Island Fiction

Late on midsummer's night there is a splash in the river Thames. A body is found on an island, asphyxiated and laced with strange markings. For DCI Craig Gillard it's a baffling case. The victim's identity is elusive, clues are scarce and every witness has something to hide. Meanwhile one of Britain's deadliest serial killers is finally up for parole after a deal to reveal the location of two missing bodies. The felon has his own plans to get even with witnesses, accusers and the officer who caught him 30 years before. And who was that? A young trainee by the name of Gillard.

Years ago, Flora fled the quiet Scottish island where she grew up - and she hasn't looked back. What would have done on Mure? It's a place where everyone has known her all her life, where no one will let her forget the past. In bright, bustling London, she can be anonymous, ambitious...and hopelessly in love with her boss. But when fate brings Flora back to the island, she's suddenly swept once more into life with her brothers - all strapping, loud, and seemingly incapable of basic housework - and her father.

Luke Taylor was searching for his missing twin brother when he discovered a new purpose on a magical tidal island. Living in a quirky bookshop is a dream come true—he just didn’t expect it to be so damn dangerous. Running a business on a tiny island was always going to bring challenges, but Luke didn’t bargain on strange customers, hexed books, or a sentient shop that seems to have its own ideas about how things ought to be done.

Team Grendel is out of options. With a mysterious enemy destroying their refuges, the crew of the Beowulf III is forced to seek sanctuary on an island that wants nothing more than to kill them all, an island that is pure death and evil. While Ballantine struggles to find them a less deadly option, Team Grendel must risk their lives to help a teammate. Something is wrong with Darby and an answer must be found before it is too late. But finding that answer may mean not all of them will make it out. Fear! Death! Terror! Blood!

Dominic Cantori is an orphan. Ashamed of his situation, Dominic avoids making friends for fear of exposing his terrible secret. One day on a class trip to Ellis Island, a tour guide asks everyone about their families. Immediately, Dominic flees from the class and hides in a closet, where he falls asleep for hours.

Julian, Dick and Anne are spending the holidays with their tomboy cousin George and her dog, Timothy. One day, George takes them to explore nearby Kirrin Island, with its rocky little coast and old ruined castle on the top. Over on the island, they make a thrilling discovery, which leads them deep into the dungeons of Kirrin Castle on a dangerous adventure. Who - and what - will they find there?

Six months out of high school and just days after finishing Marine boot camp, Jesse McDermitt is finally ready to unwind and have a little fun when he goes home on leave. But everything Jesse remembers—his friends, his family, the sparkling beaches and familiar waters of the Caloosahatchee River and Pine Island Sound, even his faithful Lab, Molly, have all changed.

Something about the Okefenokee Swamp of Southern Georgia has always called to 14-year-old Jack Hawkins. But when a nervous mama gator takes a bite out of his handmade canoe, Jack finds himself stranded on a remote island, forced to find his own food and shelter - and to unravel a mystery that reaches far into his past and could change everything he thinks he knows about himself.

Both a gripping locked room mystery, and a transporting, evocative portrait of a woman in crisis, Trouble Island marks the enthralling standalone suspense debut from Sharon Short, promising to be her breakout novel, inspired by a real island in Lake Erie, and true events from her own rich family history.

At two a.m. one icy winter morning, the Jefferson County Police Department pick up the phone to a distressed caller, Ben Parker, reporting that his wife and child are missing. Arriving at their beautiful family home in Baker Heights, Detective Megan Carpenter can see no sign of a struggle but quickly uncovers some alarming clues about the Parkers’ marriage....

An unnamed island in the middle of the ocean hides a huge secret. During the day, inhuman screams are heard coming from a house. At night, the silence is only broken by stifled rumors that come from the forest. It is said that someone there played God. It is said that something went terribly wrong....

It begins in the most boring place in the world: Chickentown, U.S.A. There lives Candy Quackenbush, her heart bursting for some clue as to what her future might hold. When the answer comes, it's not one she expects. Out of nowhere comes a wave, and Candy, led by a man called John Mischief (whose brothers live on the horns on his head), leaps into the surging waters and is carried away.

Mia Jonathon Franklin has been living a nightmare for the last two years—ever since her husband and high school sweetheart died in a fishing boat accident, leaving her to care for her two young kids on her own. She's managed to stay afloat, but her husband's paltry life insurance money is gone—and if she can't find a way to support her family, she may lose the cozy cottage she and Troy had meant to grow old in. So when Mia is offered a chance to buy her own house for a dollar if she can find business owners to move to Jonathon Island, it seems like the answer to her prayers.

Newly graduated from college, aspiring writer Beth Hayes is elected by her family to house-sit the Island Gamble. Buoyed by sentimental memories of growing up on this tiny sandbar seemingly untouched by time, Beth vows to give herself over to the Lowcountry force and discover the wisdom it holds. Just as she vows she will never give into the delusional world of white picket fences, minivans, and eternal love, she meets Max Mitchell.

Jack Sawyer takes a sorority on a party boat tour when a mysterious storm slams into them. Now they are stranded on a chain of strange islands with bizarre creatures that have an unsettling desire to kill them. He must learn how to survive the elements by building rafts, shelters, and weapons from whatever they find on the islands, all while fighting for their lives.

Darcy Davenport is ready for a fresh start. Determined to leave a string of disastrous jobs and relationships behind her, she can't wait to explore White Cliff Bay and meet the locals. When Darcy swims in the crystal clear waters of the bay, she discovers the charming Rose Island Lighthouse. But it's not just the beautiful building that she finds so intriguing....

When Lux McAllister and her boyfriend, Nico, are hired to sail two women to a remote island in the South Pacific, it seems like the opportunity of a lifetime. Stuck in a dead-end job in Hawaii, and longing to travel the world after a family tragedy, Lux is eager to climb on board The Susannah and set out on an adventure. She’s also quick to bond with their passengers, college best friends Brittany and Amma. The two women say they want to travel off the beaten path. But like Lux, they may have other reasons to be seeking an escape.

Beekeeper Holly McNee Kensen quietly lives in a world of her own on Sullivan’s Island, tending her hives and working at the local island library. Holly calls her mother "The Queen Bee" because she’s a demanding hulk of a woman. Her mother, a devoted hypochondriac, might be unaware she’s quite ill, but that doesn’t stop her from tormenting Holly. To escape the drama, Holly’s sister, Leslie, married and moved away, wanting little to do with island life. Holly’s escape is to submerge herself in the lives of the two young boys next door and their widowed father, Archie.

It's springtime on Cranberry Island - and love is in the air. It seems like every woman has the hots for buff trainer Dirk De Leon. He and his equally gorgeous business partner, Vanessa Black, are leading a weight-loss retreat at the Gray Whale Inn - forcing innkeeper Natalie Barnes to lighten up her butter-laden breakfast menu. The mood on the island darkens when two grisly discoveries are made. The first is a skeleton walled up at the island's lighthouse. The second is a corpse of the fresh variety - the handsome Dirk!

Phoebe's life was a hot mess, but inheriting an island and the ability to chat with the dead? That's a whole new level of chaos. Not to mention the body in the attic. Phoebe Ellis thought her life was already circling the drain, but attending the funeral of a wealthy author she's never met with the hopes she was named in the will? That's a new low. Little did she know that this would be the start of a wild and wacky adventure complete with a houseful of familiars, discoveries, and danger. Inheriting an island was just the breath of ocean breeze Phoebe needed.