Historical Thriller

Once he was a young, happily married businessman. Then he lost his wife to human madness and that young man was gone, replaced by the Loner, the wandering son of legendary gunfighter Frank Morgan and the current occupant of a cell in Hell Gate prison. The Loner’s crime? He looked too much like an outlaw who escaped from this very prison. So the Kid teams up with a fellow inmate with an escape plan, vowing to hunt down a look-alike killer on the loose.

New York Times best-selling author Laurie R. King has won sweeping critical acclaim and an impressive collection of awards for her writing. Although other writers have tried, no one has matched King's ability to capture the allure of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's legendary sleuth, Sherlock Holmes.

It was 1970 in a defeated Rhode Island fishing town. Vietnam and Nixon dominated the national news. Both the near and distant future looked bleak. But they were five inseparable high school friends with something incredible in common: an unwavering resolve to look after each other no matter what hell life threw at them. And they were on a mission. The plan was simple: Go off the grid before they turned 18 to avoid the draft. They’d sell some grass, stack some cash, then head west and start a commune. What could possibly go wrong?

London, 1558. Queen Mary is dead, and twenty-five-year-old Elizabeth ascends the throne. Summoned to court from exile abroad, Elizabeth's intimate spy, Brendan Prescott, is reunited with the young queen, as well as his beloved Kate, scheming William Cecil, and archrival Robert Dudley.

For years now, readers of the Russell Memoirs have wondered about the tantalizing mentions of Japan. Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes had spent three weeks there, between India ( The Game) and San Francisco ( Locked Rooms). The time has finally come to tell that story. It is 1925, and Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes arrive home to find...a stone. A stone with a name, which they last saw in the Tokyo garden of the future emperor of Japan.

Late on a spring night in 1920, five boys cross the Yorkshire dales to the ruins of Fountains Abbey, intent on raising the Devil. Instead, they stumble over the Devil himself, sitting there watching them. Terrified, they run for their lives, leaving behind a book on alchemy stolen from their schoolmaster. The next morning, a body is discovered in the cloisters of the abbey--a man swathed in a hooded cloak and wearing a gas mask.

The gun was fired close to Charles Childress’ head, and his were the only fingerprints on it, forcing the police to conclude that the author committed suicide. But his friends know this is impossible, because Childress loved himself far too much. He had just begun attracting fame, writing new mysteries starring the iconic Sergeant Barnstable, and he had bright hopes for the future. His publisher hires corpulent genius Nero Wolfe to determine who cut Childress’ career short, and the detective finds no dearth of suspects.

After slipping 150 years into the past, modern-day homicide detective Mallory Atkinson has embraced her new life in Victorian Scotland as housemaid Catriona Mitchel. Although it isn’t what she expected, she's developed real, meaningful relationships with the people around her and has come to love her role as assistant to undertaker Dr. Duncan Gray and Detective Hugh McCreadie. Mallory, Gray, and McCreadie are on their way to the Scottish Highlands for McCreadie's younger sister's wedding.

In London's fashionable Hyde Park, six murders have been discovered since the King's recent coronation. The gossip columnist known as 'Lady Whispers' is the latest victim—was she killed because her last column ridiculed an upstart duchess for announcing an upcoming conation ball? Enter Nellie Bly, fearless reporter with a nose for trouble. Fynn, the plucky Irregular with a hero's heart, finds himself in a daring rescue—that is, until Bly disappears into the night. The Baker Street team enters a whirlwind of clues and shadows.

When business magnate Robert Jeffreys announces his investment in airships, he hosts a promotional flight for a group of reporters. Working undercover in the crew is retired spy Augusta Peel. She’d rather be working on her book repair business, but Inspector Fisher of Scotland Yard has persuaded her to help with a surveillance operation. The press trip on the airship takes a turn when a body is found in a cabin. Can Augusta identify the murderer? It’s tricky to find a motive among the sophisticated passengers—some of them are sophisticated liars, too.

This lush and haunting novel tells of a city steeped in decadent pleasures and of a man, proud and defiant, caught in a web of murder and betrayal. It is 1833. In the midst of Mardi Gras, Benjamin January, a Creole physician and music teacher, is playing piano at the Salle d'Orleans when the evening's festivities are interrupted - by murder. The ravishing Angelique Crozat, a notorious octoroon who travels in the city's finest company, has been strangled to death.

Lady Violet has decided that life in noisy, crowded, busy London is simply not her cup of tea. Her search for a rural property to purchase must be set aside when she learns that Hugh St. Sevier has been accused of murder. Worse, the handsome physician is doing nothing to aid those trying to exonerate him. Though it requires outsmarting the magistrate, enlisting the aid of Sebastian, Marquess of Dunkeld, and literally poking around in the undergrowth, Violet is determined to prove her friend’s innocence—with or without St. Sevier’s cooperation.

Lady Violet returns with St. Sevier to her family seat, and finds Derwent Hall at sixes and sevens upon the occasion of her nephew’s christening. Other guests have brought their children along to celebrate the occasion, and Sebastian MacHeath is on hand to serve as godfather. Nobody seems to be getting along, despite the happy nature of the gathering. Summer heat builds to an unbearable crescendo as clandestine affairs, marital troubles, and family tensions escalate. Then somebody starts kidnapping little girls.

The instant Captain Declan Frobisher lays eyes on Lady Edwina Delbraith, he knows she's the woman he wants as his wife. The scion of a seafaring dynasty accustomed to success, he discovers that wooing Edwina is surprisingly straightforward - not least because she makes it plain that she wants him as much as he wants her.

As Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes embark on their 11th adventure together, they find themselves immersed in the world of silent filmmaking. Here, the pirates are real—and unlike the shooting done with a camera, this sort can be deadly.

Cornwall, 1901: Lucy and Jack, in the guise of a tranquil honeymoon, track a spy who threatens England's vital global telegraph lines. Enter Holmes and Watson, with young Irregulars Becky and Flynn in tow, diving into a whirlpool of sunken treasure and spectral sirens. As cryptic messages, hidden loot, and the song of a Cornwall siren entwine, the serene coast becomes a stormy battleground. The stakes? Nothing less than the Empire's safety during wartime. "The Cornwall Mermaid" is a symphony of past and present, where classic mystery meets the adrenaline of a thriller.

With the enemy growing bolder and Lady Maureen Huxley contemplating marriage to another man, Henry Thorpe, known to society as the affable Earl of Dunston, is caught in the crossfire between his mission to catch his father's murderer and his heart. Any move could exact a devastating cost. But losing the woman he loves is one price he refuses to pay.

Ian Rutledge returns to his career at Scotland Yard after years fighting in the First World War. Unknown to his colleagues he is still suffering from shell shock, and is burdened with the guilt of having had executed a young soldier on the battlefield for refusing to fight. A jealous colleague has learned of his secret and has managed to have Rutledge assigned to a difficult case which could spell disaster for Rutledge whatever the outcome. A retired officer has been murdered, and Rutledge goes to investigate.

When Lily Rowan doesn’t laugh at his jokes, Archie Goodwin knows something’s wrong. Her niece Noreen has been running around with Sparky Linville, a club-hopping bad boy who’s the terror of Manhattan nightlife, and the last time she went out with him, Noreen wasn’t herself when she came home. Springing into action, Goodwin waits for Linville outside of Morgana’s, a chrome-and-glass palace. They nearly come to blows, but Linville’s bodyguard intervenes, and Goodwin retreats to plan his next move. In the morning, Linville is dead, and Goodwin is the chief suspect.

Archie Goodwin is not overly fond of Theodore Horstmann, who takes care of the orchids on the rooftop of Nero Wolfe’s West 35th Street brownstone. But as loyal assistant to the legendary private detective, Archie will put his animosity aside when the surly orchid-keeper stumbles through the front door beaten within an inch of his life. While the gardener lies in a coma, Nero sends Archie to poke around his apartment near the river.