Traditional Detective Mystery

A savage murder interrupts a May-December marriage and leaves Brother Cadfael with a dark, terrible mystery to solve. For the key to the killing - and a secret - are hid among the lepers of Saint Giles. Now Brother Cadfael's skills must ferret out a sickness, not of the body, but of a twisted soul - in the fifth Brother Cadfael Chronicle, a work that displays Ellis Peters' special genius at her best.

London, 1898. A vibrant young heiress has gone missing, and it’s up to Sherlock and Lucy to find her. Meanwhile, threatening letters from Egyptian revolutionaries begin turning up at newspaper offices, captivating Sherlock’s interest and sparking public fear and outrage. Then, the missing young woman is found dead in front of London’s most famous Egyptian monument.

Christmas is just weeks away, but what Jacobia Jake Tiptree discovers at Faye Anne Carmody's house is far from festive: a dazed Faye Anne covered with blood. Her no-good husband, Merle--Eastport's butcher and least-liked citizen--is nowhere in sight. Nowhere, that is, until Jake finds his body--wrapped in his own butcher paper. It looks like an open-and-shut case, but Jake isn't convinced. Then another resident turns up dead, and Jake knows the trail doesn't begin--or end--with Merle.

No matter how fabulously he’s being courted, infamously dour “art hog” Arthur Wordell isn’t keen on favoring the new Guggenheim Museum with his extensive collection. Even at the urging of his beloved daughter, Nadia. Then, the night after the museum’s fête, Arthur takes a 20-story plunge from the window of his Times Square office. Nadia thinks it’s no mere coincidence. Eccentric, yes. Suicidal, no. Private Investigator Nero Wolfe and his assistant, Archie Goodwin, agree.

Staten Island would be forgettable were it not for the gleaming Tabernacle of the Silver Spire, where thousands of congregants come every Sunday to hear the sermons of Barnabas Bay. Millions more tune in on television, giving the good Reverend international fame, and a chance to spread the gospel from New York City’s harbor all the way to South Korea. But threatening notes have been appearing in the collection bag, suggesting that one of the faithful has decided it’s time this good shepherd get the hook.

A struggling young Persian artist sends Flynn, one of Sherlock Holmes’ Baker Street Irregulars, out to buy provisions for a celebratory dinner. But when he brings the requested groceries to the artist’s wife, her joy quickly turns to fear. Then Flynn returns to the artist’s studio, only to find that disaster has struck. Meanwhile, the National Portrait Gallery enlists the help of Sherlock Homes to investigate the mysterious theft of The Pink Lady. As Holmes sets out to recover the precious painting, he uncovers a dark web of deceit far more complex than he imagined.

When the luxurious Blue Train arrives at Nice, a guard attempts to wake serene Ruth Kettering from her slumbers. But she will never wake again - for a heavy blow has killed her, disfiguring her features almost beyond recognition. What is more, her precious rubies are missing. The prime suspect is Ruth's estranged husband, Derek. Yet Hercule Poirot is not convinced, so he stages an eerie reenactment of the journey, complete with the murderer on board.

For ex-Wall Streeter Jacobia Jake Tiptree and her teenage son, Sam, September promises tranquil days winter-proofing their rambling handyman's special of a home in Eastport, Maine. But there's nothing idyllic about this Down East autumn. For starters, the return of truly vicious native son Reuben Tate stirs up the town. And when somebody slits Reuben's throat and hangs his corpse on the cemetery gate, the police trace a bloodied scalpel to surgeon Victor Tiptree - Jake's former husband.

Sherlock and Lucy must defeat two ruthless organizations on two continents in this season two finale of the Sherlock and Lucy series. Their clever archenemy, the evil Lord Sonneborne, will fight them to the bitter end. But the Baker Street team is equally determined. Their own lives, and the life of Lucy's mother, are at stake, in a struggle to change the future of the British Empire.

London, 1899: Lady Constance has seen too much, and now, her life is in danger. The beautiful, aristocratic newlywed is the sole witness in a murder case, and without her testimony, a killer will walk free. Her husband is distraught, thinking any harm might come to his young bride, whose affection is the only thing that has given his wayward life purpose.

In early 1925, the Honorable Daisy Dalrymple Fletcher - recent mother of twins - resumes her journalistic career by agreeing to write a piece about the Tower of London - the Bloody Tower - for an American magazine. Invited to observe the centuries-old ritual Ceremony of the Keys, she's spending the night (her first time away from her babies), since the complex is locked and guarded, and the high walls are surrounded by a disused moat.

London, 1898. Held captive by a diabolical criminal mastermind and his gang of thugs, Watson overhears an assassination plot that not only endangers the life of Sherlock Holmes, but threatens to ignite a war. If he has any hope of foiling his kidnappers’ nefarious plans, he must escape - and quickly. Eluding the familiar foe proves challenging, however. Watson is soon caught and awakens in jail, the prime suspect for two murders, dressed in the clothes of a missing man, one Lord Harwell.

Despite the dismal Broadway season, Gunplay continues to draw crowds. A gangland spectacle, it's packed to the gills with action, explosions, and gunfire. In fact, Gunplay is so loud that no one notices the killing of Monte Field. In a sold-out theater, Field is found dead partway through the second act, surrounded by empty seats. The police hold the crowd and call for the one man who can untangle this daring murder: Inspector Richard Queen.

The winter of 1139 will disrupt Brother Cadfael's tranquil life in Shrewsbury with the most disturbing events. Raging civil war has sent refugees fleeing north from Worcester. Among them are two orphans from a noble family, a boy of thirteen and an 18-year-old girl of great beauty, and their companion, a young Benedictine nun...

It was a horrible death - Maurice Questing was lured into a pool of boiling mud and left there to die. Chief Inspector Roderick Alleyn, far from home on a wartime quest for German agents, knows that any number of people could have killed him. But who actually did?

Once, the Lamartine Hotel was a quiet refuge for New York’s stuffy fashionable set. But by the 1890s, fashion has moved uptown, and the lobby of the Lamartine has been overtaken by natty young sports, who pass their afternoons with billiards or shows of noisy derring-do. Their preferred damsel is Lila Williams, a delicate young telegraph operator whose shyness so charms them that they resolve to defend her against any ill-behaved characters. They are about to face their fiercest challenger, who rides in the gleaming armor of a millionaire.

Who would suspect that the same mind that created the most famous literary detective of all time also took on the eternally popular genre of vampires? Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, a contemporary of Bram Stoker, gave us some fascinating works of vampire fiction. From the bloodsucking plant in "The American's Tale" to the bloodsucking wife in "The Adventure of the Sussex Vampire," he reveled in the horror created by creatures who survived on the blood of men and women.

London, 1899: When a mysterious packet is stolen from a diplomatic courier, Sherlock and Lucy are called upon to recover it before its ominous contents fall into the wrong hands. The Baker Street gang uncovers a dark, tangled web of intrigue and an evil plot that could very well bring all of England to its knees. When a notorious criminal is found dead in the bookstore basement, and the bookseller is arrested for the crime, the danger becomes very real, and very personal. Can Holmes and Lucy find the perilous packet, catch the murderous mastermind, and foil the fiendish plot?

Boston expat Maura Donovan has been getting accustomed to Irish living, complete with an inherited house and a pub named Sullivan’s. But now, her mother has returned - and she’s brought Maura’s half-sister in tow. To make matters more confusing, a handful of Cork University students are knocking on Maura’s door, asking about a mystical fairy fort that happens to be located on Maura’s piece of land. Then one of the students disappears after a day of scoping out the fort, and Maura uncovers a decades-old corpse.

Just after midnight, the famous Orient Express is stopped in its tracks by a snowdrift. By morning, the millionaire Samuel Edward Ratchett lies dead in his compartment, stabbed a dozen times, his door locked from the inside. One of his fellow passengers must be the murderer. Isolated by the storm, detective Hercule Poirot must find the killer among a dozen of the dead man's enemies, before the murderer decides to strike again....