Marcia Muller's acclaimed mysteries starring Sharon McCone have been called "one of the most consistently satisfying series in whodunit history" (San Diego Union-Tribune). Her fictional territory is uniquely her own, and her creation of McCone, the first female gumshoe, changed the terrain of the genre forever. Now Muller presents McCone's strongest, most personal story to date, as the detective investigates the secrets of her own past...and finds the darkest of revelations.

LISTEN TO THE SILENCE

For Sharon McCone, when one door opens, another shuts. In the midst of celebrating a joyous wedding, she gets word that her father has died. The news leads her to the rituals of death: the scattering of ashes, the sharing of grief, the sorting through a loved one's belongings. But for Sharon McCone the last of those acts leads to a discovery that will change everything...

The existence of a legal document, hinting at a family secret deliberately withheld from McCone, provokes a violent breach between McCone and her mother. It drives McCone to search for her family's roots, particularly those of her Shoshone great-grandmother. This emotionally fueled search takes her to Montana's Flathead Indian Reservation and, eventually, to a remote and sparsely populated county in northern California. There, obsessed with her own problems, she walks into a deadly fight between Indians trying to preserve their sacred lands and a high-powered resort developer.

Soon McCone is drawn into a conspiracy that includes the attempted murder of an activist lawyer and threats on her own life. No one is talking--and McCone must learn to listen to the silence: the questions carefully avoided; the pauses that point to a lie; the hesitation when emotions block the disclosure of a vital fact.

Now, her fears mounting, her anger growing, McCone enters a dark inner place, dogged by an identity crisis--and a killer. An elusive adversary wants her to stop her search, and maybe she should. After all, the price for the whole truth--a tale of shattered love, bigotry, and homicide--may be the forfeiting of everything she believes...a fresh start...or the ignominious end that a bullet can bring.

LISTEN TO THE SILENCE is Marcia Muller at her most tantalizingly complex and dramatically intense--the kind of writing that has taken her to the top of her craft, yet allows her to reach new literary heights with each intriguing book.

A Main Selelction of the Mystery Guild®

Private Investigator Sharon McCone goes undercover to investigate the murders of two Indigenous women in remote Northern California in this gripping, atmospheric mystery in the New York Times bestselling series. When the bodies of two Indigenous women are found in the wilderness of northern California, it is only the latest horrific development in a string of similar crimes in the area. Despite all evidence to the contrary, officials rule the deaths isolated incidents, which soon join the ranks of countless other unsolved cases quickly dismissed by law enforcement. In a town where too many injustices are tolerated or brushed under the rug, only a few people remain who refuse to let a killer walk free. But Private Investigator Sharon McCone is one of those few. She is hired by an organization called Crimes against Indigenous Sisters to go undercover in Meruk County--a community rife with secrets, lies, and corruption--to expose the truth. In an isolated cabin in the freezing, treacherous woods, McCone must work quickly to unravel a mystery that is rooted in profound evil--before she becomes the killer's next target.

The bestselling author of "The McCone Files" teams up with the creator of the "Nameless Detective" for a collaborative mystery that bridges the San Franciscos of 1894 and 1986. Muller and Pronzini masterfully parallel the investigations of turn-of-the-century detective Quincannon and Chicana amateur sleuth Elena Oliverez.

In 1895 San Francisco, young debutantes don't commit suicide at festive parties, particularly not under the eye of Sabina Carpenter. But Virginia St. Ives evidently did, leaping from a foggy parapet in a shimmer of ghostly light. The seemingly impossible disappearance of her body creates an even more serious problem for the firm of Carpenter and Quincannon, Professional Detective Services.

Sabina hadn't wanted to take the assignment, but her partner John Quincannon insisted it would serve as entree to the city's ultra-rich and powerful. That means money, and Quincannon loves the almighty dollar. Which is why he is hunting the bandit who robbed the Wells, Fargo office of $35,000.

Working their separate cases (while Sabina holds John off with one light hand), the detectives give readers a tour of The City the way it was. From the infamous Barbary Coast to the expensive Tenderloin gaming houses and brothels frequented by wealthy men, Quincannon follows a danger-laden trail to unmask the murderous perpetrators of the Wells, Fargo robbery. Meanwhile, Sabina works her wiles on friends and relatives of the vanished debutante until the pieces of her puzzle start falling into place. But it's an oddly disguised gent appearing out of nowhere who provides the final clue to both cases--the shrewd "crackbrain" who believes himself to be Sherlock Holmes.

A collection of short stories ranging from the straight-forward detective to the off-beat mystery. Includes Sharon McCone and Elena Oliverez stories as well as an original introduction by the author. Marcia Muller, author of the Elena Oliverez mysteries, is the creator of sleuth Sharon McCone, widely considered to be the first of the new breed of female private eyes.

Things seem to be going smoothly for Joanna Stark; she is beginning to get over the fear that has haunted her since her near-fatal encounter (in There Hangs the Knife) with Antony Parducci, former lover, art forger, thief. But arriving home after lunch at her son's winery-to-be in their town of Sonoma, Joanna finds her house broken into and a painting-one of no value but of great significance to Joanna-has been stolen. The painting has been taken, and other subtle clues left, she knows, on purpose in order to frighten her. She is convinced that Parducci, whom she had left for dead in England, has been there, has come to kill her. Joanna is alone with her fear. Her stepson, E.J., convinced the man is certainly dead, will urge her to put him out of her mind; it's unhealthy, he's told her, to dwell on past fears. Moved to confide in a woman friend, Joanna is drawn into another mystery-the provenance and ownership of two very valuable paintings that no one had known about. Oddly, mysteries and anomalies begin to match, one with the other; and, like a giant spider, Parducci seems to be at the center of it all. This final novel in Muller's three-part work about her interesting character, Joanna Stark, brings the strongly independent woman to a final confrontation with the man who hates her for betraying him, and provides an exciting climax both to the novel and the series.

The world's first two-author, husband-and-wife short story collection. Marcia Muller and Bill Pronzini are two of the world's most popular and respected mystery authors. Their new collection demonstrates why this team has so many fans. Here you'll find Muller's famous Sharon McCone searching for the dark truth in "Somewhere in the City." Pronzini's long-heralded private eye Nameless is tracking down a clever killer in "Home is the Place Where." McCone and Nameless team up in the wry "Cache and Carry." Fourteen great stories in all.

"Sweet Cactus Wine," in which a benign saguaro cactus commits mayhem, was Muller's first Western story. Each tale, including "The Cyaniders" written especially for this collection, is a miniature masterpiece of storytelling, realistic characters, and vivid settings. Even Sharon McCone makes her appearance in two of the stories, "The Lost Coast" and "Knives at Midnight," the latter collected here for the first time. Also included is her only collaboration with her husband, Bill Pronzini, on a Western story. "Caves of Ice" was inspired by a visit to an ice cave in Montana. "Forbidden Things" is an imperishable story of a woman who finds out who she really is when she returns to Camel Rock. There are elements of horror and imagination not only in "Time of the Wolves" but also in "The Indian Witch." Time of the Wolves is an extraordinary collection of Western stories by a truly outstanding author, stories that can and will be read and reread with sustaining enjoyment

Ciro Sisneros seems the most harmless of men-a Chicano historian immersed in writing a book about the Great Depression and the Mexican-American agricultural workers of that era. Then why, when he dies of a fall at pool-side in Leisure Village Mobile Home Park, a senior citizens' community near Santa Barbara, does Gabriel a Oliverez insist that he has been murdered? True, Ciro had been warned by an anony-mous caller to stop work on his book-something he had no intention of doing. Gabriela wants her daughter, Elena, to put aside the urgent demands of her job as curator of the Museum of Mexican Art and find out why the book was a threat-and to whom. Hadn't Elena solved the murder of her predecessor (in Muller's The Tree of Death)? That's not an easy thing for Elena to do. The museum is understaffed. Fiesta time is upon them. One of the museum's volunteer workers suddenly disappears. There are countless other demands on the young curator's time. And the chairman of the museum board, Carlos Bautista, is courting her. Although she likes him well enough, she does not welcome the attentions of a man twenty-six years her senior, and she feels uncomfortable among his rich Anglo friends. But how to avoid him without antagonizing him? However, as Police Lieutenant Dave Kirk (whose attentions Elena would welcome) says of her, she is "incurably nosy." Her nosiness, in fact, causes more than one attempt on her life. Only by going far back into the past-and making a visit to "Abuela" (Grandmother) Felicia, who had been active in the agricultural workers' struggles of the thirties-does Elena learn the truth behind the legend of the slain soldiers and how it ties in with the very recent death of Ciro Sisneros.

Joanna Stark can't seem to forgive and forget: what happened twenty years ago still plagues her. She knows the only way it can be resolved is if she gets her revenge. So she devises an intricately-plotted plan to entrap and expose Anthony Parducci, an art thief who also happens to be her worst enemy and a man who once, a long time ago, she truly cared about. Knowing that two paintings from Pieter Bruegel's Proverb Series have already been stolen, and most certainly by Parducci, she has a friend order and then show a "copy" of a Bruegel in his London gallery in order to lure Parducci in. When the painting is stolen, Joanna is thrilled that her plan has been set in motion. But she soon realizes that someone double-crossed her and took the Bruegel before Parducci could get to it. Now both Parducci and Joanna are out to get the painting.

The Museum of Mexican Arts in Santa Barbara has the usual problems-chronic budget deficits and wealthy patrons who like to meddle. When Isabel Cunningham, descendant of one of the oldest Spanish land-grant families, donates a garish Tree of Life, the museum's greedy director accepts at once. Frank De Palma knows how to curry favor and raise funds, but in matters of taste, Elena Oliverez recognizes his limitations. The young curator despises the huge ceramic object and considers it an eyesore, while Frank views it as the key to future donations from a very rich patron. In addition, Frank's pompous, vain manner is as offensive as his lack of respect for good art. On the eve of the opening of the museum's new quarters, Frank is found crushed beneath the monstrosity he acquired. Elena Oliverez is every one's suspect. The continual feuding between Elena and her boss was public knowledge, and everyone had heard her threats when Frank forced the unpopular tree into the museum's permanent collection. Despite Frank's murder, the museum's opening proceeds as scheduled. Later, when Elena is made acting director, she's even more a key suspect. So the art historian turns sleuth, poking through Frank's files and puzzling over a long string of clues. All too soon she's convinced that the murderer is close by... and ready to strike again Now Elena's problem is to convince a skeptical police department that her deductions are valid. Lt. Kirk disregards key clues: several suspects have a history of suffering at Frank De Palma's hands and may have scores to settle; a museum employee has been taking a number of mysterious trips of late. The Tree of Death is rich in Southern California lore and features an inside look at what happens behind the scenes in the world of fine arts. It also introduces us to a clever young Mexican-American heroine, whose lively curiosity and love for Spanish art and history make for a memorable amateur sleuth.

Joanna Stark thought she had finally left her troubled past behind: After the death of her husband, she quit the San Francisco art security firm where she was a partner and retreated to the small California wine country town of Sonoma. But unexpectedly, in one rainy week before Thanksgiving, her carefully constructed world collapses. A Frans Hals painting, The Cavalier in White, is stolen from the M.H. de Young Museum, and the strange circumstances surrounding its disappearance prompt her former business partner to ask her to return to the city and investigate the theft. Joanna knows she must go back-as much for her own protection as for the sake of the museum. Her investigation takes her from the hushed corridors of the de Young to a seedy waterfront tavern; from a Seacliff mansion to a vandalized shack on the shores of the Bay; to galleries, museum openings-and the scene of a murder. By the time she confronts the killer, the careful order of her life is nearly destroyed and she finds that the past is not only inescapable, but also more complex and frightening than she had previously imagined.

The "Nameless Detective" and Sharon McCone join forces at a San Diego private detective convention in a posh seaside hotel to investigate a case involving multiple murder, a crime ring dealing in smuggled fugitives, and bizarre, kinky lifestyles. For Sharon it's a chance to catch up with old friends-all except for the one who fell four stories from one of the hotel spires. Now, Sharon is determined to find out why her friend died.

Hot-tempered curator Elena Oliverez threatens to kill her boss, Frank DePalma, when he orders her to put a particularly hideous piece of sculpture--donated by a wealthy patron of the new Museum of Mexican Arts--on display for the museum opening. So when someone kills Frank with the sculpture, Elena must conduct her own investigation to clear her name--or die trying.

Matt Lindstrom was falsely accused of his wife Gwen's murder. Fourteen years later he discovers that she is living a new life. Shocked to discovers that she has a child and is living with a lesbian lover, Matt journeys to find that tragedy has struck again. He must prevent a final confrontation that may prove fatal to them all.