Cat Mystery Thriller

Things never seem to go as easily for 13-year-old Frankie as they do for her sister, Tess. Unlike Tess, Frankie is neurodivergent. In her case, that means she can't stand to be touched, loud noises bother her, she's easily distracted, she hates changes in her routine, and she has to go see a therapist while other kids get to hang out at the beach. It also means Frankie has trouble making friends. She did have one - Colette - but they're not friends anymore. It's complicated. Then, just weeks before the end of seventh grade, Colette unexpectedly shows up at Frankie's door.

Tikka Malloy was 11 and one-sixth years old during the long hot summer of 1992, living in an Australian suburb with her sister and their three best friends. That summer was when the Van Apfel sisters, Ruth, Hannah, and the beautiful Cordelia, mysteriously disappeared. Did they just run - far away from their harsh, evangelical parents - or were they taken? While the search for the girls united the small community, the mystery of their disappearance was never solved. Now, years later, Tikka has returned home to try to make sense of that strange moment in time.

The long-promised Jamieson-Armstrong family camping trip takes a pause with news of murder at the local fish farm, where the vacationing families recently visited. Even worse, it looks like their campsite neighbor's brother-in-law, Adam, is the prime suspect in the fish farm Manager's murder.

When Zoe gives her cousin Lauren a disastrous "trim", they run to the new hairdresser in town, who manages to fix Lauren's hair. While they're there, an angry customer storms into the salon, complaining about her perm. A few days later, Lauren and Zoe are shocked to discover the angry customer strangled right in front of the salon! Who is a suspect? Brooke, the new hair stylist? The victim's best friend? Or the victim's ex-husband who is just recovering from their bitter divorce?

Things are finally looking up for Sarah Blair following her unsavory divorce. Settled into a cozy carriage house with her sassy Siamese cat, RahRah, she has somehow managed to hang on to her modest law firm receptionist job and - if befriending flea-bitten strays at the local animal shelter counts - lead a thriving social life. For once, Sarah almost has it together more than her enterprising twin, Emily, a professional chef whose efforts to open a gourmet restaurant have hit a real dead end. The president of the town bank and city council is murdered after icing Emily's business.

When Clyde the cat travels 200 miles back home only to find his former owner dead, the story makes national news. While everyone seems eager to tell Clyde's incredible tale, someone needs to step up to care for him. Because the media attention is creating chaos at the local shelter, cat quilter Jillian Hart agrees to foster the loyal orange tabby, hoping his location is kept secret. But while the media circus around Clyde continues, Jillian learns the real story behind his owner's death - he was murdered.

At the Blue Dahlia, where homicide detective Carmen Molina moonlights as a torch singer, she finds a dead woman lying next to her can in the parking lot. The words "she left" are spray-painted nearby. Soon, a second anonymous woman is found dead in another parking lot across town. Is a serial killer at work? Will the tough lieutenant have to resort to the despised help of amateur sleuth Temple Barr to crack the case?

Collins brings the Queen of Crime, Agatha Christie, to English language learners. Agatha Christie is the most widely published author of all time and in any language. Now Collins has adapted her famous detective novels for English language learners. These carefully abridged versions are shorter with the language targeted at learners of English.

When quilter Jillian Hart returns to her lake house in Mercy, South Carolina, she discovers her friend, Tom, is missing-and his estranged half-brother has moved into Tom's house. Jillian doesn't trust the guy, especially since he allowed Tom's diabetic cat to escape. When police officers find Tom's wrecked car with a dead stranger inside, Jillian is determined to find out what happened to Tom-before someone else turns up dead.

This is a story from the Fall of the House of Usher collection. The horrors of the Spanish Inquisition, with its dungeon of death, and the overhanging gloom on the House of Usher demonstrate unforgettably the unique imagination of Edgar Allan Poe. Unerringly, he touches upon some of our greatest nightmares: Premature burial, ghostly transformation, words from beyond the grave. Written in the 1840s, they have retained their power to shock and frighten even now.

Fresh off her engagement and still basking in the glow of new love, Ellie Rockwell should be focused on wedding plans. Instead, she and daughter Evie find themselves knee-deep in adorable kittens as Silver Circle tackles kitten season in Tablerock, Texas. But wedding catalogs and bottle-feeding schedules take a back seat when local artisan Penelope Periwinkle is discovered murdered among her handcrafted items at the town's annual Crafts and Creations Festival.

Victoria Adler's plunge into midlife proves to be quite the rollercoaster. As a successful psychotherapist, she expected stability, but life had other plans. Abandoned by her faithless husband for a fling and overwhelmed by her increasingly neurotic patients, Victoria finds solace in the company of Athos, her late father's intelligent sled dog.

A man lies under the tawny earth, hands still clutching the knife that killed him. Thorfinn Sigurdarson, Earl of all Orkney and Caithness, has made a mistake, and he won’t let himself forget it. Now, rumours have started in the Norse lands that he might be getting a second chance - but should he take it, when it means that dead men are walking?

Walking home wearily from an evening spent poring over the books of the Parchly Heights Methodist Ladies' Aid searching for a fifty-eight-cent error, Miss Jennifer Murdock becomes witness to a terrible scene: A man, stumbling drunk, arrives home–and just as he fumbles with his keys, gunfire erupts and kills him on the spot.

A lean and deceptively tough former computer salesman, Charlie Gamble subsidizes his life aboard his sailboat, The Squareknot, by doing odd boat repairs around the marina in Boston Harbor. Everything suits Charlie, until one day a heart-stoppingly beautiful woman literally falls out of her Ferrari and into his life.

Ginger’s just a kitten who loves a good mystery. She’s never actually solved one before, but when a neighbor’s safe is broken into, Ginger’s on the case. Her fellow Mystery Cats, Butterball and Zorro, don’t see any point in looking into this crime. Clearly, the neighbor’s son stole the money. He doesn’t work, mooches off his parents, and suddenly has the cash to take his girlfriend on a splashy beach vacation? Even Gemma, the neighbor-lady, feels pretty certain her son is to blame - that’s why she didn’t bother calling the police.

If you're a cat, you only have nine lives to live. But if you live them right, nine is enough to solve the mysteries of the universe. Cool cat sleuths, Tatania and Zeus, find clues as intoxicating as catnip and help their humans, fun-loving 1920s detectives, Grace and Jack, solve mysteries without missing a nap.

The Great Fire has ravaged London. Now, guided by the Fire Court, the city is rebuilding, but times are volatile and danger is only ever a heartbeat away. James Marwood, a traitor’s son, is thrust into this treacherous environment when his father discovers a dead woman in the very place where the Fire Court sits. The next day his father is run down. Accident? Or another murder....

With a story both enchanting and suspenseful, Shirley Rousseau Murphy shows once again why her trio of feline sleuths are so beloved by her fans, and why the Joe Grey mysteries should be at the top of every cat lover’s Christmas list.

Recently widowed Jillian Hart is rebuilding a life for herself and her three beloved cats - Chablis, Syrah, and Merlot - as a quilter in a small South Carolina town. The quilts she makes are for cats as smart, special, and sweet as her own, and business is thriving. But when she returns from an overnight quilting show, she discovers Chablis sneezing - and since Chablis is allergic to humans, that can only mean one thing: Someone has broken into her house. When she realizes her Abyssinian, Syrah, is missing, Jillian suspects catnapping. Spurred by Chablis and Merlot’s mournful meowing, she investigates - and discovers more missing cats and a murder.