British Crime Fiction

"They thought they’d seen the back of the vicious gang. They were wrong.

When a distinctive and valuable jewel-encrusted eye patch appears in a Christie’s auction in London, it isn’t long before the original owner’s family is made aware.

The auction starts a chain of events that lead to the reappearance of the dreaded Qupi gang, only this time led by the matriarch.

She wastes no time in arriving in the East London, causing mayhem as she leaves no stone unturned in the search for her missing husband.

It was just an ordinary Wednesday lunchtime when Detective Martha Munro's life changed forever. Her sergeant is speaking, but she barely hears what he's telling her. Your mother has been shot dead. Your four-year-old daughter has been taken. There are no leads. Who would want to hurt her family? Martha realizes it's time to ask herself some hard questions about her late father. He led the anti-corruption squad at Scotland Yard. It's rumored he kept a list of everyone who worked for him, from coppers to criminals. And just being on the list was a sure-fire way to lower your life expectancy.

The woman in white—surreal artist Damaris Gethin—has invited a select group to the opening of her exhibit Artist in Crime, held in the eerie subterranean Hades Gallery. As costumed models reenact famously violent deaths, the artist herself portrays Marie Antoinette on the day of her execution, complete with a guillotine on the stage. It's not a prop; within ten minutes of Rachel's promise to solve Damaris's future murder, the artist slips her neck into the collar of the device and the very real blade sends her head rolling at the feet of her horrified audience.

A new breed of villain has risen, possessed of extraordinary intellect and violence. Only the brilliant mind and courage of Sexton Blake, scourge of the criminal world, can stop them, in these three classic stories, collected together in one volume for the first time. From the streets of London to the catacombs of Paris, join Blake as he pits his wits against bank robbers, impostors and kidnappers, duels with swords and pursues his foes by any means necessary.

An unidentified cadaver is found in a freezer in an unoccupied luxury house. No-one seems to know or care who it is or who placed it there. When DS Alexandra Cupidi is handed the case, she can have no idea it will lead her to a series of murderous cover-ups and buried secrets. Namely the discovery of the skeleton of public-school boy, Trevor Wood, beneath a housing development.

In Wiltshire, England, the Crime Review Team headed by Gus Freeman was formed to investigate cold cases. Freeman and his team have successfully solved several cases, using old witness statements plus fresh clues. After delving into Marion Reeves’s past, Gus Freeman confronts a group of wealthy people who are desperate to hide the truth. Each witness interview provides another missing piece of the jigsaw. Can Freeman complete the picture and unmask the killer?

When Evelyn Eldritch’s landlord Randolph is poisoned at his own James Bond-themed party, she needs to find the killer fast. Who killed him? The nephew and heir? The best friend? Or the faithful secretary? Evelyn wants to prove to Detective Inspector Taylor that she’s more than just a bumbling baker with a missing witness—that cat-turned-waitress spell is proving hard to explain! But how many clues did Evelyn miss while wrangling her diva cat? It’s clear Randolph drank a poisoned cocktail, but was the cyanide really meant for him?

The sleepy town of Heartsdale, Georgia, is jolted into panic when Sara Linton, paediatrician and medical examiner, finds Sibyl Adams dead in the local diner. As well as being viciously raped, Sibyl has been cut: two deep knife wounds form a lethal cross over her stomach. But it's only once Sara starts to perform the post-mortem that the full extent of the killer's brutality becomes clear.

CASE FILE #18–June 2008. Katherine Alford was found dead in her car at a local beauty spot. The devoted mother had received an urgent phone call late in the evening, and asked a neighbor to babysit for ten minutes. She never returned. Gus Freeman and his team uncover failings in the initial police investigation, but every eyewitness they re-interview can’t offer fresh clues, they only add to the mystery. Who did Katherine dash out of the house to meet?

Driving back through Wales in a fierce winter storm, forensic anthropologist David Hunter is forced to seek shelter at a remote village in Eryri mountains. But a one-night stop-over becomes something very different after a gruesome discovery in depths of the local forest. With communications down and the only road washed out by the storm, Hunter is unsure who - if anyone - he can trust. And as long buried secrets begin to emerge, he knows that, whatever dark past the isolated community might be hiding, there's no one he can call on for help. This time he's on his own.

Since her move to the country, Melissa Craig has become firmly established in village life. So, when one of the older residents fails to show up for a drinks party, Melissa goes to check on her. What she finds chills her to the bone: Her dear neighbor has been murdered, and the killer has painted a hideous smile onto her face. Melissa soon realizes that the death in her village bears the same trademark as a series of recent murders in the Cotswolds.

When Detective Mark Turpin is assigned the task of investigating the death of a local businessman, the case is first thought to be one of accidental drowning. Until a bullet hole is found where the victim fell into the River Thames. Then a number of graves are unearthed at a disused airfield site being redeveloped by the dead man, exposing a horrific secret and plunging Mark into one of the darkest investigations of his career. After two more bodies are discovered amongst the burnt-out ruins of a building on a nearby industrial estate, Mark realises that a serial killer is at large.

When DCI Anna Tate is called to the gruesome discovery of a dead woman found on Barnes Common, she is plunged into a high‐profile investigation involving a prominent MP. London is baying for blood - but is there more to Holly’s death than at first meets the eye? Meanwhile, the hunt is on for Anna’s missing daughter Chloe, who vanished 10 years ago when her ex‐husband kidnapped her. The case has been cold for what feels like forever - but a phone call brings a brand-new lead....

James was in high spirits because he’d finally completed his long awaited autobiography. He didn’t leave a suicide note. But even more suspiciously the record of his life’s environmental achievement, his magnum opus, has gone missing. Troubled, Meg calls in amateur sleuths George and Molly Palmer-Jones to investigate. They soon uncover that life in the Morrissey family is not as idyllic as it seems—relations with ex-wife Cathy are not as friendly as Meg makes out and James appears to have fallen for another women.

Meet Steven Stelfox. London, 1997: New Labour is sweeping into power, and Britpop is at its zenith. A&R man Stelfox is slashing and burning his way through the music industry, fuelled by greed and inhuman quantities of cocaine, searching for the next hit record amid a relentless orgy of self-gratification. But as the hits dry up and the industry begins to change, Stelfox must take the notion of cutthroat business practices to murderous new levels in a desperate attempt to salvage his career.

The once tranquil woods in a picturesque part of Lenchester have become the bloody stage to a series of ritualistic murders. With no suspects, Detective Chief Inspector Whitney Walker is once again forced to call on the services of forensic psychologist Dr. Georgina Cavendish. But this murderer isn't like any they've faced before. The murders are highly elaborate, but different in their own way, and with the clock ticking, they need to get inside the killer's head before it's too late.

When DI Allie Shenton is called out to a murder suicide, it quickly becomes clear that it's a double slaying, and there is a killer on the loose. The bodies are found in a property owned by local entrepreneur/drug dealer Kenny Webb. Several young women are staying there, they are refusing to talk and one of them is missing. While she waits on forensic evidence, Allie decides to do what she does best. She takes to the community to see who will talk. Right now, she's the only one who can get answers. But then a third murder rattles everyone.

“We have a secret the Devil and I.” These are the chilling words on the back of an old photograph that Sister Joan uncovers while cleaning out the attic storerooms. What she discovers among the dusty antiques leads to her most dangerous case yet. Joan has the strangest feeling that she's being followed. But the person she thinks she saw died over a year ago . . . Or did he? Then a young secretary turns up dead. She's been strangled. Another body is found and Sister Joan must get to the bottom of things before the murderer strikes again.

When Dorothy Martin and her husband, retired police detective Alan Nesbitt, decide to visit the beautiful island of Alderney in the English Channel, they hope for a pleasant, peaceful holiday. It’s not to be. Taking a walk on their very first day, they discover a body, apparently the victim of an unfortunate accident, on a precipitous hill path.

When 89-year-old Emyr Isaac is found dead in his home, Drake and his team initially suspect a burglary gone wrong. Isaac was old, and his death was a tragedy, but it’s not a murder case...is it? But as the investigation develops, Drake uncovers more suspicious deaths, but with one connection: Each victim received care from the same healthcare professional. Drake must do all he can to ensure no more lives are lost...even if it means putting members of his own team in harm’s way.