Search results for ""Bedford Square Publishers""

A soldier and a spy, an officer but not quite a gentleman... Captain Harry Walsh is SOE's secret weapon. Loathed by his own commanding officer, haunted by the death of his closest friend and trapped in a loveless marriage, Harry Walsh is close to burn out when he is ordered to assassinate the man behind the ME 163 Komet, Hitler's miracle jet fighter. If Walsh fails, there is no prospect of allied victory in Europe. Harry Walsh is ruthless, unorthodox and ungentlemanly. He is about to wreak havoc.

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A terrifying literary thriller set on the Alaskan tundra, about the mystery of evil and mankind's losing battle with nature. NOW ON NETFLIX Wolves have come for the children of Keelut. Three children have been taken from this isolated Alaskan village, including the six-year-old boy of Medora and Vernon Slone. Wolf expert Russell Core arrives in Keelut to investigate the killings and learns of the horrifying darkness at the heart of Medora. When her husband returns from a desert war to discover his boy dead and his wife missing, he begins a maniacal pursuit that cuts a bloody swathe across the frozen landscape. As Core attempts to rescue Medora from her husband's vengeance, he comes face to face with an unspeakable secret about the indestructible bonds of family, and the untamed animal in the soul of every human being. An epic woven of both blood and myth, Hold the Dark recalls the extreme climate and tribalism of Daniel Woodrell's Winter's Bone and the primeval violence of James Dickey's Deliverance.

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Character-driven thriller about two women who attempt to take the law into their own hands to reveal the truth about a fire that killed 9 people 13 years ago. A compelling page-turner that reveals the place where small-town corruption and family abuse intersect with love, truth and justice.

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A master storyteller’s novel of crime, corruption, and antisemitism in early Manhattan, Ravage & Son reflects the lost world of Manhattan’s Lower East Side — the cradle of Jewish immigration during the first years of the twentieth century — in a dark mirror.Abraham Cahan, editor of the Jewish Daily Forward, serves as the conscience of the Jewish ghetto teeming with rogue cops and swindlers.He rescues Ben Ravage, an orphan, from a trade school and sends him off to Harvard to earn a law degree. But upon his return, Ben rejects the chance to escape his gritty origins and instead becomes a detective for the Kehilla, a quixotic gang backed by wealthy uptown patrons to help the police rid the Lower East Side of criminals.Charged with rooting out the Jewish 'Mr. Hyde', a half-mad villain who attacks the prostitutes of Allen Street, Ben discovers that his fate is irrevocably tied to that of this violent, sinister man.

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A SUNDAY TIMES HISTORICAL FICTION BOOK OF THE MONTH'Vivid, visceral and utterly immersive. Extraordinary' LIZ HYDER author of The Gifts'You can smell the spit and sawdust rising from the pages of this atmospheric gothic novel.' - RED Magazine'A Violent, disturbing gothic tale compellingly told.' - The Guardian‘If you love Sarah Waters and dark historical fiction, you will no doubt be hooked.’ - Diva magazineIn the slums of 19th-century New York.A tattooed mystic fights for her life.Her survival hangs on the turn of a tarot card.Powerful, intoxicating and full of suspense. The Knowing is a darkly spellbinding novel about a girl fighting for her survival in the decaying criminal underworlds.Whilst working as a living canvas for an abusive tattoo artist, Flora meets Minnie, an enigmatic circus performer who offers her love and refuge in an opulent townhouse, home to the menacing Mr Chester Merton. Flora earns her keep reading tarot cards for his guests whilst struggling to harness her gift, the Knowing - an ability to summon the dead. Caught in a dark love triangle between Minnie and Chester, Flora begins to unravel the secrets inside their house.The Knowing is a stunning debut inspired by real historical characters including Maud Wagner, one of the first known female tattoo artists, New York gang the Dead Rabbits, and characters from PT Barnum's circus.

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'Searingly topical.' THE TELEGRAPH'Shocking.' HEATA fresh and topical debut thriller where two detectives on a chilling murder case begin a love affair, only for one of them to become a prime suspect.Detective Erin Crane is investigating sixteen-year-old Sophie Madson's murder along with detective Tom Radley. They have a close professional bond built on mutual trust and a shared contempt for the head of the anti-corruption team, Walker.During the investigation, Tom discovers Erin’s biggest secret, but to her surprise, the revelation brings them closer together, and Tom and Erin embark on a love affair - despite all the risks.Then Erin discovers dashcam footage showing Sophie getting into Tom’s car barely an hour before she died. Tom becomes the prime suspect and everything Erin thought she could trust begins to crumble...Reader reviews'If I could rate it higher than five stars, I would do!''So many twists and turns that kept me guessing all the way through!'

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It's the oldest story in the world: boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy gets girl. But when the boy is Nick Sharman, and the girl has a violent ex-jailbird as an old boyfriend, who promises extreme retribution on anyone who gets involved with her, it's never going to be that simple...and both Sharman...and the girl are looking at a lot of trouble. With a bent brief planning an audacious multi-million pound robbery with a bunch of heavy duty thugs in tow, a beautiful sister who's a fast track CID officer, and enough ordnance to stock the Woolwich Arsenal, the scene is set for a savage and bloody confrontation under the streets of the City of London which ends literally explosively, with only one man standing. And guess who that is. Sharman shows there is life in the old dog yet, if only just.

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I Am Still The Greatest Says Johnny Angelo - Despite persistent rumours of his death fifteen years ago, Johnny Angelo's legend continues. Johnny Angelo is a rock singer, and this is his story from the beginning. As a child he is a dreamer and a solitary, a thief, a killer of birds and cats. As a man he is a god to his fans, an emperor to his cronies, a hoodlum to his enemies. Girls lie at his feet. He becomes rich. He commits murder. At the end, police shoot him down in the street. In a cool and highly original style Nik Cohn has written a bizarre fable for our time, capturing its sickness and horror yet staying true to its grandeur and allure. King Death - Eddie is a strange man with an extraordinary talent that makes him the 'performer' he is. Eddie administers Death. His subjects, he explains, are not afraid, but are thrilled and transported. To Eddie, Death is completion, and he finds fulfilment, satisfaction, and pride in each job he carries out. When Seaton Carew, America's most successful TV entrepreneur, chances to witness Eddie in action, Eddie's career is altered. Overcoming many obstacles, he and Seaton literally ride to glory on the Deliverance Special, a train carrying King Death and his huge entourage all over America. But then a disturbing change comes over Eddie and threatens to topple him from his grisly throne... King Death is part nightmare, part modern fairytale and wholly original.

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The iconic, tough-but-tender Boston PI Spenser returns in an outstanding new addition to the New York Times-bestselling series from author Ace Atkins. What started out as a joke landed seventeen-year-old Dillon Yates in a lockdown juvenile facility in Boston Harbor. When he set up a prank twitter account for his vice principal, he never dreamed he could be brought up on criminal charges, but that's exactly what happened. This is Blackburn, Massachusetts, where zero tolerance for minors is a way of life. Leading the movement is hard-as-nails Judge Joe Scali, who gives speeches about getting tough on today's wild youth. But Dillon's mother, who knows other Blackburn kids who are doing hard time for minor infractions, isn't buying Scali's line. She hires Spenser to find the truth behind the Draconian sentencing. From the Harbor Islands to a gated Florida community, Spenser and trusted ally Hawk follow a trail through the Boston underworld with links to a shadowy corporation that runs New England's private prisons. They eventually uncover a culture of corruption and cover-ups in the old mill town, where hundreds of kids are sent off to for-profit juvie jails.

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Hearing footsteps pounding along the street behind him he glanced back, fleetingly worried, then laughed because the street was deserted. All the same, he felt uneasy. Everything looked different in the dark. Then he heard more footsteps approaching, and a hoarse voice called out. Turning his head, he made out a figure hovering in the shadows and as it raised one arm, the barrel of a gun glinted in the moonlight The dead body of unassuming David Lester is discovered in a dark side-street, and DI Geraldine Steel is plunged into another murder investigation. The clues mount up along with the suspects, but with the death of another man in inexplicable circumstances, the case becomes increasingly complex. As Geraldine investigates the seemingly unrelated crimes, she makes a shocking discovery about her birth mother.

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When a police officer's daughter was found raped and murdered, Sailor Grant, the local nonce, was sent down. Sharman always had his doubts, but that part of his life is over. Now, Sailor is out of prison and keeps phoning Sharman to help him get justice, but Nick wants to be left alone. When Sailor is found dead and Sharman is half beaten to death by the local coppers, Nick realises that he must find the truth about the events from his past before those close to him are killed.

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Mickey Prada is a nice kid. Perhaps too nice. He works in a neighbourhood seafood market in Brooklyn putting fish on ice. He's got a nice girlfriend. He even delayed college a year, to look after his sick dad who's gradually losing his marbles and has a tendency to go walkabout. But Mickey's got a little problem. A customer at the fish store, Angelo Santoro, keeps asking Mickey to place bets for him and Angelo keeps losing. As Angelo gets further in the hole, his bad luck is turning out to be Mickey's too. Now Mickey's got his bookie after him and Angelo's showing him the butt of his pistol rather than paying him back. So when his best friend, Chris, asks Mickey to join him on a can't-lose caper, Mickey decides to go along. But, sure-fire schemes often have a way of backfiring, and this one is sending Mickey into an uncharted part of Brooklyn, where fish like Chris and Mickey have trouble...

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A hilariously dark thriller about two very different New York couples. The DePinos are miserable, living in a tiny rundown apartment above a deli on Tenth Avenue. The Sussmans live in a posh building on the Upper East Side. When Joey DePino loses his job and is threatened by his bookies and loan shark, he involves the Sussmans in a sick, desperate plan to pay off his gambling debts. But ad exec David Sussman has his own problems, trying to stop his suddenly psychopathic Asian mistress from ruining him, and won't go down without a fight. As the lives of the DePinos and the Sussmans become increasingly intertwined, Joey and David plunge their families into a moral-less world where anything is possible and nothing is personal.

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'A mine is a hole in the ground with a fool at the bottom and a crook at the top.' - Mark Twain A billion dollars is a lot of money but not for Jim, a trading whizz kid. While buying into a new mine in Congo his broker has gone missing in the Jungle. Baz Mycock is a shady mining promoter who will stop at nothing to part speculators with their money. Barron Mining could be just the killing he has always planned. 'Man bites Dog' is a Congolese child soldier, trapped and enslaved by a conflict of unprecedented brutality. In The Twain Maxim their paths cross under the malevolent gaze of Nyiragongo, Africa's most volatile volcano as the lure of untold mineral riches sets off a trail of devastation.

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Conman is the story of young Neil Martin, a kindly family man. A bit geeky, a bit nerdy. If you met him, you would assume he runs a failing comic memorabilia store in London's Soho. Which he does. In order to bail himself out of a huge stock-ruining, poster sopping basement flood, he needs to claim on his insurance. Which he would do - if he'd remembered to pay his premium. Terrified of losing everything - his wife Jane, his daughter, his business, his home - and scared to appear the dumb, working-class pleb that Jane's father always took him for, Neil reluctantly agrees to help Christopher - a passing confidence trickster - use his premises for a big sting. So the con is on and the trap is set. Neil meets Christopher's crew and, as he introduces them to the world of the vintage comic collectable, he is introduced to the life of the grifter. The swaps, swindles and switcheroos. The colourful patter of marks, mitt fitters, cacklebladders and cold pokes. But things are never as they seem in the twilight world of the confidence man. And when Christopher's real target is revealed, Neil finds himself plotting, switching, swapping and scamming for revenge, for redemption. And for his life. Somewhere in the shadows, where High Fidelity meets The Usual Suspects, where David Mamet meets Ben Elton, Conman will keep you laughing, guessing and up all night until the last page is turned and the breathtaking truth is revealed.

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An urgent book on generative artificial intelligence exploring the risk and benefits looming in this seminal momentThe debut of ChatGPT on November 30th was a watershed moment in the history of technology. We stand on the threshold of a new age â one where content of all kinds, even software itself, will be conjured, seemingly from thin air, with simple conversation. In a culture fraught with misinformation, Mastering AI pierces through the thicket of exaggerated claims, explaining how we arrived at this moment and mapping the likely long-term impacts on business, economics, culture and society this potent technology will have. This book will serve as a guide to those dangers â as well as highlighting the technologyâs transformative potential â and will pinpoint concrete steps that should be taken to regulate generative AI.

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When two seemingly unconnected mysterious deaths occur on his watch, police chief Jesse Stone must pull out all the stops to unravel the truth and stop a killer from striking again. The small town of Paradise is devastated when a star high-school baseball player is found dead at the bottom of a bluff just a day after winning the team's biggest game. For Jesse, the loss is doubly difficult - the teen was the nephew of his colleague, Suitcase Simpson, and Jesse had been coaching the young shortstop. As he searches for answers about how the boy died and why, he is stonewalled at every turn, and it seems that someone is determined to keep him from digging further. Jesse suddenly must divide his attention between two cases after the shocking murder of former Paradise police chief, Charlie Farrell. Before his death, Farrell had been looking into a series of scam calls that preyed upon the elderly. But how do these 'ghost calls' connect to his murder? When threats - and gunshots - appear on Jesse's own doorstep, the race to find answers is on. Both old and new enemies come into play, and in the end, Jesse and his team must discover the common factor between the two deaths in order to prevent a third.

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Critically acclaimed novelist Michael Farris Smith pulls Nick Carraway out of the shadows and into the spotlight in this exhilarating imagination of his life before The Great Gatsby. Before Nick Carraway moved to West Egg and into Gatsby's world, he was at the centre of a very different story - one taking place along the trenches and deep within the tunnels of World War I. Floundering in the wake of the destruction he witnessed first-hand, Nick delays his return home, hoping to escape the questions he cannot answer about the horrors of war. Instead, he embarks on a transcontinental redemptive journey that takes him from a whirlwind Paris romance - doomed from the very beginning - to the dizzying frenzy of New Orleans, rife with its own flavour of debauchery and violence. An epic portrait of a truly singular era and a sweeping, romantic story of self-discovery, this rich and imaginative novel breathes new life into a character that many know only from the periphery. Charged with enough alcohol, heartbreak, and profound yearning to transfix even the heartiest of golden age scribes, NICK reveals the man behind the narrator who has captivated readers for decades.

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England, 1943 Lost in fog, pilot Vee Katchatourian is forced to make an emergency landing where she meets enigmatic RAF airman Stefan Bergel, and then can't get him out of her mind. In occupied Poland, Ewa Hartman hosts German officers in her father's guest house, while secretly gathering intelligence for the Polish resistance. Mourning her lover, Stefan, who was captured by the Soviets at the start of the war, Ewa is shocked to see him on the street one day. Haunted by a terrible choice he made in captivity, Stefan asks Vee and Ewa to help him expose one of the darkest secrets of the war. But it is not clear where everyone's loyalties lie until they are tested. Published to coincide with the 75th anniversary of VE Day and based on WWII atrocity the Katyn Massacre, When We Fall is a moving story of three lives forever altered by one fatal choice.

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IN A TOWN FULL OF SECRETS, WHO CAN YOU TRUST? In a town full of secrets, who can you trust? In the aftermath of a mass shooting in a mosque, small town tensions run high. Clashes between the Muslim community and a local faction of radical white nationalists are escalating, but who would have motive and opportunity to commit such a devastating act of violence? Detectives Esa Khattak and Rachel Getty from Canada's Community Policing Unit are assigned to this high-profile case and tasked to ensure the extremely volatile situation doesn't worsen. But when leaked CCTV footage exposes a shocking piece of evidence, both sides of the divide are enraged. As Khattak and Getty work through a mounting list of suspects, they realise there's far more going on in this small town than anyone first thought... A Deadly Divide is a piercingly observed, highly topical thriller by human rights law professor and award-winning author Ausma Zehanat Khan.

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Short-listed for the Crimefest/Specsavers Debut Crime Fiction Award 2020 Longlisted for the Historical Writers Association (HWA) Debut Crown award 2019 To believe in her future, she must uncover her past... Birmingham, 1885. Born in a gaol and raised in a workhouse, Cora Burns has always struggled to control the violence inside her. Haunted by memories of a terrible crime, she seeks a new life working as a servant in the house of scientist Thomas Jerwood. Here, Cora befriends a young girl, Violet, who seems to be the subject of a living experiment. But is Jerwood also secretly studying Cora...? With the power and intrigue of Laura Purcell's The Silent Companions and Sarah Schmidt's See What I Have Done, Carolyn Kirby's stunning debut takes the reader on a heart-breaking journey through Victorian Birmingham and questions where we first learn violence: from our scars or from our hearts.

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The story of Ted Lewis carries historical and cultural resonances for our own troubled times Ted Lewis is one of the most important writers you've never heard of. Born in Manchester in 1940, he grew up in the tough environs of post-war Humberside, attending Hull College of Arts and Crafts before heading for London. His life described a cycle of obscurity to glamour and back to obscurity, followed by death at only 42. He sampled the bright temptations of sixties London while working in advertising, TV and films and he encountered excitement and danger in Soho drinking dens, rubbing shoulders with the 'East End boys' in gangland haunts. He wrote for Z Cars and had some nine books published. Alas, unable to repeat the commercial success of Get Carter, Lewis's life fell apart, his marriage ended and he returned to Humberside and an all too early demise. Getting Carter is a meticulously researched and riveting account of the career of a doomed genius. Long-time admirer Nick Triplow has fashioned a thorough, sympathetic and unsparing narrative. Required reading for noirists, this book will enthral and move anyone who finds irresistible the old cocktail of rags to riches to rags.

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When a hysterical mother reports her baby's sudden disappearance, suspicion immediately falls on the absent husband. But Detective Geraldine Steel's gut instinct tells her this case is not as simple as her colleagues think... Complications in the mother's life begin to surface, including her relationship with her controlling father, a controversial political figure. As the police investigate, their urgent attempt to find the missing infant grows ever more perplexing. Steel is forced to suspect everyone associated with the family - and when a body is discovered, matters take a deadly turn.

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Amid a global crisis, one woman searches for justice... The Syrian refugee crisis becomes personal for Inspector Esa Khattak and Sergeant Rachel Getty. NGO worker Audrey Clare, sister of Khattak's childhood friend, is missing. In her wake, a French Interpol Agent and a young Syrian man are found dead at the Greek refugee camp where she worked. Khattak and Getty travel to Greece to trace Audrey's last movements in a desperate attempt to find her. In doing so, they learn that her work in Greece had strayed well beyond the remit of her NGO... Had Audrey been on the edge of exposing a dangerous secret at the heart of the refugee crisis - one that ultimately put a target on her own back? No Place of Refuge is a highly topical, moving mystery in which Khan sensitively exposes the very worst and best of humanity. Fans of the series will love this latest instalment.

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Thelma and Louise meets Goodfellas when an unlikely trio of women in New York find themselves banding together to escape the clutches of violent figures from their pasts. THELMA AND LOUISE MEETS GOODFELLAS when an unlikely trio of women in New York find themselves banding together to escape the clutches of violent figures from their pasts. After Brooklyn mob widow Rena Ruggiero hits her eighty-year-old neighbour Enzio on the head with an ashtray when he makes an unwanted move on her, she steals his vintage Chevy Impala and retreats to the Bronx home of her estranged daughter, Adrienne, and her granddaughter, Lucia, only to be turned away at the door. Their neighbour, Lacey 'Wolfie' Wolfstein, a one-time Golden Age porn star and retired Florida Suncoast grifter, takes Rena in and befriends her. When Lucia discovers that Adrienne is planning to hit the road with her ex-boyfriend, she figures Rena is her only way out of a life on the run with a mother she can't stand. The stage is set for an explosion that will propel Rena, Wolfie, and Lucia down a strange path, each woman running from their demons, no matter what the cost. A Friend is a Gift You Give Yourself is a screwball noir about finding friendship and family where you least expect it, in which William Boyle again draws readers into the familiar - and sometimes frightening - world in the shadows at the edges of New York's neighbourhoods.

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Iconic, tough-but-tender Boston PI Spenser delves into the black market art scene to investigate a decades-long unsolved crime of dangerous proportions. Iconic, tough-but-tender Boston PI Spenser delves into the black market art scene to investigate a decades-long unsolved crime of dangerous proportions. The heist was legendary, still talked about twenty years after the priceless paintings disappeared from one of Boston's premier art museums. Most thought the art was lost forever, buried deep, sold off overseas, or, worse, destroyed as incriminating evidence. But when paint chips from the most valuable piece stolen, Gentlemen in Black by a Spanish master, arrives at the desk of a Boston journalist, the museum finds hope and enlists Spenser's help. Soon the cold art case thrusts Spenser into the shady world of black market art dealers, aged Mafia bosses, and old vendettas. A five-million-dollar-reward by the museum's top benefactor, an aged, unlikable Boston socialite, sets Spenser and pal Vinnie Morris onto a trail of hidden secrets, jailhouse confessions, murder, and double crosses.

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'I absolutely adored this book' - Stephen KingMeet Mrs Planksy, supposed retiree, reckless motorbike rider and exasperated solver of international internet scams.Mrs Plansky's Revenge is bestselling author Spencer Quinn's first novel in a new series since the meteoric launch of Chet and Bernie -- introducing the irresistible and unforgettable Mrs Plansky, in a story perfect for book clubs and commercial fiction readers.Mrs Loretta Plansky, a widow in her seventies, is settling into retirement in Florida while dealing with her 98-year-old father and fielding requests for money from her beloved children and grandchildren. Thankfully, her new hip hasn’t changed her killer tennis game one bit.One night Mrs Plansky is startled awake by a phone call from a voice claiming to be her grandson Will, who needs ten thousand dollars to get out of a jam.By morning, Mrs Plansky has lost everything. Law enforcement announces that her life savings have vanished, and that it’s hopeless to find the scammers behind the heist. First humiliated, then furious, Loretta Plansky refuses to be just another victim.In a courageous bid for justice, Mrs Plansky follows her only clue on a whirlwind adventure to a small village in Romania to get her money and her dignity back — and perhaps find a new lease on life, too.

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Loyalty can save a soul — or destroy one.Franco Fiorvante is a handsome lemon-grower who has toiled for years on the estate of boss Baron Zito. Franco dreams of owning his own lemon grove, but the rigid class system of Sicily thwarts his ambitions. Determined to secure a prosperous future, Franco will do anything to prove his loyalty to the Baron. But when Baron Zito asks him to arrange the kidnapping of a little boy, Franco crosses the point of no return, setting in motion the making of the world’s first Mafia family.Gaetano Catalano is an idealistic young lawyer, whose devotion for justice is a calling. Gaetano is a member of the Beati Paoli, a real-life secret society of aristocrats who investigate crime. Gaetano and the Beati Paoli set out to find the boy, but for Gaetano, the mission turns to obsession. He risks everything to right the wrong.The kidnapped boy, Dante, grows up without even knowing his last name. He doubts his own sanity until he meets Lucia, a girl with a tragic past of her own. They fall in love, and set out to find his true identity.

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The town of Paradise receives a tragic shock when the mayor is discovered dead, his body lying in an open grave on a property on the lake. It's ostensibly suicide, but Jesse has his doubts... especially because the piece of land where the man was found is the subject of a contentious and dodgy land deal. Two powerful moguls are fighting over the right to buy and develop the prime piece of real estate, and one of them has brought in a hired gun, an old adversary of Jesse's: Wilson Cromartie, aka Crow. Meanwhile, the town council is debating if they want to sacrifice Paradise's stately character for the economic boost of a glitzy new development. Tempers are running hot, and as the deaths begin to mount, it's increasingly clear that the mayor may have standing in the wrong person's way.

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In the newest Wolfe-family adventure from James Carlos Blake, Rudy and Frank Wolfe are engaging in routine miscellaneous business - some legitimate and some less so - for their family when they stumble upon a stash of high-quality pornographic films in a raid. The plot thickens when their Aunt Catalina, the family matriarch aged 115, recognizes her long-lost sister in one of the young performers. Catalina tasks the boys with tracking the girl down, however improbable a connection may be. This proves to be no simple task. Soon, Rudy and Frank find themselves moving away from world of porn and towards the upper echelons of the Sinaloa drug cartel, where the mysterious woman has become a particular favorite of the head narco. For their aunt, the woman, and themselves, Frank and Rudy must find a way to get her out without alerting the cartel. A tropical storm complicates their quest, but their sprawling family may save them from this obstacle, too. Often outrageous and always entertaining, the Wolfes are not to be missed.

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Still Life with Woodpecker is sort of a love story that takes place inside a pack of Camel cigarettes. It reveals the purpose of the moon, explains the difference between criminals and outlaws, examines the conflict between social activism and romantic individualism, and paints a portrait of contemporary society that includes powerful Arabs, exiled royalty, and pregnant cheerleaders. It also deals with the problem of redheads.

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Why would two Eastern European meatboys want to whack an innocent cab driver? That's the question that occurs to Gilrein as Raban and Blumfeld press the gun barrel into his mouth. Does it have something to do with the ritual death-by-flencing of Leo Tani? Or does the answer involve Gilrein's ex-lover, now working as a librarian for a bibliomaniac gangster. Or maybe the whole thing has something to do with the Inspector, inventor of the notorious Methodology? And how does Bobby Oster figure in the mix, with his crew of murder-for-hire rogue cops who call themselves The Magicians? To find the answers, Gilrein will drive the night streets of his hometown and face down more than one demon from his past. From the Vacuum, where child-artists are held captive in veal pens and forced to forge graphic novels, to the Houdini Lounge, where the second annual immigrant death-match is being marketed, Gilrein will wander the underworld, collecting stories and looking for absolution. In the end, he'll brush up against "Alicia's Tale" and learn new truths about the terrifying negotiations always taking place between the storyteller and the audience in the city of Quinsigamond.

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WHEN THE TARGETS ARE RANDOM, YOU COULD BE NEXT WHEN THE TARGETS ARE RANDOM, YOU COULD BE NEXT A man is killed in apparently random attack, and suspicion falls on a gang of muggers. Only Detective Sergeant Geraldine Steel thinks this is the work of a more deliberate murderer. Two more victims are discovered, after further seemingly indiscriminate attacks. The muggers are tracked down, with tragic consequences, but does the killer still remain at large? When Geraldine finally manages to track down a witness, she finds her own life is in danger...

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Jitterbug Perfume is an epic. Which is to say, it begins in the forests of ancient Bohemia and doesn't conclude until nine o'clock tonight [Paris time]. It is a saga, as well. A saga must have a hero, and the hero of this one is a janitor with a missing bottle. The bottle is blue, very, very old, and embossed with the image of a goat-horned god. If the liquid in the bottle is actually the secret essence of the universe, as some folks seem to think, it had better be discovered soon because it is leaking and there is only a drop of two left.

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A masterful, revelatory work of literary non-fiction about a teenage girl’s shocking crime — and its extraordinary aftermath.'An absorbing work of social history and a story about the mystery and miracle of forgiveness...it deserves to be read with attention.' Hilary Mantel, Booker Prize–winning author of the Wolf Hall trilogyOn a spring afternoon in 1985 in Gary, Indiana, a fifteen-year-old black girl kills a white elderly bible teacher in a violent home invasion. In a city with a history of racial tension the press swoops in.When Paula is sentenced to death, no one decries the impending execution of a tenth grader. But the tide begins to shift when the victim’s grandson Bill forgives the girl, against the wishes of his family, and campaigns to spare her life. This tragedy in a midwestern steel town soon reverberates across the United States and around the world — reaching as far away as the Vatican — as newspapers cover the story on their front pages and millions sign petitions in support of Paula.As Paula waits on death row, her fate sparks a debate that not only animates legal circles but raises vital questions about the value of human life. This story asks us to consider the nature of justice, and what radical acts of empathy we might be capable of.

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A mind-bending, brain-expanding cornucopia of facts for curious minds from the bestselling author of Why Don't Penguins' Feet Freeze? and Does Anything Eat Wasps?Own the room with this hilarious collection of fact-tastic myth-busters and jaw-dropping trivia exploring science, history, sport and lesser-known facts from across the universe.Did you know that the Moon has a Bishop?That ostriches DON'T bury their heads in the sand?And that powdered rice was used as cement in the Great Wall of China?What do souls weigh?What can't 60% of the human population smell?And what on earth is rhinotillexomania?And the big one...are farts actually invisible?The answers to these questions are all here.Challenge your brain, turn your world upside down and relish the irresistible mix of wit and wisdom.It's also a perfect gift for the brainiac in your life.

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