Crime Fiction 5


Hare both worked on the Union Canal or that the notorious Victorian baby farmers used waterways to dispose of the unfortunate infants in their care? 159 paperback pages, illus. £12.99 NOW £3.50


72140 SECRET HISTORY OF MI6 1909-1949 by Keith Jeffery


Britain’s Secret Intelligence Service - also commonly known as MI6 - during the war years formed significant and highly influential ties with the US. Here are the challenges it faced trying to counter the spread of Communism and the growing threats from Germany, Italy and Japan - all this with inadequate resources. Read for the first time some of the human consequences, including embezzlement, treachery and suicide, as well as high-profile blunders. The war also brought the agency many of its greatest triumphs, among them the pioneering of cryptography on an industrial scale and the devising of some of the methods and equipment that would inspire Ian Fleming’s novels. 810 pages, archive photos.


$39.95 NOW £6.50


72327 WHODUNITS: More Than 100 Mysteries for You to Solve


by Tom Bullimore et al This book offers 100 whodunits with the added perk that it invites you, the reader, to work shoulder to shoulder with some expert detectives. A crime has been


committed, you have to untangle the evidence and name the guilty party. But, naturally, it is not that simple. Is the crime a frame-up? How did the perpetrator gain access to commit their crime, when it appears impossible? Just how innocent is that innocent bystander? Examine the clues one at a time. Then see the solution at the back. 275pp softback, drawings. £5.99 NOW £3


72359 THE DANGEROUS OTTO KATZ: The


Many Lives of a Soviet Spy by Jonathan Miles


Dashing, intelligent and lethal, Otto Katz (1895-1952) was one of the 20th century’s most accomplished spies, the inspiration for Victor Lazlo in Casablanca. To the FBI he was “an extremely dangerous man” and MI6 thought that he was “director of all Communist policy” in the West, but the reality was much more than they could ever have realised. Lover of Marlene Dietrich, one of the first to alert the world to the threat of Hitler, infiltrator of England and recruiter of the Cambridge spies, Stalin’s head of operations during the Spanish Civil War and arranger of Trotsky’s assassination, he was also a playboy socialite in Hollywood. Noel Coward was employed by MI6 to attempt to “turn” him after WWII. He was accused of treason, convicted on charges that were patently untrue and hanged in Prague on 3 December 1952. 365pp, photos. $26 NOW £5


72597 BRIDGE OF SPIES: A True Story of the Cold War by Giles Whittell


Here is the true story of three extraordinary characters: Rudolf Abel - a British-born KGB agent jailed by the FBI, Gary Powers - the American U-2 pilot shot down whilst flying a reconnaissance mission over the closed cities of central Russia, and Frederic Pryor - a young American graduate student mistakenly arrested as a spy by the Stasi, East Germany’s secret police. Here is the tragicomedy of errors that eventually induced Khrushchev to deploy missiles to Cuba. The three men were exchanged at Berlin’s Glienicke Bridge and Checkpoint Charlie, rescued against daunting odds. 274 compelling pages, archive photos. $24.99 NOW £5


CRIME FICTION


73146 STAGESTRUCK by Peter Lovesey


Lovesey picks up the conventions of the classic English detective novel and delivers then with a contemporary twist. Clarion Calhoun is a fading pop star wanting to launch an acting career. The audience at her début at Bath’s Theatre Royal are expecting a dramatic evening, but what they get is beyond their wildest imaginations.


Peter Diamond, Bath’s top detective, is given the case. Soon the tension at the theatre mounts, legends come to life and the killer strikes again. The Theatre Royal, over 200 years old and steeped in tradition and superstition, is the perfect setting for the new Diamond mystery by the award winning writer. 327pp in paperback. £7.99 NOW £4


71176 THE EYES OF MAX CARRADOS


by Ernest Bramah


Max Carrados is one of the most unusual detectives in all fiction. He is blind - and yet he has developed his other faculties to such an amazing degree that they more than compensate for his lack of sight. ‘Lose one sense and the others, touch, taste, smell, hearing improve…with a little dedicated training.’ Carrados can read a


newspaper headline with the touch of his fingers, detect a man wearing a false moustache because ‘he carries a five yard aura of spirit gum’ and shoot a villain by aiming at the sound of his beating heart. Assisted by his sharp-eyed manservant, Parker, Carrados is the mystery-solver par excellence. Here is a collection of the best of Max Carrados, a set of stories featuring a series of baffling puzzles to challenge the greatest of detectives. 670 page paperback. ONLY £3


73306 HUE & CRY by Shirley McKay


The first in a must-read series of Hew Cullan Mysteries set in 1579 in St. Andrews. Cullan, a young lawyer, returns home from studying in Paris, but it proves to be a cold homecoming. His friend, university regent Nicholas Colp is accused of murdering a 13 year old boy. The boy was a private pupil of Nicholas. A salacious gossip backed up by


incriminating letters have him judged, convicted and heading for the hangman’s noose. Hew uncovers a dark tale of duplicity and passion in a world of religious piety and corruption emerges. 325pp in paperback. £8.99 NOW £3.50


73484 WATERLOO SUNSET by Martin Edwards Liverpool lawyer Harry Devlin never knew five short lines could be so menacing - someone wants him dead and he has only got seven days to find the killer. IN MEMORY. Harry Devlin. Died suddenly. Liverpool. Midsummer’s Eve. When a mutilated corpse of a young woman washes up on Waterloo Beach, Harry wonders if the premature notice of his demise


and the discovery of the dead girl might be connected. He has only got six days to find out. 477pp in paperback.


£6.99 NOW £3


73144 SEBASTIAN BERGMAN


by Hjorth Rosenfeldt From the creator of the brilliant TV drama ‘The Bridge’, here is an electrifying Swedish international bestseller. 16 year old Roger has vanished and days pass while the police do nothing, blaming his disappearance on teenage antics. Then his pale, mutilated body is found floating in a shallow


marshland pool, his heart missing. The police bring in Sebastian Bergman - widower, psychologist, top criminal profiler and one of Sweden’s foremost experts on serial killers. Since losing his wife and child, Sebastian has become numb to the outside world and has no interest in taking on the murder case, until he is blindsided by a secret from his past. It’s not long until the brittle web of lies and deception seizes his full attention. A rival to Jo Nesbo and Henning Mankell and one for all crime fiction fans. 440pp in paperback. £7.99 NOW £3.50


73269 CANDLENIGHT by Phil Rickman


Corpse-candles, phantom funerals, the bird of death, in a remote Welsh mountain village there hides an ancient and bloody secret. For Bethan, the schoolteacher, the old superstitions woven into the social fabric of her West Wales village are primitive and distasteful. Which is why she is pleased to welcome the sophisticated newcomers, London journalist Giles Freeman and his


wife Claire. Surely they’ll let in some fresh air? But the Freemans are keen to absorb this different culture and a whole new way of life, and rejecting the advice of an old colleague who warns them of a hard and bitter land, they soon learn that this community hides an ancient secret, one that bodes ill for newcomers. Written with blood-curdling aplomb. 500 page paperback. £8.99 NOW £3


73343 CHARLES JESSOLD


CONSIDERED A MURDERER by Wesley Stace


The night before brilliant but erratic composer Charles Jessold’s opera, about a betrayed husband who murders his wife and her lover, is due to open, Jessold is found dead, apparently having murdered his wife and her lover. Leslie Shepherd, music critic and Jessold’s collaborator on the opera, reflects on


the scandalous affair in a dazzling, passionate and witty novel about the dangerous relationship between artist and critic. A witty, erudite, polished and subtle tale of English music with Wodehouse-style dialogue. 344pp in paperback.


£7.99 NOW £4


73345 CLOSE UP ON DEATH by Maureen O’Brien In an Inspector Bright mystery, here the body of talented TV actress Liza Drew is found in an empty house in north London. Her family and friends are stunned. Liza had no enemies. Sent to investigate, Detective Inspector John Bright concentrates on the motives of three people closest to her - her mother, her lover Paul,


and her best friend Millie. 252pp in new paperback reprint of the 1989 original. £6.99 NOW £4.75


73349 DYING IN THE WOOL:


A Kate Shackleton Mystery by Frances Brody


Bridgestead is a quiet Yorkshire village, a peaceful spot with a babbling brook, rolling hills and a working mill at its heart. Nothing exceptional happens until the day that Master of the Mill Joshua Braithwaite goes missing in dramatic circumstances, never to be heard of


again. Now Joshua’s daughter is getting married and wants one last attempt to find her father. Did he run off with his mistress or was he murdered for his mounting coffers? Kate Shackleton has always loved solving puzzles so who better to get to the bottom of this mysterious disappearance? 356pp in paperback. £8.99 NOW £4


71236 THE FRANCHISE


AFFAIR by Josephine Tey Marion Sharpe and her mother seem an unlikely duo to be found on the wrong side of the law. They have led a quiet and unremarkable life in their country home, The Franchise. Unremarkable that is until the police turn up on their doorstep with a demure young woman. Not only does Betty Kame accuse them of kidnap and abuse, she can back up her claim


with a detailed description of the attic room in which she was kept, right down to the crack in its round window. But there is something about Betty’s story that doesn’t quite add up. With an un-guessable ending, 278pp, paperback.


£7.99 NOW £3.50 71238 TO LOVE AND BE


WISE by Josephine Tey It was rumoured that Hollywood stars would go to any lengths for the privilege of being photographed by the good-looking, brilliantly talented and ultra-fashionable portrait photographer Leslie Searle. But what was this gifted creature doing in such an English village backwater as Salcott St Mary? And why, and how, did he disappear? If a crime had been committed, was


it murder or fraud, or simply some macabre practical joke? 256pp in paperback. £7.99 NOW £3.50


71342 HOUND OF THE BASKERVILLES AND THE SIGN OF THE FOUR by Arthur Conan Doyle


A stylish embossed black cover with an easy-to-use elastic closure make this a strikingly handsome edition and endpaper image. There are new introductions by Caroline Dalzell, Steve Sims and David Sinclair. Conan Doyle presents us with Sherlock Holmes’ flawed personality from early on and we see him as a tormented soul who finds relief from unbearable pain with his 7% solution of cocaine - he is a cold, dark and troubled man. The complete texts are rendered in modern, readable typeface, there is a Hound of the Baskervilles character list, a timeline and a colour map of Dartmoor, home of The Hound. 228pp, colour illus. ONLY £2


72645 THE CHARMING QUIRKS OF OTHERS: An


Isabel Dalhousie Novel by Alexander McCall Smith Our inquisitive heroine has been asked to help in a rather tricky situation. A successor is being sought for the headmaster of a local boys’ school. The board has three final candidates but has received an anonymous letter alleging that one of them has a very serious skeleton


in the closet and could Isabel discreetly look into it? What she discovers about all the candidates is surprising, but what she discovers about herself and Jamie, the father of her young son, turns out to be equally revealing. 256pp. $24.95 NOW £5


71694 BLACK ICE by Michael Connelly The corpse in the hotel room appears to be that of a missing LAPD Narcotics Officer. Rumours abound that the cop had crossed over, selling a new drug called Black Ice that had been infiltrating LA from Mexico, and the LAPD brass are quick to declare his death a suicide. Detective Hieronymus ‘Harry’ Bosch isn’t so sure. Prompted by odd, inexplicable details at the crime scene, and an undeniable attraction to the cop’s widow, Bosch starts his own maverick investigation that soon leads him over the border to Mexicali and into a dangerous labyrinth. 377pp, paperback. £7.99 NOW £3


71834 FAITH by Peter James


Perfection is more than just an ideal, it’s a living to Ross Ransome. He is one of the richest plastic surgeons in the business and even his wife is perfect - after all, he has spent enough hours in surgery to getting her that way. So when she becomes ill and turns her back on conventional medicine and seeks help from a charismatic alternative therapist, Ransome feels bitter and betrayed. Why should anyone have his wife when he can’t. A terrifying thriller which shows what happens when our belief in people gets out of control. 465pp in paperback. £6.99 NOW £2.75


73142 RUSH OF BLOOD by Mark Billingham


Three couples meet by the pool on their Florida holiday and become fast friends. But, on the last night of the festivities, their revels take a tragic twist. The daughter of another holidaymaker goes missing, and her body is later found floating in the mangroves. When the shocked six return home they remain in contact and, over the course of three increasingly fraught


dinner parties, they come to know one another better. However, they do not always like what they find. Buried beneath these apparently normal exteriors are some dark secrets, hidden kinks, ugly vices - and then a second girl goes missing. Could it be that one of these six has a secret far darker than anybody can imagine? 390 increasingly tense pages. £16.99 NOW £6


Fans of authors Agatha Raisin and the Hamish Macbeth series will welcome this house party of aristocrats, servants and murder.


73333 AGATHA RAISIN COMPANION


introduced by M. C. Beaton A celebration of all things Agatha, here is a sharp, witty, hugely intelligent, delightfully intolerant and magnificently non- pc insight into village life. It includes an introduction by and an exclusive interview with the author M. C. Beaton, as well as


Agatha’s previously unseen biography and her retirement to the Cotswolds and her ‘somewhat complicated’ love life. Here we take a look at all the men in Agatha’s life (and there are many!) and a section on the real and fictitious Cotswolds. We go back to the beginning and take a look at the plot summaries of the last 20 titles in the series and Agatha’s Appetites, a collection of all the recipes featured in the series. Finally there is a quiz to test your knowledge. 138pp, line art. £12.99 NOW £6


73382 SNOBBERY WITH


VIOLENCE by M. C. Beaton After a brief and ill-advised dalliance with the Suffragette movement, Lady Rose Summers’ début season in London society turns out to be a complete disaster. Her father suspects that her fiancé, Sir Geoffrey Blandon, is a first-class scoundrel and calls in Captain Harry Cathcart to investigate. But when a malicious guest is found dead in suspicious circumstances, Rose


becomes far more interested in discovering the truth than in landing a more appropriate suitor. As Harry and Rose begin to unravel a web of lies and rumours, a clever murderer sets out to make Rose’s dreadful first season her last. 248pp in paperback. £6.99 NOW £4


73379 SICK OF SHADOWS by M. C. Beaton A curse has befallen one of Rose’s friends. It would seem that even a pretend engagement cannot keep Lady Rose Summer from trouble. Bored with endless parties, teas and balls, she befriends Dolly Tremaine, a beautiful young girl newly arrived from the country and overwhelmed by the demands of the Season. Their friendship is cut tragically short when Dolly is found dead in the river, flowers in her hair and blood on her breast. Rose immediately calls on her fiancé, investigator Captain Harry Cathcart to help solve the mystery of the death, and to keep Rose from becoming the murderer’s next victim. An amusing brew of mystery and romance. 247pp in paperback. £6.99 NOW £4


73356 HASTY DEATH by M. C. Beaton


Longing for a life of emancipation, Lady Rose Summer has abandoned the comforts of her parent’s house to become self supporting. But life as a working woman isn’t quite as liberating as Rose she had imagined. Fortunately for her, drudgery comes to an end when old acquaintance Freddy Pomfret is murdered, and her help, and upper class connections, are


required by amateur sleuth Captain Harry Cathcart. As Rose and Harry prepare to take on the usual Edwardian social rounds, little do they know that they are about to uncover a devious blackmail plot and an unlikely killer. 245pp in paperback. £6.99 NOW £4


73856 THERE GOES THE BRIDE by M. C. Beaton Till death does them part! A less-than-welcome invitation to ex-husband James’s wedding, to a beautiful younger woman, lands on Agatha’s doormat. But it is one wedding and a funeral when the bride is murdered on her big day. Prime suspect Agatha finds her world turned upside down, and not just because the bride’s mother wants her to take on the case of her murdered daughter, but also Agatha has fallen head over heels in love with a sexy Frenchman. Nonetheless, she is dependably on hand to catch the killer, and untangle her own love life. Hugely witty, sharp and intelligent writing. 290pp in paperback.


£6.99 NOW £4


74028 M. C. BEATON: Set of Five A super selection for fans of Agatha Raisin. Buy all five titles and save even more.


£40.95 NOW £18


71998 PERFECT PEOPLE by Peter James


!


John and Naomi Klaesson are grieving the death of their four year old son from a rare genetic disorder. They desperately want another child, but when they find out that they are both carriers of a rogue gene, they realise the odds of their next child contracting the same disease are high. Then they hear about geneticist Dr Leo Dettore who has methods that can spare them the heartache of ever losing another child, even if his methods are more than they can afford. At his clinic is where their nightmare begins. Choices of eye colour, hair, sporting abilities - they can literally design their own child. Now it is too late to turn back as Naomi is pregnant, and already something is badly wrong. 597pp in chunky paperback. £7.99 NOW £4


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