Classic Fiction Mysteries

It sounds idyllic: a leisurely drive through the sun-drenched landscape of Provence. But Charity's dream holiday turns into a nightmare when she becomes embroiled in a sinister plot to kidnap a young boy. She soon finds herself in a deadly pursuit and must uncover whom to trust...and whom to fall for.

Welworth Garden City in the 1940s is a forward-thinking town where free spirits find a home - vegetarians, socialists, and an array of exotic religious groups. Chief among these are the Children of Osiris, led by the eccentric High Prophet, Eustace K. Mildmann. The cult is a seething hotbed of petty resentment, jealousy and dark secrets - which eventually lead to murder. The stage is set for one of Inspector Meredith's most bizarre and exacting cases.

When Dr Raymond Ferens moves to a practice at Milham in the Moor in north Devon, he and his wife are enchanted with the beautiful hilltop village lying so close to moor and sky. At first they see only its charm, but soon they begin to uncover its secrets - envy, hatred and malice. Everyone says that Sister Monica, warden of a children's home, is a saint - but is she? A few months after the Ferens' arrival her body is found drowned in the mill-race. Chief Inspector Macdonald faces one of his most difficult cases in a village determined not to betray its dark secrets to a stranger.

Ben Aaronovitch has stormed the bestseller list with his superb London crime series. A unique blend of police procedural, loving detail about the greatest character of all, London, and a dash of the supernatural. A mutilated body in Crawley. Another killer on the loose. The prime suspect is one Robert Weil; an associate of the twisted magician known as the Faceless Man? Or just a common or garden serial killer? Before PC Peter Grant can get his head round the case a town planner going under a tube train and a stolen grimoire are adding to his case-load. So far so London.

When a man’s headless body is discovered in Paris’ Saint-Martin Canal, Maigret is quick to answer the call. It is in this very neighborhood that he meets a strangely taciturn woman who runs a cafe. Her husband is away on a trip - or so she says. As is often the case, Maigret soon learns that there is more to the story than meets the eye.

Ranofer struggles to thwart the plottings of his evil brother, Gebu, so he can become master goldsmith like their father. Young listeners will love this exciting tale of ancient Egyptian mystery and intrigue.

On Max's birthday, he finds a kind of magic mirror in the attic. It can make him invisible. So Max and his friends start playing "now you see me, now you don't." Until Max realizes that he's losing control. Staying invisible a little too long. Having a harder and harder time coming back. Getting invisible is turning into a very dangerous game. The next time Max gets invisible, will it be...forever?

From the internationally acclaimed best-selling author of Code Name Verity comes a stunning new story of pearls, love and murder. Sixteen-year-old Julie Beaufort-Stuart is returning to her family's ancestral home in Perthshire for one last summer. It is not an idyllic return to childhood. Her grandfather's death has forced the sale of the house and estate, and this will be a summer of good-byes. Not least to the McEwen family - Highland travellers who have been part of the landscape for as long as anyone can remember.

In the back of Adam Farmer's mind, he always knew there was something not quite right about his family. It was more than just the fact that his dad seemed to be stoically going through the motions or that his sad-eyed mother spent most of her time in her room. Somewhere in the recesses of Adam's memory, he recalled a frantic journey in the middle of the night, hurried like criminals onto a bus, staring out the windows at some dark, malevolent thing none of them could see.

The Second World War is drawing to a close. Nicholas Vaughan, released from the army after an accident, takes refuge in Devon renting a thatched cottage in the beautiful countryside at Mallory Fitzjohn. Hard work and rural peace seem to make this a happy bachelor life. On a nearby farm lives the bored, flirtatious June St Cyres, an exile from London while her husband is a Japanese POW. June’s presence attracts fashionable visitors of dubious character and threatens to spoil Vaughan’s prized seclusion. When Little Thatch is destroyed in a blaze, all Vaughan’s work goes up in smoke, and Inspector Macdonald is drafted in to uncover a motive for murder.

After two rollicking adventures through Western literature, resourceful literary detective Thursday Next definitely needs some downtime. And what better place for a respite than in the hidden depths of the Well of Lost Plots, where all unpublished books reside? But peace and quiet remain elusive for Thursday, who soon discovers that the Well is a veritable linguistic free-for-all, where grammasites run rampant, plot devices are hawked on the black market, and lousy books—like the one she has taken up residence in—are scrapped for salvage.

Eventually Dona lands in remote Navron, looking for peace of mind in its solitary woods and hidden creeks. She finds the passion her spirit craves in the love of a daring French pirate who is being hunted by all of Cornwall. Together, they embark upon a quest rife with danger and glory, one which bestows upon Dona the ultimate choice: sacrifice her lover to certain death or risk her own life to save him

A story of revenge with a shocking premise and numerous reversals, Skin tackles the issue of what true beauty is - and what's merely skin deep.

The White Company is a motley group of English mercenaries, fighting under the leadership of Sir Nigel Loring. Bound by an unquestioning respect for social order, patriotism and a lust for adventure, the company makes its way to France to fight in the local wars. With assiduous attention to historical detail, Conan Doyle paints a convincing picture of the chivalric life and manners of the 14th century.

It's a race against the clock in this tale of danger and intrigue. In the glitzy era of the 1920s, charming armature sleuths, Tommy and Tuppence set out to solve the mysterious disappearance of a client and unravel a mysterious plot involving blackmail, international intrigue, and perhaps even the sinking of the Lusitania. When labor unrest erupts in England, the situation could turn deadly if a state secret falls into the wrong hands, but Tuppence has no qualms in accepting a job offer to stop that from happening.

After Arthur Penfold’s wife reveals she is leaving him to care for her ailing aunt, he sets upon a path of murder and deceit to avoid the social embarrassment of a second marital breakdown. But the purchase of a poetry book triggers a sequence of events that begins to unravel both Arthur and a seemingly open-and-shut murder case.

This bundle includes The Curse of the Ancient Emerald and Tunnel of Secrets.

In a desolate orphanage in what remains of post-Communist Romania, a desperately ill infant is given the wrong blood transfusion - and flourishes when he's supposed to die. The discovery of his unique immune system may hold the key to the long-awaited cure for cancer and AIDS - and a link to a clan of vampires.

When the body of N’Gana Frimbo, the African conjure-man, is discovered in his consultation room, Perry Dart, one of Harlem’s 10 Black police detectives, is called in to investigate. Together with Dr Archer, a physician from across the street, Dart is determined to solve the baffling mystery, helped and hindered by Bubber Brown and Jinx Jenkins, local boys keen to clear themselves of suspicion of murder and undertake their own investigations.

Harmon Cooper presents Book 8 in the Cherry Blossom Girls series.