Crime Fiction Authors, Murder Mystery Books, Thriller Novel Reviews & True Crime at Tangled Web - Publisher Penguin 07 April-June

Crime Fiction Authors, Murder Mystery Books, Thriller Novel Reviews & True Crime at Tangled Web - Publisher Penguin 07 April-June

File Updated: 17/08/2010

New Crime & Mystery Fiction Titles From Penguin April-June 07

John Buchan The Thirty-nine Steps (Penguin Red Classics) Pbk published June 2007 by Penguin at Ł7.99 ISBN: 0141031263

Richard Hannay has just returned to England after years in South Africa and is thoroughly bored with his life in London. But then a murder is committed in his flat, just days after a chance encounter with an American who had told him about an assassination plot which could have dire international consequences. An obvious suspect for the police and an easy target for the killers, Hannay goes on the run in his native Scotland where he will need all his courage and ingenuity to stay one step ahead of his pursuers.

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G.K. Chesterton The Man Who Was Thursday: A Nightmare (Penguin Red Classics) Pbk published June 2007 by Penguin at Ł7.99 ISBN: 0141031255

Can you trust yourself when you don't know who you are? Syme uses his new acquaintance to go undercover in Europe's Central Anarchist Council and infiltrate their deadly mission, even managing to have himself voted to the position of 'Thursday'. In a park in London, secret policeman Gabriel Syme strikes up a conversation with an anarchist. Sworn to do his duty, When Syme discovers another undercover policeman on the Council, however, he starts to question his role in their operations. And as a desperate chase across Europe begins, his confusion grows, as well as his confidence in his ability to outwit his enemies. But he has still to face the greatest terror that the Council has - its leader: a man named Sunday, whose true nature is worse than Syme could ever have imagined...

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Erskine Childers The Riddle of the Sands: A Record of Secret Service (Penguin Red Classics) Pbk published June 2007 by Penguin at Ł7.99 ISBN: 0141031271

Childers' lone masterpiece, "The Riddle of the Sands", considered the first modern spy thriller, is recognisable as the brilliant forerunner of the realism of Graham Greene and John le Carre. Its unique flavour comes from its fine characterization, richly authentic background of inshore sailing and vivid evocation of the late 1890s - an atmosphere of mutual suspicion and intrigue that was soon to lead to war.

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Sir Arthur Conan Doyle The Lost World (Penguin Red Classics) Pbk published June 2007 by Penguin at Ł7.99 ISBN: 0141031298

A land before time - a journey beyond belief...Unlucky in love, but desperate to prove himself in an adventure, journalist Ed Malone is sent to test the infamous and hot-tempered Professor Challenger on his bizarre South American expedition findings - not least his sketches of a strange plateau and the monstrous creatures that appear to live there. But rather than being angry at his questions, Challenger invites him along on his next field trip. Malone is delighted: until it becomes clear that the Professor was telling the truth about the terrible lost world he has discovered. Will they all survive the terrifying creatures on the island? And will anyone ever believe what they saw there?

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Jonathan Kellerman Gone Pbk published June 2007 by Penguin at Ł6.99 ISBN: 0141021950

Los Angeles is full of actors. For psychologist Alex Delaware, finding out what's real and what's not is about to become a matter of life and horrific death...Called in to evaluate an aspiring actress accused - along with her boyfriend - of staging her own abduction, Alex is indifferent when the case seems to go nowhere. But then the girl is savagely murdered, and suddenly a straightforward script takes a decidedly unexpected turn. Dylan Meserve, the victim's boyfriend, has also disappeared and the caretaker at the couple's acting school has a history that makes him suspicious as well as weird. Is Dylan a deranged killer, or another victim? Alex and detective Milo Sturges begin auditioning suspects and trawling the depths of LA's seedy underbelly. Then more dead wannabes start turning up...

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Chris Kuzneski Sign of the Cross Pbk published April 2007 by Penguin at Ł6.99 ISBN: 0141030844

On a Danish shore, a Vatican priest is found-hanging on a cross. The next day, the crime is repeated in Asia and Africa. Meanwhile, in the catacombs near Orvieto, Italy, an archeologist unearths a scroll revealing secrets that could rock the foundations of Christianity. Its discovery makes him the most wanted criminal in Europe. But his most dangerous enemies operate outside the law of man.

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Chris Mooney The Missing Pbk published May 2007 by Penguin at Ł6.99 ISBN: 0141030852

The woman was missing for five years. The Crime Scene Investigator finds her. And the serial killer wants them both dead ...When Boston CSI Darby McCormick finds a raving and emaciated woman hiding at the scene of a violent kidnap, she runs a DNA search to identify the Jane Doe. The result confirms she was abducted five years earlier and has somehow managed to escape from the dungeon in which she's been caged. With a teenage couple also missing and Jane Doe seriously ill, the clock is ticking for Darby as she hunts for the dungeon before anyone else disappears or dies. And when the FBI takes over the investigation, it becomes clear that a sadistic serial killer has been on the prowl for decades - and is poised to strike again at any moment - a killer with links to horrors that Darby has desperately tried to bury in her past ...

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Marisha Pessl Special Topics in Calamity Physics Pbk published May 2007 by Penguin at Ł7.99 ISBN: 0141024321

Sunday Telegraph `Brilliant . . . guaranteed to join the ranks of 'The Secret History' and 'Virgin Suicides' as a cult hit and instant classic'
Independent on Sunday `Undoubtedly one of the most impressive debut novels I have ever read'
Scotsman `Triumphant. A supremely inspired, dazzling, wildly dynamic, whirling, glittering, multifaceted marvel, delivered in an irrepressibly smart and flamboyant new voice'
New York Times `Supremely inspired ... a whirling, glittering, multifaceted marvel, delivered in an irrepressibly smart and flamboyant new voice ... required reading'
Audrey Niffenegger, author of The Time Traveler's Wife `[It] made me stay up all night reading . . . reminded me of my lost, bad-girl days. I loved this book'

'It had been almost a year since I'd found Hannah dead, and I thought I'd managed to erase all traces of that night within myself. I was wrong.' "Special Topics in Calamity Physics" is a mesmerizing debut. As teenager Blue van Meer tells her story we are hurled into a dizzying world of murder and butterflies, womanizing and wandering, American McCulture, the Western Canon, political radicalism and juvenile crushisms. Structured around a syllabus for a Great Works of Literature class (with hand-drawn Visual Aids), Blue's wickedly funny yet poignant tale reveals how the imagination finds meaning in the most bewildering times, the ways people of all ages strive for connection, and how the darkest of secrets can set us free.

Marisha Pessl was born in 1977 and lives in New York. This is her first novel.

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John Rickards The Darkness Inside Pbk published April 2007 by Penguin at Ł6.99 ISBN: 0141021160

Seven years ago, Cody Williams was the FBI's prime suspect in a series of horrific New England abductions. Seven years ago, Alex Rourke put Cody Williams behind bars. Now Cody Williams is dying. He wants to set the record straight. And he'll talk only to Alex ...Former FBI agent Rourke has successfully re-invented himself as a private detective, but he's still haunted by the Williams case. And facing the monster again will mean squaring up to some demons from the past. For Cody has nothing left to lose - and a big final hand to play. When it appears that a victim of Cody's might still be alive, Alex is left to make a terrible choice that, either way, will mean the end of at least one life. Because it's not just Cody Williams who has a dark secret ...

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Michael Ridpath See No Evil Pbk published April 2007 by Penguin at Ł6.99 ISBN: 014101525X

When an old college friend pays Alex Calder an unexpected visit he is drawn once more into the City's shady underbelly. For Kim is married to Todd, son of South African newspaper tycoon Cornelius van Zyl. Todd wants Alex's help to investigate the murder of his mother 18 years ago. It was assumed Martha was killed by guerrillas but the recent discovery of a letter sent shortly before her death now suggests a crime far closer to home. When an attempt on his life puts Todd in a coma, Alex vows to uncover the truth. Then a sudden blast shatters his world...

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Georges Simenon Maigret in Court (Read Red) Pbk published May 2007 by Penguin at Ł7.99 ISBN: 0141029633

In a great courtroom drama, Maigret has to explain why he does not believe that Gaston Meurant was capable of slitting his aunt's throat for money and smothering a small child. But in saving him from the gallows, Maigret must expose some dark secrets about Meurant's life. This is a painful story of an oppressive domestic tragedy and the compassionate insight of a remarkable detective.

'A truly wonderful writer ...marvellously readable - lucid, simple, absolutely in tune with that world he creates of run-down hotels, cold, dark barges, quayside canal-taverns, lurking prostitutes, pot-bellied burghers, taciturn youths, slippery barmen' - Muriel Spark, "Sunday Times".

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Georges Simenon Lock 14 (Read Red) Pbk published May 2007 by Penguin at Ł7.99 ISBN: 0141029617

One rainy night, a canal worker stumbles across the strangled body of Mary Lampson in a stable near Lock 14. The dead woman's husband seems unmoved by her death and is curt and unhelpful when Maigret interviews him aboard his yacht. But gradually Maigret is able to piece together their story - a sordid tale of whisky-fuelled orgies and nomadic life on the canals. Can the answer to this crime be found aboard the yacht? Or is the murderer among the bargees, carters and lock-keepers who work the canal?
In "Lock 14", Simenon plunges Maigret into the unfamiliar canal world of shabby bars and shadowy towpaths, drawing together the strands of a tragic case of lost identity.

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Georges Simenon The Friend of Madame Maigret (Read Red) Pbk published May 2007 by Penguin at Ł7.99 ISBN: 0141029609

Maigret becomes increasingly frustrated as his attempts to prove that a brutal, repulsive murder has been committed at a local bookbinder prove fruitless. The mystery revolves around a series of seemingly unconnected incidents and characters, creating an intricate and complicated narrative set amongst the backdrop of the Marais district of Paris. Eventually, it is the intelligent and compassionate Madame Maigret who provides the vital clue.

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Georges Simenon Maigret and the Idle Burglar (Read Red) Pbk published May 2007 by Penguin at Ł7.99 ISBN: 0141029625

Set against a high-profile hunt for the latest criminal gang to hit Paris, Maigret is determined to track down the murderer of a quiet crook of the old school, for whom he cannot help feeling affection and respect. In Maigret's careful recreation of the life of this gentle and eccentric burglar, Simenon beautifully depicts Maigret's insight, compassion, and melancholic nostalgia.

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Andrew Taylor The Barred Window Pbk published May 2007 by Penguin at Ł7.99 ISBN: 0141027665

See Review by Liz Lees

It is 1993 and Thomas Penmarsh has lived in Finisterre, the house by the sea, all his life, sleeping each night in the room with the barred window. He's only 48 but has been an old man since one evening in 1967 when he lost everything he valued ...However now his controlling mother has died and he is master of the house. When Esmond, his cousin and childhood confidante, comes to live with him Thomas is overjoyed - Esmond always looks after him ...But is Esmond all that he seems? And why is he so concerned that Alice wants to come home too? Darling Alice, whom neither have seen since that fateful night twenty-six years ago...

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Andrew Taylor The Raven on the Water Pbk published May 2007 by Penguin at Ł7.99 ISBN: 0141027657

Back in 1964, Peter Redburn and his best friend Richard had spent a golden summer holiday playing out their special game - a private world of secret rituals and oaths of loyalty sworn for eternity. It was all very innocent - until James and Kate joined in ...
And then, one night, their childish game turned to tragedy ...
Now an adult, Peter has never been able to escape his own feelings of guilt about the events that summer. So when he stumbles across a hoard of childhood memories, he knows he must search out the truth. And with a funeral bringing all participants together again, bitter rivalries and sordid secrets are about to be unearthed.

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