LibGuides: Library Discussion Groups: Mysteries for Lunch

Mysteries for Lunch Titles by Year

January 4: The House of Silk by Anthony Horowitz
Call Number: MYSTERY Horowitz
ISBN: 9780316197014
Publication Date: 2012-10-02
A fine art dealer named Edmund Carstairs visits Sherlock Holmes and Dr John Watson to beg for their help. He is being menaced by a strange man in a flat cap - a wanted criminal who seems to have followed him all the way from America. In the days that follow, his home is robbed, his family is threatened. And then the first murder takes place. Almost unwillingly, Holmes and Watson find themselves being drawn ever deeper into an international conspiracy connected to the teeming criminal underworld of Boston, the gaslit streets of London, opium dens and much, much more. And as they dig, they begin to hear the whispered phrase-the House of Silk-a mysterious entity that connects the highest levels of government to the deepest depths of criminality. Holmes begins to fear that he has uncovered a conspiracy that threatens to tear apart the very fabric of society.
February 1: His Majesty's Hope by Susan Elia MacNeal
Call Number: MYSTERY MacNeal
ISBN: 9780345536730
Publication Date: 2013-05-14
World War II has finally come home to Britain, but it takes more than nightly air raids to rattle intrepid spy and expert code breaker Maggie Hope. After serving as a secret agent to protect Princess Elizabeth at Windsor Castle, Maggie is now an elite member of the Special Operations Executive—a black ops organization designed to aid the British effort abroad—and her first assignment sends her straight into Nazi-controlled Berlin, the very heart of the German war machine. Relying on her quick wit and keen instincts, Maggie infiltrates the highest level of Berlin society, gathering information to pass on to London headquarters. But the secrets she unveils will expose a darker, more dangerous side of the war—and of her own past.
March 7: The Body in the Dales by J. R. Ellis
ISBN: 9781503903111
Publication Date: 2018-08-09
A body is discovered deep in a cave beneath the Yorkshire Dales. Leading the investigation into the mysterious death are experienced DCI Jim Oldroyd and his partner DS Carter, a newcomer from London. The deceased is Dave Atkins, well known throughout the village but not well liked. While there is no shortage of suspects, the details of the crime leave Oldroyd and Carter stumped. How did Atkins’s body end up in such a remote section of the cave? When someone with vital information turns up dead, it becomes clear that whoever is behind the murders will stop at nothing to conceal their tracks. Oldroyd and his team try to uncover the truth, but every answer unearths a new set of questions. And as secrets and lies are exposed within the close-knit community, the mystery becomes deeper, darker and more complex than the caves below.
April 4: Milk and Honey by Faye Kellerman
Call Number: MYSTERY Kellerman
ISBN: 9780061999260
Publication Date: 2011-01-25
Sergeant Pete Decker is driving through a housing estate one night when he discovers an abandoned toddler in blood-stained pyjamas. As Decker and his partner, Marge Dunn, hunt for the child's parents, the bee-stings they notice all over the child's arm guide them to a honey farm set in the barren scrubland surrounding Los Angeles. It's a tough landscape, populated by hard-working people with little time for city folks, so the two detectives aren't surprised when there is no welcoming party. Nothing, though, has prepared them for the incredible stonewalling from the locals, nor for the grisly sight that greets them in the farmhouse. But Decker and Dunn are professionals to the core and, delving deeper, find a gruesome mystery far more lethal than the ordinary hornet's nest...
May 2: The Barrakee Mystery: The Lure of the Bush by Arthur Upfield
ISBN: 9781922384706
Publication Date: 2020-06-01
Why was King Henry, an aboriginal from Western Australia, killed in New South Wales? What was the feud that led to murder after nineteen long years had passed? Who was the woman who saw the murder and kept silent? This first story of Inspector Bonaparte takes him to the Darling River bush country where he encounters those problems he understands so well - mixed blood and divided loyalties.
June 6: Saint Peter's Fair by Ellis Peters
ISBN: 9781504048446
Publication Date: 2017-11-14
St. Peter’s Fair is a grand, festive event, attracting merchants from across England and beyond. There is a pause in the civil war racking the country in the summer of 1139, and the fair promises to bring some much-needed gaiety to the town of Shrewsbury—until the body of a wealthy merchant is found murdered in the river Severn. Was Thomas of Bristol the victim of murderous thieves? And, if so, why were his valuables abandoned nearby? Brother Cadfael, that shrewd but kindly monk, offers to help the merchant’s lovely niece Emma. But while he is searching for the killer, Thomas of Bristol’s wares are ransacked and two more men are murdered. Emma almost certainly knows more than she is telling—as others will soon realize. Cadfael desperately races to save the young girl, knowing that in a country at war with itself, betrayal can come from any direction, and even good intentions can kill.
July 11: Killing Floor by Lee Child
Call Number: SUSPENSE Child
ISBN: 9780515153651
Publication Date: 2012-10-30
Ex-military policeman Jack Reacher is a drifter. He’s just passing through Margrave, Georgia, and in less than an hour, he’s arrested for murder. Not much of a welcome. All Reacher knows is that he didn’t kill anybody. At least not here. Not lately. But he doesn’t stand a chance of convincing anyone. Not in Margrave, Georgia. Not a chance in hell.
August 1: First Degree by David Rosenfelt
Call Number: MYSTERY Rosenfelt
ISBN: 9780446613866
Publication Date: 2004-06-01
No one can separate defense attorney Andy Carpenter from his golden retriever, Tara, who stands loyally beside him through every investigation, no matter how dangerous or puzzling-and he is about to be confronted with one of his most difficult cases yet. When a cop's body is found burned and decapitated, the last thing Andy expects is for a stranger to waltz into his office and confess to the crime. For the wisecracking millionaire attorney suffering from "lawyer's block," the case looks like a no-brainer, that is until the cops pick up another suspect: Andy's lead P.I., Laurie Collins, who happens to be the love of his life. Soon Laurie's case is looking bleak and Andy is becoming increasingly desperate. All he had wanted was a case to sink his teeth into. Now he gets one that's a kick in the head . . . and the heart.
September 5: Memory Man by David Baldacci
Call Number: SUSPENSE Baldacci
ISBN: 9781455559817
Publication Date: 2015-09-15
Police detective Amos Decker returned from a stakeout one evening and entered a nightmare--his wife, young daughter, and brother-in-law had been murdered. His family destroyed, their killer's identity as mysterious as the motive behind the crime, and unable to forget a single detail from that horrible night, Decker finds his world collapsing around him. He leaves the police force, loses his home, and winds up on the street, taking piecemeal jobs as a private investigator when he can. But over a year later, a man turns himself in to the police and confesses to the murders. At the same time a horrific event nearly brings Burlington to its knees, and Decker is called back in to help with this investigation. Decker also seizes his chance to learn what really happened to his family that night. To uncover the stunning truth, he must use his remarkable gifts and confront the burdens that go along with them. He must endure the memories he would much rather forget. And he may have to make the ultimate sacrifice.
October 3: The Ghost Walker by Margaret Coel
Call Number: MYSTERY Coel
ISBN: 9780425154687
Publication Date: 1996-10-01
Father John O'Malley comes across the corpse lying in a ditch beside the highway. When he returns with the police, it is gone. The Arapahos of the Wind River Reservation speak of Ghost Walkers—tormented souls caught between the earth and the spirit world, who are capable of anything. Then, within days, a young man disappears from the Reservation without a trace. A young woman is found brutally murdered. And as Father John and Arapaho lawyer Vicky Holden investigate these crimes, someone—or something—begins following them. Together, Vicky and Father John must draw upon ancient Arapaho traditions to stop a killer, explain the inexplicable, and put a ghost to rest...
November 7: Track of the Cat by Nevada Barr
Call Number: MYSTERY Barr
ISBN: 9780399138249
Publication Date: 1993-03-01
Anna Pigeon has fled New York and her memories to find work as a ranger in the country’s national parks. In the remote backcountry of West Texas, however, she discovers murder and violence. Fellow park ranger Sheila Drury is mysteriously killed, presumably by a mountain lion. But the deep claw marks Anna finds across Drury’s throat and the paw prints surrounding the body are too perfect to be real.
December 5: 4:50 from Paddington by Agatha Christie
ISBN: 9780063214088
Publication Date: 2022-05-03
For an instant the two trains ran side by side. In that frozen moment, Elspeth McGillicuddy stared helplessly out of her carriage window as a man tightened his grip around a woman’s throat. She watched on as the body crumpled. Then the other train drew away. But who, apart from Mrs. McGillicuddy’s friend Jane Marple, would take her story seriously? After all, there are no other witnesses, no suspects, and no case. How could there be, with no corpse and no one missing? Miss Marple asks her highly efficient and intelligent young friend Lucy Eyelesbarrow to infiltrate the Crackenthorpe family, who seem to be at the heart of this mystery, and help unmask a murderer.

January 5: Twenty-One Days by Anne Perry
Call Number: MYSTERY Perry
ISBN: 9780399179884
Publication Date: 2018-04-10
1910: 25-year-old Daniel Pitt is a junior barrister in London and eager to prove himself, independent of his renowned parents’ influence. And the new case before him will be the test. When his client, arrogant biographer Russell Graves, is found guilty of murdering his wife, Daniel is dispatched to find the real killer before Graves faces the hangman’s noose—in only twenty-one days. Could Mrs. Graves’s violent death have anything to do with her husband’s profession? Someone in power may be framing the biographer to keep damaging secrets from coming to light. It is a theory that leads Daniel’s investigation unexpectedly to London’s Special Branch—and, disturbingly, to one of his father’s closest colleagues.
February 2: Messenger of Truth by Jacqueline Winspear
Call Number: MYSTERY Winspear
ISBN: 9780805078985
Publication Date: 2006-08-22
London, 1931: The night before an exhibition of his artwork opens at a famed Mayfair gallery, the controversial artist Nick Bassington-Hope falls to his death. The police rule it an accident, but Nick's twin sister, Georgina, a wartime journalist and a infamous figure in her own right, isn't convinced. When the authorities refuse to consider her theory that Nick was murdered, Georgina seeks out a fellow graduate from Girton College, Maisie Dobbs, psychologist and investigator, for help. Nick was a veteran of World War I, and before long the case leads Maisie to the desolate beaches of Dungeness in Kent, and into the sinister underbelly of the city's art world.
March 2: To Kill a Troubadour by Martin Walker
Call Number: MYSTERY Walker
ISBN: 9780593319796
Publication Date: 2022-08-09
Les Troubadours, a folk music group that Bruno has long supported, go viral with their new number, “Song for Catalonia,” when the Spanish government suddenly bans the song. The songwriter, Joel Martin, is a local enthusiast for the old Occitan language of Périgord and the medieval troubadours, and he sympathizes with the Catalan bid for independence. The success of his song provokes outrage among extreme Spanish nationalists. Then, in a stolen car found on a Périgord back road, police discover a distinctive bullet for a state-of-the-art sniper's rifle that can kill at three kilometers, and they fear that Joel might be the intended target. The French and Spanish governments agree to mount a joint operation to stop the assailants, and Bruno is the local man on the spot who mobilizes his resources to track them down. While Bruno tries to keep the peace, his friend Florence reaches out for help. Her abusive ex-husband is about to be paroled from prison and she fears he will return to reclaim their children.
April 6: Princess Elizabeth's Spy by Susan Elia MacNeal
Call Number: MYSTERY MacNeal
ISBN: 9780553593624
Publication Date: 2012-10-16
As World War II sweeps the continent and England steels itself against German attack, Maggie Hope, former secretary to Prime Minister Winston Churchill, completes her training to become a spy for MI-5. Spirited, strong-willed, and possessing one of the sharpest minds in government for mathematics and code-breaking, she fully expects to be sent abroad to gather intelligence for the British front. Instead, to her great disappointment, she is dispatched to go undercover at Windsor Castle, where she will tutor the young Princess Elizabeth in math. Yet castle life quickly proves more dangerous—and deadly—than Maggie ever expected.
May 15: A Beautiful Blue Death by Charles Finch
ISBN: 9780312359775
Publication Date: 2007-06-26
Charles Lenox, Victorian gentleman and armchair explorer, likes nothing more than to relax in his private study with a cup of tea, a roaring fire and a good book. But when his lifelong friend Lady Jane asks for his help, Lenox cannot resist the chance to unravel a mystery. Prudence Smith, one of Jane's former servants, is dead of an apparent suicide. But Lenox suspects something far more sinister: murder, by a rare and deadly poison. The grand house where the girl worked is full of suspects, and though Prue had dabbled with the hearts of more than a few men, Lenox is baffled by the motive for the girl's death. When another body turns up during the London season's most fashionable ball, Lenox must untangle a web of loyalties and animosities. Was it jealousy that killed Prudence Smith? Or was it something else entirely? And can Lenox find the answer before the killer strikes again―this time, disturbingly close to home?
June 1: The ABC Murders Agatha Christie by Agatha Christie
Call Number: MYSTERY Christie
ISBN: 9780517035832
Publication Date: 1990-06-12
There’s a serial killer on the loose, working his way through the alphabet and the whole country is in a state of panic. A is for Mrs. Ascher in Andover, B is for Betty Barnard in Bexhill, C is for Sir Carmichael Clarke in Churston. With each murder, the killer is getting more confident—but leaving a trail of deliberate clues to taunt the proud Hercule Poirot might just prove to be the first, and fatal, mistake.
July 6: Shadow of Doubt by Nancy Silverman
ISBN: 9781940976563
Publication Date: 2014-12-02
hen a top Hollywood Agent is found poisoned in the bathtub of her home, suspicion quickly turns to one of her two nieces. But Carol Childs, a reporter for a local talk radio station, doesn’t believe it. The suspect is her neighbor and friend, and also her primary source for insider industry news. After a media frenzy pits one niece against the other—and the body count starts to rise—Carol knows she must save her friend from being tried in the court of public opinion. But even the most seasoned reporter can be surprised, and when a Hollywood psychic shows up in Carol’s studio one night and warns her there will be more deaths, things take an unexpected turn. Suddenly nobody is above suspicion. Carol must challenge both her friendship and the facts, and the only thing she knows for certain is that the killer is still out there. But the closer she gets to the truth, the more danger she’s in.
August 3: The Eagle Catcher by Margaret Coel
Call Number: MYSTERY Coel
ISBN: 9780425154632
Publication Date: 1996-09-01
On the windswept plains of Wyoming’s Wind River Reservation, Arapahos have gathered for the Ethete powwow. It is a sacred time to reaffirm the balance and harmony in life. But these feelings of unity quickly give way to fear when tribal chairman Harvey Castle is found murdered—and every bit of evidence points to his nephew, Anthony. There are two people who don’t believe the young man capable of murder: Father John O’Malley, history scholar and pastor of St. Francis Mission, and Vicky Holden, an attorney who has recently returned to the reservation to help her people. Their investigation draws Father John and Vicky across the high plains of the Wind River Reservation—from the intimate Arapaho community centers to a byzantine world of incalculable corruption and finally into the past. It is here, in the “Old Time,” where Father John catches a rare glimpse into the Arapaho life few outsiders ever see—and a crime fewer could imagine.
September 7: Dead Run by P. J. Tracy
ISBN: 9780399152467
Publication Date: 2005-04-21
Computer game company founders Grace MacBride and Annie Belinsky—along with Wisconsin deputy Sharon Mueller—are enroute to Green Bay, following reports of a serial killer, when their car breaks down deep in the northern woods. A short walk through the forest leads them to the eerily quiet town of Four Corners, where they find severed phone lines and a complete absence of any life. But the quiet is deceptive. Before they know it, they witness a horrifying double murder—and discover that this is only the beginning of a race to save their own lives—and countless others.
October 5: The Cove by Catherine Coulter
Call Number: SUSPENSE Coulter
ISBN: 9780399150869
Publication Date: 2003-11-10
Sally Brainerd can't remember what happened the night her father was murdered. Maybe she did it. Or maybe it was her poor, traumatized mother. Either way, the safest place for her is far away from Washington, D.C.. But while her aunt's home in The Cove should be a quiet refuge, Sally can't shake the feeling that there's something not quite right about the postcard perfect little town. Despite his target's checkered past and convenient memory loss, FBI Special Agent James Quinlan isn't convinced she's the killer—but maybe she knows who is. As he uses his cover to get close to Sally and unearth the memories her mind has hidden away, James can't deny his connection to the troubled woman. But as their lies and passions intertwine, Sally and James soon learn they aren't the only ones keeping deadly secrets in The Cove.
November 2: Edinburgh Twilight by Carole Lawrence
ISBN: 9781477848814
Publication Date: 2017-09-05
As a new century approaches, Edinburgh is a city divided. The wealthy residents of New Town live in comfort, while Old Town’s cobblestone streets are clotted with criminals, prostitution, and poverty. Detective Inspector Ian Hamilton is no stranger to Edinburgh’s darkest crimes. Scarred by the mysterious fire that killed his parents, he faces his toughest case yet when a young man is found strangled in Holyrood Park. With little evidence aside from a strange playing card found on the body, Hamilton engages the help of his aunt, a gifted photographer, and George Pearson, a librarian with a shared interest in the criminal mind. But the body count is rising. As newspapers spin tales of the “Holyrood Strangler,” panic sets in across the city. And with each victim, the murderer is getting closer to Hamilton, the one man who dares to stop him.
December 7: Collared by David Rosenfelt
Call Number: MYSTERY Rosenfelt
ISBN: 9781250055354
Publication Date: 2017-07-18
Lawyer Andy Carpenter’s true passion is the Tara Foundation, the dog rescue organization he runs with his friend Willie Miller. All kinds of dogs make their way to the foundation, and it isn’t that surprising to find a dog abandoned at the shelter one morning, though it was accompanied by a mysterious anonymous note. But they are quite surprised when they scan the dog’s embedded chip, and discover that they know this dog. He is the “DNA dog.” Two and a half years ago, Jill Hickman was a single mother of an adopted baby. Her baby and dog were kidnapped in broad daylight in Eastside Park, and they haven’t been seen since. A tip came in that ID’d a former boyfriend of Hickman’s, Keith Wachtel, as the kidnapper. A search of his house showed no sign of the child but did uncover more incriminating evidence, and the clincher that generated Wachtel’s arrest was some dog hair, notable since Wachtel did not have a dog. DNA tests showed conclusively that the hair belonged to Hickman’s dog. Wachtel was convicted of kidnapping, but the dog and baby were never found. Now, with the reappearance of the dog, the case is brought back to light, and the search for the child renewed. Goaded by his wife’s desire to help a friend and fellow mother and Andy’s desire to make sure the real kidnapper is in jail, Andy and his team enter the case. But what they start to uncover is far more complicated and dangerous than they ever expected.

January 6: The Blessing Way by Tony Hillerman
Call Number: MYSTERY Hillerman
ISBN: 9780061808357
Publication Date: 2009-05-26
From New York Times bestselling author Tony Hillerman, the first novel in his series featuring Lieutenant Joe Leaphorn & Officer Jim Chee who encounter a bizarre case that borders between the supernatural and murder. Homicide is always an abomination, but there is something exceptionally disturbing about the victim discovered in a high, lonely place--a corpse with a mouth full of sand--abandoned at a crime scene seemingly devoid of tracks or useful clues. Though it goes against his better judgment, Navajo Tribal Police Lieutenant Joe Leaphorn cannot help but suspect the hand of a supernatural killer. There is palpable evil in the air, and Leaphorn's pursuit of a Wolf-Witch leads him where even the bravest men fear, on a chilling trail that winds perilously between mysticism and murder.
February 3: Death in the Devil's Acre by Anne Perry
ISBN: ‎9780345514042
Publication Date: 1985
When a doctor is found brutally murdered in the lurid section of London aptly named “Devil’s Acre,” even its most hardened residents are stunned. But shock soon turns to horror when Inspector Thomas Pitt discovers three more bodies with the same gruesome “calling card”: a stab wound in the back and a rather inexpertly executed mutilation. As Pitt and his wife, Charlotte, race against time to find the killer, a treacherous mystery unfolds. And no one, not the lowest brand of ruffian or the most established aristocrat, will escape unscathed.
March 3: Monk's Hood by Ellis Peters
ISBN: 9781504001977
Publication Date: 2014-11-25
Gervase Bonel is a guest of Shrewsbury Abbey of Saint Peter and Saint Paul when he suddenly takes ill. Luckily, the abbey boasts the services of the clever and kindly Brother Cadfael, a skilled herbalist. Cadfael hurries to the man’s bedside, only to be confronted with two surprises: In Master Bonel’s wife, the good monk recognizes Richildis, whom he loved before he took his vows—and Master Bonel has been fatally poisoned by monk’s-hood oil from Cadfael’s stores. The sheriff is convinced that the murderer is Richildis’s son, Edwin, who hated his stepfather. But Cadfael, guided in part by his concern for a woman to whom he was once betrothed, is certain of her son’s innocence. Using his knowledge of both herbs and the human heart, Cadfael deciphers a deadly recipe for murder.
April 7: Pardonable Lies by Jacqueline Winspear
Call Number: MYSTERY Winspear
ISBN: 9780312426217
Publication Date: 2006-06-27
A deathbed plea from his wife leads Sir Cecil Lawton to seek the aid of Maisie Dobbs, psychologist and investigator. As Maisie soon learns, Agnes Lawton never accepted that her aviator son was killed in the Great War, a torment that led her not only to the edge of madness but to the doors of those who practice the dark arts and commune with the spirit world. In accepting the assignment, Maisie finds her spiritual strength tested, as well as her regard for her mentor, Maurice Blanche. The mission also brings her together once again with her college friend Priscilla Evernden, who served in France and who lost three brothers to the war--one of whom, it turns out, had an intriguing connection to the missing Ralph Lawton.
May 5: New York Dead by Stuart Woods
Call Number: SUSPENSE Woods
ISBN: 9780060179250
Publication Date: 1991-10-01
Everyone is always telling Stone Barrington that he’s too smart to be a cop, but it’s pure luck that places him on the streets in the dead of night, just in time to witness the horrifying incident that turns his life inside out. Suddenly he is on the front page of every New York newspaper and his life is hopelessly entwined in the increasingly shocking life (and perhaps death) of Sasha Nijinsky, the country’s hottest and most beautiful television anchorwoman. No matter where he turns, the case is waiting for him, haunting his nights and turning his days into a living hell. Stone finds himself caught in a perilous web of unspeakable crimes, dangerous friends, and sexual depravity that has throughout it one common thread: Sasha.
June 2: Death at la Fenice by Donna Leon
Call Number: MYSTERY Leon
ISBN: 9780060740689
Publication Date: 2004-07-27
Beautiful and serene Venice is a city almost devoid of crime. But that is little comfort to Maestro Helmut Wellauer, a world-renowned conductor whose intermission refreshment comes one night with a little something extra in it--cyanide. For Guido Brunetti, vice-commissario of police and genius detective, finding a suspect isn't a problem; narrowing the large and unconventional group of enemies down to one is. As the suave and pithy Brunetti pieces together clues, a shocking picture of depravity and revenge emerges, leaving him torn between what is and what should be right--and questioning what the law can do, and what needs to be done.
July 7: Enter a Murderer by Ngaio Marsh
ISBN: 9781934609859
Publication Date: 2012-09-16
Ngaio Marsh was, among other things, a well-respected theatrical producer (having started out as an actress), and her passion for and knowledge of the theater was displayed in many of Alleyn’s adventures. In Enter a Murderer, the Inspector has been invited to an opening night, a new play in which two characters quarrel and then struggle for a gun, with predictably sad results. Even sadder, the gun was not, in fact, loaded with blanks.
August 4: The Man in the Queue by Robert Barnard (Introduction by); Joséphine Tey
ISBN: 9780684815022
Publication Date: 1995-11-29
A long line had formed for the standing-room-only section of the Woffington Theatre. London’s favorite musical comedy of the past two years was finishing its run at the end of the week. Suddenly, the line began to move, forming a wedge before the open doors as hopeful theatergoers nudged their way forward. But one man, his head sunk down upon his chest, slowly sank to his knees and then, still more slowly, keeled over on his face. Thinking he had fainted, a spectator moved to help, but recoiled in horror from what lay before him: the man in the queue had a small silver dagger neatly plunged into his back. With the wit and guile that have made Inspector Grant a favorite of mystery fans, the inspector sets about discovering just how a murder occurred among so many witnesses, none of whom saw a thing.
September 1: Fire and Ice by Dana Stabenow
ISBN: 9780525944386
Publication Date: 1998-10-01
Alaska State Trooper Liam Campbell, demoted and reassigned to the remote Bush town of Newenham, literally steps off the plane into a murder scene. Dealing with death is never simple, but when the woman leaning over the body proves to be Liam's old flame, it’s evident that his new job is about to become much more complicated. From Newenham’s cast of eccentric—and sometimes hair-trigger—residents, to the intricate ballet of fishing boats rushing against time to net their limit, Stabenow captures the contagious spirit of melancholy madness that pervades America’s last frontier.
Cover Her Face by P. D. James
Call Number: MYSTERY James
ISBN: 9780743219570
Publication Date: 2001-05-08
Sally Jupp was a sly and sensuous young woman who used her body and her brains to make her way up the social ladder. Now she lies across her bed with dark bruises from a strangler's fingers forever marring her lily-white throat. Someone has decided that the wages of sin should be death...and it is up to Chief Inspector Adam Dalgliesh to find who that someone is.
November 3: Sacred and Profane by Faye Kellerman
Call Number: MYSTERY Kellerman
ISBN: 9780061999253
Publication Date: 2011-01-25
Los Angeles Police Detective Peter Decker had grown very close to Rina's young sons, Sammy and Jake, as he had to their mother, and he looked forward to spending a day of his vacation camping with the boys. A nice reprieve from the grueling work of a homicide cop - until Sammy stumbles upon a gruesome sight. Two human skeletons, charred beyond recognition, are identified by a forensic dentist as teenage girls - and for Decker, the father of a 16-year-old daughter, vacation time is over. Throwing himself professionally and emotionally into the murder case, he launches a very personal investigation: a quest that pulls him deep into the crack dens of Hollywood Boulevard and painfully close to the children of the streets and a nightmare world he must make his own.
December 1: Death of a Toy Soldier by Barbara Early
ISBN: 9781683312826
Publication Date: 2016
Liz McCall grew up in a playful winter wonderland but it was never her dream to manage her father's vintage toyshop. However, after he sank his entire police pension into the business, someone needed to help him turn his dreams into reality―and keep him from sneaking off to patrol the not-so-mean streets of East Aurora, NY. The mood goes from nice to naughty when a nervous man, who was trying to have his antique toys appraised, is found in the shop with a lawn dart through his chest. Suddenly, Liz's business plan is plunged into deep freeze, while she and her father find themselves toying with a cold-blooded killer who's playing for keeps. Now, it looks like Christmas might be cancelled for the neighborhood kids if Liz can't wrap up the case

January 7: The Cuckoo's Calling by Robert Galbraith
Call Number: MYSTERY Galbraith
ISBN: 9780316206846
Publication Date: 2013-04-30
After losing his leg to a land mine in Afghanistan, Cormoran Strike is barely scraping by as a private investigator. Strike is down to one client, and creditors are calling. He has also just broken up with his longtime girlfriend and is living in his office. Then John Bristow walks through his door with an amazing story: His sister, thelegendary supermodel Lula Landry, known to her friends as the Cuckoo, famously fell to her death a few months earlier. The police ruled it a suicide, but John refuses to believe that. The case plunges Strike into the world of multimillionaire beauties, rock-star boyfriends, and desperate designers, and it introduces him to every variety of pleasure, enticement, seduction, and delusion known to man
February 4: No Rest for the Dead by Andrew Gulli; David Baldacci (Intro and Notes by); Sandra Brown; Jeffery Deaver; Lisa Scottoline; R. L. Stine
Call Number: FICTION No
ISBN: 9781451607376
Publication Date: 2011-07-05
When Christopher Thomas, a ruthless curator at San Francisco’s McFall Art Museum, is murdered and his decaying body is found in an iron maiden in a Berlin museum, his wife, Rosemary, is the primary suspect, and she is tried, convicted, and executed. Ten years later, Jon Nunn, the detective who cracked the case, is convinced that the wrong person was put to death. In the years since the case was closed, he’s discovered a web of deceit and betrayal surrounding the Thomases that could implicate any number of people in the crime. In this innovative storytelling approach, twenty-five bestselling writers bring their distinctive voice to a chapter of the narrative, building the tension to a shocking, explosive finale.
March 4: Maisie Dobbs by Jacqueline Winspear
Call Number: MYSTERY Winspear
ISBN: 9781569473306
Publication Date: 2003-07-01
Maisie Dobbs got her start as a maid in an aristocratic London household when she was thirteen. Her employer, suffragette Lady Rowan Compton, soon became her patron, taking the remarkably bright youngster under her wing. Lady Rowan's friend, Maurice Blanche, often retained as an investigator by the European elite, recognized Maisie’s intuitive gifts and helped her earn admission to the prestigious Girton College in Cambridge, where Maisie planned to complete her education. The outbreak of war changed everything. Maisie trained as a nurse, then left for France to serve at the Front, where she found—and lost—an important part of herself. Ten years after the Armistice, in the spring of 1929, Maisie sets out on her own as a private investigator, one who has learned that coincidences are meaningful, and truth elusive.
April 1: Rules of Prey by John Sandford
ISBN: 9780399134654
Publication Date: 1989-07-24
Lieutenant Lucas Davenport is determined to track down a diabolically clever serial killer who leads a double life, carefully picks out his female victims, and taunts the police with notes signed "Maddog."
May 6: A Man lay Dead by Ngaio Marsh
ISBN: 9781405532068
This classic from the Golden Age of British mystery opens during a country-house party between the two world wars—servants bustling, gin flowing, the gentlemen in dinner jackets, the ladies all slink and smolder. Even more delicious: The host, Sir Hubert Handesley, has invented a new and especially exciting version of that beloved parlor entertainment, The Murder Game. It’s the first Roderick Alleyn book in the series.
June 3: Open and Shut by David Rosenfelt
Call Number: MYSTERY Rosenfelt
ISBN: 9780892967483
Publication Date: 2002-05-09
Whether dueling with new forensics or the local old boys' network, irreverent defense attorney Andy Carpenter always leaves them awed with his biting wit and winning fourth-quarter game plan. But Andy prefers the company of his best friend, Tara, to the people he encounters in the courtroom. Tara, a golden retriever, is clearly smarter than half the lawyers who clog the courts of Passaic County. However, just as it seems Andy has everything figured out, his dad, New Jersey's legendary ex-D.A., drops dead in front of him at a game in Yankee Stadium. The shocks pile on as he discovers his dad left him with two unexpected legacies: a fortune of $22 million that Andy never knew existed . . . and a murder case with enough racial tinder to burn down City Hall.
July 1: A Time to Kill by John Grisham
Call Number: SUSPENSE Grisham
ISBN: 9780804121156
Publication Date: 2013-09-24
The life of a ten-year-old black girl is shattered by two drunken and remorseless white men. The mostly white town of Clanton in Ford County, Mississippi, reacts with shock and horror at the inhuman crime—until the girl’s father acquires an assault rifle and takes justice into his own hands.
For ten days, as burning crosses and the crack of sniper fire spread through the streets of Clanton, the nation sits spellbound as defense attorney Jake Brigance struggles to save his client’s life—and then his own.
August 5: Compromising Positions by Susan Isaacs
ISBN: 9781585470860
Publication Date: 2001-05-01
Though she can’t admit it to herself, Judith Singer is bored. Each morning she kisses her husband on his way to work, and each evening she fixes him dinner. Three nights a week, they make tepid love. Life in their Long Island split-level is a ho-hum affair, but when a local dentist is murdered in his office, Judith’s curiosity gets the better of her. Judith soon learns that Dr. Fleckstein’s private life wasn’t as immaculate as his smile, and anyone in town might be the murderer. And when her neighbor becomes the chief suspect, Judith must find the real killer or risk losing her only friend in all of suburbia.
September 2: The Mysterious Mr. Quin by Agatha Christie
Call Number: MYSTERY Christie
ISBN: 9780553350432
Publication Date: 1976-03-01
A mysterious stranger appears at a New Year's Eve party, becoming the enigmatic sleuthing sidekick to the snobbish Mr Satterthwaite! So far, it had been a typical New Year's Eve house party. But Mr Satterthwaite -- a keen observer of human nature -- sensed that the real drama of the evening was yet to unfold. So it proved when a mysterious stranger arrived after midnight. Who was this Mr Quin? And why did his presence have such a pronounced effect on Eleanor Portal, the woman with the dyed-black hair? Each chapter is a separate mystery where Mr. Quin appears and disappears almost magically at the most inopportune times.
October 7: In the Blood by Steve Robinson
ISBN: 9781477818527
Publication Date: 2014-03-18
Two hundred years ago a loyalist family fled to England to escape the American War of Independence and seemingly vanished into thin air. American genealogist Jefferson Tayte is hired to find out what happened, but it soon becomes apparent that a calculated killer is out to stop him.
In the Blood combines a centuries-old mystery with a present-day thriller that brings two people from opposite sides of the Atlantic together to uncover a series of carefully hidden crimes. Tayte's research centers around the tragic life of a young Cornish girl, a writing box, and the discovery of a dark secret that he believes will lead him to the family he is looking for. Trouble is, someone else is looking for the same answers and will stop at nothing to find them. In the Blood is the first book in the Jefferson Tayte mystery series.
November 4: Monkeewrench by P. J. Tracy
ISBN: 9780399149788
Publication Date: 2003-04-14
Haunted by a series of horrifying and violent episodes in their past, Grace McBride and the oddball crew of her software company, Monkeewrench, create a computer game where the killer is always caught, where the good guys always win. But their game becomes a nightmare when someone starts duplicating the fictional murders in real life, down to the last detail. By the time the police realize what's happening, three people are dead, and with 17 more murder scenarios available online, there are 17 more potential victims. While the authorities scramble to find the killer in a city paralyzed by fear, the Monkeewrench staff are playing their own game, analyzing victim profiles in a frantic attempt to discover the murderer's next target.
December 2: A Share in Death by Deborah Crombie
Call Number: MYSTERY Crombie
ISBN: 9780684195278
Publication Date: 1993-02-17
A week's holiday in a luxurious Yorkshire time-share is just what Scotland Yard's Superintendent Duncan Kincaid needs. But the discovery of a body floating in the whirlpool bath ends Kincaid's vacation before it's begun. One of his new acquaintances at Followdale House is dead; another is a killer. Despite a distinct lack of cooperation from the local constabulary, Kincaid's keen sense of duty won't allow him to ignore the heinous crime, impelling him to send for his enthusiastic young assistant, Sergeant Gemma James.

January 2: Big Sky by Kate Atkinson
Call Number: MYSTERY Atkinson
ISBN: 9780316523097
Publication Date: 2019-06-25
Jackson Brodie has relocated to a quiet seaside village, in the occasional company of his recalcitrant teenage son and an aging Labrador, both at the discretion of his ex-partner Julia. It's picturesque, but there's something darker lurking behind the scenes. Jackson's current job, gathering proof of an unfaithful husband for his suspicious wife, is fairly standard-issue, but a chance encounter with a desperate man on a crumbling cliff leads him into a sinister network - and back across the path of his old friend Reggie.
February 6: The Snow Child by Eowyn Ivey
ISBN: 0316175676
Publication Date: 2012-02-01
Alaska, 1920: a brutal place to homestead, and especially tough for recent arrivals Jack and Mabel. Childless, they are drifting apart--he breaking under the weight of the work of the farm; she crumbling from loneliness and despair. In a moment of levity during the season's first snowfall, they build a child out of snow. The next morning the snow child is gone--but they glimpse a young, blonde-haired girl running through the trees.

This little girl, who calls herself Faina, seems to be a child of the woods. She hunts with a red fox at her side, skims lightly across the snow, and somehow survives alone in the Alaskan wilderness. As Jack and Mabel struggle to understand this child who could have stepped from the pages of a fairy tale, they come to love her as their own daughter. But in this beautiful, violent place things are rarely as they appear, and what they eventually learn about Faina will transform all of them.
March 5: Live Bait by P. J. Tracy
Call Number: MYSTERY Tracy
ISBN: 9780399151477
Publication Date: 2004-05-03
Minneapolis detectives Leo Magozzi and Gino Rolseth are bored - ever since they solved the Monkeewrench case, the Twin Cities have been in a murder-free dry spell, as people no longer seem interested in killing one another. But with two brutal homicides taking place in one awful night, the crime drought ends - not with a trickle, but with an eventual torrent. Who would kill Morey Gilbert, a man without an enemy, a man who might as well have been a saint? His tiny, cranky little wife, Lily, is no help, and may even be a suspect; his estranged son, Jack, an infamous ambulance-chasing lawyer, has his own enemies; and his son-in-law, former cop Marty Pullman, is so depressed over his wife's death a year ago that he's ready to kill himself, but not Morey. The number of victims - all elderly - grows, and the city is fearful once again." The detectives' investigation threatens to uncover a series of horrendous secrets, some buried within the heart of the police department itself, blurring the lines between heroes and villains. Grace MacBride's cold-case-solving software may find the missing link - but at a terrible price.
April 2: The Widows of Malabar Hill by Sujata Massey
ISBN: 1616959762
Publication Date: 2018-11-20
Perveen Mistry, the daughter of a respected Zoroastrian family, has just joined her father's law firm, becoming one of the first female lawyers in India. Armed with a legal education from Oxford, Perveen also has a tragic personal history that makes women's legal rights especially important to her.

Mistry Law has been appointed to execute the will of Mr. Omar Farid, a wealthy Muslim mill owner who has left three widows behind. But as Perveen examines the paperwork, she notices something strange: all three of the wives have signed over their full inheritance to a charity. What will they live on? Perveen is suspicious, especially since one of the widows has signed her form with an X—meaning she probably couldn't even read the document. The Farid widows live in full purdah—in strict seclusion, never leaving the women's quarters or speaking to any men. Are they being taken advantage of by an unscrupulous guardian? Perveen tries to investigate, and realizes her instincts were correct when tensions escalate to murder. Now it is her responsibility to figure out what really happened on Malabar Hill, and to ensure that no innocent women or children are in further danger.

Inspired in part by the woman who made history as India's first female attorney, The Widows of Malabar Hill is a richly wrought story of multicultural 1920s Bombay as well as the debut of a sharp new sleuth.
May 7: Sweet Little Lies by Caz Frear
ISBN: 0062823191
Publication Date: 2018-08-14
Twenty-six-year-old Cat Kinsella overcame a troubled childhood to become a Detective Constable with the Metropolitan Police Force, but she’s never been able to banish these ghosts. When she’s called to the scene of a murder in Islington, not far from the pub her estranged father still runs, she discovers that Alice Lapaine, a young housewife who didn’t get out much, has been found strangled.

Cat and her team immediately suspect Alice’s husband, until she receives a mysterious phone call that links the victim to Maryanne Doyle, a teenage girl who went missing in Ireland eighteen years earlier. The call raises uneasy memories for Cat—her family met Maryanne while on holiday, right before she vanished. Though she was only a child, Cat knew that her charming but dissolute father wasn’t telling the truth when he denied knowing anything about Maryanne or her disappearance. Did her father do something to the teenage girl all those years ago? Could he have harmed Alice now? And how can you trust a liar even if he might be telling the truth?

Determined to close the two cases, Cat rushes headlong into the investigation, crossing ethical lines and trampling professional codes. But in looking into the past, she might not like what she finds. . . .
June 4: Birds of a Feather by Jacqueline Winspear
Call Number: MYSTERY Winspear
ISBN: 9781569473689
Publication Date: 2004-06-01
acqueline Winspear’s marvelous debut, Maisie Dobbs, won her fans from around the world and raised her intuitive, intelligent, and resourceful heroine to the ranks of literature’s favorite sleuths. Birds of a Feather, its follow-up, finds psychologist and private investigator Maisie Dobbs on another dangerously intriguing adventure in London “between the wars.” It is the spring of 1930, and Maisie has been hired to find a runaway heiress. But what seems a simple case at the outset soon becomes increasingly complicated when three of the heiress’s old friends are found dead. Is there a connection between the woman’s mysterious disappearance and the murders? Who would want to kill three seemingly respectable young women? As Maisie investigates, she discovers that the answers lie in the unforgettable agony of the Great War.
July 2: Mr. Churchill's Secretary by Susan Elia MacNeal
Call Number: MYSTERY MacNeal
ISBN: 9780553593617
Publication Date: 2012-04-03
Maggie Hope graduated at the top of her college class and has all the skills of the finest minds in British intelligence, but her gender qualifies her only to be the newest typist at No. 10 Downing Street. Her ispirit and remarkable gifts for codebreaking, though, rival those of even the highest men in government, and Maggie finds that working for the prime minister affords her a level of clearance she could never have imagined. In troubled, deadly times, access to the War Rooms also exposes Maggie to the machinations of a menacing faction determined to do whatever it takes to change the course of history. Ensnared in a web of spies, murder, and intrigue, Maggie must work quickly to balance her duty to King and Country with her chances for survival. When she unravels a mystery that points toward her own family’s hidden secrets, she’ll discover that her quick wits are all that stand between an assassin’s murderous plan and Churchill.
August 6: Paper Son by S. J. Rozan
ISBN: 164313129X
Publication Date: 2019-07-02
The Most Southern Place on Earth: that’s what they call the Mississippi Delta. It’s not a place Lydia Chin, an American-born Chinese private detective from Chinatown, NYC, ever thought she’d have reason to go. But when her mother tells her a cousin Lydia didn’t know she had is in jail in Clarksdale, Mississippi—and that Lydia has to rush down south and get him out—Lydia finds herself rolling down Highway 61 with Bill Smith, her partner, behind the wheel.
From the river levees to the refinement of Oxford, from old cotton gins to new computer scams, Lydia soon finds that nothing in Mississippi is as she expected it to be. Including her cousin’s legal troubles—or possibly even his innocence. Can she uncover the truth in a place more foreign to her than any she’s ever seen?
September 3: A Better Man by Louise Penny
Call Number: MYSTERY Penny
ISBN: 9781250066213
Publication Date: 2019-08-27
It's Gamache's first day back as head of the homicide department, a job he temporarily shares with his previous second-in-command, Jean-Guy Beauvoir. Flood waters are rising across the province. In the middle of the turmoil a father approaches Gamache, pleading for help in finding his daughter. As crisis piles upon crisis, Gamache tries to hold off the encroaching chaos, and realizes the search for Vivienne Godin should be abandoned. But with a daughter of his own, he finds himself developing a profound, and perhaps unwise, empathy for her distraught father.
October 1: Paradox by Catherine Coulter
Call Number: SUSPENSE Coulter
ISBN: 9781501138126
Publication Date: 2018-07-31
When an escaped mental patient fails to kidnap five-year-old Sean Savich, agents Sherlock and Savich know they’re in his crosshairs and must find him before he continues with his kill list. Chief Ty Christie of Willicott, Maryland, witnesses a murder at dawn from the deck of her lake cottage. When dragging the lake, the divers find not only find the murder victim but also dozens of bones. Working together with Chief Christie, Savich and Sherlock soon discover a frightening connection between the bones and the escaped psychopath.
November 5: Old Bones by Douglas Preston; Lincoln Child
Call Number: SUSPENSE Preston
ISBN: 9781538747223
Publication Date: 2019-08-20
Nora Kelly, a young but successful curator with a series of important excavations already under her belt, is approached by the handsome Historian, Guy Porter, to lead an expedition unlike any other. Guy tells his story--one involving the ill-fated Donner Party, who became permanently lodged in the American consciousness in the winter of 1847, when the first skeletonized survivors of the party stumbled out of the California mountains, replete with tales of courage, resourcefulness, bad luck, murder, barbarism--and, finally, starvation and cannibalism. Captivated by the Donner Party, Nora agrees and they venture into the Sierra Nevada in search of the camp. Quickly, they learn that the discovery of the missing starvation camp is just the tip of the iceberg--and that the real truth behind those long-dead pioneers is not only far more complex and surprising than they could have imagined...but it is one that puts them both in mortal danger from a very real, present-day threat in which the search for the lost party, and its fabled fortune in gold, are merely means to a horrifying end.
December 3: They All Fall Down by Rachel Howzell Hall
ISBN: 0765398141
Publication Date: 2019-04-09
t was supposed to be the trip of a lifetime.
Delighted by a surprise invitation, Miriam Macy sails off to a luxurious private island off the coast of Mexico with six other strangers. Surrounded by miles of open water in the gloriously green Sea of Cortez, Miriam is soon shocked to discover that she and the rest of her companions have been brought to the remote island under false pretenses—and all seven strangers harbor a secret.
Danger lurks in the lush forest and in the halls and bedrooms of the lonely mansion. Sporadic cell-phone coverage and miles of ocean keeps the group trapped in paradise. And strange accidents stir suspicions, as one by one . . .
They all fall down
For fans of thrilling contemporary suspense, Rachel Howzell Hall’s brilliant stand-alone novel brings seven sinners to a private island for a reckoning that will leave you breathless.

January 3: A Cold Day for Murder by Dana Stabenow
ISBN: 9781590588734
Publication Date: 2011-02-01
It’s December in the Park, and a ranger is missing. It’s no great loss to the rest of the Park rats, they figure he’s stumbled into a snowbank and will re-emerge come breakup, just in time for the ground to thaw and them to bury him. But when the man sent to look for him also disappears, Kate Shugak, ex-investigator for the Anchorage D.A. and Park homesteader, is sent in search of them both.
First in the Kate Shugak series.
February 7: Cold Harbour by Jack Higgins
Call Number: SUSPENSE Higgins
ISBN: 0425193209
Publication Date: 2003-12-02
May 1944. The eve of the Allied invasion of Europe. When American OSS agent Craig Osbourne is taken aboard a German E-boat off the coast of Brittany, he thinks that his war – and possibly his life – are over. But the Lili Marlene is actually operated by the Royal Navy out of an ultrasecret base on the English coast. And it will soon be returning Osbourne – a highly trained assassin – to occupied France. There, he will help the beautiful twin sister of a dead British agent infiltrate a German High Command briefing on the defense of the Atlantic Wall. Nothing will prevent the coming Allied assault – but its success may well depend on the outcome of this mission…
March 7: Homicide in Hardcover by Kate Carlisle
ISBN: 1597229911
Publication Date: 2009-06-17
Brooklyn Wainwright is a skilled surgeon. Sure, her patients might smell likemold and have spines made of leather, but no ailing book is going to die on her watch. The same can't be said of Abraham Karastovsky, Brooklyn's friend and former employer.

On the eve of a celebration for his latest book restoration, Brooklyn finds her mentor lying in a poolof his own blood. With his final breath Abraham leaves Brooklyn with acryptic message, "Remember the Devil," and gives her a priceless--andsupposedly cursed--copy of Goethe's Faust for safe-keeping. Brooklyn suddenly finds herself accused of murder and theft, thanks toDerek Stone, the humorless--and annoyingly attractive--British securityofficer who found her kneeling over the body. Now she has to read theclues left behind by her mentor if she is going to restore justice...
April 4: Lost Light by Michael Connelly
Call Number: MYSTERY Connelly
ISBN: 9780316154604
Publication Date: 2003-04-01
The vision has haunted him for four years--a young woman lying crumpled in death, her hand outstretched in silent supplication. Harry Bosch was taken off the Angella Benton murder case when the production assistant's death was linked with the violent theft of two million dollars from a movie set. Both files were never closed. Now retired from the L.A.P.D., Bosch is determined to find justice for Angella. Without a badge to open doors and strike fear into the guilty, he's on his own. And even in the face of an opponent more powerful and ruthless than any he's ever encountered, Bosch is not backing down.
May 2: The Dry by Jane Harper
Call Number: MYSTERY Harper
ISBN: 9781250105608
Publication Date: 2017-01-10
A small town hides big secrets in The Dry, an atmospheric, page-turning debut mystery by award-winning author Jane Harper. After getting a note demanding his presence, Federal Agent Aaron Falk arrives in his hometown for the first time in decades to attend the funeral of his best friend, Luke. Twenty years ago when Falk was accused of murder, Luke was his alibi. Falk and his father fled under a cloud of suspicion, saved from prosecution only because of Luke's steadfast claim that the boys had been together at the time of the crime. But now more than one person knows they didn't tell the truth back then, and Luke is dead. Amid the worst drought in a century, Falk and the local detective question what really happened to Luke. As Falk reluctantly investigates to see if there's more to Luke's death than there seems to be, long-buried mysteries resurface, as do the lies that have haunted them. And Falk will find that small towns have always hidden big secrets."-- Provided by publisher.
June 6: Aunt Bessie Assumes by Diana Xarissa
ISBN: 1499366027
Publication Date: 2014-05-22
Aunt Bessie assumes that she'll have the beach all to herself on a cold, wet, and windy March morning just after sunrise, then she stumbles (almost literally) over a dead body. Elizabeth (Bessie) Cubbon, aged somewhere between free bus pass (60) and telegram from the Queen (100), has lived her entire adult life in a small cottage on Laxey beach. For most of those years, she's been in the habit of taking a brisk morning walk along the beach. Dead men have never been part of the scenery before. Aunt Bessie assumes that the dead man died of natural causes, then the police find the knife in his chest. Try as she might, Bessie just can't find anything to like about the young widow that she provides tea and sympathy to in the immediate aftermath of finding the body. There isn't much to like about the rest of the victim's family either. Aunt Bessie assumes that the police will have the case wrapped up in no time at all, then she finds a second body. Can Bessie and her friends find the killer before she ends up as the next victim?
July 11: The Murder Room by P. D. James
Call Number: MYSTERY James
ISBN: 9781400041411
Publication Date: 2003-11-18
Commander Adam Dalgliesh is already acquainted with the Dupayne--a museum dedicated to the interwar years, with a room celebrating the most notorious murders of that time--when he is called to investigate the killing of one of the family trustees. He soon discovers that the victim was seeking to close the museum against the wishes of the fellow trustees and the Dupayne's devoted staff. Everyone, it seems, has something to gain from the crime. When it becomes clear that the murderer has been inspired by the real-life crimes from the murder room--and is preparing to kill again--Dalgliesh knows that to solve this case he has to get into the mind of a ruthless killer.
August 1: Dirty Work by Stuart Woods
Call Number: SUSPENSE Woods
ISBN: 9780399149825
Publication Date: 2003-04-14
Hired to prove infidelity in an heiress’s marriage, Stone Barrington goes undercover. But the work turns dirty—and catastrophic—when the errant husband is found dead and the other woman disappears without a trace. Now, Stone must clear his own good name and find a killer hiding among the glitterati of New York’s high society.
September 5: Seven Dials by Anne Perry
Call Number: MYSTERY Perry
ISBN: 9780345440075
Publication Date: 2003-02-04
Thomas Pitt, mainstay of Her Majesty’s Special Branch, is summoned to Connaught Square mansion, where the body of a junior diplomat lies huddled in a wheelbarrow. Nearby stands the tenant of the house, the beautiful, notorious Egyptian woman Ayesha Zakhari, who falls under the shadow of suspicion. Pitt’s orders are to protect—at all costs—the good name of the third person in the garden: senior cabinet minister Saville Ryerson. The distinguished public servant, whispered to be Ayesha’s lover, insists that she is as innocent as Pitt himself. Pitt’s journey to uncover the truth takes him from Egyptian cotton fields to the insidious London slum called Seven Dials—and ultimately to a packed London courtroom in which shocking secrets will at last be revealed.
October 3: Kingdom of the Blind by Louise Penny
Call Number: MYSTERY Penny
ISBN: 9781250066206
Publication Date: 2018-11-27
When a peculiar letter arrives inviting Armand Gamache to an abandoned farmhouse, the former head of the Sûreté du Québec discovers that a complete stranger has named him one of the executors of her will. Still on suspension, and frankly curious, Gamache accepts and soon learns that the other two executors are Myrna Landers, the bookseller from Three Pines, and a young builder. None of them had ever met the elderly woman. The will is so odd and includes bequests that are so wildly unlikely that Gamache and the others suspect the woman must have been delusional. But what if, Gamache begins to ask himself, she was perfectly sane? When a body is found, the terms of the bizarre will suddenly seem less peculiar and far more menacing. But it isn't the only menace Gamache is facing. The investigation into what happened six months ago--the events that led to his suspension--has dragged on, into the dead of winter. And while most of the opioids he allowed to slip through his hands, in order to bring down the cartels, have been retrieved, there is one devastating exception. Enough narcotic to kill thousands has disappeared into inner city Montreal. With the deadly drug about to hit the streets, Gamache races for answers. As he uses increasingly audacious, even desperate, measures to retrieve the drug, Armand Gamache begins to see his own blind spots. And the terrible things hiding there.
November 7: Ragtime in Simla by Barbara Cleverly
ISBN: 0440242231
Publication Date: 2004-10-26
Simla 1922. While the rest of India bakes in the hot season, up in the pine-scented coolness of the Himalayan hills the English have recreated a vision of home. Here are half-timbered houses, amateur theatricals, gymkhanas and a glittering vice-regal court for the socialites. The summer capital of the British Raj is fizzing with the energy of the jazz age. It is toward this country that detective Joe Sandilands is heading as the guest of the governor of Bengal. But when Joe's travelling companion, a Russian opera singer, is shot dead at his side on the road to Simla, he finds himself plunged into a murder investigation. As Joe begins to unravel the mystery which has its roots in the aftermath of the First World War, he discovers that behind the sparkling facade of Simla lies a trail of murder, vice and blackmail.
December 5: The Bar Harbor Retirement Home for Famous Writers (and Their Muses) by Terri-Lynne DeFino
ISBN: 9780062742674
Publication Date: 2018-06-12
lfonse Carducci was a literary giant who lived his life to excess—lovers, alcohol, parties, and literary rivalries. But now he's come to the Bar Harbor Home for the Elderly to spend the remainder of his days among kindred spirits: the publishing industry's nearly gone but never forgotten greats. Only now, at the end of his life, does he comprehend the price of appeasing every desire, and the consequences of forsaking love to pursue greatness. For Alfonse has an unshakeable case of writer's block that distresses him much more than his precarious health.

Set on the water in one of New England's most beautiful locales, the Bar Harbor Home was established specifically for elderly writers needing a place to live out their golden years—or final days—in understated luxury and surrounded by congenial literary company. A faithful staff of nurses and orderlies surround the writers, and are drawn into their orbit, as they are forced to reckon with their own life stories. Among them are Cecibel Bringer, a young woman who knows first-hand the cost of chasing excess. A terrible accident destroyed her face and her sister in a split-second decision that Cecibel can never forgive, though she has tried to forget. Living quietly as an orderly, refusing to risk again the cost of love, Cecibel never anticipated the impact of meeting her favorite writer, Alfonse Carducci—or the effect he would have on her existence. In Cecibel, Alfonse finds a muse who returns him to the passion he thought he lost. As the words flow from him, weaving a tale taken up by the other residents of the Pen, Cecibel is reawakened to the idea of love and forgiveness.

As the edges between story and reality blur, a world within a world is created. It’s a place where the old are made young, the damaged are made whole, and anything is possible….

This group of whodunit fans meets on the first Thursday each month at noon. Click on the Home button to get back to the main menu.

January 4 Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie

February 1 The Art Forger by Barbara Shapiro

March 1 The Indian Sign: A Milan Jacovich Mystery by Les Roberts

April 5 The Enemy: A Jack Reacher Novel by Lee Child

May 3 Rumpole of the Bailey by John Mortimer

June 7 Murder at Hatfield House by Amanda Carmack

July 5 Sherlock Holmes and the Ice Palace Murders by Larry Millett

August 2 A Morbid Taste for Bones: The Chronicles of Brother Cadfael by Ellis Peters

September 6 Glass Houses: A Gamache Novel by Louise Penny

October 4 The House at Sea's End: A Ruth Galloway Mystery by Elly Griffiths

November 1 Blood From a Stone: AGuido Brunetti Mystery by Donna Leon

December 6 The Wisdom of Father Brown by G.K. Chesterton

January 5 The Darling Dahlias & the Cucumber Tree by Susan Wittig Albert

February 2 The Lighthouse by P.D. James

March 2 Department Thirty by David Kent

April 6 Peril at End House by Agatha Christie

May 4 The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafón

June 1 Death of a Ghost by Margery Allingham

July 6 The Big Bow Mystery by Israel Zangwill

August 3 Vintage Murder by Ngaio Marsh

September 7 Maigret and the Yellow Dog by Georges Simenon

October 5 The Nature of the Beast by Louise Penny

November 2 The Trespasser by Tana French

December 7 Kissing Christmas Goodbye by M.C. Beaton

May 7, 2015 Unsuitable Job for a Woman by P.D. James

June 4, 2015 Whose Body? by Dorothy Sayers

July 2, 2015 Spider Woman's Daughter by Anne Hillerman

August 6, 2015 The Caves of Steel by Isaac Asimov

September 3, 2015 Unwilling Accomplice by Charles Todd

October 1, 2015 How the Light Gets In by Louise Penny

November 5, 2015 The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie by Alan Bradley

December 3, 2015 The Sign of the Book by John Dunning

January 7, 2016 The Killings at Badger's Drift by Caroline Graham

February 4, 2016 Darkest Fear by Harlan Coben

March 3, 2016 Wicked Uncle by Patricia Wentworth

April 7, 2016 A Broken Vessel by Kate Ross

June 9 Whom the Gods Love by Kate Ross

July 7 New Orleans Mourning by Julie Smith

August 4 The Long Way Home by Louise Penny

September 1 The Mystery of Swordfish Reef by Arthur Upfield

October 6 The Deep Blue Good-by by John D. MacDonald

November 3 A Vineyard Killing by Philip R. Craig

December 1 The Coroner's Lunch by Colin Cotterill