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Thrillers and SuspenseMay 2016
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"The first chapter, Marcus, is essential. If the readers don't like it, they won't read the rest of your book." ~ from Joel Dicker's The Truth About the Harry Quebert Affair
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The last mile
by David Baldacci
Convicted murderer Melvin Mars is counting down the last hours before his execution--for the violent killing of his parents twenty years earlier--when he's granted an unexpected reprieve. Another man has confessed to the crime. Amos Decker, newly hired on an FBI special task force, takes an interest in Mars's case after discovering the striking similarities to his own life: Both men were talented football players with promising careers cut short by tragedy. Both men's families were brutally murdered. And in both cases, another suspect came forward, years after the killing, to confess to the crime. A suspect who may or may not have been telling the truth. The confession has the potential to make Melvin Mars--guilty or not--a free man. Who wants Mars out of prison? And why now? But when a member of Decker's team disappears, it becomes clear that something much larger--and more sinister--than just one convicted criminal's life hangs in the balance. Decker will need all of his extraordinary brainpower to stop an innocent man from being executed.
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| Dodgers: A Novel by Bill BeverlyCrime Fiction. East, a Los Angeles gang member who works as a lookout, is only 16 when he's sent to Wisconsin as part of a group to kill a witness hiding out there. Along with three other teens (including his younger brother), he must traverse an entirely alien America, where as young black men they stand out far more than they did in L.A. Observant and cautious, East is a complex character, one who is good at what he does but not entirely hardened by his life. Recommended for fans of Richard Price, this debut is a "searing novel about crime, race, and coming-of-age" (Booklist). |
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Trail of Echoes : A Detective Elouise Norton Novel
by Rachel Howzell Hall
On a rainy spring day in Los Angeles, homicide detective Elouise "Lou" Norton is called away from a rare lunch date to Bonner Park, where the body of thirteen-year-old Chanita Lords has been discovered. When Lou and her partner, Colin Taggert, take on the sad task of informing Chanita's mother, Lou is surprised to find herself in the apartment building she grew up in. Chanita was interested in photography and, much like Lou, a black girl destined to leave the housing projects behind. Her death fits a chilling pattern of exceptional African-American girls--dancers, artists, honors scholars-gone recently missing in the same school district, the one Lou attended not so long ago. Lou is valiantly trying to make a go of life after her divorce and doing everything she can to avoid her long estranged father. She races to catch a serial killer, but he remains frustratingly out of her reach, sending cryptic cyphers and taunting clues that arrive too late to prevent the next death. This one is personal, and it's only a matter of time before he comes after Lou herself..
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Hide away : An Eve Duncan Novel
by Iris Johansen
Protecting a young girl who has murderous enemies, forensic sculptor Eve Duncan takes her charge to the remote Scottish Highlands, where, with the assistance of Jane MacGuire, they search for a hidden treasure and navigate threats that change Eve's relationship with Joe Quinn.
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| The Advocate's Daughter by Anthony FranzeLegal Thriller. Sean Serrat is a successful D.C. attorney on the short list for a nomination to the Supreme Court. Which might be a problem -- a violent incident from his youth, should it become public, would torpedo his career. But this concern is eclipsed when his daughter's body is found in the high court's library and her African American boyfriend is accused of her murder. Though the police are sure they've got their man (some believe that the arrest is racially motivated), Sean is not, and his ensuing investigation turns up dangerous secrets among the Washington elite. With an exciting story and an insider's view of the world of the Supreme Court, this is a good bet for fans of legal thrillers. |
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Walleye Junction : A Mystery
by Karin Salvalaggio
When outspoken radio talk show host Philip Long is kidnapped and murdered, Detective Macy Greeley leaves her young son in the care of her mother and heads up to remote Walleye Junction, Montana to take charge of the investigation. It is initially believed that Long’s murder is the result of a controversial radio show he’s done on the rise of far right militias in the state. Within days the two kidnappers are found dead following a massive heroin overdose, and the authorities are hopeful the investigation is finished. But there are too many discrepancies for Macy to settle for obvious answers. The kidnapper’s bodies have been moved, their son is on the run and a series of anonymous emails point investigators toward the murky world of prescription painkiller abuse. Macy soon finds herself immersed in small town intrigues as she races to find who’s really responsible for Philip Long’s murder. Meanwhile, Philip Long’s daughter Emma is dealing with her own problems. It’s been twelve years since she left Walleye Junction after her best friend died from a drug overdose. Emma finds that little in Walleye Junction has changed in her absence. She is also becoming increasingly uneasy as the familiar surroundings stir up memories that are best forgotten.
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Extreme prey
by John Sandford
Invited to join his governor friend's campaign staff for the presidency, Lucas Davenport discovers that the governor is being stalked by a would-be assassin who proves lethal to anyone in the way of his target. By the award-winning author of the Virgil Flowers series.
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Tundra kill : a novel
by Stan Jones
Nathan Active, the top cop in a swath of the Alaskan tundra that is larger than15 U.S. states, has a new mystery to unravel after a dog musher is killed by a snowmobile. When the case is connected with Alaska’s gorgeous female governor, Active is swept into the bizarre family affairs and outsized political ambitions of the most dangerous woman he has ever met. Now the counter-moves that have been put into place by the governor threaten the lives of both his beloved Grace Palmer and her daughter, Nita. With his career on the line, Active has to outwit the governor and save the people he cares for most before time runs out.
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| Twisted River: A Novel by Siobhan MacDonaldPsychological Suspense. On page one of this atmospheric debut, a man closes the trunk of his car, obstructing his children's view of the dead woman enclosed there. They don't notice. But what has happened? And who's the woman? The twisty, turning route to that moment started when two families -- one Irish, one American -- agreed to swap homes to get away from their troubles (money woes, bullied children, faltering marriages) but only managed to exacerbate them -- and create new ones. Richly detailed when it comes to character motivations, economic pressures in both New York and Ireland, and the locations themselves, Twisted River is an absorbing experience. |
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| Cold Barrel Zero by Matthew QuirkTechno-Thriller. Details abound in this fast-paced novel -- how to avoid a drone, how to convert a car into your own personal safety deposit box -- but not at the expense of action, of which there is plenty. The complex story revolves around a group of American black ops agents led by John Hayes, who has been accused of committing war crimes, and the hunt to find him and his team before they launch an attack on U.S. soil. Caught in the middle is his former friend, Tom Byrne, who's been recruited by the U.S. government to find Hayes, but who struggles with his loyalties and is unsure whom to trust. "Hair-raising," says Booklist of a novel that is "even more chilling for its air of plausibility." |
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City of the lost : A Thriller
by Kelley Armstrong
Escaping to an off-the-grid domestic violence shelter community with her best friend, whose ex-husband has targeted them both with violence, homicide detective Casey Duncan investigates a first murder in the community and realizes that she may be in greater danger than before.
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| Rain Dogs by Baron R. BirtcherCrime Fiction. In 1976, Vietnam vet Colt Freeland and his buddy Snyder are happy enough with their small-time pot farm in the wilds of Northern California. But the U.S. War on Drugs is gaining strength, and further south, the Mexican and Colombian cocaine trade is ramping up. Events conspire to force the California duo right into the middle of a much bigger problem than they ever anticipated, stuck between a desperate Mexican drug lord, his Colombian competitors, and the local border cops. With plenty of action, this is "the real deal," enthuses Publishers Weekly. |
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| The Quest by Nelson DeMilleThriller. Originally published in 1975 and rewritten (to nearly twice the original length) and republished in 2013, The Quest follows three journalists in the 1970s as they follow up on a tip from a dying priest. Originally in Ethiopia to cover that country's civil war, their quest for a scoop changes focus when the mortally wounded priest, who claims to have been imprisoned for decades, tells them he's found the Holy Grail. Captured by rebel forces and then kicked out of the country, the three -- driven by different motivations -- plan their return. Fans of Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code may be interested in this early take on a historical mystery. |
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Hostage : a novel
by Elie Wiesel
From Elie Wiesel, Nobel laureate and author of Night, a charged, deeply moving novel about the legacy of the Holocaust in today’s troubled world and the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It’s 1975, and Shaltiel Feigenberg—professional storyteller, writer and beloved husband—has been taken hostage: abducted from his home in Brooklyn, blindfolded and tied to a chair in a dark basement. His captors, an Arab and an Italian, don’t explain why the innocent Shaltiel has been chosen, just that his life will be bartered for the freedom of three Palestinian prisoners. As his days of waiting commence, Shaltiel resorts to what he does best, telling stories—to himself and to the men who hold his fate in their hands. With beauty and sensitivity, Wiesel builds the world of Shaltiel’s memories, haunted by the Holocaust and a Europe in the midst of radical change. A Communist brother, a childhood spent hiding from the Nazis in a cellar, the kindness of liberating Russian soldiers, the unrest of the 1960s—these are the stories that unfold in Shaltiel’s captivity, as the outside world breathlessly follows his disappearance and the police move toward a final confrontation with his captors. Impassioned, provocative and insistently humane, Hostage is both a masterly thriller and a profoundly wise meditation on the power of memory to connect us to the past and our shared need for resolution.
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Miracle girls : a novel
by Mary Beth Caschetta
When Cee-Cee closes her eyes, she can suddenly see all the missing girls in the Mohawk Valley. It's part of the message: they are buried in wheat fields and stashed behind train tracks, or sprawled at the bottom of the canal. Could have been you, one dead girl says, smart-mouthed. But instead it was me! A live one tied up somewhere in a basement cocks her head: But, guess what—you're next! Cee-Cee tries to focus, but a terrible headache rises from the back of her neck, as if someone has struck her there. She should take her medicine, but Mrs. Patrick took away the pink bottles. In the thicket overhead, the branches are picked clean as bones, no longer swaying. Now she steps back until her heels butt up against the fat oak tree. In the woods, everything is silent. Even the trees stand still. It's 1973 in the Mohawk Valley, and children are disappearing. Cee-Cee Bianco is visited by the Virgin Mary, but her brothers see a much darker vision. When the youngest Bianco falls into a coma after witnessing a brutal crime in the woods and Cee-Cee performs a miracle, she is guarded by war-protesting Sisters whose order is not the benign sanctuary it seems.
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| The Truth about the Harry Quebert Affair by Joel Dicker; translated by Sam TaylorSuspense Fiction. In 1975, a teen girl disappeared in rural New Hampshire. In 2008, author Marcus Goldberg, struggling with inspiration, visits his mentor, famed writer Harry Quebert, and is shocked when the body of the missing teen is found on Harry's property. Harry is soon arrested for the crime (the girl had been his underage girlfriend in 1975), and Marcus has found the topic for his next book. Styled as a novel-within-a-novel, this complex and twisting story comes in at a hefty 600+ pages as it follows Marcus' efforts to find out what happened in 1975. |
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After her : a novel
by Joyce Maynard
Thirty years after destroying her detective father's career and altering the lives of everyone she loves, Rachel, who has never given up hope of vindicating her father, finally finds The Sunset Strangler, a killer who, in the summer of 1979, preyed on young women in northern California.
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| Blood on Snow: A Novel by Jo NesbøScandinavian Crime Fiction. Olav is a soft-hearted criminal limited by his skills; the only thing he's got any talent for is "fixing" problems -- which means killing people at the request of his heroin kingpin boss. Unfortunately, he's been assigned to kill his boss' wife...and whether he does or doesn't, he's in the dangerous position of knowing rather too much about his employer. And that's before he falls in love with his target. Set in Oslo in the 1970s, this "jewel of a novel" (Booklist) was followed by Midnight Sun, which shares its setting. |
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| Cop Town: A Novel by Karin SlaughterSuspense Fiction. In 1974, Kate Murphy finds herself way out of her depth as a rookie Atlanta cop. Raised on the wealthy side of town, she's been given a uniform that's too large and teamed with blue-collar Maggie Lawson. Neither woman gets any respect -- not even Maggie, whose brother and uncle are cops -- but they soon join forces to investigate unofficially when no one else will listen to their ideas about the serial killer who's been targeting police officers. This compelling stand-alone novel by veteran author Karin Slaughter provides a fascinating glimpse at the 1970s, especially when it comes to addressing sexism and racism. |
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Death wears a beauty mask : and other stories
by Mary Higgins Clark
A one-of-a-kind mystery collection that showcases the immense storytelling talent #1 New York Times bestselling author Mary Higgins Clark has honed over her tremendous career—including a bone-chilling, previously unpublished short story forty years in the making.
In 1974, master storyteller Mary Higgins Clark began writing a novella inspired by the dark side of the New York City fashion world. She then put the unfinished manuscript aside to write Where Are the Children?, the novel that would launch her career. Forty years later, Clark returned to that novella and wrote its ending. Now—for the first time ever—Death Wears a Beauty Mask is available for readers along with a stunning array of short fiction that spans her remarkable career.
From Clark’s first-ever published story (1956’s “Stowaway”), to classic tales featuring some of her most memorable characters, Death Wears A Beauty Mask And Other Stories is a jewel of a collection brimming over with the chills and heart-pounding drama we’ve come to expect from the Queen of Suspense. Death Wears A Beauty Mask And Other Stories is a spine-tingling read and a special glimpse into the evolution of a world-class writing career.
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Contact your librarian for more great books!
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Prince George's County Memorial Library System 9601 Capital Lane Largo, Maryland 20774 301-699-3500www.pgcmls.info/ |
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