Showing results by publisher "Quercus" in Crime Fiction

It is autumn in Castle Knoll and Annie Adams is busy settling into her new home. She doesn't find Gravesdown Hall particularly cosy, especially since she found two dead bodies there over the summer. What's more, ever since she arrived in the village, Annie has had the creeping sense she's being watched. Lonely, and desperate for some company, Annie starts talking to a stranger she meets in the grounds of the estate. The striking old woman introduces herself as Peony Lane, the fortune-teller who predicted Great Aunt Frances' murder all those years ago. And now she has a fortune to tell Annie.

Bruno Courrѐges is chief of police of the lovely Dordogne town of St Denis with a remit that covers the beautiful valley of the river Vézѐre. One autumn morning he comes across an abandoned car parked near a local beauty spot. Inside is a dead woman, Monique, an apparent suicide resulting from depression. But there are circumstances surrounding the death that raise Bruno's suspicions, particularly when disputes arise surrounding her Will.

The death of a young Pakistani bride in Glasgow gets Rosie Gilmour's antennae twitching. She is sure this tragic accident was anything but - but she is not prepared for where her investigation will take her.... Rosie has her hands full navigating the sensitivities of this case - the girl's grieving family and the tensions between the white and Pakistani communities in the city - when she is contacted by two prostitutes in serious trouble. One of their clients has died on the job, and they've gone on the run - with his briefcase.

It started with a splash. Jimmy, a homeless veteran grappling with PTSD, did his best to pretend he hadn't heard it - the sound of something heavy falling into the Tyne at the height of an argument between two men on the riverbank. Not his fight. Then he sees the headline: Girl in Missing Dad Plea. The girl, Carrie, reminds him of someone he lost, and this makes his mind up: it's time to stop hiding from his past. But telling Carrie what he heard - or thought he heard - turns out to be just the beginning of the story.

As war looms over Britain and there is talk of gas masks and blackout, people are understandably jumpy and anxious. Stella Fry, who's been working in Vienna for a Jewish family, returns home with no job and a broken heart. She answers an advertisement from a famous mystery writer, Hubert Newman, who needs a manuscript typed. She takes on the job and is shocked the next day to learn of the writer's sudden, unexplained death.

Lee Arnold and Mumtaz Hakim run a detective agency in London's East End. But their latest case could have devastating consequences.A new client, Nasreen, has sought Hakim's help. Recently moved to a new house, and with a baby on the way, this should be an exciting time- but Nasreen has made friends in the community that she cannot tell her husband, Abdullah, about. And when a murder takes place close to their home, Nasreen suspects that Abdullah also has something to hide.

It's a crisp spring morning when Cass drops her husband, a respected lecturer, to the beach for his medically prescribed swim. While waiting for him, something catches her eye. A young woman runs towards her husband and embraces him—until he holds his hand over her face and she falls down on the stones, dead. In the backseat of the car, their seven-year-old son sits quietly. When her husband returns, he says nothing. Neither does Cass. Afraid to speak up in the immediate aftermath, Cass embarks on a solitary quest to unravel what has taken place.

A money-laundering accountant disappears in Romania. The hitman hired to disappear him is found dead in a Glasgow flat. And the owner of the flat, the accountant's widow, claims she knows nothing about it. Crime reporter Rosie Gilmour isn't convinced by Helen Lewis's innocent facade - she is convinced Helen was the one who ordered the hit on her husband, and she's going to prove it.

A group of archaeologists are excavating a Bronze Age burial site in the grounds of Trusloe Hall, a minor stately home in Wiltshire. Excited that their dig is being filmed for a TV documentary, the group are camping onsite and having the time of their lives. In the blink of an eye, one of the party disappears: a young woman called Nazma Kirmani. An extensive police investigation fails to find any trace of her, and the case goes cold for over twenty years....

Ruby Winter is surprised when her reclusive father invites a strange solider into their house. Intrigued, she tries to eavesdrop on their conversation, but is alarmed when she hears a fight break out. She dashes into the kitchen to save her dad, but he's not the one in trouble. The soldier has been stabbed and is bleeding out on the floor. Refusing her pleas to call an ambulance, her dad urges her to pack a bag—they have to run. As they try to escape her dad is shot and Ruby is chased by one of the soldier's comrades but is hidden by Lucas, a boy she has ignored up till now.

Kerry Casey is now a fully fledged gangland boss. With her business partner Sharon and her wily lawyer Marty at her side, she is busy ridding her organisation of the drug-dealing, people-trafficking scum her dead brother Mickey got them involved with. But her great dream is still to take the Caseys straight. Her plan to turn her organisation around hinges on building a property empire in Spain. But Kerry has some deadly rivals - in Glasgow, on the Costa del Sol, and even further afield.

Crime reporter Rosie Gilmour returns from hiding in Bosnia to a story of a brutal execution. University lecturer Tom Mahoney was shot at point-blank range; the killing has all the signs of a hit. But who would want to kill a retired lecturer? Rosie throws herself into the investigation, looking for a witness that has gone missing. A witness that might hold the key to the story. But she has her own reasons to stay hidden. As Rosie digs deeper, she finds the story has connections to the Ministry of Defence and MI6, and Mahoney's past is darker than anyone could imagine.

A sadistic killer with a grudge against Rosie Gilmour is on the loose in Glasgow. Thomas Boag escaped from his first court appearance facing charges on a brutal murder. He's suspected in the disappearances of two other people. Now he's out for revenge. Rosie tries to distract herself with a new story: refugees trafficked into Glasgow and used as modern-day slaves - or worse. But this investigation soon leads her into dangerous territory as it takes her up against some of Glasgow's nastiest characters, and all the while, somewhere out there, Boag is laying his trap....

Revered artist Kim Lord is about to unveil her most shocking show yet: Still Lives, a series of self-portraits in which she impersonates the female victims of America's most famous homicides, from Nicole Brown Simpson to the Black Dahlia. As celebrities and rich patrons pour into LA's Rocque Museum for the opening night, the attendees wait eagerly for Kim's arrival. All except Maggie Richter, museum editor and ex-girlfriend of Greg Shaw Ferguson, Kim's new boyfriend. But Kim never shows up to her party, and the crowd's impatience slowly turns to unease.

Six Four. The nightmare no parent could endure. The case no detective could solve. The twist no listener could predict. For five days in January 1989, the parents of a seven-year-old Tokyo schoolgirl sat and listened to the demands of their daughter's kidnapper. They would never learn his identity. They would never see their daughter again. For the 14 years that followed, the Japanese public listened to the police's apologies. They would never forget the botched investigation that became known as Six Four.

The future is looking bright for Billie Carlson. With her child safely home and a new relationship on the horizon, she hasn't felt so settled in years. But when Billie takes on a new client, Elizabeth Fletcher, it's clear trouble is imminent. Elizabeth has killed a man in self-defence. She met him in a bar but he'd turned aggressive, attacking Elizabeth in the middle of the night when she caught him going through her husband's desk drawers. Refusing to go to the police for fear her husband will find out, Elizabeth wants Billie to work out who he was - and what secrets he was looking for.

Private investigator and ex-soldier Lee Arnold and police superintendent Paul Venus are by no means friends, but when Venus' son, Harry, is kidnapped and ransom demands arrive from an address in Arnold's patch in east London, the superintendent doesn't know who else to turn to. Arnold and his Muslim assistant, Mumtaz Hakim, soon find themselves chasing leads into several of the East End's uneasily coexisting communities.

Former investment banker Johan Golding - Joe to his friends - is the newest member of the Hartley and Edwards Investigations team. And he's thrilled to be shadowing Kitt Hartley, librarian-turned-top sleuth, and her right-hand woman Grace Edwards; even if it means adjusting to the low-level madness that seems to reign in the Hartley and Edwards offices. But Joe finds himself thrown in at the deep end when a man known as Ralph Holmes goes missing on the outskirts of Carlisle.

A perfect family or a perfect lie? When Jo's teenage daughter goes missing, she feels like the world is collapsing around her. Has Grace been taken, or have recent tensions between mother and daughter driven her away? With little urgency from the police, who have dismissed Grace as a teenage runaway who will soon return home, Jo takes matters into her own hands. But as she gets closer to discovering what has happened to Grace, it looks like the Jo's deepest, darkest secret is about to be uncovered, and it could destroy everything she holds dear.

In the first thaw of spring the body of a young woman surfaces in the River Torne in the far north of Sweden. Rebecka Martinsson is working as a prosecutor in nearby Kiruna, her sleep troubled by visions of a shadowy, accusing figure. Could the body belong to the girl in her dream? Joining forces with Police Inspector Anna-Maria Mella, Martinsson will need all her courage to face a killer who will kill again to keep the past buried under half a century of silent ice and snow.