While on a voyage to Africa, an unproven young writer named Arthur Conan Doyle hears of the Mary Celeste and decides to write an outlandish short story about what took place. This causes quite a sensation between sought-after Philadelphia spiritualist medium Violet Petra and a rational-minded journalist named Phoebe Grant, who is seeking to expose Petra as a fraud. Then there is the family of the Mary Celeste's captain, a family linked to the sea for generations and marked repeatedly by tragedy.

Shortly after Lacey and her husband move in to what they think is their dream home, the warm and welcoming house becomes cold and dark. There is something malevolent within these walls that wants to hurt Lacey’s unborn child --- a terrifying presence that only she can sense. To save her family, Lacey must discover the truth about the house and confront an evil that has lingered in wait for years.

The year is 1845, and young researcher Eliot Saxby is paid to go on an expedition to the Arctic in the hope of finding remains of the by-now-extinct Great Auk, a large flightless bird of mythical status. Eliot joins a hunting ship, but the crew and the passengers are not what they seem. As the ship moves further and further into the wilds of the Arctic Sea, Eliot clings to what he believes in, but is irrevocably drawn back into a past that haunts him --- and a present that confronts him with a myriad of dangers.

Special Agent Pendergast’s arrival at an exclusive Colorado ski resort to rescue his protégée, Corrie Swanson, from serious trouble with the law coincides with the first attack of a murderous arsonist who begins burning down mansions with the families locked inside. Eventually, he uncovers a mysterious connection between several miners who were killed 150 years earlier and a fabled, long-lost Sherlock Holmes story --- one that might just offer the key to the modern-day killings as well.

Teenager Tyler Wingo learns that his father was killed in action in Afghanistan. Then the extraordinary happens: Tyler receives a communication from his father after his supposed death. Tyler hires Sean King and Michelle Maxwell to solve the mystery surrounding his father. But their investigation quickly leads to deeper, more troubling questions. Could Tyler's father really still be alive? What was his true mission? Could Tyler be the next target?

Caught up in a moment of boyhood competition, William Bellman recklessly aims his slingshot at a rook resting on a branch, killing the bird instantly. Years later, when a stranger mysteriously enters William’s life, the terrible and unforeseen consequences of his past indiscretion take root. In a desperate bid to save the only precious thing he has left, he enters into a rather strange bargain with an even stranger partner.

Mary DiNunzio has just been promoted to partner and is about to take on her most unusual case yet, brought to the all-female law firm of Rosato & Associates by a 13-year-old genius with a penchant for beekeeping. Allegra Gardner’s sister Fiona was murdered six years ago, and it appeared that the accused, Lonnie Stall, was the culprit. But Allegra believes Lonnie is innocent and has been wrongly imprisoned.

State Senator Paul Giannis is a candidate for Mayor of Kindle County. His identical twin brother Cass is newly released from prison, 25 years after pleading guilty to the murder of his girlfriend, Dita Kronon. When Evon Miller, an ex-FBI agent who is the head of security for the Kronon family business, and private investigator Tim Brodie begin a re-investigation of Dita's death, a complex web of murder, sex and betrayal dramatically unfolds.

Ann Rule unravels a shattering case of Christmastime murder off the coast of Washington State. It’s a case with enough drama, greed, sex and scandal to be called “The Real Housewives of Whidbey Island,” but this was not reality television. This was murder: pure, cruel, ugly and senseless. And someone had to pay the price.