English Detective Noir

The fog isn’t the only thing wreaking havoc at La Jolla’s landmark Hotel California. A prankster has been hiring employees for nonexistent jobs, a decomposing whale ends up beached in front of the hotel and interrupts a grunion run, and a group of swingers has arrived at the property for a love-in. Not for the first time, hotel detective Am Caulfield is overheard saying, “Hotels are like a circus without the tent.” In addition to those headaches, Am has more than a few mysteries on his hands: Which one of the hotel guests murdered the famed paranormal debunker in room 374?

Have yourself a scary little Christmas. In the heart of the holiday season, priceless paintings have vanished from a Park Avenue murder scene. Now, dashing French detective Luc Moncrief must become a quick study in the art of the steal - before a cold-blooded killer paints the town red. Merry Christmas, Detective.

Summer has come to Atlantic City but the boardwalk is empty of tourists, the casino lights have dimmed, and two Jane Does are laid out in the marshland behind the Sunset Motel, just west of town. Only one person even knows they’re there. Meanwhile, Clara, a young boardwalk psychic, struggles to attract clients for the tarot readings that pay her rent. When she begins to experience very real and disturbing visions, she suspects they could be related to the recent cases of women gone missing in town.

Before the Thin Man: The Prequel to Dashiell Hammett’s “The Thin Man” is a prequel, set in 1928, to the original work based on The Thin Man characters created by Dashiell Hammett in 1933. His book was published in 1934 and soon afterward made into the hit movie of the same name starring William Powell and Myrna Loy as Nick and Nora Charles. The movie was so popular five more movies starring the same lead actors were made in the following thirteen years. The final movie, Song of the Thin Man, was released August 28, 1947. This story shows who Nick and Nora are, where they came from, ...

Some people will do anything for family … even kill. After a frantic missing persons case goes wrong, private investigator Thomas Blume is facing a wrecked car and a disastrous winter when a mysterious invitation arrives, promising a big payday with only one catch … he must solve the case of a murdered billionaire. But when Blume realizes something far more valuable than money has been taken from the victim, he finds himself battling across country mansions, dark alleyways, and through layers of intrigue, family feuds, and corporate conspiracy, to enter a dangerous world of ...

As Sheriff Clayton Burroughs tries to juggle fatherhood, his job, and his recovery from being shot in the confrontation that killed his two criminally inclined brothers last year, he’s doing all he can just to survive. Yet after years of carefully toeing the line between his life in law enforcement and his family, he finally has to make a choice. When a rival organization makes a first foray into Burroughs' territory, leaving a trail of bodies and a whiff of fear in its wake, Clayton is pulled back into the life he so desperately wants to leave behind.

Hard-boiled detective Sam Spade is hired to locate a client's sister by tailing the sister's companion. Spade's partner Miles Archer takes on the assignment, and quickly both Archer and the man he was shadowing are murdered. As Spade pursues the mystery of his partner's death, he is drawn into a circle of colorful characters, and they are all after a legendary statuette of a falcon that had long ago been made for King Charles of Spain. Encrusted with jewels, it is worth a fortune.

A wealthy Pasadena widow with a mean streak, a missing daughter-in-law with a past, and a gold coin worth a small fortune - the elements don't quite add up until Marlowe discovers evidence of murder, rape, blackmail, and the worst kind of human exploitation.

When the body of a man is found dead in his remote, isolated home, DI Tom Janssen and his team struggle to understand what motive there could be to murder such an inoffensive, seemingly placid local character. The man lived alone and was well known in the community, but kept his distance from others, leading a haphazard way of life almost entirely off the grid. What secrets did he hide in his private life that might be worth killing for? As the team are about to understand, even the most nondescript of people can exist in a world darker than most of us will ever see....

A detective finds the murderer he's looking for in an unexpected way.

'A fantastic writer.' Donald Ray Pollock 'Nigel Bird is fast becoming one of the top writers in his genre.' Luca Veste DIRTY OLD TOWN is the debut collection from the prize-winning writer Nigel Bird. His brilliantly observed slices of life allow us to visit places we may not normally choose to enter and to walk a few miles in the shoes of others. Though his tales have darkness at their core, they are also full of a heart and spirit that one rarely finds in the world or ‘noir’ or ‘crime-writing’. There are 9 stories here: Drinking Wine (Spo-Dee-Oh-Dee); Dirty Old Town; Sea Minor; ...

After narrowly escaping with his life at the hands of a murderous Hollywood pimp, detective Happy Doll, bullet-ridden but healing, has landed on a remote Mexican beach. In a humble shack and with his dog for company, Doll settles into a peaceful idyll of Buddhist study. But then trouble, as it always does, comes to paradise. Doll is the witness to a murder for which he is framed, and now, with an expired passport and the Mexican authorities on his tail, he must sneak across the border back to L.A. by any means necessary, with the goal of bringing the true murderer to justice.

Grace had never been more terrified...the pain was relentless. Nothing in her life prepared her for this. She desperately needed somewhere safe...someplace she could hide. Someone she could trust with her life. It was dark...and getting darker. Ronan Hendricks didn’t recognize her voice. Not family...not friends. Probably not an enemy. But he didn’t need the years he’d spent as a detective to recognize what he did hear... Fear. In a desperate moment of hope, a single number saved her life. Then a complete stranger opened his home offering safety yet Grace knew danger surrounded them.....

LAPD Detective Margaret Nolan is struggling to move forward after the death of her brother in Afghanistan and taking a life in the line of duty. Her stoic parents offer little support – they refuse to address anything difficult, and she’s afraid their relationship is eroding beyond the point of recovery.

Los Angeles has many faces: the real LA where regular people live and work, the degenerate underbelly of any big city, and the rarified world of wealth, power, and celebrity. LAPD Detective Margaret Nolan’s latest case plunges her into this insular realm of privilege and gives her a glimpse of the darkness behind the glitter. The body of beloved actor Evan Hobbes is found in the rubble of a Malibu rockslide a day after a fake video ruins his career. It’s not clear to Nolan if it’s an accident, a suicide, or a murder, and things get murkier as the investigation expands.

Retired police detective Danny Love pictures himself as a hard-boiled PI now that he's hung his own shingle. He likes being his own boss, and business is steady, but some personal issues have led to a potential financial crisis that is keeping him awake at night. Love believes that his problems are over when a wealthy client enters his office with a lucrative offer. Despite his intense dislike of Catherine Godfrey due to her arrogance and entitlement, the thought of alleviating his money woes is too enticing to resist, and he takes the case. However, as the investigation progresses, it soon...

Of all the demons and monsters Samantha Moon has faced over the years, only one is unstoppable: time. Life feels as stable as it's likely to get for her, which should have been her first warning something was about to go wrong. An out-of-the-blue call from her sister brings bad news concerning her father's health. Ever since she went off to college, Sam has been somewhat estranged from her parents—no surprise since they never seemed to much even notice their kids' existence, leaving the eldest sister to fill the role of mother and father. Whatever notion she had to reestablish contact ...

Sixteen-year-old Emily had everything to live for, a bright, beautiful teenager with a promising future ahead of her. But in one night her life is cut short. The police say it’s an accident, but her parents think she was murdered. When Detective Rachel Prince is called in to investigate the shocking death at the height of the Edinburgh Festival, her instincts tell her that things are not as they first appear. Something is very wrong. Rachel discovers a chilling link with the suspicious death of another international student, who stayed in the same house as Emily two years earlier.

A Missing Person Case Explodes Into a Deadly Chase for Justice A family is slaughtered during a home invasion in an upscale Connecticut neighborhood—except for one child who survives, having seen the unmasked face of a killer. Years later, a U.S. Senator’s son vanishes from Yale, and the FBI is out of leads. Enter ATF Agent Sam Caviello, whose uncanny instincts make him the senator’s last hope. Paired with FBI Agent Kiara Rivers, Caviello uncovers a chilling link between an Ivy League Professor and mob violence. When Rivers is abducted in a brutal retaliatory move, Caviello must break...

When you can’t hear…death comes silently. Scotland Yard detective Valerie Crowther is assigned to investigate the murder of a student at a university for the Deaf in London, England. The murder investigation coincides with a deadly flu virus outbreak, resulting in the university being quarantined from the outside world. When more Deaf students are murdered, it becomes clear there is a serial killer operating within the sealed-off university. A chilling cat-and-mouse game evolves as the unknown killer targets Valerie and the virus claims more lives. A stunning, claustrophobic, “...