Tag: Thriller

THE WHEEL OF DOLL – Jonathan Ames

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Although badly scarred and down to his last kidney after the previous caper, Happy Doll is back in business. When a beguiling young woman turns up at his door, it’s Doll’s past that comes knocking. Mary DeAngelo is searching for her estranged mother, Ines Candle—a singular and troubled woman Doll once loved. The last he’d seen her she’d been near-death: arms slit like envelopes. Although she survived the episode, she vanished shortly thereafter. Now, years later, Mary claims Ines is alive and has recently made contact—messaging her on Facebook and calling her from a burner phone—only to disappear once again. Although his psychoanalyst would discourage it, Doll takes the case, desperate to see Ines again. But as the investigation deepens, there are questions he can’t shake. What’s led the flighty Ines to reappear? Is Mary only relaying half the truth? And who is Mary’s strange and mysterious husband?
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DEAD FIRST – Johnny Compton

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When private investigator Shyla Sinclair is invited to the looming mansion of eccentric billionaire Saxton Braith, she’s more than a little suspicious. The last thing she expects to see that night is Braith’s assistant driving an iron rod straight through the back of his skull. Scratch that—the last thing she expects to see is Braith’s resurrection afterward.

Braith can’t die, it turns out, but he has no explanation for his immortality, and very few intact memories of his past. Which is why he wants to pay Shyla millions to investigate him, and bring his long-buried history to light. 

Shyla can’t help but be intrigued, but she’s also trapped by the offer. Braith has made it clear that he knows she’s the only person he can trust with his secret, because he knows all about hers.
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A PARTICULARLY NASTY CASE – Adam Kay

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When his toxic medical director dies of a heart attack, fellow doctor Eitan Rose smells foul play. Nobody else does, though, including some quite crucial players like the police and the medical examiner. So Eitan vows to uncover the truth himself.

But Eitan’s own past and reputation are far from spotless, despite his budding relationship with Cole, a handsome hospital porter, and reluctant camaraderie with his office mate, Margaret-with-the-cats. As his colleagues become increasingly concerned about his mental health, Eitan’s investigation spirals out of control. Could a killer really be stalking the wards? Or is Eitan making a catastrophic mistake?
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BLOOD SUGAR – Daniel Kraus

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In a ruined house at the end of Yellow Street, an angry outcast hatches a scheme to take revenge for all the wrongs he has suffered. With the help of three alienated kids, he plans to hide razor blades, poison, and broken glass in Halloween candy, maiming or killing dozens of innocent children. But as the clock ticks closer to sundown, will one of his helpers—an innocent himself, in his own streetwise way—carry out or defeat the plan?

Told from the child’s point of view, in a voice as unforgettable as A Clockwork Orange, Kraus’ novel is at once frightening and emotional, thought-provoking and laugh-out-loud funny. It’ll make you rethink your concepts of family, loyalty, and justice—and will leave you double-checking the wrappers on your Halloween candy for the rest of your days.
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THE FEEDING – Anthony Ryan

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Fifteen years ago the feeders rose from the shadows to transform the world into a graveyard. The few survivors exist in fortified settlements surrounded by the empty ruins of a destroyed civilization. For years the citizens of New City Redoubt have relied on an elite cadre of Crossers to navigate the feeder-infested wasteland between settlements in order to trade for vital supplies. But the Outside is becoming ever more dangerous, and the ranks of the Crossers grow thinner with every crossing.

Layla, only a child when the Feeding destroyed the old world, spends her days scavenging the ruins for valuable scrap and her nights helping her adoptive family eke a living from the Redoubt’s only movie theater. Now, with her father slowly dying, Layla resolves to join the Crossers to retrieve the medicine that can save him. Smart, ruthless, and fast on her feet, Layla quickly gains the respect of her fellow Crossers. But, in a world lost to the deadliest predators, can even the most cunning prey survive?
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ALTER EGO – Alex Segura

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Annie Bustamante is a cultural force like none other: an acclaimed filmmaker, an author, a comic book artist known for one of the all time best superhero comics in recent memory. But she’s never been able to tackle her longtime favorite superhero, the Lethal Lynx. Only known to the most die-hard comics fans and long out of print, the rights were never available―until now.

But Annie is skeptical of who is making the offer: Bert Carlyle’s father started Triumph Comics, and has long claimed ownership of the Lynx. When she starts getting anonymous messages urging her not to trust anyone, Annie’s inner alarms go off. Even worse? Carlyle wants to pair her with a disgraced filmmaker for a desperate media play.

Annie, who has been called a genius, a sell-out, a visionary, a hack, and everything else under the sun, is sick of the money grab. For the first time since she started reading a tattered copy of The Legendary Lynx #1 as a kid, she feels a pure, creative spark. The chance to tell a story her way. She’s not about to let that go. Even if it means uncovering the dark truth about the character she loves.
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SHE RIDES SHOTGUN – Jordan Harper

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Eleven-year-old Polly McClusky is shy, too old for the teddy bear she carries with her everywhere, when she is unexpectedly reunited with her father, Nate, fresh out of jail and driving a stolen car. He takes her from the front of her school into a world of robbery, violence, and the constant threat of death. And he does it to save her life.

Nate made dangerous enemies in prison–a gang called Aryan Steel has put out a bounty on his head, counting on its members on the outside to finish him off. They’ve already murdered his ex-wife, Polly’s mother. And Polly is their next target. 

Nate and Polly’s lives soon become a series of narrow misses, of evading the bad guys and the police, of sleepless nights in motels. Out on the lam, Polly is forced to grow up early: with barely any time to mourn her mother, she must learn how to take a punch and pull off a drug-house heist. She finds herself transforming from a shy little girl into a true fighter. Nate, in turn, learns what it’s like to love fiercely and unconditionally–a love he’s never quite felt before. But can their powerful bond transcend the dangerous existence he’s carved out for them? Will they ever be able to live an honest life, free of fear?
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SENSELESS – Ronald Malfi

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What do you see…?

When the mutilated body of a young woman is discovered in the desert on the outskirts of Los Angeles, the detective assigned to the case can’t deny the similarities between this murder and one that occurred a year prior. Media outlets are quick to surmise this is the work of a budding serial killer, but Detective Bill Renney is struggling with an altogether different scenario: a secret that keeps him tethered to the husband of the first victim.

What do you hear…?

Maureen Park, newly engaged to Hollywood producer Greg Dawson, finds her engagement party crashed by the arrival of Landon, Greg’s son. A darkly unsettling young man, Landon invades Maureen’s new existence, and the longer he stays, the more convinced she becomes that he may have something to do with the recent murder in the high desert.

What do you feel…?

Toby Kampen, the self-proclaimed Human Fly, begins an obsession over a woman who is unlike anyone he has ever met. A woman with rattlesnake teeth and a penchant for biting. A woman who has trapped him in her spell. A woman who may or may not be completely human.
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COMPOUND FRACTURE – Andrew Joseph White

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On the night Miles Abernathy—sixteen-year-old socialist and proud West Virginian—comes out as trans to his parents, he sneaks off to a party, carrying evidence that may finally turn the tide of the blood feud plaguing Twist Creek: Photos that prove the county’s Sheriff Davies was responsible for the so-called “accident” that injured his dad, killed others, and crushed their grassroots efforts to unseat him.

The feud began a hundred years ago when Miles’s great-great-grandfather, Saint Abernathy, incited a miners’ rebellion that ended with a public execution at the hands of law enforcement. Now, Miles becomes the feud’s latest victim as the sheriff’s son and his friends sniff out the evidence, follow him through the woods, and beat him nearly to death. 

In the hospital, the ghost of a soot-covered man hovers over Miles’s bedside while Sheriff Davies threatens Miles into silence. But when Miles accidently kills one of the boys who hurt him, he learns of other folks in Twist Creek who want out from under the sheriff’s heel. To free their families from this cycle of cruelty, they’re willing to put everything on the line—is Miles?
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A MAN NAMED DOLL – Jonathan Ames

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Happy Doll is a charming, if occasionally inexpert, private detective living just one sheer cliff drop beneath the Hollywood sign with his beloved half-Chihuahua half-Terrier, George. A veteran of both the Navy and LAPD, Doll supplements his meager income as a P.I. by working through the night at a local Thai spa that offers its clients a number of special services. Armed with his sixteen-inch steel telescopic baton, biting dry humor, and just a bit of a hero complex, the ex-cop sets out to protect the women who work there from clients who have trouble understanding the word “no.”
 
Doll gets by just fine following his two basic rules: bark loudly and act first. But when things get out-of-hand with one particularly violent patron, even he finds himself wildly out of his depth, and then things take an even more dangerous twist when an old friend from his days as a cop shows up at his door with a bullet in his gut.
 
A Man Named Doll is more than just a fascinating introduction to one truly singular character, it is a highly addictive and completely unpredictable joyride through the sensuous and violent streets of LA.
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