52 results for "Mystery"

Fear of the dark

Mosley, Walter
The third in the Fearless Jones series from the author of the Easy Rawlins crime thrillers. Fearless Jones and Paris Minton return in a high-velocity thriller about family, betrayal, and revenge. 'I'm in trouble, Paris.' Paris Minton has heard these words before. They mean only one thing: that his neck is on the line too. So when they are uttered by his lowlife cousin Ulysses S. Grant, Paris keeps the door to his bookshop firmly closed. With family like Ulysses - 'Useless' to everyone except his mother - who needs enemies? But trouble always finds an open window, and before long Paris is paying a call on his long-time friend and bodyguard, Fearless Jones. Criss-crossing the complicated landscape of 1950s Los Angeles, where a wrong look can get a black man killed, Paris and Fearless find desperate women, secret lives, and more than one dead body along the way. Walter Mosley serves up another taut mystery plot humming with brilliant characterisations, sharp dialogue and dark humour - a combination as fresh and zesty as ever. This is the third book in the series that began with Fearless Jones and Fear Itself. It is Mosley's favourite fictional territory, played with a lighter touch.
Phoenix 2008 288 pages

Dead air: a Jessie Drake mystery

Krich, Rochelle Majer
Hailed as one of the "top ten women who write superior crime fiction" by the Los Angeles Times, award-winning author Rochelle Krich adds another superb novel of mystery, murder, and icy suspense to her outstanding collection. Dead Air stars Krich's popular LAPD Homicide Detective Jessie Drake in a case that begins with a surprise visit from an old friend and quickly turns into a heart-wrenching, life and death drama that rocks the city. Jessie is astonished when her closest high school confidant, who hasn't been in touch for almost two years, shows up at her door with an alarming tale of being harassed by an unseen stalker. Jessie's friend is now "Dr. Renee," a popular radio talk show therapist who doles out quick-fix no-nonsense advice to troubled callers on everything from lackluster marriages to steamy illicit affairs. Now Renee is desperately frightened and convinced Jessie can help her. Skeptical, and with little to go on, Jessie agrees to investigate---just as a favor. But Jessie's interest quickly turns professional when Renee's six-year-old daughter Molly is kidnapped---and the child's nanny murdered. Renee and her estranged husband Barry, already in a fierce battle over custody, trade angry charges of blame and suspicion while Jessie tracks a bizarre series of events that began a few weeks earlier when a battered wife phoned Dr. Renee for help. Now the woman's crazed husband blames the radio therapist for handing out advice that has ruined his marriage. And---on the air for all to hear---he threatens revenge. With a child as a pawn, a killer plays a chilling game where he holds all the cards---and he's chosen Jessie to be LAPD's top player. As the hours tick by, he uses the radio talk show to up the ante, sending shocking waves of horror and disbelief through the city and terror into the hearts of loved ones. And under the hot glare of media scrutiny, Jessie works feverishly against the clock to beat him at his own game.Hailed as one of the "top ten women who write superior crime fiction" by the Los Angeles Times, award-winning author Rochelle Krich adds another superb novel of mystery, murder, and icy suspense to her outstanding collection. DEAD AIR stars Krich's popular LAPD Homicide Detective Jessie Drake in a case that begins with a surprise visit from an old friend and quickly turns into a heart-wrenching, life and death drama that rocks the city. Jessie is astonished when her closest high school confidant, who hasn't been in touch for almost two years, shows up at her door with an alarming tale of being harassed by an unseen stalker. Jessie's friend is now "Dr. Renee," a popular radio talk show therapist who doles out quick-fix no-nonsense advice to troubled callers on everything from lackluster marriages to steamy illicit affairs. Now Renee is desperately frightened and convinced Jessie can help her. Skeptical, and with little to go on, Jessie agrees to investigate---just as a favor. But Jessie's interest quickly turns professional when Renee's six-year-old daughter Molly is kidnapped---and the child's nanny murdered. Renee and her estranged husband Barry, already in a fierce battle over custody, trade angry charges of blame and suspicion while Jessie tracks a bizarre series of events that began a few weeks earlier when a battered wife phoned Dr. Renee for help. Now the woman's crazed husband blames the radio therapist for handing out advice that has ruined his marriage. And---on the air for all to hear---he threatens revenge. With a child as a pawn, a killer plays a chilling game where he holds all the cards---and he's chosen Jessie to be LAPD's top player. As the hours tick by, he uses the radio talk show to up the ante, sending shocking waves of horror and disbelief through the city and terror into the hearts of loved ones. And under the hot glare of media scrutiny, Jessie works feverishly against the clock to beat him at his own game. BHailed as one of the "top ten women who write superior crime fiction" by the Los Angeles Times, award-winning author Rochelle Krich adds another superb novel of mystery, murder, and icy suspense to her outstanding collection. DEAD AIR stars Krich's popular LAPD Homicide Detective Jessie Drake in a case that begins with a surprise visit from an old friend and quickly turns into a heart-wrenching, life and death drama that rocks the city. Jessie is astonished when her closest high school confidant, who hasn't been in touch for almost two years, shows up at her door with an alarming tale of being harassed by an unseen stalker. Jessie's friend is now "Dr. Renee," a popular radio talk show therapist who doles out quick-fix no-nonsense advice to troubled callers on everything from lackluster marriages to steamy illicit affairs. Now Renee is desperately frightened and convinced Jessie can help her. Skeptical, and with little to go on, Jessie agrees to investigate---just as a favor. But Jessie's interest quickly turns professional when Renee's six-year-old daughter Molly is kidnapped---and the child's nanny murdered. Renee and her estranged husband Barry, already in a fierce battle over custody, trade angry charges of blame and suspicion while Jessie tracks a bizarre series of events that began a few weeks earlier when a battered wife phoned Dr. Renee for help. Now the woman's crazed husband blames the radio therapist for handing out advice that has ruined his marriage. And---on the air for all to hear---he threatens revenge. With a child as a pawn, a killer plays a chilling game where he holds all the cards---and he's chosen Jessie to be LAPD's top player. As the hours tick by, he uses the radio talk show to up the ante, sending shocking waves of horror and disbelief through the city and terror into the hearts of loved ones. And under the hot glare of media scrutiny, Jessie works feverishly against the clock to beat him at his own game. B
Avon Twilight 2000-03-07 336 pages

Shadows of sin: a Jessie Drake mystery

Krich, Rochelle Majer
One of the "top ten women who write superior crime fiction" (Charles Champlin, mystery reviewer for the "Los Angeles Times), Rochelle Krich propels her exceptional sleuth, LAPD homicide detective Jessie Drake, into a deadly maze of rage, revenge, and moral complexities in what is the award-winning author's most gripping and provocative novel to date. At first glance it appears to be a random multiple murder -- a prominent plastic surgeon and his nurse and receptionist shot dead in their plush Century City office. But to Jessie Drake, the savage nature of Dr. Ronald Bushnell's fatal wounds suggests a crime of intense passion...and bitter retribution.Following her suspicions, the conscience-driven detective takes her investigation to the core of the seemingly harmonious family life of the slain surgeon. On the surface, Bushnell had everything: respect, money, a palatial home, a loving wife and daughter. But there is a joker in the deck, Bushnell's foster son, Ethan Meissner -- a troubled young loner with dark periods in his history. And the boy hasn't been seen since the murders.Ethan's unexplained disappearance suggests that the runaway knows something; he may be a material witness in a triple homicide or a premeditated killer...or another victim. The search for the missing teenager takes Jessie across many volatile borders -- those between nations, between families, and the razor-thin one that separates love from hatred. But the truth lies somewhere in a harrowing past of tainted blood and horrific personal tragedy. The deeper Jessie ventures into this shadow world of cruelty and secrets, the more she is haunted by the echoes of a lost soul's unanswered cry for help...and by the mostheinous crime of all, in which the sins of the guilty are visited on the innocent.
William Morrow 2001 337 pages

My gun has bullets

Goldberg, Lee
When Officer Charlie Willis pulls over a speeding Rolls-Royce hell-bent for Neiman Marcus, he's surprised to see TV's kindly Miss Agatha leveling a .45 at his stomach. He's even more surprised when she guns him down and keeps on driving. Charlie wakes up in the hospital to find a William Morris agent and a network executive at his bedside. The next thing Charlie knows, he's the star of the cop show My Gun Has Bullets and embroiled in a mob takeover of network television. And so begins an uproarious but deadly romp through the wonderful world of TV make-believe...with real bullets. To make it to sweeps week, Charlie will have to survive two homicidal stuntmen, a rabid star-dog, a hit man turned producer, a psychotic old lady, a sex-crazed blackmailer, and vicious ratings...with only a stunning Baywatch beauty to help him. This wickedly funny paean to absurdity lays to rest the scurrilous rumor that people in television know what they are doing.
St. Martin's Press 1995 262 pages

A man named Doll

Ames, Jonathan
"Happy Doll is a charming, if occasionally inexpert, private detective living just one sheer cliff drop beneath the Hollywood sign with his beloved half-Chihuahua half-Terrier, George. A veteran of both the Navy and LAPD, Doll supplements his meager income as a P.I. by working through the night at a local Thai spa that offers its clients a number of special services. Armed with his sixteen-inch steel telescopic baton, biting dry humor, and just a bit of a hero complex, the ex-cop sets out to protect the women who work there from clients who have trouble understanding the word "no." Doll gets by just fine following his two basic rules: bark loudly and act first. But when things get out-of-hand with one particularly violent patron, even he finds himself wildly out of his depth, and then things take an even more dangerous twist when an old friend from his days as a cop shows up at his door with a bullet in his gut. A Man Named Doll is more than just a fascinating introduction to one truly singular character, it is a highly addictive and completely unpredictable joyride through the sensuous and violent streets of LA." - Amazon.com
Mulholland Books 2022-09-06 10 pages

Out there in the dark

Strick, Wesley
" Out There in the Dark is an old school Hollywood blockbuster. . . . A terrific, grab-you-by-the-throat movieland epic." ---Jerry Stahl, author of Permanent Midnight Since leaving Berlin, the proud, distinguished émigré director Dieter Seife has had to content himself cranking out B movies for Superior Pictures in Hollywood during World War II. Finally, Superior's founder, Arthur Lustig, gives Seife the chance to prove himself on a lavish, three-hankie "woman's picture" titled The Big Betrayal . Set to star is Harley Hayden, the young (and 4-F) actor who's engaged to Lustig's daughter. Though the town's biggest names are in uniform, Seife is convinced he can find a better male lead for his movie. Hayden counters by hiring a disgraced ex-cop named Roarke to look into Seife's private life---does the secretive German have something to hide? What Roarke uncovers is dangerous, disturbing . . . and, maybe, a very different mystery than it seems. With its atmosphere of lockstep patriotism and rampant paranoia, Out There in the Dark provocatively speaks to our own time even as it brings to life the sordid side of 1940's Hollywood.
Thomas Dunne 2006-02-07 323 pages

Still night in L.A.: a detective novel

Saroyan, Aram
"Michael Shepard, a detective with his own set of problems, is hired one morning by a fashionable young woman at her Hollywood apartment. Soon he's embroiled in a murder investigation that may shed light on a nearly forgotten tragedy. A divorced father wondering how to set his son on a better course in life, the detective gets into deepening trouble as he negotiates a vivid panorama of the town's modern-day beautiful and damned. Author Aram Saroyan harnesses the hardboiled styles of Chandler, Hammett, and Ross MacDonald into a contemporary tale of information age intrigue. The text is supplemented with cell phone photos taken by Saroyan in the same environs in which the story unfolds." --
Three Rooms Press 2015 149 pages