Mystery Reads

Targeted Age Group:: 25+
Category: Mystery/Suspense

About The Purloined Angel:
This is the perfect gift for Christmas because the book is set around Christmastime. It is a lighthearted mystery with humor and twists and turns. It appeals to mystery lovers of any age.
Betty Brown has a problem on her hands. It is Christmas and there is no joy on earth for her this season. Betty’s retirement community has turned on her. They think she committed a crime that is inexcusable. Join in on the hunt in this who dunnit.

[Read more…] about Gift Guide: The Purloined Angel by Mollie Ann Sluss

Targeted Age Group:: Adult only
Category: Mystery/Suspense

Print book price range: $8.54
eBook price range: $2.99

About Burning Ties:
Allyson Roberts has risen from the ashes. She now has a career, a relationship, and a purpose in life. But as a new assignment comes along, Jake Morrissey, the man who helped her rebuild her life and has been her rock ever since might now become too dangerous for her to love. Will Ally and Jake find a way to be together, or will their ties burn them?

Delilah Jones has always been the odd one out with a wayward past. Now, she has a chance to shine by completing an undercover assignment that has her colleagues at a standstill. But what if getting a lead will cost Delilah her only chance for true love? Will she have to choose between her heart and career, or will she find a way to have both?

[Read more…] about Gift Guide: Burning Ties by Marie Astor

Targeted Age Group:: adult
Category: Mystery/Suspense

Print book price range: $25.95
eBook price range: $3.99

About Stalking Season:
This is the second book in the Seasons Mystery Series featuring homicide detectives Sarah Kingsley and Angel Johnson, unlikely and unwilling partners. Think “Lethal Weapon” set in Dallas with female leads. The murder of young Tracy Clemment is the kind of high-profile case that detectives hate and the press eats up, especially when the father is a Dallas high-roller.

STARRED Publishers Weekly Review
“ . . . gripping second mystery featuring Dallas, Tex., police detectives Sarah Kingsly and Angel Johnson. . . . The relationship between the women is just as absorbing as the search for the killer. Few readers will anticipate the closing twist.”

Kirkus Review
“So deftly plotted and paced that, although it’s certainly possible to grow impatient with the protagonists’ unwarranted impatience toward each other, they’re appealing enough to keep the pages turning.”

[Read more…] about Gift Guide: Stalking Season by Maryann Miller

Targeted Age Group:: 21 plus
Category: Mystery/Suspense

About Trespass:
A brand-new novel, a sequel to She’s Not There, starring private investigator TJ Peacock and Lisa Rayburn.

A deadly house explosion nearby lures investigator TJ Peacock to the site of the fire where she meets Gemma, a woman tortured by the death of a friend who died in the explosion.

Gemma, struggling with the ghosts of her past, is convinced the explosion was deliberate, and hires TJ to find out who murdered her friend. TJ takes the case and returns to the work she loves, despite feeling guilty about the responsibilities of motherhood and the attitude of her long-time lover, Detective Richard Conlin.

When a series of attacks and a murder take place in the same neighborhood, TJ unearths a bizarre connection to a sixteen-year-old double suicide of a couple who were partnered in a swingers’ group. A killer is trying to eliminate everyone who had been players in the group.

The clock is ticking as TJ tries to unravel the mystery before more people are killed.

[Read more…] about Gift Guide: Trespass by Marla Madison

Targeted Age Group:: over 18
Category: Mystery/Suspense

About Getting Him Off Quickly:
Paralegal Daisy Sinclair works for a well-known successful criminal defense attorney in downtown Fort Worth. She works hard and plays even harder, but has a code to never mix business with pleasure. This code is tested when her boss hires irresistibly sexy Warren Cole, a criminal investigator, to partner with her in a case defending a prominent figure against a double murder charge.

[Read more…] about Gift Guide: Getting Him Off Quickly by C. R. Lemons

Targeted Age Group:: Adult
Category: Mystery/Suspense

About And Sudden Death:
The looting of $2 million, murder, and revenge…it’s going to be an interesting cruise to Honolulu

Rex McBride, LA private detective and self-proclaimed heel, needs to forget. He needs to forget his last case. But mostly he needs to forget the beautiful Sheila Mason, going on trial thanks to McBride. He needs to get away. And he needs the money that Mr. Vickers offers him…ten percent of the dough that disappeared with Nordstrom after he looted the Southern Counties Buildings & Loan.

Nordstrom himself got away clean. He had something over two million in his pants at the time.

Now, after three years, Mrs. Sibyl Nordstrom has booked passage on the Honolulu Queen to Honolulu. Vicker’s spy, a maid in Mrs. Nordstrom’s apartment, says she may be off to meet her husband.

But then the maid is found murdered, shot with a .32-caliber handgun. Could a woman, could Mrs. Sibyl Nordstrom fire such a weapon? Or is someone else responsible?

On board, McBride checks the passenger manifest. Mrs. Sibyl Nordstrom is traveling alone, under her own name. Does that make her innocent or crafty? But Fenner, Teal and O’Connor—Nordstom’s patsies—are not listed. Could they be on board under assumed names, tracking Mrs. Nordstrom to her husband, the money and revenge?

McBride wastes no time associating himself with the beautiful Mrs. Sibyl Nordstrom, meeting her officially when she is seated next to him at dinner the first night.

She was even more stunning than her pictures. Perhaps it was her gown, a black-and-silver effect that could have been painted on her. Her hair was platinum, her eyes a curious shade that might have been described as sea green. Her hips moved with a provocative sway that was just short of a challenge.

His eyes glowed warmly. “How do you do, Mrs. Nordstrom?”

Could there be more than meets the eye to this beautiful woman? Could she have fired the .32 that killed the maid, or broken the poor girl’s fingers to get information before shooting her in cold blood? If so, what would make a woman like Mrs. Sibyl Nordstrom—Beautiful— kill?

Could it be the enigmatic Japanese gentleman, Baron Ito Itsuki, seen leaving Beautiful’s lanai suite late that night? McBride’s check on the Baron reveals he is supposedly attached to the Japanese Consulate. And he’s been checking up on McBride, as well.

“I was having a little party in my suite.” Beautiful told him.

Then he got it. Not only had he seen Baron Ito Itsuki, he had been seen. This was her way of accounting for the baron’s presence.

“Itsuki is amusing, don’t you think?”

Amusing, indeed. Until he throws himself off his lanai balcony and his valet hangs himself with his own belt. Along with the missing Simmons—McBride’s steward—lost overboard, and the mysterious Englishman Fessenden—misguided defender of Miss Ford’s honor—stabbed to death on the promenade, bodies begin to stack up…McBride attached to each.

Under suspicion, McBride struggles to continue his investigation into the deaths and what connection there is between the mysterious Japanese Baron, the beautiful Mrs. Sibyl Nordstrom, and the missing two million dollars.

Can he continue to woo Mrs. Nordstrom and get her to lead him to her husband? Can he uncover the connection between Itsuki and his lovely prey? Can he unravel the mystery before more people he loves, like the lovely Miss Kay Ford, are killed?

Find out in this breath-taking mystery set against a pre-World War II scenario of international intrigue, greed, revenge and murder. Take a Look Inside, above, or download a sample to your Kindle device and find out why AND SUDDEN DEATH is still a favorite read of hardboiled murder mystery fans 75 years after it was first serialized as HOMICIDE HONOLULU BOUND in 1939.

[Read more…] about Gift Guide: And Sudden Death by Cleve F. Adams

Targeted Age Group:: Young Adult
Category: Mystery/Suspense

Print book price range: $11.99
eBook price range: $3.99

About The Carlswick Affair:
San Francisco Book Festival 2014 Honorable Mention – “Move over Nancy Drew. There’s a new teenage heroine in town, and her name is Stephanie Cooper…This page-turning novel will be devoured by young adults and mystery lovers.”

Stephanie adores the quaint English village of Carlswick where she is spending the summer, but its sunlit streets lead to two houses that hide secrets. One house belongs to her family, and one is the ancestral home of James Knox.

Can she trust him? James is a musician who has stolen her heart, but her mind is full of doubt. He is a rising rock star, who has captivated her from his first hello, but an old family feud stands between them.

Stephanie’s beautiful great-aunt Sophie died suddenly seventy years ago, on the eve of her elopement with James’ great-uncle. Village gossip about this tragic wartime romance is mingled with whispers of secretive visitors, smuggling, and perhaps – collaboration- with the Nazis.

European history reaches forward to intrude on James and Stephanie’s modern love. She is driven to find out the truth about her great-aunt, whose lost romance in many ways parallels her own.

However great the danger, she must uncover the secrets that lie hidden beneath the ancient roof of Knox Manor.

[Read more…] about Gift Guide: The Carlswick Affair by SL Beaumont

Targeted Age Group:: Adults
Category: Mystery/Suspense

Print book price range: $13.25
eBook price range: $2.99

About Dig Two Graves: Revenge or Honor:
In war torn Greece, OSS commando, Lt. John Pantheras, stumbles onto a horrific plot.The Nazis are collecting a ransom from every Jewish Greek but they plan a double cross. They are going to deport the Jewish community despite their promises. Lt. Pantheras, a Greek resistance leader, and a rabbi turn the Nazi plot on its head when they steal the accumulated ransom. Things go well until the Nazis counterattack and John disappears with the bulk of the loot.

Nearly seventy years after WWII, while investigating his father’s murder, AJ Pantheras meets Ceres Savas. The elderly Greek shares a story reaching back to WWII Greece involving AJ’s grandfather, an immense stolen fortune, and the key to AJ’s father’s death. AJ’s grandfather, Lt John Pantheras helped Greek Jews escape the Nazis but disappeared with an immense fortune. Ceres and AJ seek this missing fortune for vastly different reasons. While AJ confronts his fears and greed, he is pulled into a decades old mystery and a duel with a pair of hired killers. With the help of the old Greek and a smart, shapely Italian PI, he tries to stay one-step ahead of death and the shadowy former Nazi officer who may be behind it all.

[Read more…] about Gift Guide: Dig Two Graves: Revenge or Honor by Nick Vellis

Targeted Age Group:: 16 to 100
Category: Mystery/Suspense

Print book price range: $13.39 – 14.99
eBook price range: $3.68

About The C ENIGMA:
A particular brand of evil has reared its ugly head at certain points throughout history, and humanity must fight to keep it in check. This balance is sometimes managed on the scale of world wars, but it can also come down to an individual’s actions. The C ENIGMA explores the premise that one man’s courage can influence the outcome of a war on evil as large and powerful as Hitler’s Nazism.

Chance—or perhaps fate—leads Matthias Adkins up to his grandfather’s attic, where he discovers a hidden picture of Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, the head of the German secret service during WWII. A few other items reveal that his grandfather has left him a set of riddles that will lead him through three time periods—1945, 1988, and 2008—on a hunt for his family’s identity and his own destiny…which turns out to be a destiny beyond his wildest dreams.

[Read more…] about Gift Guide: The C ENIGMA by SPIROS Gratsias