Showing results by publisher "Hodder & Stoughton" in Psychological

When an 11-year-old boy is found murdered, forensic evidence and reliable eyewitnesses undeniably point to the town's popular Little League coach. But the jailed suspect, arrested in a public spectacle, has an alibi, and further research convinces Detective Ralph Anderson that the coach was indeed out of town. So how can he have been in two places at the same time?

A collection of four uniquely wonderful long stories, including a stand-alone sequel to the number one best seller The Outsider. News people have a saying: 'If it bleeds, it leads'. And a bomb at Albert Macready Middle School is guaranteed to lead any bulletin. Holly Gibney of the Finders Keepers detective agency is working on the case of a missing dog when she sees the footage on TV. But when she tunes in again, to the late-night report, she realises there is something not quite right about the correspondent who was first on the scene.

In the near future, where America has become a police state, 100 boys are selected to enter an annual contest where the winner will be awarded whatever he wants for the rest of his life. The game is simple - maintain a steady walking pace of four miles per hour without stopping. Three warnings and you're out - permanently.

Roused by a single drop of blood, Rosie Daniels wakes up to the chilling realisation that her husband is going to kill her. And she takes flight - with his credit card. Alone in a strange city, Rosie begins to build a new life: she meets Bill Steiner and she finds an odd junk shop painting, Rose Madder, which strangely seems to want her as much as she wants it.

After every parents' evening, friends Nina, Bel and Rachel look forward to their regular debrief at the pub. But there will be no clinking Prosecco tonight. They are discussing an anonymous note that has been left in a child's schoolbag: this class has secrets. All the parents tell lies. As more notes are discovered, scandalous accusations are made and the school playground becomes rife with rumours. Who could be revealing the three friends' secrets? Because they thought the only people who knew everything about them were each other....

Amy has only ever known life in the Clearing. She knows what's expected of her. That is, until a new young girl joins the group. Freya has gone to great lengths to feel like a 'normal person'. In fact, if you saw her go about her day with her young son, you'd think she was an everyday mum. That is, until a young girl goes missing and someone from her past, someone she hasn't seen for a very long time, arrives in town.

It felt like any other evening before Karl and his daughter were ambushed by a figure in a blank mask. A knife is put to her throat and Karl is forced to make an impossible decision. Stay and die, or walk away and take this thug's word that they will both live. It's not long before more seemingly unconnected and innocent people across London are offered a deal in exchange for their life. More blood is spilled, more families shattered and more people are left to suffer with the consequences of their decisions.

The first the police know of the crime is when clips are sent from the victim's Snapchat account, showing her begging for forgiveness. The CCTV at the cinema where she was working show her being dragged into the night by a masked killer. When the body is found, it is marked with a number 2...Detective Huldar joins the murder investigation, bringing child psychologist Freyja on board to help question the murdered teenager's friends. Soon, they uncover that Stella was far from the angel people claim: a relentless bully, she made life miserable for those around her.

When Tess hears Lydia Green is moving back to the village, she is full of excitement. As teenagers, Tess and Lydia were inseparable. Until the end of that last summer when Lydia suddenly moved away. With the recent loss of her husband and two small children to care for, Tess could really use the support of her old best friend. It feels like a bright spot of light in such a difficult time. Like fate has brought Lydia back to her. But when Tess sees Lydia for the first time in decades, in front of all the other mums at Saturday sport, Lydia pretends not to know her.

When a high-rise development in South London catches fire mid-construction, a close-knit team of fire fighters tackle the blaze. The building should be empty, but they find a man, unconscious, next to several cases of money. The fire crew make a fateful decision: leave the man, take the money, quit the service and never speak of this again. But five years later one of them is set alight at his own wedding. Soon after, a second is found in the burnt-out remains of his Maserati. It appears that someone knows what they did. And there are still three firemen left to go....

Five years ago, Laurel Lovejoy had it all. The high-powered city job, the loving husband, the perfect daughter. Now, she is 40 and alone, and working for a courier service. But she has discovered that being a delivery driver comes with a superpower: it makes her invisible. People accept her presence without question. They go about their lives, unaware of just how much she sees - how much she knows.

The only witness to a shocking murder is the victim's 10-year-old daughter, Margret. The police turn to the Children's House for their expertise in childhood trauma. The manager, Freyja, doesn't much like the police - especially the detective in charge, Huldar. But she does want to help them protect Margret. And when more people die - their murders heralded by strange messages, texts, and strings of numbers - they will have to work together to crack the riddle before they become targets themselves.

When private investigator Reid is sent to look into a suspicious car crash, he finds himself in the one place he swore he'd never go back to—the town where he grew up. Returning to Manson brings back traumatic memories that Reid has spent a decade burying, and keeping his past separate from the investigation is futile. People remember what he did all those years ago. As rumours swirl about the couple involved in the crash, Reid's line of questioning is taken in a new direction when the Chief of Police's daughter goes missing.

This is a fact: Ryan Summers walked into Three Rivers College and killed 13 women, then himself. But no one can say why. The question is one that cries out to be answered - by Ryan's mother, Moira; by Ishbel, the mother of Abigail, the first victim; and by DI Helen Birch, put in charge of the case on her first day at her new job. But as the tabloids and the media swarm, as the families' secrets come out, as the world searches for someone to blame...the truth seems to vanish.

While on a walking holiday through the beautiful, deserted hills of Crete, Nicola Ferris stumbles across a critically injured Englishman, guarded by a fierce Greek. Nicola cannot abandon them and so sets off on a perilous search for their lost companion - all the while being pursued by someone who wants to make sure none of them leave the island....

A lifetime ago, a patient escaped Nazareth mental asylum. They covered their tracks carefully. Or so they thought. Thirty years ago, Marianne Smy committed a crime then fled from her home to leave the past behind. Or so she thought. Now, Marianne has been forced to return. Nazareth asylum has been converted to luxury flats, but its terrible hold on her is still strong. A successful academic, a loving mother and a loyal wife, she fears her secret being revealed and her world shattering. She is right to be scared.

Back in the summer of 1988, a young Richard Chizmar was catapulted into the centre of a living nightmare as the serial killer Joshua Gallagher - dubbed by the media as 'The Boogeyman' - stalked his tranquil Maryland town. These days, Chizmar enjoys a certain level of notoriety himself as he is the only person to whom Josh Gallagher will talk, on or off the record. Chizmar likes to visit Gallagher in prison but when a masked figure leaves a horrifying calling card in the front of his home, Chizmar finds there is a price for dancing with the devil.

Amelie has always been a survivor, from losing her parents as a child in Paris to making it on her own in London. Then she meets Carolyn and is soon swept up in a glamorous London lifestyle. Until it starts to go wrong.

Ava Kirilova has reached the very top of her profession. After years and years of hard graft, pain and sacrifice as part of the London Russian Ballet Company, allowing nothing else to distract her, she is finally the poster girl for Swan Lake. Even Mr K—her father, and the intense, terrifying director of the company—can find no fault. Ava has pushed herself ahead of countless other talented, hardworking girls, and they are all watching her now.

With supply in the Scottish cities drying up, Aida is forced back home to live with her mum at their rural farm. For now, they are safe with just enough to get by. Yet at the border, tensions are close to breaking point as more and more southerners chase the delusion that Scotland is an eternal spring - while fewer and fewer are allowed through. The service station where Aida works grows emptier with every day. Then, when suspicious strangers arrive at the farm asking for help, Aida and her family face a terrible decision. How much water can they afford to share?