DREAM TOWN
by David Baldacci
Private investigator and World War II veteran Aloysius Archer heads to Los Angeles, the city where dreams are made and shattered, and is ensnared in a lethal case in this latest thriller in #1 New York Times bestselling author David Baldacci’s Nero Award-winning series.
It’s the eve of 1953, and Aloysius Archer is in Los Angeles to ring in the New Year with an old friend, aspiring actress Liberty Callahan, when their evening is interrupted by an acquaintance of Callahan’s: Eleanor Lamb, a screenwriter in dire straits.
After a series of increasingly chilling events—mysterious phone calls, the same blue car loitering outside her house, and a bloody knife left in her sink—Eleanor fears that her life is in danger, and she wants to hire Archer to look into the matter. Archer suspects that Eleanor knows more than she’s saying, but before he can officially take on her case, a dead body turns up inside of Eleanor’s home . . . and Eleanor herself disappears.
Missing client or not, Archer is dead set on finding both the murderer and Eleanor. With the help of Callahan and his partner Willie Dash, he launches an investigation that will take him from mob-ridden Las Vegas to the glamorous world of Hollywood to the darkest corners of Los Angeles—a city in which beautiful faces are attached to cutthroat schemers, where the cops can be more corrupt than the criminals . . . and where the powerful people responsible for his client’s disappearance will kill without a moment’s hesitation if they catch Archer on their trail.
KINGDOM OF BONES
by James Rollins
From #1 New York Times bestselling author James Rollins, the latest riveting, deeply imaginative thriller in the Sigma Force series, told with his trademark blend of cutting-edge science, historical mystery, and pulse-pounding action.
It begins in Africa . . .
A United Nations relief team in a small village in the Congo makes an alarming discovery. An unknown force is leveling the evolutionary playing field. Men, women, and children have been reduced to a dull, catatonic state. The environment surrounding them—plants and animals—has grown more cunning and predatory, evolving at an exponential pace. The insidious phenomenon is spreading from a cursed site in the jungle — known to locals as the Kingdom of Bones —and sweeping across Africa, threatening the rest of the world.
What has made the biosphere run amok? Is it a natural event? Or more terrifyingly, did someone engineer it?
Commander Gray Pierce and Sigma Force are prepared for the extraordinary and have kept the world safe, vigilance for which they have paid a tragic personal price. Yet, even these brilliant and seasoned scientific warriors do not understand what is behind this frightening development—or know how to stop it. As they race to find answers, the members of Sigma quickly realize they have become the prey.
To head off global catastrophe, Sigma Force must risk their lives to uncover the shattering secret at the heart of the African continent—a truth that will illuminate who we are as a species and where we may be headed . . . sooner than we know.
Mother Nature—red in tooth and claw—is turning against humankind, propelling the entire world into the Kingdom of Bones.
THE WORLD OF PONDSIDE
by Mary Helen Stefaniak
*A Crime Reads Pick of Most Anticipated Crime Fiction of 2022
*A Publishers Weekly Pick of Most Anticipated Thrillers of Spring
“Deeply moving, as heart-poundingly suspenseful as the best video games … and just plain fun.” — Eileen Pollack, author of The Professor of Immortality
In a game of life or death, the seniors at Pondside Manor risk it all.
With help from Pondside Manor’s quirky, twentysomething “kitchen boy” Foster Kresowik, wheelchair-bound resident Robert Kallman creates The World of Pondside, a video game that delights the rest home’s residents by allowing them to virtually relive blissful moments from days long past–or even create new ones.
One-legged Duane Lotspeich is overjoyed when he can once again dance the tango. Thrilled octogenarian Laverne Slotnick cheers on her favorite baseball team from the stands at Candlestick Park with her beloved husband–who died years ago. Even the rest home’s overwhelmed head administrator escapes her exhausting job by logging onto a much more luxurious virtual world.
Robert’s game may have enlivened the halls of Pondside Manor, but chaos ensues when he’s discovered dead, strapped in his wheelchair and drowned in the rest home’s pond. If any resident witnessed his death, they’re not telling–either covering up or quite possibly just forgetting. And it’s far from clear to anyone–much less the police–if this brilliant man’s death was suicide or murder. After all, who’d want to kill a dying ALS patient?
When Robert’s popular video game goes dark, its players grow desperate. The task of getting it back online falls to tattooed kitchen worker Foster, who enlists help from a raucous bunch of misfits suffering from various stages of dementia and other age-related afflictions. Their pursuit–virtual and real–has unintended consequences, uncovering both a criminal conspiracy and the dying wishes of Foster’s friend Robert. From Pondside Manor, an astonishing journey is embarked upon–blissful, treacherous, and unforgettable.
Packed with sharp wit and compassion, Mary Helen Stefaniak has written a rousing, perceptive, and utterly original novel.
DEATH OF THE BLACK WIDOW
by James Patterson & J.D. Barker
She destroys the men she loves—and escapes every time. The most dangerous killer James Patterson has ever created is also his most seductive.
On his first night with Detroit PD, Officer Walter O’Brien is called to a murder scene. A terrified twenty-year-old has bludgeoned her kidnapper with skill that shocks even O’Brien’s veteran partner. The young woman is also a brilliant escape artist. Her bold flight from police custody makes the case impossible to solve—and, for Walter, even more impossible to forget.
By the time Walter’s promoted to detective, his fascination with the missing, gray-eyed woman is approaching obsession. And when Walter discovers that he’s not alone in his search, one truth is certain. This deadly string of secrets didn’t begin in his home city—but he’s going to make sure it ends there.
THE DEVIL'S DICTIONARY
by Steven Kotler
New York Times bestselling author Steven Kotler’s follow up to Last Tango in Cyberspace, a near-future thriller about the evolution of empathy in the tradition of William Gibson and Neal Stephenson.
Hard to say exactly when the human species fractured. Harder to say when this new talent arrived. But Lion Zorn, protagonist of Last Tango in Cyberspace, is the first of his kind―an empathy tracker, an emotional forecaster, with a felt sense for how culture evolves and the future arrives.
It’s also a useful skill in today’s competitive business market.
In The Devil’s Dictionary, when a routine em-tracking job goes sideways and em-trackers themselves start disappearing, Lion finds himself not knowing who to trust in a life and death race to uncover the truth. And when the trail leads to the world’s first mega-linkage, a continent-wide national park advertised as the best way to stave off environmental collapse, and exotic animals unlike any on Earth start showing up―Lion’s quest for truth becomes a fight for the survival of the species.
Packed with intrigue and heart-pounding action, marked by unforgettable characters and vivid storytelling, filled with science-based brilliance and cult comic touches, The Devil’s Dictionary is Steven Kotler at his thrilling science fiction best.
PAY DIRT ROAD
by Samantha Jayne Allen
Friday Night Lights meets Mare of Easttown in this small-town mystery about an unlikely private investigator searching for a missing waitress. Pay Dirt Road is the mesmerizing debut from the 2019 Tony Hillerman Prize recipient Samantha Jayne Allen.
Annie McIntyre has a love/hate relationship with Garnett, Texas.
Recently graduated from college and home waitressing, lacking not in ambition but certainly in direction, Annie is lured into the family business―a private investigation firm―by her supposed-to-be-retired grandfather, Leroy, despite the rest of the clan’s misgivings.
When a waitress at the café goes missing, Annie and Leroy begin an investigation that leads them down rural routes and haunted byways, to noxious-smelling oil fields and to the glowing neon of local honky-tonks. As Annie works to uncover the truth she finds herself identifying with the victim in increasing, unsettling ways, and realizes she must confront her own past―failed romances, a disturbing experience she’d rather forget, and the trick mirror of nostalgia itself―if she wants to survive this homecoming.
BLOOD SUGAR
by Sascha Rothchild
An utterly delicious debut thriller that tells the story of the most likable murderess you will ever meet, perfect for fans of Riley Sager and Jessica Knoll.
“I could just kill you right now!” It’s something we’ve all thought at one time or another. But Ruby has actually acted on it. Three times, to be exact.
Though she may be a murderer, Ruby is not a sociopath. She is an animal-loving therapist with a thriving practice. She’s felt empathy and sympathy. She’s had long-lasting friendships and relationships, and has a husband, Jason, whom she adores. But the homicide detectives at Miami Beach PD are not convinced of her happy marriage. When we meet Ruby, she is in a police interrogation room, being accused of Jason’s murder. Which, ironically, is one murder that she did not commit, though a scandal-obsessed public believes differently. As she undergoes questioning, Ruby’s mind races back to all the details of her life that led her to this exact moment, and to the three dead bodies in her wake. Because though she may not have killed her husband, Ruby certainly isn’t innocent.
Alternating between Ruby’s memories of her past crimes and her present-day fight to clear her name, Blood Sugar is a twisty, clever debut with an unforgettable protagonist who you can’t help but root for—an addicting mixture of sour and sweet.
THE SWEET GOODBYE
by Ron Corbett
In this thrilling new series from Edgar®-nominated author Ron Corbett, the most dangerous predator in the Maine wilderness walks on two feet—and it is Danny Barrett’s job to bring him down.
Something is not right in the North Maine Woods.
A small family-run lumber company should not have more than two hundred million unaccountable dollars on their books. Money like that comes from moving something other than wood across the border.
The first agent the FBI sent undercover was their best man—sure to get the answers that were needed. He was dead within a month.
Now, Danny Barrett is taking his place. Before he was a cop, Danny grew up in the woods of Northern Michigan. He is the only chance the feds have of getting answers, but how many more will have to die first?
MURDER AT CLARIDGE'S
by Jim Eldridge
One of the Claridge’s kitchen porters is found dead – strangled. He was a recent employee who claimed to be Romanian, but evidence suggests he may have been German. Detective Chief Inspector Coburg has to find out exactly who he was, and what he was doing at Claridge’s under a false identity. Once he has established those facts, he might get an insight into why he was killed, and who by.
Coburg’s job is complicated by the fact that so many of the hotel’s residents are exiled European royalty. King George of Greece is registered as ‘Mr Brown’ and even the Duke of Windsor is staying, though without Wallis Simpson. Clandestine affairs, furtive goings-on and conspiracies against the government: Coburg must tread very lightly indeed …
Still Hot in Mysteries & Thrillers
WHAT HAPPENED TO THE BENNETTS
by Lisa Scottoline
From #1 bestselling author Lisa Scottoline comes a pulse-pounding new novel.
Your family has been attacked, never again to be the same.
Now you have to choose between law…and justice.
Jason Bennett is a suburban dad who owns a court-reporting business, but one night, his life takes a horrific turn. He is driving his family home after his daughter’s field hockey game when a pickup truck begins tailgating them, on a dark stretch of road. Suddenly two men jump from the pickup and pull guns on Jason, demanding the car. A horrific flash of violence changes his life forever.
Later that awful night, Jason and his family receive a visit from the FBI. The agents tell them that the carjackers were members of a dangerous drug-trafficking organization – and now Jason and his family are in their crosshairs.
The agents advise the Bennetts to enter the witness protection program right away, and they have no choice but to agree. But WITSEC was designed to protect criminal informants, not law-abiding families. Taken from all they know, trapped in an unfamiliar life, the Bennetts begin to fall apart at the seams. Then Jason learns a shocking truth and realizes that he has to take matters into his own hands.
Sometimes justice is a one-man show.
THE PARIS APARTMENT
by Lucy Foley
THE #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
“As you patiently await season two of Only Murders in the Building, cozy up with Lucy Foley’s latest whodunnit.” — Parade
“Exceedingly clever.” — Booklist
From the New York Times bestselling author of The Guest List comes a new locked room mystery, set in a Paris apartment building in which every resident has something to hide…
Jess needs a fresh start. She’s broke and alone, and she’s just left her job under less than ideal circumstances. Her half-brother Ben didn’t sound thrilled when she asked if she could crash with him for a bit, but he didn’t say no, and surely everything will look better from Paris. Only when she shows up – to find a very nice apartment, could Ben really have afforded this? – he’s not there.
The longer Ben stays missing, the more Jess starts to dig into her brother’s situation, and the more questions she has. Ben’s neighbors are an eclectic bunch, and not particularly friendly. Jess may have come to Paris to escape her past, but it’s starting to look like it’s Ben’s future that’s in question.
The socialite – The nice guy – The alcoholic – The girl on the verge – The concierge
Everyone’s a neighbor. Everyone’s a suspect. And everyone knows something they’re not telling.