Publisher: Severn House
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 10/01/2010
ISBN-13: 9780727869128
ISBN-10: 0727869124

Cozy Mystery. With a new location, a new business partner, and a five-foot inflatable coffee cup for her roof, Uncommon Grounds owner Maggy Thorsen is excited about the future--especially since her coffee shop's new home is a quaint railroad station that's being revitalized by a new commuter-rail connection. But something even worse than cold coffee mars Maggy's day--at the station's dedication, a corpse is found in her giant coffee cup...and rumor has it that the newly dead woman had been having an affair with Maggy's boyfriend, Sheriff Jake Pavlik. This 6th outing for Maggy is a "delightful" (Publishers Weekly) cozy that's sure to warm up readers.

Publisher: St. Martin's Press
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 10/12/2010
ISBN-13: 9780312557300
ISBN-10: 0312557302

Mystery. Investigating a triple murder case caught on video at a Hollywood mansion, LAPD detective Shane Scully and his wealthy new partner, Sumner "Hitch" Hitchens, find the open-and-shut case complicated by the discovery of a spent bullet casing that doesn't match the evidence...and by the news that another killing took place at the home 25 years earlier. Could the cases be connected? The Prostitutes' Ball is the 10th--and possibly last--book in the Shane Scully series; talented writer and TV producer (The Rockford Files, The A-Team, Wiseguy, etc.) Stephen J. Cannell died earlier this year. Fans of well-drawn characters and fast-paced tales should check out his work.

Publisher: William Morrow
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 10/12/2010
ISBN-13: 9780061915017
ISBN-10: 0061915017

Cozy Mystery. Heaven--in the ghostly form of Department of Good Intentions emissary (and rule-breaker) Bailey Ruth Raeburn--must help headstrong Kay Clark stay alive. After years away, Kay's former boyfriend has come home to Adelaide, Oklahoma and died in what appeared to be an accident. But did someone who was at his family's mansion push him down the long stairway? Kay thinks so--and now she's in danger. The critics love Bailey Ruth--Kirkus Reviews calls her "delightful" and Publishers Weekly says she is "an irresistible cozy sleuth." Readers who enjoy Nancy Atherton's Aunt Dimity series might like this funny and heartwarming supernatural series, too.

Publisher: Atlantic Monthly Press
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 10/05/2010
ISBN-13: 9780802119568
ISBN-10: 0802119565

Historical Crime Novel. Talented 10-year-old Austrian cellist Meret Voytek studies with Jewish teacher Victor Rosen, who flees the country when Hitler's power grows and becomes a spy. Meret stays and plays for an orchestra that quickly becomes part of the Hitler Youth, but she is later sent to Auschwitz. Meanwhile, Hungarian physicist Karel Szabo is recruited by the Americans to help build the atomic bomb. In the second half of the novel, in 1948 London, Scotland Yard Detective Frederick Troy learns about all of them as he investigates a murder case. This rich, complex book, the 7th in the Troy novels, takes place in various locales and will please fans who enjoy multi-layered historical stories.

Publisher: Berkley Books
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 10/05/2010
ISBN-13: 9780425236642
ISBN-10: 0425236641

Historical Mystery. In this "superb" (Publishers Weekly, starred review) debut novel, 28-year-old Charles du Luc arrives in 1686 Paris to work as an instructor of rhetoric at a renowned Jesuit college and is charged with putting on the school's theatrical and dance production. Charles, who's both served in the military and illegally helped Huguenots, turns investigator when someone murders his star dancer. Fans of well-plotted, well-researched mysteries (such as those by Ariana Franklin) will appreciate the authentic historical details and how the city of Paris comes to life in this acclaimed first novel. Readers interested in the history of dance will find this book especially compelling.

Authors have long written about the locked-room mystery, with everyone from Edgar Allan Poe and Arthur Conan Doyle to Agatha Christie and John Dickson Carr penning plots based on impossible crimes. But there are plenty of modern writers taking up the challenge, too.

Publisher: HarperTorch
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 11/01/2005
ISBN-13: 9780060731441
ISBN-10: 0060731443

Humorous Mystery. Bernie Rhodenbarr is a Greenwich Village bookstore owner. He's also a reformed burglar--well, he is until his landlord raises his rent by thousands of dollars. But things don't go as planned for the eminently likeable lock-picker's return to a life of crime. The cops come knocking about a stolen million-dollar baseball-card collection. Only Bernie doesn't know anything about the cards, as he was busy at another apartment finding a dead body in a locked room. This 6th book in Lawrence Block's witty Bernie series is a "deliciously laid-back fare from a master who makes it all look easy" (Kirkus Reviews, starred review).

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Publisher: Bantam
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 09/30/2008
ISBN-13: 9780553588323
ISBN-10: 055358832X

Mystery. Heading for the International Spiritualists' Convention, British police detectives John May and Arthur Bryant (who are known for using unorthodox methods to solve crimes) find themselves stranded by a massive blizzard along with dozens of other motorists. But the cold weather isn't all that May and Bryant have to worry about in their 5th book; they soon learn that a serial killer may be stranded on the same roadway and that one of the members of their Peculiar Crime Unit has been found dead in a locked room. Publishers Weekly says that White Corridor's "fair-play solution will particularly satisfy lovers of golden age mysteries."

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Publisher: Forge
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 03/31/2009
ISBN-13: 9780765318190
ISBN-10: 0765318199

Mystery. Several vintage mystery books--including rare first editions by Agatha Christie, Dashiell Hammett, and Rex Stout--are kept under lock and key in a special library with the added protection of a security alarm and double-bolted windows. So how did someone manage to secret away eight of the most valuable books? That's what San Francisco-based detective Nameless agrees to find out in Schemers, the 34th book in this long-running series. Mystery fans who enjoy dryly humorous books and haven't met Nameless should check out one of his cases and see why Bill Pronzini (who's married to author Marcia Muller) is a Mystery Writers of America Grandmaster.

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Publisher: Poisoned Pen Press
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 08/10/2008
ISBN-13: 9781590585351
ISBN-10: 1590585356

Mystery. Some homes in the 1800s had stranger rooms (accommodations for unknown travelers, which had their own entrances and separate locks). Nearly 150 years ago, a murder took place in the locked stranger room of the Lydell house in Virginia. The crime was never solved. Now, a new locked-room murder has been committed in the same place. Sheriff Ike Schwartz and FBI agent Karl Hedrick investigate the crimes, past and present, but are hampered by elderly Jonathan Lydell III, who is as prejudiced as he is proud of his family history and his house. In a starred review, Library Journal calls this book "too good to miss."

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Publisher: Random House Trade Paperbacks
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 05/08/2007
ISBN-13: 9780812977639
ISBN-10: 0812977637

Historical Mystery. In Vienna, Austria at the turn of the 20th century, a beautiful spiritualist medium is shot and killed in a locked room--and there's absolutely no trace of a bullet or gun inside, only a strange note. Detective Oskar Rheinhardt and his good friend psychoanalyst Max Liebermann (a colleague of Freud) investigate that death as well as the strange hysterical paralysis of another young woman, but soon, another locked-room death occurs. Kirkus Reviews calls the book "immensely entertaining." Also published as Mortal Mischief, A Death in Vienna is the 1st in an acclaimed series by British psychologist Frank Tallis.

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