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Reviews

by Allen Eskens - Fiction, Mystery, Suspense, Thriller

Max Rupert has left his position as a Minneapolis homicide detective to live in solitude. Mourning the tragic death of his wife, he's also racked by guilt --- he alone knows what happened to her killer. But then the former local sheriff, Lyle Voight, arrives with a desperate plea: Lyle’s daughter, Sandy, and his six-year-old grandson, Pip, have disappeared. Lyle is certain that Sandy's ex-husband, Reed, is behind it, but the new sheriff is refusing to investigate. When Max reluctantly looks into their disappearance, he too becomes convinced something has gone very wrong. But the closer Max and Lyle get to finding proof, the more slippery Reed becomes, until he makes a break for the beautiful but formidable Boundary Waters wilderness with vulnerable Pip in tow.

by Robert Harris - Fiction, Historical Fiction, Historical Thriller, Suspense, Thriller

1660 England. General Edward Whalley and his son-in law, Colonel William Goffe, board a ship bound for the New World. They are on the run, wanted for the murder of King Charles I --- a brazen execution that marked the culmination of the English Civil War, in which parliamentarians successfully battled royalists for control. But now, 10 years after Charles’ beheading, the royalists have returned to power. Under the provisions of the Act of Oblivion, the 59 men who signed the king’s death warrant and participated in his execution have been found guilty in absentia of high treason. Some of the Roundheads, including Oliver Cromwell, are already dead. Others have been captured, hung, drawn and quartered. A few are imprisoned for life. But two have escaped to America by boat.

by Agatha Christie and various authors - Anthology, Fiction, Mystery, Short Stories

Agatha Christie’s legendary sleuth, Jane Marple, returns to solve 12 baffling cases in this brand-new collection, penned by a host of acclaimed authors skilled in the fine art of mystery and murder. Join Marple as she travels through her sleepy English village and around the world. In St Mary Mead, a Christmas dinner is interrupted by unexpected guests; the Broadway stage in New York City is set for a dangerous improvisation; bad omens surround an untimely death aboard a cruise ship to Hong Kong; and a bestselling writer on holiday in Italy is caught in a nefarious plot. These and other crimes committed in the name of love, jealousy, blackmail and revenge are ones that only the indomitable Jane Marple can solve.

by Andrew Mayne - Fiction, Suspense, Thriller

A signal is detected at the outer edge of the solar system. Computational biologist Dr. Theo Cray and magician-turned-FBI-agent Jessica Blackwood are looking --- and listening --- a little closer. The man at the center of this cosmic mystery is billionaire Thomas T. Theismann. He’s spent a lifetime --- and a fortune --- trying to find out if we’re alone in the universe. Highly skeptical, Theo joins the effort to find the source of the signal, and he quickly enlists Jessica to look into the suspicious death of another academic at the lab. As their investigations converge, they uncover curious connections to the otherworldly contact, including a 1970s science-fiction writer and the body of an astronaut found buried in an ancient tomb.

by Laurie R. King - Fiction, Mystery

A magnificent house, vast formal gardens, a golden family that shaped California, and a colorful past filled with now-famous artists: the Gardener Estate was a 12th-century Eden. And now, just as the Estate is preparing to move into a new future, restoration work on some of its art digs up a grim relic of the home’s past: a human skull, hidden away for decades. Inspector Raquel Laing has her work cut out for her. Fifty years ago, the Estate’s young heir, Rob Gardener, turned his palatial home into a counterculture commune of peace, love and equality. But that was also a time when serial killers preyed on innocents --- monsters like The Highwayman, whose case has just surged back into the public eye. Could the skull belong to one of his victims?

by Amanda Jayatissa - Fiction, Psychological Suspense, Psychological Thriller, Suspense, Thriller

When Amaya is invited to Kaavi’s over-the-top wedding in Sri Lanka, she is surprised and a little hurt to hear from her former best friend after so many years of radio silence. But when Amaya learns that the groom is her very own ex-boyfriend, she is consumed by a single thought: She must stop the wedding from happening, no matter the cost. But as the week of wedding celebrations begin and rumors about Amaya’s past begin to swirl, she can’t help but feel like she also has a target on her back. When Kaavi goes missing and is presumed dead, all evidence points to Amaya. However, nothing is as it seems as Amanda Jayatissa expertly unravels that each wedding guest has their own dark secret and agenda, and Amaya may not be the only one with a plan to keep the bride from getting her happily ever after.

by Stephen King - Fantasy, Fiction, Supernatural Thriller, Suspense, Thriller

Charlie Reade looks like a regular high school kid, but he carries a heavy load. His mom was killed in a hit-and-run accident when he was 10, and grief drove his dad to drink. Charlie learned how to take care of himself --- and his dad. When Charlie is 17, he meets a dog named Radar and her aging master, Howard Bowditch, a recluse in a big house at the top of a big hill, with a locked shed in the backyard. Sometimes strange sounds emerge from it. Charlie starts doing jobs for Mr. Bowditch and loses his heart to Radar. Then, when Bowditch dies, he leaves Charlie a cassette tape telling a story no one would believe. What Bowditch knows, and has kept secret all his long life, is that inside the shed is a portal to another world.

written by David Lagercrantz, translated by Ian Giles - Fiction, Suspense, Thriller

Professor Hans Rekke is a world authority on interrogation techniques, capable of dizzying feats of logic and observation. But he also has a fragile psyche that falls apart under pressure. Micaela Vargas is a street-smart police officer, the daughter of Chilean political refugees, who grew up in the projects on the outskirts of Stockholm and has two brothers on the wrong side of the law. She is tenacious and uncompromising, and desperate to prove herself to her fellow cops. Micaela needs Hans’ unique mind to help her solve the case of a murdered asylum seeker from Afghanistan. Hans needs Micaela to save him from himself. Together, they need to find the killer before they’re both silenced for good.

by Jeff Abbott - Fiction, Suspense, Thriller

Sam Capra is working for America's most secret espionage agency, known as Section K, when he is informed that Markus Bolt is missing. Bolt is the last American traitor, who had turned over allied agent names and military secrets to the Russians. He fled to Moscow when he was discovered, but now a trusted source inside Russia tells Section K that Markus Bolt has vanished from Moscow --- and the Americans need to find him before the Russians do. Sam is charged with making contact with Bolt's abandoned American daughter, Amanda, and determining if she's had any contact with her father. He must discover the reason behind Bolt's unexpected run and protect Amanda from the killers hunting her father.

by William Kent Krueger - Fiction, Mystery

The ancient Ojibwe healer Henry Meloux has had a vision of his death. As he walks the Northwoods in solitude, he tries to prepare himself peacefully for the end of his long life. But peace is destined to elude him as hunters fill the woods seeking a woman named Dolores Morriseau, a stranger who had come to the healer for shelter and the gift of his wisdom. Meloux guides this stranger and his great niece, Cork O’Connor’s wife, to safety deep into the Boundary Waters, his home for more than a century. On the last journey he may ever take into this beloved land, Meloux must do his best to outwit the deadly mercenaries who follow. Meanwhile, in Aurora, Cork works feverishly to identify the hunters and the reason for their relentless pursuit, but he has little to go on.