"Banks is one of the freshest voices in hard-boiled crime fiction today." – Library Journal
"Banks has an ear for the vernacular as sharp as, but a shade or two bluer than, that of George V. Higgins. Let the squeamish stick with Tony Soprano; this is the real tough stuff." – Kirkus
"Banks has a Cain-esque ability (James M., not Abel’s brother) to take well-drawn, realistic characters whose moral compass is wobbling, and let them slash and burn their way to ruin." – Spinetingler Magazine
About the author:
Ray Banks is the author of the Cal Innes Quartet (SATURDAY'S CHILD, DONKEY PUNCH, NO MORE HEROES, BEAST OF BURDEN) and the novellas, GUN and CALIFORNIA. A very different version of DEAD MONEY was previously published under the title THE BIG BLIND. He lives in Edinburgh.
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The first book in the bestselling Dan 'Spider' Shepherd series.
Dan 'Spider' Shepherd is used to putting his life on the line. Working for an elite undercover squad he has lied, cheated and conned in order to bring Britain's most wanted criminals to justice.
But when a powerful drugs baron starts to kill off witnesses to his crimes, Shepherd is given his most dangerous assignment yet. He has to go undercover in a top security prison, a world where one wrong move will mean certain death.
As Shepherd gambles everything to move in on his quarry, he soon realises that the man he is hunting is even more dangerous than the police realise. And that he is capable of striking outside the prison walls and hitting Shepherd where it hurts most.
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'Dangerous Conceits' is a detective novel by Dennis O’Donnell, author of 'The Locked Ward'.
O'Donnell has been a lifelong fan of American crime writers like Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler and Mickey Spillane. 'Dangerous Conceits' updates the private eye novel to contemporary West Lothian and, in the person of Jack Black, provides aficionados of the genre with a new take on the legendary gumshoes of the 30s and 40s.
Jack Black is single - again - a smoker and a lover of Shakespeare. He hardly drinks at all any more. He lives alone with his cat, Black Jack, listens to the blues and does humdrum private investigator work to keep the wolf from the door. That is, until the summer Grace McGuire turns up at his little office above the Chinese takeaway in Bathgate.
It’s scorching. Jack is going through a dry spell. Then Grace arrives ...
'I pegged her as in her early forties. She had collar-length brown hair and big puppy-dog eyes. Her nose was long, but then so was Nefertiti’s, they say. Or maybe that was Cleopatra. I can’t comment. Personally, I’ve never gone in for those ancient Egyptian babes. I know that my description makes her sound like a borzoi but, just take my word for it, the features all worked. Later, when she used it, she had one of those rare smiles that’s been described by lesser writers as ‘radiant’. Smiling, she had all the allure of the three Sirens together, the time each of them had a big magnet in one hand, a strong light in the other, and a decoy duck on her head. Her smile had all the strangeness and charm of a sub-atomic particle. An Ideal Tooth Exhibition. She also had a fine set of curves that were pleasantly wrapped in a tan V-neck top and a pair of fawn slacks. But it was her legs that were the piece de resistance, as Marcel Marceau would say - fine, shapely things that went all the way up to her tush and back down again. State of the art legs. With pins like that, you’d keep a spare pair in the cupboard under the stairs in case of accidents. She deserved one of those throaty gurgles that Roy Orbison does in Pretty Woman.'
In no time Jack is up to his ears in an investigation that involves him in evangelical religion, sexual promiscuity and murder. Dangerous conceits, indeed.
Jack is a modern private eye with more than a touch of the great side-of-the-mouth ‘noir’ detectives of the 30s and 40s he so admires.
This is fast, funny and unputdownable.
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New edits of this book as of May 3, 2012.
Someone is murdering women from the class of '67 and it's up to Jim Richards, who has reluctantly just turned sixty, to stop him. Jim's life is in the dumps and then late one might he receives an email from a childhood sweetheart he hasn't seen in over 40 years, pleading for help but he doesn't get to her in time, she's been murdered. A killer is now stalking and killing his former female classmates for unknown reasons and Jim, along with his only friend Buck, a big, mustachioed biker, go off to track down the killer before he can get to one former classmate, Penny Wickens, a TV talk show host who Jim has just fallen for while protecting her. The killer is also murdering the women right out from under police protection, driving homicide detective Will Trapper crazy, and he slowly depends on Jim to help. There's humor, suspense, wild chases across suburban Detroit with cops, classic cars and motorcycle clubs; murder, mayhem, and a good amount of romance.
"We all talk a great game about writing, but when you see how hard a guy like Bob is working to make it happen...it's...Wow! Also, I just finished Classmate Murders--well done! Rockin' good fun!" - John Locke, Best-selling Author of Donovan Creed series, "Lethal People", "Lethal Experiment", "Saving Rachel" and "Now & Then".
"Bob Moats' Classmate Murders is an exc
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Full of strong characters, Smuggle is ideal for fans of Martina Cole, Jessie Keane or Jacqui Rose.
Smuggle – definition – move (goods) illegally into or out of a country.
High taxation in England to support the war towards the end of the 18th century kick started the illicit trade of the Smuggler in the UK, and this has continued ever since.
Set in the north of England in the early “noughties”, this is a powerful account, free of artificiality, of a group of career criminals whose primary occupation is smuggling tobacco into the country. Jake is from a good background with a taste for recreational drugs and young ladies. Mick his crime partner is notorious and well known in the criminal underworld. Derek the co-ordinator of their operations plans their transition to smuggling cocaine, which they agree to quite freely as the rewards are much greater. They begin to co-manage a lap dancing club and make enemies of the bouncer who has been employed to protect the interests of Ashley, the founder of the club. In classical gangster style, as they gain more money, power and respect, they declare their authority more and start building their business interests.
Gritty, authentic, a real life English crime world that transports you into the lives of the Smugglers.
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Some of the most vibrant and varied crime writing around anywhere is centred on the evocative industrial fishing port of Hull, with its shadowy wind-swept streets, its hard-bitten attitudes, its drugs, its gangsters and yet its underlying humanity that clings like untended weeds amid the cracks of the endemic poverty and the violence.
And Alfie Robins' 'Reprisal' is an outstanding example of the genre, a classic police procedural where you can hear the streets, smell the weather, savour the taciturn banter, and feel the four inch nail being driven into the heads of victims by a vengeful, meticulous and psychotic serial killer.
This is a criminal environment as real as it gets, and this is how people die if DCI Philip Marlowe and his over-stretched, tight-knit team don't get there first.
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Is it ever truly possible to atone for killing someone?
After the death of his son in a freak accident, DI Harlan Miller's life is spiralling out of control. He’s drinking too much. His marriage and career are on the rocks. But things are about to get even worse for him. A booze-soaked night out and a single wild punch leave a man dead and Harlan facing a manslaughter charge.
Fast-forward four years. Harlan’s prison term is up, but life on the outside holds little promise. Divorced, alone, consumed with guilt, he thinks of nothing beyond atoning for the death he caused. But how do you make up for depriving a wife of her husband and two young boys of their father? Then something happens, something terrible, yet something that holds out a twisted kind of hope for Harlan – the dead man’s youngest son is abducted.
From that moment Harlan’s life has only one purpose – finding the boy. So begins a frantic race against time that leads him to a place darker than anything he experienced as a policeman and a stark moral choice that compels him to question the law he once enforced.
Set in the northern English city of Sheffield, Blood Guilt is a gritty crime thriller that'll leave you asking yourself how far you'd go to protect a child from the very real monsters that stalk our world. If you're a fan of fast-paced, hard-hitting fiction that isn't afraid of dark subjects and dangerous questions, this full-length novel is for you.
REVIEWS:
'Excellent plot and a page-turner.' Amazon Vine Voice Review.
'A well-written, taut thriller with more twists and turns than a theme park ride.' ElementaryvWatson.
'...a great page-turner with a unique premise and I zoomed through it in a couple of days as I really wanted to know what happened!' Just a normal girl in London.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Ben Cheetham is an award-winning, Pushcart Prize nominated author from Sheffield, UK, whose fiction has been widely published in magazines and anthologies.
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WHAT OTHERS ARE SAYING:
“Small town life in southern Idaho might seem quaint and idyllic to some. But when local newspaper reporter Cal Murphy begins to uncover a series of strange deaths that are linked to a sticky spider web of deception, the lid on the peaceful town is blown wide open. Told with all the energy and bravado of an old pro, first-timer J.R. Chartrand hits one out of the park his first time at bat with Under Your Skin. It's that good.” - Vincent Zandri, bestselling author of The Remains
“J.R. does a fantastic job at keeping you engaged and interested. I look forward to more from this talented author.”
- Aaron Patterson, bestselling author of SWEET DREAMS
“Like a John Grisham novel, from the very start I was pulled right into the story and couldn't put the book down. It was as if I personally knew and cared about what happened to each of the main characters. Every chapter ended with so much excitement and suspense I had to continue to read until I learned how it ended, even though it kept me up until 3:00 AM.”
- Ray F., reader
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In a small rural town in the Pacific Northwest, three star high school football players are all found dead scattered throughout the county in a 24-hour period ... and nobody seems to care why. But when journalist Cal Murphy begins looking for answers, his questions aren't welcomed by law enforcement officials -- or anyone else in town.
As he and fellow photographer Kelly Mendoza attempt to make sense of bizarre circumstances that led to the teens' deaths, Cal makes a chilling discovery, uncovering a vast conspiracy that grows darker with every twist and turn.
With a mastermind determined to silence Cal and Kelly, the young reporters ultimately must decide if their lives are worth the risk to reveal the truth.
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You think you’ve got problems?
Doc Goold calls it cognizant premonition triggered by causal hypersensitivity, but Manny Shepherd and his Vietnam vet buddy Steve Mallinotti call it Shepherd’s Luck, that time-proven knack to sense bad shit lurks just around the corner. Manny felt the premonition slump into his gut minutes before he witnesses Steve’s girlfriend Rita Hayward get slammed in the mud to her death by a well-stacked gal dubbing herself Screaming Eagle.
Mired in shock, guilt and a drunken haze, Steve coerces Manny, who has little on his Private Investigator’s plate, to figure out why Rita died like that with them and a SRO crowd watching and cheering at Peoria’s Heart of Illinois fair. After all, back in earlier days at Neelys Landing, Missouri, Rita reigned as a star gymnast. So how could a simple Judo throw have killed her?
No way will Manny jeopardize his tenuous yet sensual relationship with Tazewell County’s District Attorney, Lisa Shelton, to hang around half-naked, oiled-bodied beauties with names like Virgin Witch, Passion Queen, Midnight Fire, and Holy Terror, just to expose the obvious – Princess Lay-ya aka Rita Hayward just took a bad…okay, seriously bad header.
Steve’s heart-tugging story of Rita’s journey to professional mud wrestler fame, and haunted by Rita’s single staring dead eye watching him, Manny takes the leap onto the St. Louis Slingers on-tour bus. Shepherd’s Luck bites hard amidst boobs and bullets as Manny is targeted while he hunts down a scheming, sadistic killer.
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PRODUCT DESCRIPTION
The six Simeon Grist private-eye novels by 2011 Edgar and Macavity Award nominee Timothy Hallinan have become cult favorites and are now available fot the first time since the 1990s. For a fee so big he can't turn it down, Grist is hired to watchdog the kind of guy he'd usually prefer to throw through the nearest window. Toby Vane is the golden boy of prime-time TV, whose gee-whiz smile and chiseled features mask a dark secret that would take the shine off for his millions of adoring female fans: every now and then he beats up a woman, and almost any woman will do. When some of the women around Toby begin to turn up dead, Simeon has to figure out whether he's protecting a murderer – or whether one of Toby's multitude of enemies wants to put him away forever. And when Simeon meets the beautiful Nana, the whole situation becomes very personal, very fast.
PRAISE FOR “SKIN DEEP” AND THE SIMEON GRIST NOVELS
“Gutsy, vibrant . . . a sharp noir L.A. Portrait.” – Kirkus Reviews
“Riveting, action-packed . . . Hallinan's best yet.” Library Journal
“A genuine, hard-boiled whodunit with plenty of motives, cagey suspects, and secret past lives.”
-- Booklist
A welcome visit from an old, tough friend . . . Hallinan does a great job . . . Excellent!”
-- Chicago Tribune
“The third . . . Simeon Grist makes me eager to go back and catch up on the first two.”
The Indianapolis News
“A modern successor to Raymond Chandler.”
– Los Angeles Daily News
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A UK Kindle Store Top Ten Bestseller
When a seven-year-old boy disappears after school, the case is handed to Detective Frank Collins. He's been looking to lead a high-profile case for a while, and sets out determined to prove his worth. But the missing schoolboy is only a trigger for another crime. Someone is intent on exploiting the boy's grief-stricken mother. And they have plans for Frank Collins too.
Praise for BYE BYE BABY
"The approach is so fresh that it makes the whole thing feel like the first time I've read a police story" Do Some Damage
"...a purely original, funny, sharp piece of writing. It has a plot that develops in an unorthodox, non-linear fashion--hardly resembling many of the police procedurals I've read. It's often noted that Guthrie is one of the top working mystery writers, and he certainly lives up to that reputation..." Death By Killing
"A story that moves quickly, in short chapters of crisp prose, with plenty of plot turns to hold the attention, and characters you can love and others you can hate... Like Guthrie's full-length novels, Bye Bye Baby is sly, noir as all hell (more noir than some, actually), and it just might bring a tear of pity to your eyes. It's a police procedural filled with incident and back story, and man, what an ending." Detectives Beyond Borders
"...a dark, clever, funny and sad story which races along to reach a smart conclusion. A tough and lovely slice of the hard side of life." You Would Say That, Wouldn't You?
Praise for SLAMMER
"SLAMMER is the most relentlessly page-turning novel this reviewer has come across in a long, long time, but Guthrie does so much more than just throw visceral action and sharp banter at the reader, teasing and cajoling us with red herrings and subtle foreshadowing, delving deep inside a mind that is quickly unravelling into psychotic madness. At SLAMMER's core is a surprisingly subtle examination of what it means to be good or evil, and how easily that distinction can become blurred. Guthrie creates empathy for all his characters – there are no faceless monsters here – and in portraying the prisoners and their guards as two sides of the same human coin, he nails a universal truth about the nature of life and about the way we differentiate good and bad, sanity and madness." The Scotsman
"This is Guthrie's masterpiece to date, grim and brutal in tone, cunning in design and flawless in the telling. Guthrie keeps the numerous plot turns both exciting and believable. There is a surprise twist in the middle of the novel that stuns the reader and makes the pace even faster...SLAMMER is not only artful, it's real art." Bookgasm
"...an absolute masterpiece, really should be at the top of everyone's "must-read" list" Eurocrime
"...a gripping psychological crime novel. When we speak of those on the forefront of dark fiction ...Guthrie’s name is near the top of the list, and SLAMMER proves why." Bookspot Central
"a dark jigsaw-puzzle of a book... expect moments of 'oh, I see!' mingled with sharp sadness. Nick Glass is an unforgettable protagonist and Guthrie has placed him in a darkly tragic, poignant, and ultimately satisfying psychological thriller." The Drowning Machine
"Guthrie's prose is a series of short, sharp shocks, reeking of the visceral brutality of the toughest contemporary noir... those who enjoy the darker side of the genre are in for some serious thrills." The Guardian
"one of the best thrillers of the year" The Editor's Notebook
About the author:
Allan Guthrie is an award-winning Scottish crime writer. His debut novel, TWO-WAY SPLIT, was shortlisted for the CWA Debut Dagger award and went on to win the Theakstons Crime Novel Of The Year in 2007. He is the author of four other novels: KISS HER GOODBYE (nominated for an Edgar), HARD MAN, SAVAGE NIGHT and SLAMMER and three novellas: KILL CLOCK , KILLING MUM and BYE BYE BABY. When he's not writing, he's a literary agent with Jenny Brown Associates.
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The Premier Book Awards named Fleet's first thriller, ABSOLUTION, Best Mystery-Suspense-Thriller of 2009. "Kudos to Fleet for another nail-biting page-turner!" -- K. G. Hunt
" ... absolutely riveting..." -- Stanley D. Crow
" Great character development, a really good story [and] an absolutely fascinating ending ... a very suspenseful book!" -- Feathered Quill Book Reviews
Sexual obsession drives this riveting novel of psychological suspense. Beautiful, talented and ambitious, Belinda wants to be a star. But fame can be dangerous.
"Vividly drawn characters ... Fleet takes us inside the head of the obsessed stalker as he lusts after his victim. This is one 'must buy' book -- Tom Bryson, author of Too Smart To Die
"NOPD Detective Frank Renzi is a very likeable, well-developed character. In fact, all of Fleet's characters are well-developed and intriguing. If you enjoy psychological suspense [add] "Diva" to your reading list." -- Kam Aures, Rebecca's Reads
The votes are in ... if you enjoy suspense thrillers, DIVA is the book for you!