Kidnapping Thriller

Deeper than the Dead introduced Tami Hoag's millions of fans to Oak Knoll, a small California town that, in the mid-eighties, seemed as idyllic as any . . . until the See-No-Evil killer shattered that notion. It took FBI agent Vince Leone and a new technique called profiling" to put an end to the trauma. Now Hoag returns once more to Oak Knoll for the third installment of this best-selling series.

In the Maya Gray series (which begins with book one, Girl One: Murder) FBI Special Agent Maya Gray, 39, has seen it all. She’s one of BAU’s rising stars and the go-to agent for hard-to-crack serial cases. When she receives a handwritten postcard promising to release 12 kidnapped women if she will solve 12 cold cases, she assumes it’s a hoax. Until the note mentions that, among the captives, is her missing sister. Maya, shaken, is forced to take it seriously.

PI Charlie Dodge knows what it’s like to have something important disappear. His wife, Annie, suffers from early-onset Alzheimer’s, causing her to remember little of the life she shared with her husband. Charlie has devoted his career to saving what he can - missing people, threatened lives. But when prominent Denver multimillionaire Carter Dunleavy vanishes without a trace, Charlie and his assistant, Wyrick, discover missing doesn’t always mean gone. It turns out Carter didn’t vanish after all - he’s gone into hiding.

A woman is found locked in a basement, barely alive, unidentifiable: the woman can't speak, there are no missing persons reports that match their profile, and the confused, elderly man who owns the house claims he has never seen them before. The inhabitants of the quiet street are in shock - how could this happen right under their noses? But Detective Inspector Adam Fawley knows nothing is impossible, and no one is as innocent as they seem. As the police grow desperate for a lead, DI Fawley stumbles across a breakthrough, a link to a case he worked years before.

Eric disappeared when he was three years old. Ben looked away for only a second at the grocery store, but that was all it took. His brother was gone. Vanished right into the sticky air of the Florida Panhandle. They say you've got only a couple days to find a missing person. Forty-eight hours to conduct searches, knock on doors, and talk to witnesses. Two days to tear the world apart if there's any chance of putting yours back together. That's your window. That window closed five years ago, leaving Ben's life in ruins.

John Wells may have left the CIA, but it hasn't left him. A mysterious call brings a surprise meeting with the aged monarch of Saudi Arabia, King Abdullah. "My kingdom is on a precipice," he tells Wells. "Powerful factions are plotting against me, and my own family is in danger. I don't know who I can trust, but I'm told I can trust you."

Wendi Wise is a troubled young woman who snorts her breakfast through a straw and spends more time in rehab than in the real world. Her life is seemingly out of control. But now she has a plan. That plan involves a sharp set of butcher knives. She's going back to where all of her troubles began...Flocksdale. Wendi was lured away from a local skating rink, at the age of 13, and held captive in a place she calls The House of Horrors. Dumped off blindfolded on the side of a dirt road, Wendi soon discovered that she was addicted to the drugs they fed her while she was captive.

When a series of suspicious fires leaves multiple victims dead in their homes, NYPD hostage negotiator Abby Mullen knows in her bones that the terrors of her childhood have returned. As a young girl, she narrowly escaped a fire set by Moses Wilcox, a fanatical cult leader who’s been presumed dead for thirty years. These murders have his fingerprints all over them.

Thirty years ago two sisters disappeared from a shopping mall. Their bodies were never found, and those familiar with the case have always been tortured by these questions: How do you kidnap two girls? Who or what could have lured the two sisters away from a busy mall on a Saturday afternoon without leaving behind a single clue or witness? Now a clearly disoriented woman involved in a rush-hour hit-and-run claims to be the younger of the long-gone Bethany sisters.

Vivvy Bouchet, daughter of a known psychic, was ten when she saved a boy’s life by making an impossible prediction. Now she’s an astrophysicist in Texas, devoted to science, but the boy she saved has become a cop who continues to believe she can see things no one else can. When he begs for help on the high-profile cold case of a kidnapped girl, Vivvy steps back into the ocean of voices that once nearly drowned her.

What happens when science goes too far? Chimera Secrets feature five stories about genetically altered humans who find love. A Nurse for a Wolfman: Only love can tame the beast. Guarding the Mermaid: Love is even more slippery than this mermaid when wet. The Lionman Kidnapping: It’s not just his mane that’s impressive. A Chimera’s Revenge: A mad scientist. An even madder patient. A fiery kind of love. Capturing a Unicorn: Will he betray or save the world’s only unicorn?

When 12-year-old Sophie Williams went on a Girl Scout summer camp, she never returned home. Three months later, her body is found inside her sleeping bag in the most frequented area of Cocoa Beach, and the town is outraged. The girl isn't just any child. She's the town's most beloved surf idol, and it was believed that she could be the next Kelly Slater. As another child, the son of a well-known senator, is kidnapped, and the parents receive a disturbing video, FBI profiler Eva Rae Thomas plunges into the investigation, breaking her promise to her children not to do police work again.

Jenny is a successful family doctor, the mother of three great teenagers, married to a celebrated neurosurgeon. But when her youngest child, 15-year-old Naomi, doesn't come home after her school play, Jenny's seemingly ideal life begins to crumble. The authorities launch a nationwide search with no success. Naomi has vanished, and her family is broken.

Thirteen years ago, Cole and Lisa Shipley were fostering an infant with hopes of adopting her. Overnight everything was turned upside down, when the child’s mother bled to death on their front doorstep. Her last words: He’s coming here…for her! Save her. Afraid, bewildered, and with a baby in their arms, they fled. The longer they hid, the guiltier they looked. Now in a small Colorado town under assumed identities, they’ve been seemingly safe.

Wanted: A picturesque new town, a fresh start, and a much-needed escape from the constant reminder that the world is still full of bad guys. For FBI agent Olivia Knight, that perfect place is Belle Grove, a charming small town in Northern Virginia, a place hidden by lush greenery and away from the big city. But when Olivia finds a young girl malnourished and disheveled outside her home, she is thrown into a disturbing case. In order to catch the culprit and find the missing children in her new hometown, Olivia must dive deep into the twisted mind of a deranged serial kidnapper.

There's a gang war unfolding on the streets of Seattle. A young boy has been killed in a drive-by shooting, and the ensuing chaos threatens to engulf the city. Normally, chief of detectives Mort Grant would be dealing with the fallout - but right now, his mind is elsewhere.... In one gut-wrenching phone call, Mort's worst fears are realized. His granddaughter Hadley has been kidnapped, and the culprit is his own flesh and blood: Allie, his daughter and Hadley's aunt. Now, desperate for any sign of the missing six-year-old girl, Mort turns once again to the relentless vigilante called The Fixer for help.

The world thought Dmitri Melnikov was dead. Especially Quinn. Why would he have believed otherwise, since the bomb intended for Melnikov had nearly killed Quinn and several members of his team? But Melnikov is not dead. He has been taken by someone who wants to shut him up. And the former chess champion isn’t the only one who has been abducted.

When a grisly teen murder rocks his quiet northwestern town, rough-around-the-edges Sheriff Jeffrey Mills has his hands full identifying the body while facing the mounting pressure of tracking down the missing high school teacher the community is determined to find. In the blink of an eye, a heart attack sidelines him during the search, and Mills faces an impossible choice: skirt the law and lose his one chance for redemption or leave Sarah Baker to her fate.

When Charlie Dodge gets a phone call from a frantic woman stating her daughter has been kidnapped by her ex-husband and taken into a cult called Fourth Dimension, he takes the case without hesitation. The cult’s rumored purpose is to gather men with psychic abilities with the goal of breeding a race of people who have supernatural powers. Once accepted into the cult, men are given a young girl to marry in exchange for one of their own daughters.

Trapped, chained and abused for months in her dismal underground cell at the age of 12 and then 13, courageous Abby hides a note identifying her kidnapper. She prays for a miracle — but despairs her fate is sealed. “If I don't live through this,” says her tear-stained plea, “I would like my body to be cremated and the ashes poured all over my house. PS: If you find me dead, my killer is . . . He kidnapped me on the morning of March 10, 1976. I also died, if so, after my 13th birthday.”