Once a busy hospital, St Jude’s now stands derelict, awaiting demolition.When a partially mummified corpse is found in the building’s cavernous loft, forensics expert Dr David Hunter is called in to take a look. He can’t say how long the body’s been there, but he is certain it’s that of a young woman. And that she was pregnant.Then part of the attic floor collapses, revealing another of the hospital’s secrets: a bricked-up chamber with beds inside. And some of them are still occupied.For Hunter, what began as a straightforward case is about to become a twisted nightmare. And it soon becomes clear that St Jude’s hasn’t claimed its last victim...

23 mystery stories by Richard Deming.

We are delighted to present our second collection of Talmage Powell mystery short stories! Talmage Powell (1920–2000) was one of the all-time great mystery writers of the pulp magazines (and later the digest mystery magazines). He claimed to have written more than 500 short stories, and we have no reason to doubt him — we are working on a bibliography of his work and have documented 373 magazine stories so far... and who knows how many are out there under pseudonyms or buried in obscure magazines? He wrote his first novel, The Smasher, in 1959. He went on to pen 11 more novels under his own name, 4 as “Ellery Queen,” and 2 novelizations of the hit TV series Mission: Impossible. Clearly, though short stories were his first love.

The Washington Post described Peter Lovesey’s crime fiction as “ingenious... irresistible... wickedly clever.” In “The Sedgemoor Strangler,” a serial killer leaves a naked corpse among the reeds, and a young waitress gradually comes to suspect that she is the next victim. Another serial killer terrifies a nineteenth-century housewife in the shocking, twisting tale of “Dr Death.” Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson investigate the stealing of the Christmas Star in “The Four Wise Men.” “The Amorous Corpse” is one of the finest recent impossible crime detective stories — a robbery is committed by a man proven by unimpeachable evidence to have been dead several hours earlier. In “The Problem of Stateroom 10,” the famous mystery writer Jacques Futrelle investigates a murder as the Titanic goes down.Full of wit, irony, tricky plots, and an engaging sense of place and time, The Sedgemoor Strangler is an extraordinary collection of sixteen extraordinary stories.Peter Lovesey has won honors around the world, including the Gold and Silver Daggers, the Macavity, and the Grand Prix de Litterateur Policière. The British Crime Writers Association has recognized Lovesey with its highest honor, the Cartier Diamond Dagger for Lifetime Achievement.The Sedgemoor Strangler and Other Stories of Crime includes a complete checklist of Peter Lovesey’s crime writing.

She was a woman alone, fighting for her life. But she had a weapon working for her stronger even than a murder rap. And used it!

This is a story of the most heart-rending of crimes — the kidnapping of a little child. First the author lets us see the crime itself. Then we watch the anguish of the parents as they discover their loss, the arrival of the ransom note, the payment of the money and all the cruel aftermaths of this cruelest of crimes.

Just because no one had ever tried it before? What better place for a heist, if it was timed right, than a football stadium?There’d have to be money in the box office; the game was a sellout. Every eye in the place would be glued to the action down on the field. Even the getaway would be a cinch. Who was going to challenge an ambulance, either going out or coming in?An ambulance, with one of the seven at the wheel in a white uniform, and the swag neatly shrouded in the back. The only problem was changing cars, and Parker had that one figured, too.So, they’d find an abandoned ambulance. Who was to know who’d been driving it? Because by that time Parker and the other six would be back at the hideaway divvying up the loot!

A 90-year-old man is found dead in his bed, smothered with his own pillow.

On his desk the police find newspaper cuttings about a murder case dating from the Second World War, when a young woman was found strangled behind Reykjavík’s National Theatre.

Konrád, a former detective, is bored with retirement and remembers the crime. He grew up in ‘the shadow district’, a rough neighbourhood bordered by the National Theatre and an abattoir. Why would someone be interested in that crime now? He starts his own unofficial enquiry.

Alternating between Konrád’s investigation and the original police inquiry, we discover that two girls had been...

Reykjavík, August 1941. When a travelling salesman is found murdered in a basement flat, killed by a bullet from a Colt .45, the police initially suspect a member of the Allied occupation force.

The British are in the process of handing over to the Americans and the streets are crawling with servicemen whose relations with the local women are a major cause for concern.

Flóvent, Reykjavík’s sole detective, is joined by the young military policeman Thorson. Their investigation focuses on a family of German residents, the retired doctor Rudolf Lunden and his estranged son Felix, who is on the run, suspected of being a spy.

Flóvent and Thorson race to solve the case and to stay ahead of US counter-intelligence, amid rumours of a possible visit by Churchill. As evidence emerges of dubious experiments carried out on Icelandic schoolboys in the 1930s, Thorson becomes increasingly suspicious of the role played by the murdered man’s former girlfriend, Vera, and her British soldier lover.

The first stand-alone thriller by critically acclaimed author Charlie Huston, The Shotgun Rule is a raw tale of four teenage friends who go looking for a little trouble - and find it. Blood spilled on the asphalt of this town long years gone has left a stain, and it's spreading.Not that a thing like that matters to teenagers like George, Hector, Paul, and Andy. It's summer 1983 in a northern California suburb, and these working-class kids have been killing time the usual ways: ducking their parents, tinkering with their bikes, and racing around town getting high and boosting their neighbors' meds. Just another typical summer break in the burbs. Till Andy's bike is stolen by the town's legendary petty hoods, the Arroyo brothers. When the boys break into the Arroyos' place in search of the bike, they stumble across the brothers' private industry: a crank lab. Being the kind of kids who rarely know better, they do what comes naturally: they take a stash of crank to sell for quick cash. But doing so they unleash hidden rivalries and crimes, and the dark and secret past of their town and their families.The spreading stain is drawing local drug lords, crooked cops, hard-riding bikers, and the brutal history of the boys' fathers in its wake.

Chris Burnett, successful, wealthy and married to the daughter of a multi-millionaire, receives severe brain injuries in a car accident. While convalescing, Burnett disappears for twenty-four hours, during which time a prostitute is brutally murdered and mutilated. Evidence found by a private inquiry agent points to Burnett. His wife, blackmailed by the inquiry agent, sets out to prove her husband’s innocence.

This swiftly moving story of murder and suspense culminates in an unexpected and dramatic climax that is the hallmark of a James Hadley Chase novel.