English Women Sleuths

Maisie Dobbs got her start as a maid in an aristocratic London household when she was thirteen. Her employer, suffragette Lady Rowan Compton, soon became her patron, taking the remarkably bright youngster under her wing. Lady Rowan’s friend, Maurice Blanche, often retained as an investigator by the European elite, recognized Maisie’s intuitive gifts. The outbreak of war changed everything. Ten years after the Armistice, in the spring of 1929, Maisie sets out on her own as a private investigator, one who has learned that coincidences are meaningful, and truth elusive.

Twelve women have vanished, leaving behind no trace or clue—their whereabouts still a mystery after eleven years. Amelia Faraday is beautiful, smart, and a walking disaster. Suffering from blackouts, she also suffers from something worse—the feeling that she is personally involved in a series of deaths. Now as a new series of murders begins, and she continues to suffer from blackouts, Amelia is left wondering if she is a cold-blooded killer—or a pawn in a deadly game that's only just beginning....

When Aunt Adeline goes missing, it is up to her niece, Charlotte, to uncover the clues of her deeply hidden family secrets and the town she calls home.

Meg Gates could use a guidebook for life. Indeed, she's faced some challenges. She dropped out of college to work for a tech startup that failed—and her fiancé just took her bridesmaid to Italy on what was supposed to be Meg's honeymoon. Now, at twenty-six, Meg has taken the ferry ride of shame from Seattle back to Bainbridge Island to live with her family. At least she has her rescue cocker spaniel, Watson, by her side. But it's Meg who could use a rescue—and she's hoping it will come in the form of a part-time gig doing research for a bestselling mystery writer.

Rosemary has her hands full with the launch of her much anticipated magical chocolate shop. She's enjoying the peace and quiet of Myrtlewood, and the last thing she wants to do is get involved in Bermuda witching politics. Athena, on the other hand, is dying for a tropical escape, especially when things take a turn for the strange and unusual where her powers are concerned, leading to terrible embarrassment.

On the first day of Christmas, my true love gave to me—well, actually, my true love, Darcy O’Mara, is spending a feliz navidad tramping around South America. Meanwhile, Mummy is holed up in a tiny village called Tiddleton-under-Lovey with that droll Noel Coward! And I’m snowed in at Castle Rannoch with my bumbling brother, Binky, and sourpuss sister-in-law, Fig.

This mesmerizing novel tells the story of a brutal murder in the staid Tokyo suburbs, as a young mother who works the night shift making boxed lunches strangles her abusive husband and then seeks the help of her coworkers to dispose of the body and cover up her crime. The coolly intelligent Masako emerges as the plot's ringleader but quickly discovers that this killing is merely the beginning, as it leads to a terrifying foray into the violent underbelly of Japanese society.

After leaving a decade ago, Angie Curtis has been called back to Harbor Haven, Maine, by her grandmother, Charlotte, who raised her following her mother's disappearance when she was a child. Her mother has been found, and now the question of her whereabouts has sadly become the mystery of her murder. The bright spot in Angie's homecoming is reuniting with Charlotte, who has started her own needlepointing business with a group called the Mainely Needlepointers.

As a teenager, Hayley DaSilva walked into a nightmare, discovering the bodies of her mother, twin brother, and friend all brutally slaughtered in her home…and her nine-year-old brother missing. Her father, Leonard DaSilva, confessed to the murders, but Ethan was never seen again. He lied. But why? Now, Hayley has fled her dreadful past in Thamespark—until the call from Detective Sebastian Locke. Little bones uncovered in a shallow grave belong to Ethan…and the investigation reveals holes in the case that prove Leonard’s confession was false. He didn’t kill his family. So why did he say he did?

When Jem knocked on the door of an isolated cottage overlooking the beautiful Neptune Cove, she was hoping for help fixing a birthday cake baking disaster. She was not expecting to find the tenant dead on the tiled floor, specks of blood on the collar of his navy and red satin pajamas. The victim is Arthur Ajax, a handsome and wealthy American businessman who arrived in the Isles of Scilly as a tourist 10 months ago and never left.

A new year, 1917, is dawning, and the Great War that ravages the world shows no sign of abating. Answering the siren call of Egypt once more, Amelia Peabody and her family arrive at their home in Luxor to learn of a new royal tomb ransacked by thieves. Soon an even more disturbing outrage...

Rona Shively is a private detective. She’s smart, sassy...and seriously confused. She’s also got to pay the rent, so she takes on yet another crazy case. Her new client, Ted McCafferty, has asked for her assistance in finding out what happened to his sister. All reports say that she was killed in a boating accident, but McCafferty thinks that her husband may be hiding something. At first blush, her new client has a boyish charm, and she feels very comfortable around him. But things are never as they seem.

Investigator Kendra Michaels -- once blind and known for her sharp skills -- puts her life on the line to catch a killer in this electrifying novel from the #1 NYT bestselling and Edgar Award-winning duo. Dr. Kendra Michaels, blind for the first twenty years of her life before gaining her sight...

In this novel from number-one New York Times-best-selling author J. D. Robb, the newly promoted captain of the NYPSD and his wife return a day early from their vacation, looking forward to spending time with their bright and vivacious 16-year-old daughter, who stayed behind. Not even their worst nightmares could have prepared them for the crime scene that awaits them inside.

Jane reluctantly agrees to accompany her good friend Cordelia Thorn on a peculiar holiday trip: Cordelia's estranged sister, Broadway star Octavia Thorn, has asked them to attend her wedding. Octavia getting married is no surprise, but her candidate for hubby #4 certainly is. Roland Lester is a reclusive 83-year-old retired Hollywood director. No one can understand how the two met. When the bodies start to drop, Jane realizes it might not be love at all that brought the young diva and the aged director together, but something much deeper, and perhaps more sinister.

Lieutenant Abby Mullen is no stranger to crisis. As the hostage negotiation instructor for the NYPD, she deals with worst-case scenarios every day. Nothing fazes her anymore. That all changes when she gets a call from Eden Fletcher, a fellow survivor of the infamous Wilcox cult. The two haven’t spoken since the night of a tragic, fiery massacre, when their paths diverged. But now Eden needs Abby’s help: someone has kidnapped her son and is demanding a $5 million ransom. As Abby throws herself into the case, she can’t help but wonder why the kidnapper has targeted Eden.

It’s time for the annual Halloween festival in Sinful, and Fortune, Ida Belle, and Gertie can’t wait to suit up and enjoy the food and activities. But when a dead man gallops through the park on a black stallion and slides to a decapitated stop right in front of Swamp Team 3, they know another festival is about to be turned on its head...so to speak.

Mercy and Lizzie McCarthy are settling in to the charming seaside village of Shamrock Cove on the west coast of Ireland. Lizzie throws herself into organizing a book festival and mystery writer Mercy even agrees to come out of her bookish hidey-hole to do get involved. But then the star author for the event is found dead. James Brandt was killed by a falling bookshelf in his own cottage… The local detective is not convinced by Mercy’s suspicion of murder but when someone else turns up dead, the police cannot ignore it.

It’s New Year’s in Sinful, and the competition for the New Year’s Queen is heating up as the warring churches go head-to-head. Fortune Redding is not the sequined dress kind of woman, but reluctantly agrees to partake in the debacle so that Ida Belle and Gertie can best their nemesis, Celia, who’s put up former Sinful mean girl RJ Rogers. RJ and her friend Ricky Benoit left plenty of devastation in their wake when they fled Sinful after high school. So when they return and Ricky is found dead, there’s no shortage of suspects.

Rosemary and Athena's lives are thrown as the big Summer Solstice festival brings a series of mysterious events. Rosemary's chocolate shop plans are being waylaid by strange disappearances and uninvited visitors. Meanwhile, Athena is sure the astrological lessons at Myrtlewood Academy hold the key to unlocking the town's latest mystery, even if her mother doesn't want to hear about it. Can Rosemary and Athena manage to work together and cast aside their stubbornness before thousands of festival-goers succumb to a magical catastrophe?