Amateur Sleuths

US Army Lieutenant Billy Boyle, an ex-cop who serves as detective for General Ike, is sent to Caserta, Italy, to investigate the murders of two American officers stationed there. The MOs are completely different, and it seems like the officers had no connection to each other, but one frightening fact links the murders. Each body was discovered with a single playing card: the lieutenant’s with the ten of hearts; the captain’s, the jack of hearts. The message seems clear—if the murderer isn’t apprehended, the higher ranks will be next.

Actor, writer and director Mahesh Dattani is the first playwright in English to be awarded the Sahitya Akademi Award by India’s National Academy of Letters. Included here are all three of his plays featuring Uma Rao – PhD student, daughter-in-law of Bangalore's deputy commissioner of police, and wife of the superintendent. Priyanga Burford (neé Elan), stars as the intrepid sleuth, with full casts including Shiv Grewal, Saeed Jaffrey, Ajay Chhabra, Amerjit Deu and Nitin Chandra Ganatra.

It's been years since Zoe last saw them – since they graduated, drifted apart, and lost touch. Years since Zoe ended things with Dan because the memories were too painful to bear. Years since that night – the night an unexpected death shattered their close-knit group of friends. Now, Zoe is invited to Scotland for a wedding – a grand affair at a manor house on a remote island. Apprehensive about the reunion, she hopes the long drive with Lily will help ease her nerves. But things are far from simple.

Der internationale Nr.-1-Bestseller und Netflix-Erfolg – endlich auf Deutsch! New York 1998. Während der Thanksgiving-Parade verschwindet die 3-jährige Kiera Templeton. Die Polizei findet keine Spur und stellt die Ermittlungen schließlich ein. Nur die Journalistin Miren Triggs sucht unermüdlich weiter, als alle anderen längst das Interesse an der Geschichte verloren haben. Fünf Jahre später, an Kieras 8. Geburtstag, taucht ein Video auf. Erst ist nur Schneegestöber zu sehen, dann erkennt man ein Zimmer.

On board the world’s finest luxury cruise ship, the days are filled with sunshine, cocktails, and incredible new places to explore. Unless you are employed as the ship’s detective, that is. That job falls to a lady called Patricia Fisher, a whip-smart sleuth whose special skills include attracting trouble, getting shot at, and running away screaming.

In The Hunter's Lodge Case, Agatha Christie delivers a compelling mystery featuring her famous detective, Hercule Poirot. Called to a remote countryside lodge to investigate a chilling murder, Poirot finds himself unraveling a tangled web of lies, deceit, and hidden motives. As he navigates a maze of secrets, the quaint lodge reveals itself as anything but peaceful, with each clue bringing him closer to a surprising truth.

Kit Pelham is a professional fan, interviewer, host of the podcast The First Cult is the Deepest, and occasional obituary writer. Except this time the obituary is for her friend, maverick podcaster Wolf Tyler, who is murdered in his shed during a live broadcast, moments before revealing a huge secret about the cult TV show Vixens from the Void. Kit and her group of friends and fellow superfans soon realise Wolf had discovered something about the disappearance of Lily Sparkes, an extra on Vixens from the Void, back in 1986. And it was a secret worth killing for.

The Yarn Studio’s Seaside Knitters have their hands full designing new classes for vacationers, as well as testing each other’s originality by creating a single blanket together. Birdie’s teenage granddaughter is also visiting for the season. Meanwhile, the Lazy Lobster and Soup Café’s local fare is gaining newfound attention with the addition of a well-known Boston chef. It’s sure to be another beautiful, busy time in their tight-knit town… Until Birdie spots a huge blaze from her balcony one evening, frighteningly close to knitter Cass’s lobster business.

After a gruelling stint as the most powerful woman in the world, Angela can finally put her feet up. With her quantum-chemist husband Achim, her bodyguard Mike and their new pug Putin, she has retired to the idyllic north German village of Kleinfreudenstadt-on-Dumpfsee. But it isn’t easy to settle into country life. Baking and hiking just aren’t as exciting as global financial meltdowns or deranged American presidents. And Angela’s fellow villagers all seem to want something, from her xenophobic AfD-voting namesake to the local aristocrat desperate to bury her family’s Nazi past.

I am accused of the worst of crimes – murdering my baby – and I have hours before this passenger ferry docks in Spain to find him, alive. Someone knows about my difficult past and darkest secrets, and now I think they’ve taken my baby. But who would do this to me and why? I know the answer. Or least I think I do…The police want to know why I have fled my home and husband. How do I tell them that I had a breakdown after my first baby died? That today is the anniversary of his death? That my husband is planning on having me sectioned? Despite what my husband says, I’m not ill. Am I?

When twenty-year-old Cass Ryan is pulled out of the Hudson River, she's officially dead for four minutes. She doesn't know anything about the boy who pushed her in. She doesn't know why she's been hallucinating since coming back. What she does know is that the violent visions feel terrifyingly real and that her life will never be the same. Enter The Else & Bellows Institute.

The descendant of adventuring-dead-aristocrats, Clarissa Knightley supplements a modest inheritance by penning gothic novels that cost more than they earn. Upon learning that she has mysteriously inherited a share of an earl's estate, she rashly packs up her household. In remote Gravesyde Priory, she hopes to find a safe haven and family who will welcome her and her young nephew. Instead, she discovers a drunken American army captain, his African servant, and ancient, surly caretakers.

Londra, anni Venti del Novecento. Beatrice Bernabò, detta Miss Bee, è una ventenne italiana che vive nella capitale inglese da qualche anno. Insieme alle sorelle, Beatrice si è trasferita al seguito del padre Leonida, docente di italianistica all’Università. Il mandato del padre gode della protezione dell’ambasciatore italiano in UK, che non può che essere fascista. Invitata a cena dalla nobile dirimpettaia, Mrs Ashbury – vedova e madre di un unico e affascinante figlio, il conturbante Christopher detto Kit – Beatrice si trova suo malgrado in mezzo a un giallo che è al contempo un triangolo amoroso.

England, 1941. The tranquil village of Crofter’s Green seems like a haven from the chaos of wartime. But when a local air raid warden is found dead in the village churchyard, five villagers--some getting on in years and none of them policemen--decide they need to uncover the truth.

When seven-year-old Emma disappears, her stepmother Amanda uncovers dark secrets lurking in their small town. Facing corrupt police and uncooperative locals, Amanda and her niece Renee follow chilling clues leading to a familiar neighbor with a hidden, deadly past. Racing to save Emma, they risk everything to expose a truth that could destroy their town.

As the hotel launches an addition to its overnight amenities on a neighboring property, Delia Sanchez MacBride, the Loring’s principal owner and hospitality manager, is haunted by premonitions of disaster. Delia’s worst fears begin to materialize when the hotel’s most macabre secret is literally unearthed, namely when the bodily remains of The Forgotten Fifty, a group of townspeople who vanished without a trace a century ago, are revealed as being buried in the Loring’s basement.

Ember Burns was determined to overcome her grief and establish a new veterinary practice, but her first client lands her in the middle of a murder mystery. When the evidence points to a horse as the cause of death, she vows to protect him. Except horses don't talk and neither do the dead, so Ember has to rely on her intelligence and instinct to get to the truth. A truth buried under layers of small-town secrets big enough to get her killed.

In 1985, Kat McCann was six years old when renowned Austrian detective Alik Lisser solved her mother’s murder. And unfortunately proved Kat’s father as the culprit. Ten years later Kat is still obsessed with the heroic criminologist. She’s also addicted to the bestselling novels inspired by Alik’s ingenious deductions—penned by the grande dame of whodunits, who’s a bit of a mystery herself. Kat has devoured them all. Even the one based on her father’s crime.

Welcome to Owhiro, Florida – a quaint seaside village, and currently the scene of a bizarre unsolved murder. Local bartender Kalliope Brooks was horrified to find a dead body hidden in her car, and now she can’t seem to tear herself away from the case. Her growing obsession with the young victim is leading to her own danger – much to the alarm of her best friend, Tess, her adoring father, and the lead detective. Can she uncover the murderer shaking up her charming little hometown before someone else is killed?

Zum 150. Geburtstag des großen Autors und Literatur-Nobelpreisträgers: Ein historischer Kriminalroman, der Thomas Mann auf noch nie gelesene Weise lebendig werden lässt. "Der Dichter hatte sich vom Strandkorb erhoben und die Jagdszenen beobachtet. Als ich im bescheidenen Triumph die Arme mit den aufgefangenen, zerknitterten Blättern hob, schlug er sich auf die Oberschenkel und klatschte dann in die Hände. "Ganz vortrefflich!", rief er, und mir ging das Herz auf." Eine schillernde Hommage an Thomas Mann und eine spannende Erzählung über Mut, Freundschaft und die Kraft der Literatur, die Welt zu verändern.

Alice Montgomery goes missing in 2015. Seven years later, her best friend Hannah is bouncing from city to city, forever feeling the need to outrun something, but unsure what. With the niggling need to move nipping at her heels, Hannah decides to return home – a small coastal town in Western Australia – for the first time since she left, to help her mum after surgery and confront their fractured relationship. When Hannah hears that Marnie Montgomery, Alice's mum, has been diagnosed with terminal cancer, she is seized by terror that she will never know the truth of her friend's disappearance.

When San Francisco–based FDA epidemiologist Dr. Carrie Hediger uncovers a rash of unexplained deaths while investigating the suspiciously convenient death of her best friend, she becomes determined to find answers—even if it leads her to a murderer, and even if confronting authority, using her wiles, and bending the rules to get justice risks her future in the FDA. To unravel the puzzle, Carrie assembles a team: some talented post-doctoral fellows, a quirky pharmacologist, an unctuous chemist, and a skeptical FBI agent that she can’t help her attraction for.

Injured in a bombing, war correspondent Kate Tessler returns to her hometown in Arizona to recover. For the first time in her life, she's starting to feel her age of nearly fifty despite living like a teenager again: staying in her childhood bedroom with only a cat for company, trying to understand why her sister resents her so much, and running into people who still refer to her as Kitty. The hardest part? Seeing her once sharp and witty mother stuck in an Alzheimer's unit.

It's an exciting time in Sweet River, Texas, and the whole town is talking. Maybe, a little too much. Former English professor Ainsley McGregor has gambled everything on her new business: Bless Your Art, an artisan market where local artists sell their wares and teach classes. The bright, white space is filled to the brim with colorful art, yarn, jewelry, pet treats, antiques, and even a few medieval weapons. Oh, and there are wine tastings. Everything is better with wine. Ainsley is surprised by how well things are going—right up until the moment her Great Dane finds a dead body.

Skye Brigid O'Shea is desperate for an escape. Losing big in a nasty divorce and taking the fall for a patient's death, the stressed-out thirty-two-year-old jumps at the chance to move to Ireland after inheriting her grandmother's B&B. But the nosy American quickly lands back in hot water when she investigates unearthly howls and discovers the disagreeable local she argued with earlier stone-cold dead.