In 'The Guardians' we follow the reactions of the British Government to the attacks in Paris on the offices of the magazine Charlie Hebdo and the Jewish supermarket. Their concern, of course, is of repeat attacks in Great Britain and, in particular, on the vulnerable junior Government ministers who do not have police protection. With each Government department anxious not to increase its spending, providing extra protection would be costly. It is decided to recruit recently-retired members of the armed forces, mainly with the rank of sergeant and with active front-line experience in Afghanistan. Fifty would be initially required, with a reserve of another fifty, all placed on a twelve-month contract that could be extended.

Right. Wrong. Life is lived somewhere in between.

Duchess Day Radley is a thirteen-year-old self-proclaimed outlaw. Rules are for other people. She is the fierce protector of her five-year-old brother, Robin, and the parent to her mother, Star, a single mom incapable of taking care of herself, let alone her two kids.

Walk has never left the coastal California town where he and Star grew up. He may have become the chief of police, but he’s still trying to heal the old wound of having given the testimony that sent his best friend, Vincent King, to prison decades before. And he's in overdrive protecting Duchess and her brother.

Now, thirty years later, Vincent is being released. And Duchess and Walk must face the trouble that comes with his return. We Begin at the End is an extraordinary novel about two kinds of families―the ones we are born into and the ones we create.

How do you catch a killer, when all your suspects know how to get away with murder?

When the Australian Mystery Writers' Society invited me to their crime-writing festival aboard the Ghan, the famous train between Darwin and Adelaide, I was hoping for some inspiration for my second book. Fiction, this time: I needed a break from real people killing each other. Obviously, that didn't pan out.

The program is a who's who of crime writing royalty:

the debut writer (me!)
the forensic science writer
the blockbuster writer
the legal thriller writer
the literary writer
the psychological suspense writer.

But when one of us is murdered, six authors quickly turn into five detectives. Together, we should know how to solve a crime.

Or commit one...

NYPD Detective Declan Shaw gets a call: How fast can you get to the Beresford building on Central Park West?

In the tower apartment, Shaw finds a woman waiting for him. She's covered in blood. A body is lying dead on the floor of the luxurious living room.

Every book in the apartment's floor-to-ceiling shelves is by the same author: bestselling true-crime writer Denise Morrow.

"This is you?" Shaw asks the woman. "You're a writer?"
​
Only one person knows the ending to this story. Is it the victim or the killer?

The Winter Children is a haunting mystery from Lulu Taylor, author of The Snow Angel. Behind a selfless act of kindness lies dark intentions . . . After years of IVF, Olivia and Dan are blissfully happy at the arrival of their long dreamed-of twins. At the same time, they make the move to Renniston Hall, a huge, Elizabethan house that belongs to absent friends. Living rent-free in a small part of the unmodernised house, once a boarding school, they can begin to enjoy the family life they've always wanted. But there is a secret at the heart of their family, one that Olivia does not yet know. And the house, too, holds darkness deep within it . . .

Nikki Quintero, an agent from the Colombian National Police Special Operations Command arrives in London and informs the National Security Agency that two Colombian assassins are on their way to London to murder an English police officer in revenge for him thwarting their attempted importation of a vast quantity of cocaine into the UK some months earlier. The National Security Agency quickly identifies John Ridge as being the policeman at risk and with Ridge's help put in place a sting operation designed to lead to the arrest of the people involved in the conspiracy to murder him. Working closely with Nikki Quintero, Ridge soon becomes distracted from the operation by Nikki, who has other things on her mind. Once again, Ridge's supervisors seem unwilling to assist him and spend their time trying to get him suspended from duty. Ridge, out jogging one evening, is confronted by the giant Colombian assassin lying in wait for him at the end of the Brighton Pier. A violent confrontation takes place between the two men on the pier where there can only be one winner. The situation then gets worse when Ridge discovers that his family is at risk, when they are held hostage by Mateo Garcia. Can Ridge beat the odds stacked against him and rescue his family before Garcia exacts his revenge?

When I Was Ten is the stay-up-all-night thriller by acclaimed crime author Fiona Cummins. 'Grips like a vice' - Val McDermid 'Absorbing, tense and beautifully paced' - Daily Mail Twenty-one years ago, Dr Richard Carter and his wife Pamela were killed in what has become the most infamous double murder of the modern age. Their ten year-old daughter - nicknamed the Angel of Death - spent eight years in a children's secure unit and is living quietly under an assumed name with a family of her own. Now, on the anniversary of the trial, a documentary team has tracked down her older sister, compelling her to break two decades of silence. Her explosive interview sparks national headlines and journalist Brinley Booth, a childhood friend of the Carter sisters, is tasked with covering the news story. For the first time, the three women are forced to confront what really happened that night - with devastating consequences for them all. 'I finished it with my heart in my mouth. Highly recommended' - Louise Candlish 'Dark, creepy and ultimately compassionate . . . a chilling look at the consequences of a childhood gone wrong' - JP Delaney 'Utterly compelling; a true just-one-more-chapter thriller' - Clare Mackintosh 'Pacy, dark and surprises to the bitter end. Loved it' - Fiona Barton

Andy Baker is an advertising executive from Manchester in London on business and staying in the Four Freedoms Tower. Khalid is an Islamic extremist and member of Al-Qaeda, who is planning on conducting a suicide bombing in London. The two men get into the lift early in the morning and the lift breaks down. The story follows both men's reaction to their situation and each other.

Billionaires, politicians, and celebrities flock to indulge in the ultimate luxury of Heaven Falls, the world's most elite health resort. But they also flock to Heaven Falls for another reason... "You CAN buy love," says the Heaven Falls brochure. "Don't let anyone say that you can't." Heaven Falls offers something unique: the thrill of a romantic interlude. Romance with a complete stranger - romance that feeds the hungry heart and nurtures the soul. The ecstasy of falling in love comes with no strings attached, no misunderstandings... Sounds pretty good? Single mother, unemployed Tess thinks so. Especially when the owners of the resort invite her and her ten-year-old daughter to move there. Not only that, but, once there, she is guaranteed a job, a home, and a lifetime of financial security. And before long, she herself is falling in love. But Heaven Falls is not heaven, and soon her world begins to crumble. She has no one to turn to for help... except for the man who betrayed her.

As the 21st Century dawns, a career as a British Government's deeply covert MI-4 field agent would test the bravest and most resilient. Philippa Ploughman is swept into counter-terrorism normally thought of as a male dominated preserve. Annually, billions of dollars are generated by illegal drugs, in America and the Middle East. The United States and Canada are vulnerable to narcotics flooding from South America while an estimated 85% of all Afghanistan poppy narcotics arrive overland in Europe. Is there a thread of international money laundering between the two in a global weapons trade? Into this world is thrust an amiable, vulnerable, unlikely form capable of switching from femininity to vigorous self defence in the blink of an eye or the flash of weapon's test.The lady has been launched to find the truth. And now that the UN Security Council's deadline for Iran to halt its work on nuclear fuel enrichment has been ignored, things are set to become more challenging...

With his family caught in the crosshairs of a group of brutal killers, detective Cork O'Connor must solve the murder of a young girl in William Kent Krueger's latest unforgettable "New York Times "bestseller.
During a houseboat vacation on the remote Lake of the Woods, a violent gale sweeps through unexpectedly, stranding Cork and his daughter, Jenny, on a devastated island where the wind has ushered in a force far darker and more deadly than any storm.
Amid the wreckage, Cork and Jenny discover the body of a teenage girl. She wasn't killed by the storm, however; she'd been bound and tortured before she died. Nearby, underneath a tangle of branches, they also find a baby boy, hungry and dehydrated, but still very much alive. Powerful forces intent on securing the child pursue them to the isolated Northwest Angle, where it's impossible to tell who among the residents is in league with the devil, but Cork understands that to save his family he must solve the puzzle of this mysterious child whom death follows like a shadow.

Brilliantly portrayed by a novelist with a talent for hyperbole and downright yarning unequaled since Mark Twain, (Saturday Review), this slave's-eye view of the Civil War exposes America's racial foibles of the past and present with uninhibited humor and panache.Mixing history, fantasy, political reality, and comedy, Ishmael Reed spins the tale of three runaway slaves and the master determined to catch them. His on-target parody of fugitive slave narratives and other literary forms includes a hero who boards a jet bound for Canada; Abraham Lincoln waltzing through slave quarters to the tune of Hello, Dolly; and a plantation mistress entranced by TV's Beecher Hour. Filled with insights into the political consciences (or lack thereof) of both blacks and whites, Flight to Canada confirms Reed's status as a great writer (James Baldwin).A demonized Uncle Tom's Cabin, a book that reinvents the particulars of slavery in America with comic rage. -- The New York Times Book ReviewWears the mantle of Baldwin and Ellison like a high-powered Flip Wilson in drag...a terrifically funny book. -- Baltimore Sun

Dave Stubbs continues his employment as an assassin with the government on deniable operations. Unfortunately because of this, his marriage is starting to go down the pan. His boss, after considering all the options, decides to give him a six-month release from all contracts so that he can get his marriage back on tracks. Once the six months is up, and his home life is back on keel, he is asked to train a suitable replacement to do his job for when he is retired. Unfortunately this doesn't go to plan. Dave now returns to deniable operations with a vengeance and even becomes a soldier for a period of time. The word "Assassin" probably comes from the Arabic word 'Hashshashin', meaning hashish eaters. Assassins have been around for thousands of years and probably long before the first Crusade in 1080. They were once members of the Nizari (Shia Islam) sect of Ismaili Muslims and were militant fanatics reputed to use hashish (marijuana) before going on murder missions. This has not really been proved in any history book. So take this statement with a pinch of salt. Assassins have been responsible for the murders of: Julius Caesar, Thomas Beckett (the Archbishop of Canterbury), Lord Mountbatten, John F Kennedy and WPC Yvonne Fletcher, a police officer on duty outside the Libyan Embassy in London. And, many, many more influential people over the years. Assassination in law, is the premeditated murder of a person.

Lucy Masters has just completed her PhD and is heading out to the Himalayas to climb some of the world's most challenging mountains. An assassin stalks a man whose company has developed a revolutionary new social media application. Harry Parker, an ex-Gurkha Army officer, is on leave between development contracts in Nepal. One of the City's most successful hedge fund managers is about to make his biggest ever fortune. Though they don't know it yet, the lives of these very different people come together in the most unexpected way. Add in a young and very beautiful emerging artist, a sociopath ex-special forces 'fixer' and an ambitious Police commissioner and the stage is set for a dramatic adventure. From the mountains of Nepal and the Tors of Dartmoor to the streets of London and Edinburgh, the story that unfolds will grip you from the first page.