Mystery Comedy Fiction

'What? You mean the earl does it for money? That's way beyond the barbed wire!' This explosion of disgust from Blotto is provoked when Twinks informs him of the activities of the Earl of Woking. The gentleman in question is owner of Clusters, a stately home not far from Tawcester Towers, and he has been renting out parts of Clusters for private functions - and charging his guests! The discovery of this appalling lapse in aristocratic behaviour sets Blotto and Twinks off on their latest adventure.

Fifteen years ago, a murder/suicide in room 712 rocked the grand old Bellweather Hotel and the young bridesmaid who witnessed it. Now hundreds of high school musicians, including quiet bassoonist Rabbit Hatmaker and his brassy diva twin, Alice, have gathered in its cavernous, crumbling halls for the annual Statewide festival; the grown-up bridesmaid has returned to face her demons; and a snowstorm is forecast that will trap everyone on the grounds. Then one of the orchestra’s stars disappears—from room 712.

As a shaky truce between suburban gangsters starts to unravel, schlubby civilian Scott Clark has other things on his mind: if he can't afford to buy out his ex-father-in-law, Scott's about to lose the only house he's ever called home. In the red-hot urban housing market, he doesn't have a chance - until he and his best friends take the desperate measure of staging a fake drive-by shooting on the property to push down the asking price. But then Scott's mobster-posturing stunt attracts the attention of the real criminals.

Dear Bennington College Admissions Officer: I’m probably not your average applicant from Beverly Hills, CA. And I’m not one to brag, but I’m pretty much the smartest girl in my class at Mark Frost Academy. My grades are excellent. My motivation is high. I don’t drink or do drugs or hang...

Paris, 1980. The literary critic Roland Barthes dies - struck by a laundry van - after lunch with the presidential candidate François Mitterand. The world of letters mourns a tragic accident. But what if it wasn't an accident at all? What if Barthes was murdered?

A duchess in time saves a noble line … In theory, the Duke of Candover is the most eligible peer in the realm. But in truth, he has a deep aversion to the merest hint of marriage, not to mention two botched engagements which have marked his jaded soul. Now, after a debauched bachelor party...

With a Hollywood film crew in town to shoot a remake of the horror classic The Perishing, the residents of Wildwood Cove are all abuzz. Even Marley McKinney, owner of The Flip Side Pancake House, can overlook the fact that the lead actress, Alyssa Jayde, happens to be an old flame of her boyfriend. After all, the crew loves Marley's crêpes - so much so that Christine, the head makeup artist, invites her on set for a behind-the-scenes tour. But when Marley arrives, the special-effects trailer is on fire...with Christine inside.

An ax murder leaves Franki less than jazzed.... Jazz Fest is in full swing in The Big Easy, but PI Franki Amato is singing the blues. The owner of an historic Italian grocery and deli is murdered in a manner eerily reminiscent of the Axeman of New Orleans, a notorious serial killer who hasn’t struck in over a century, and someone Franki knows has been arrested for the crime. Adding to her distress, Franki, her mom, and her meddling Sicilian nonna finally meet her fiancé’s family, but the tone of their encounter is decidedly downbeat.

For PI Franki Amato, New Orleans is anything but The Big Easy. Her best friend and employer has assigned her an unsettling investigation - the murder of a gorgeous cosmetics CEO at an allegedly haunted plantation. Adding to Franki’s stress, her meddling Sicilian nonna is planning her engagement even though her boyfriend, Bradley, hasn’t popped the question, and his new secretary seems determined to ensure a proposal never happens. As Bradley grows distant and the plantation grows dangerous, Franki turns to a psychic who is deathly afraid of ghosts.

ASBOs may be the pride and joy of New Labour, but they don't cut much ice with Horace Rumpole - he takes the old-fashioned view that if anyone is going to be threatened with a restriction of their liberty then some form of legal proceeding ought to be gone through first. When one of the Timson children is given an ASBO for playing football in the street, Rumpole soon realizes something fishy is going on.

“Think of a darker, more aggressive version of C.S. Lewis’ The Screwtape Letters. . . . Filled with wicked mischief and dark dares.” — Kansas City Star From Clive Barker, the great master of horror and the macabre, comes a brilliant and truly unsettling tour de force of the...

“Fresh, confident, intelligent and amusing. Grab a cold drink, put your feet up, and enjoy yourself.”— Sue Grafton The first entry in a thoroughly original and witty series that sets Atlanta house cleaner cum sleuth Callahan Garrity on the trail of a client’s missing au pair, now...

Why is everyone rushing to flee Tampa on a cruise ship to hell? Serge is back with a bullet, torn between homicide and souvenirs. So is Coleman, torn between getting hammered and getting more hammered. Then there's good ol' Jim Davenport, the E-Team, the Diaz Brothers, and Johnny Vegas, the...

What do you get when you combine a chicken named Elvis, a locked diary, and a secret Violet Parker does not want share with her daughter? Seeing Trouble is the first of many short stories involving the characters of the Deadwood Mystery series.

Melissa Bank's runaway bestseller, The Girls' Guide to Hunting and Fishing, charmed readers and critics alike with its wickedly insightful, tender look at a young woman's forays into love, work, and friendship. Now, with The Wonder Spot, Bank is back with her signature combination of devilishly...

Joe Brody is just your average Dostoevsky-reading, Harvard-expelled strip-club bouncer who has a highly classified military history and whose best friend from Catholic school happens to be head mafioso Gio Caprisi. FBI agent Donna Zamora, the best shot in her class at Quantico, is a single mother stuck at a desk manning the hotline. Their storylines intersect over a tip from a cokehead that leads to a crackdown on Gio's strip joint in Queens and Joe's arrest - just one piece of a city-wide sweep aimed at flushing out anyone who might have a lead on the most-wanted terrorists....

SWFG: Single, White, Female, Geek. "That's me, Lexi Carmichael, a reformed hacker who was gainfully employed by the National Security Agency. But a series of extraordinary events led me to leave government life behind for a fresh start with a brand-new company and an incredibly sexy boss, Finn Shaughnessy. It may not be kosher to have the hots for your boss, but he seems to have the hots for me, too. If only things didn't get so complicated...."

Niederkaltenkirchen goes future: Dass nun also tatsächlich ein Luxus-Spa-Hotel seine Pforten in Niederkaltenkirchen geöffnet hat, erfreut zumindest die eine Hälfte der Bevölkerung nur wenig. Als kurz darauf auch noch eine Leiche ausgerechnet in einer Marmorbadewanne dort liegt, muss der Eberhofer freilich wieder ran. Ganz egal, wie geschmeidig es mit der Susi grad läuft. Leider ist der Birkenberger Rudi momentan ein wenig verpeilt, was den Franz vor eine schwere Entscheidung stellt.

Dishing out bad news is Jackie Parker's job. So when her boss grabs her assets one time too many, she serves him her notice and hopes he chokes on it. There must be a better way for a certified process server to make a living in Miami than working for a lousy lecherous lawyer. Whatever Jackie decides, her number one priority is to spend time with her husband, Luke, preferably without his brother Logan - AKA the Dark Prince.

All it takes is a few underhanded moves by a tough ex-cop named Eppick to pull thief John Dortmunder into a game he never wanted to play. With no choice, he sets out on a perilous treasure hunt for a long-lost gold and jewel-studded chess set once intended as a birthday gift for the last Romanov czar. Success is not inevitable with Dortmunder leading the attack, but he's nothing if not persistent, and some gambit or other might just stumble into a winning move.