Crime Fiction Authors, Murder Mystery Books, Thriller Novel Reviews & True Crime at Tangled Web

Crime Fiction Authors, Murder Mystery Books, Thriller Novel Reviews & True Crime at Tangled Web - Publisher Pan 08 Jan-March

File Updated: 19/07/2010

New Crime & Mystery Fiction Titles From Pan Jan-March 08

Meg Cabot Size Doesn't Matter Pbk published January 2008 by Pan at Ł6.99 ISBN: 033044395X

Heather should be happy. She's finally got a boyfriend and although he was only supposed to be her "rebound guy", things have gotten serious fast ...She's also actually passing her first college course, and better yet her dad's moving out. On the down side, her boss, Dr. Veatch, may well be the most boring man on the face of the planet ...But that hardly seems reason enough to put a bullet through his head. Can Heather find her boss' murderer, answer Tad's question, and get her landlord Cooper to realize that by letting her go, he's making the biggest mistake of his life, all while maintaining a fifteen hundred calorie per day diet?

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Chelsea Cain Heartsick Pbk published February 2008 by Pan at Ł6.99 ISBN: 033044980X

See Review by Martin Edwards - author of the highly acclaimed Harry Devlin Mysteries

He thinks he sees a flash of emotion in her eyes. Sympathy? Then it's gone. 'Whatever you think this is going to be like,' she whispers, 'it's going to be worse.' When beautiful serial killer Gretchen Lowell captured her last victim, the man in charge of hunting her down, she quickly established who was really in control of the investigation. So why, after ten days of horrifying physical and mental torture, did she release Detective Archie Sheridan from the brink of death and hand herself in? Two years on, Archie remains driven by a terrifying obsession that was born during his time alone with Gretchen. One thing is clear Archie does not believe he was ever truly freed. Now Archie returns to lead the search for a new killer, whose recent attacks on teenage girls have left the city of Portland reeling. Shadowed by vulnerable young reporter Susan Ward, Archie knows that only one person can help him climb into the mind of this psychopath. But can Archie finally manage to confront the demons of his past without being consumed by them?

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Julie Compton Tell No Lies Pbk published February 2008 by Pan at Ł6.99 ISBN: 0330452851

Jack Hilliard is a 35-year-old assistant DA who appears to have it all: intelligence, good looks, a great job, and a solid marriage with his wife, Claire. But Jack finds himself at a crossroads in his life when, on the same night his boss announces his resignation as DA, Jack's subterranean flirtation with his enigmatic lawyer friend Jenny bubbles to the surface. Jack soon learns how easy it is to compromise his values and comfortable life for ambition and desire. Despite Claire's counsel to stand by his beliefs, Jack misrepresents his position on the death penalty to secure the top spot at the DA's office. As the pressures of the campaign mount, he struggles to deny his growing obsession with Jenny, who supports his ambitions at whatever cost. When Jenny is charged with a heinous crime, and Jack is the only one who can prove her innocence, he must make a Hobson's choice: save Jenny by speaking out, or save his marriage and career by remaining silent.

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Julie Compton Best Intentions Pbk published January 2008 by Pan at Ł6.99 ISBN: 0330452851

Jack Hilliard is a 35-year-old assistant DA who appears to have it all: intelligence, good looks, a great job, and a solid marriage with his wife, Claire. But Jack finds himself at a crossroads in his life when, on the same night his boss announces his resignation as DA, Jack's subterranean flirtation with his enigmatic lawyer friend Jenny bubbles to the surface. Jack soon learns how easy it is to compromise his values and comfortable life for ambition and desire. Despite Claire's counsel to stand by his beliefs, Jack misrepresents his position on the death penalty to secure the top spot at the DA's office. As the pressures of the campaign mount, he struggles to deny his growing obsession with Jenny, who supports his ambitions at whatever cost. When Jenny is charged with a heinous crime, and Jack is the only one who can prove her innocence, he must make a Hobson's choice: save Jenny by speaking out, or save his marriage and career by remaining silent.

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Hal Duncan Ink: The Book of All Hours (Book of All Hours 2) Pbk published January 2008 by Pan at Ł7.99 ISBN: 0330438387

It's twenty years since the Evenfall swept across the Vellum and the bitmites took reality apart, twenty years since Phreedom Messenger disappeared into the wilderness and Seamus Finnan was imprisoned in his own past. Twenty years of chaos but the Dukes, the remnants of the Covenant, still cling to power in their enclaves of order in the bitmite-devastated wilderness ...in their Havens in the Hinter. Across the folds of time and space, though, rogues and rebels are rising up against the Empire. From a mediaeval fortress where wandering mummers stage a Harlequin play based on Euripides' "The Bacchae" and performed in the Cant to Kentigern where another Harlequin, Jack Flash, wreaks havoc on a fascist state that thought him dead.From a 1939 Paris where Jack Carter and Seamus Finnan, heroes of the International Brigades, seek to rewrite history - to a 1929 Berlin where a very different Jack seeks to save the world from a history he has helped make real. Locked in an eternal battle of chaos and order, it seems everyone must play their part now, as rebel or tyrant, hero or villain. 'It is, quite simply, stunning and the most powerful debut novel I've read since Susanna Clarke's Jonathan

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David Fiddimore The Forgotten War Pbk published March 2008 by Pan at Ł7.99 ISBN: 0330446940

The third book in the wartime series continuing from Tuesday's War and Charlie's War. The war's over. Charlie Bassett is one of England's brave young survivors. Haunted by one woman's smile and by his wartime adventures, he finally returns back home to try to pick up the pieces of his broken life. There's just one small problem - everyone thinks he's dead. Arrested as a deserter, his only way out of prison is to work for a shadowy government agency monitoring the growth of Communism in post-war Europe. Special radio missions keep him busy in the air, while his all-female team, headed up by the icy Miss Miller, keeps his feet firmly on the ground. But then Charlie is forced to go undercover as a spy in a Communist group called the Rubble Rats.The government calls them the Red Menace, but Charlie finds a group of hard-working families just trying to get by - and his loyalties are torn. When he discovers that Grace Baker is one of them, Charlie must make some difficult decisions. For king and country? Or for the woman he once loved?

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Forsyth N & Castro E Other People's Money Pbk published March 2008 by Pan at Ł7.99 ISBN: 0330446010

Elliot Castro was a gifted outsider, a working-class kid with ambitions who wanted to live the high life but lacked the money to do so. Until, at the tender age of sixteen, he worked out how to use the credit card system to his advantage. Identifying the banks' security weaknesses, utilising his intelligence and charm, Elliot embarked on a massive spending spree. From London to New York, Ibiza to Beverly Hills, he lived the fantasy life, staying in famous hotels, flying first class, blowing a fortune on designer clothes. Time and time again Elliot managed to wriggle free of the numerous authorities who were on his tail, while his life spiralled out of control. Meanwhile, from a police station at Heathrow, a detective was patiently tracking him down ...With a likeable hero, filled with humour and as fast-paced as a thriller, "Other People's Money" is crime writing at its best.
'A fascinating and illuminating story' - Irvine Welsh. 'Exhilarating Brit variation on Catch Me if You Can, which never misses an opportunity to up the sweaty-palmed suspense' - "Arena".

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Michael Stephen Fuchs The Manuscript Pbk published January 2008 by Pan at Ł7.99 ISBN: 0330452576

The hunt is on for the manuscript. On the way we meet a gun-toting urban professional with a weakness for internet discussion groups; a chemistry student turned online drug dealer; a pair of slacker post-grads with big questions and escalating problems; an unstoppable hitman; a federal agent on the take; a cadre of well-armed mercenaries; and a gang of Angry Young Taoists, calmly blasting the hell out of everyone. This unlikely group of people are brought together by their quest for the meaning of life, discovered in the remote highlands of South America by an infamous 19th century explorer, which is now said to be concealed in the inaccessible spaces of a hidden website on the perimeters of a shadow Internet. During the course of their perilous quest, they come up against others who stop at nothing to keep the truth hidden.

'A high-energy, enthusiastic yarn.' - "Pulp.net".
'Smart, sexy, and as funny in spots as it's dark in others. But I love this book because it has soul, too. It's not afraid to ask the big questions about the Meaning of Life. And here's the kicker: it's not even afraid to answer them.' - "Valerie Sayers".
'Clever and engaging.' - "Times Literary Supplement".

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Eliza Graham Playing with the Moon Pbk published February 2008 by Pan at Ł7.99 ISBN: 0230531253

Shattered by a recent bereavement, Minna and husband Tom retreat to an isolated village on the Dorset coast, seeking the solitude that will allow them to cope with their loss and rebuild their foundering marriage. Walking on the beach one day, they unearth a human skeleton. It is a discovery which will plunge Minna into a mystery which will consume her for months to come. The remains are soon identified as those of Private Lew Campbell, a black American GI who, it seems, drowned during a wartime exercise in the area half a century before.Growing increasingly preoccupied with the dead soldier's fate, Minna befriends a melancholy elderly woman, Felix, who lived in the village during the war. As Minna coaxes Felix's story from her, it becomes clear that the old woman knows more about the dead GI than she initially let on. "Playing with the Moon" is an unforgettable novel about memory and loss, about the legacy of war, and the need to reconcile ourselves to our past in order to live with the present.

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Lori Handeland Crescent Moon Pbk published March 2008 by Pan at Ł6.99 ISBN: 0330451332

When the moon changes its shape, temptation and terror become one...New Orleans is known for sinful pleasures and strange magic, but for cryptozoologist Diana Malone it offers one irresistible attraction. For over a hundred years there have been whispers of the wolves around the Crescent City, and the recent discovery of bodies in the nearby swamps hints at a creature even more dangerous...one that could make Diana's career and fortune, if she lives to capture it.Adam Ruelle is a reclusive former Special Forces officer, the last of the mysterious Cajun family rumored to be cursed, and the only person skilled enough to guide Diana in her search. Rugged and captivating, he fills her nights with desire...but by day, Diana is plagued with doubts. Adam clearly knows more than he's telling, but is his aim to protect her or to distract her? Something is stalking its prey in the Louisiana bayou, and every step towards the horrifying truth brings Diana closer to a centuries-old enemy that lives for the smell of fear and the thrill of killing, again and again…

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Lori Handeland Midnight Moon Pbk published March 2008 by Pan at Ł6.99 ISBN: 0330451340

At midnight her darkest fears and deepest desires will reach their peak ...Cassandra thought she had the perfect life until she suffered a devastating tragedy. Now she has a new identity as Priestess Cassandra, owner of a New Orleans voodoo shop, and a new purpose. A research trip for a paranormal secret society leads Cassandra to Haiti, where rumors fly of a sinister voodoo master, Jacques Mezareau, who can resurrect the dead. Fortune hunter Devon Murphy agrees to guide Cassandra there safely, but his sensual appeal promises danger of a different kind ...As Cassandra and Devon make their way to the eerie jungle village, their attraction explodes into an intoxicating desire, and Cassandra begins to question her resolve to never let another man into her life. Her attempts to resist Devon become more and more impossible. But when she succeeds in learning Jacques' macabre ritual, her new powers may have come with a terrifying price. Now, haunted by violent dreams that grow more vivid as the midnight moon approaches, Cassandra must uncover the shocking truth about an ancient curse before it leads her to destroy herself-and everyone she loves ...

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Lori Handeland Dark Moon Pbk published January 2008 by Pan at Ł6.99 ISBN: 0330451316

Dr Elise Hanover quite literally lives for her job since quitting would mean meeting a silver bullet with her name on it. She works alone, struggling to unlock the mysteries of an affliction that should only exist in nightmares. But Elise knows from personal experience just how real it is. Because the first time its deadly power pulsed through her veins was the last time she saw the love of her life. Until now ...The surprise visit from FBI agent Nic Franklin is merely the first in a series of shocks. After her lab is firebombed and her most bloodthirsty test subject escapes, Elise and Nic have no choice but join forces. Unfortunately, the situation in remote Fairhaven, Wisconsin, is far from safe: Nic has too many questions about Elise's work and why she deserted him years ago; townsfolk are disappearing, and Elise feels her own condition intensifying in ways as terrifying and exhilarating as her rekindled attraction to Nic.Now, as a shadowy evil closes in, it's becoming all too clear that Elise is the only one who can stop it if it doesn't stop her first...'Fresh, fun and fabulous! Lori Handeland is an exciting new voice in paranormal suspense' - Sherrilyn Kenyon.

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David Hewson The Promised Land Pbk published January 2008 by Pan at Ł6.99 ISBN: 0330446347

Ex-cop Bierce has been in prison for over twenty years following his conviction for the murders of his wife and son. He has no memory of the tragedy and has never been able to say with certainty that he didn't do it - except he cannot imagine why on earth he would have killed his beloved family. Unexpectedly released moments before his execution, he teams up with the beautiful, feisty, half-Chinese Alice Loong, who is seeking answers to her own troubled past and the death of her mother on that same day in 1983. Alice guides Bierce through the strange new world of the twenty-first century, but what secrets is she hiding? Pursued by mysterious enemies who are convinced that Bierce knows more than he is telling about his wife's death, the pair embark on a dangerous race against time to uncover the real truth about the events of that fateful day.

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Richard Kunzmann Salamander Cotton Pbk published February 2008 by Pan at Ł6.99 ISBN: 0330426621 Artwork by: Cover design: © www.blacksheep-uk.com. Coverimage: Corbis

A wealthy ex-farmer has been found beaten and burned to death at his home in suburban Johannesburg. Why does his estranged wife not seem particularly surprised by this cold-blooded murder, and insist that the killer will be found in the Northern Cape? That is where the victim's plantations were located - a desolate landscape of extreme poverty, and with a very dark mining past. Police-officer Jacob Tshabalala persuades his former colleague Harry Mason to accompany the woman there as a private investigator, and the moment they arrive in the near-abandoned mining town of Leopold's, Harry senses that dangerous secrets are resurfacing. To add to this dark menace is the supposed existence of a local demon, and when Harry's little daughter is viciously attacked, he realises here is a mystery that he must resolutely unravel.

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Brian McGilloway Borderlands Pbk published March 2008 by Pan at Ł6.99 ISBN: 033045255X

See Review by Cath Staincliffe author of the popular Sal Kilkenny mysteries and the series creator of TV Blue Murder

The corpse of local teenager Angela Cashell is found on the Tyrone-Donegal border, between the North and South of Ireland, in an area known as the borderlands. Garda Inspector Benedict Devlin heads the investigation: the only clues are a gold ring placed on the girl's finger and an old photograph, left where she died. Then another teenager is murdered, and things become further complicated when Devlin unearths a link between the recent killings and the disappearance of a prostitute twenty-five years earlier - a case in which he believes one of his own colleagues is implicated. As a thickening snow storm blurs the border between North and South, Devlin finds the distinction between right and wrong, vengeance and justice, and even police-officer and criminal becoming equally unclear.

A dazzling and lyrical debut crime novel, "Borderlands" marks the beginning of a compelling new series featuring Inspector Benedict Devlin.

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Catherine Sampson The Pool of Unease Pbk published March 2008 by Pan at Ł6.99 ISBN: 0330448218

See Review by Cath Staincliffe author of the popular Sal Kilkenny mysteries and the series creator of TV Blue Murder
See Review by Judith Rhodes

Robin Ballantyne is investigating the murder of a British man in Beijing. His headless body was found in woods by an icy, fetid lake. Is his death linked to a recent series of brutal attacks on women? In a city thick with paranoia and corruption, Robin struggles to separate rumour from reality. Meanwhile, late one freezing night, Chinese private detective Song rescues a young boy from a fire on a building site. With witnesses appearing from the murky surrounds, bloody clothes on the ground but no body, and flames blazing around him, Song panics and flees still clutching the boy. From the smog of the capital to the poverty-stricken countryside, and from the mansions of millionaires to a disused quarry where the children of scavengers root among the rubbish, Song and Robin must unravel the truth behind the murders before they find themselves silenced and before the killer can make another sinister move ...
Shattering traditional preconceptions, "The Pool of Unease" is a gritty, fast-paced thriller that exposes the shadowy underbelly of modern China.

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Tim Severin Corsair Pbk published January 2008 by Pan at Ł6.99 ISBN: 0330443135

In 1677, on a late summer's evening two ships lurk off the coast of southwest Ireland. They are Barbary corsairs from North Africa, slave catchers. As soon as it is dark, their landing parties row ashore to raid a small fishing village - on the hunt for fresh prey ...In the village, seventeen-year-old Hector Lynch wakes to the sound of a pistol shot. Moments later he and his sister Elizabeth are taken prisoner. From then on Hector's life plunges into a turbulent and lawless world that is full of surprises. Separated from Elizabeth, he is sold to the slave market of Algiers, where he survives with the help of his newfound friend Dan, a Miskito Indian from the Caribbean. The two men convert to Islam to escape the horrors of the slave pens, only to become victims of the deadly warfare of the Mediterranean. Serving aboard a Turkish corsair ship, their vessel is sunk at sea and they find themselves condemned to the oar as galley slaves for France. Driven by his quest to find his sister, Hector finally stumbles on the chilling truth of her fate when he and Dan are shipwrecked on the coast of Morocco...

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Martin Cruz Smith Stalin's Ghost Pbk published March 2008 by Pan at Ł7.99 ISBN: 033044493X

See Review by Cath Staincliffe author of the popular Sal Kilkenny mysteries and the series creator of TV Blue Murder

Moscow lies deep under snow, and Arkady Renko is on the trail of a suspect police officer, a former Black Beret who served with glory against the insurgency in Chechnya. But proof of the man's corruption is proving more elusive to gather. Then Renko's unpopular boss calls him in to handle a delicate matter: passengers riding the last metro of the night have reported seeing the ghost of Stalin waving to them from the platform edge. Every night at the same time, regular as clockwork. Meanwhile, his adopted son, Zhenya has disappeared, and his girlfriend, Eva, has reignited an affair with the very officer Arkady is investigating. Renko is assigned the help of an expert Stalinist, a decorated war hero and chess grandmaster. Not everyone, it seems, likes the fact that Stalin is dead...Not only an original and deeply humane thriller, "Stalin's Ghost" is also a wonderful evocation of the emerging New Russia where only too often the troubles of the present erupt into double-cross, murder and grand chess stratagems...

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Wilbur Smith The Quest Pbk published March 2008 by Pan at Ł7.99 ISBN: 0330412728

Wilbur Smith returns with the eagerly awaited sequel to his thrilling Egyptian series. Following on from "River God", "The Seventh Scroll" and "Warlock, "The Quest" continues the story of the Warlock, Taita, wise in the lore of the ancient Gods and a master of magic and the supernatural. Egypt is struck by a series of terrible plagues that cripple the Kingdom, and then the ultimate disaster follows. The Nile fails. The waters that nourish and sustain the land dry up. Something catastrophic is taking place in the distant and totally unexplored depths of Africa from where the mighty river springs. In desperation Pharoah sends for Taita, the only man who might be able to win through to the source of the Nile and discover the cause of all their woes. None of them can have any idea of what a terrible enemy lies in ambush for "The Warlock" in those mysterious lands at the end of their world.

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Douglas Thompson The Hustlers Pbk published February 2008 by Pan at Ł7.99 ISBN: 0330449516

John Burke and Bobby McKew first met in Dublin, but their paths were to cross again in London in the late 1950s, with fateful results. By this time John was running illegal gambling parties in Belgravia and Bobby was the lieutenant of a notorious crime boss. When gambling was legalized, clubs sprang up everywhere. And for those who shared Bobby's mindset ('I would never get into a game of chance unless I knew it was bent and I was on the winning end') there was money to be made. Finally able to tell their story and name their co-conspirators without fear of reprisals, John and Bobby describe the full details of a scam they called 'the big edge', an undetectable way to fix the hugely fashionable game of chemin de fer. As John says, 'It was psychologically and mathematically brilliant. Einstein would have been proud of it.' It was the ultimate con, and those involved made tens of millions of pounds. And they stole from everyone - government ministers, the rich and titled, movie moguls as well as the ordinary punter. Told through the eyes of two charming Irishmen, evoking London society in the late 1950s and 60s, with a fantastic cast of characters ranging from legendary safecracker Eddie Chapman and Great Train Robber Bruce Reynolds to Sam Spiegel, Ian Fleming and the Maharaja of Baroda, "The Hustlers" is a gripping account of one of the twentieth century's most outrageous scams.

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