The Invisible Guardian

For rookie detective constable Fiona Griffiths, her first major investigation promises to be a tough initiation. A young woman and her six-year-old daughter have been found brutally murdered in a squalid flat, the single clue a platinum credit card belonging to a millionaire businessman who died in a plane crash six months before. Fiona, however, has secrets of her own. She is still recovering from a crushing psychological breakdown, and the feelings that haunt her are constantly threatening to undermine the mask of normality she has learned to wear.

The Strangler's Honeymoon is the penultimate gripping Scandinavian crime thriller in the Van Veeteren series by Håkan Nesser. Desperately lonely, 16-year-old Monica Kammerle has little idea of what she is getting herself into when she begins an affair with her mother's latest partner, the sophisticated Benjamin Kerran.... Months later, when a woman's strangled body is found, the Maardam police must discover who has committed this terrible crime.

A white-knuckle crime debut introducing DI Meg Dalton, perfect for fans of Broadchurch and Happy Valley. A lawyer is found dead in a Peak District cave, his face ribboned with scratches. Amidst rumours of a local curse, DI Meg Dalton is convinced this is cold-blooded murder. There's just one catch - chiselled into the cave wall above the body is an image of the grim reaper and the dead man's initials, and it's been there for over a century.

It's December in the quiet Swedish town of Kymlinge, and the Hermansson family are gathering to celebrate father Karl-Erik and eldest daughter Ebba's joint landmark birthdays. But beneath the guise of happy festivities, tensions are running high, and it's not long before the night takes a dark and unexpected turn....

It's 1996, and in Houston a mayoral election is looming. As usual the campaign focuses on Pleasantville. Axel Hathorne, former chief of police, was all set to become Houston's first black mayor. But his lead is slipping thanks to Sandy Wolcott, a defence lawyer. And then, just as the competition intensifies, a girl goes missing, apparently while canvassing for Axel. And when her body is found, Axel's nephew is charged with her murder.

Jan Reyna is a murder squad detective, British by adoption and choice, Faroese by birth and history. Called back to the remote Danish Faroe Islands when his father suffers a paralysing stroke, Reyna is forced to reexamine his decades-long rejection of the past and of his father in particular. But in this now-foreign country, whose language and customs he no longer understands, Reyna is also drawn into a rare Faroese murder case.

Florence, 1986: A seemingly inexplicable attack on a church fresco of Adam and Eve brings together an unlikely couple: Julia Wellbeloved, an art student, and Pino Fratelli, a semi-retired detective who longs to be back in the field. Their investigation leads them to the secret society that underpins the city, and back to the darkness in Florence’s past: the night of the great flood in 1966…

It is the year of our Lord 1363. And in the cathedral city of York people are dying in mysterious circumstances. But there seems to be a common thread - the herbal remedies dispensed by Nicholas Wilton, Master Apothecary. The first victim is an anonymous pilgrim. But when a highborn nobleman dies after taking the same potion the authorities decide to act. Dispatched to York, in disguise, to unravel the mystery, Owen Archer, former Captain of Archers, apprentices himself to the Apothecary.

Penguin presents the unabridged,downloadable audiobook edition of The Strings of Murder by Oscar de Muriel, read by Andy Secombe, including musical interludes recorded by the author himself. Edinburgh, 1888. A virtuoso violinist is brutally killed in his home. But with no way in or out of the locked practice room, the murder makes no sense. Fearing a national panic over a copycat Ripper, Scotland Yard sends Inspector Ian Frey to investigate under the cover of a fake department specializing in the occult.

Magic caused the war. Magic is forbidden. Magic will save us. It was said the Labyrinth had once been the great meeting place, a sprawling city at the heart of an endless maze where a million humans hosted the Houses of the Aelfir. The Aelfir who had brought trade and riches, and a future full of promise.

It's 1975. A baby, minutes old, is forcibly taken from its devastated mother. In 2010, the body of an elderly woman is found in a Dublin public park in the depths of winter. Detective Inspector Tom Reynolds is working the case. He's convinced the murder is linked to historical events that took place in the notorious Magdalene Laundries. Reynolds and his team follow the trail to an isolated convent in the Irish countryside. But once inside, it becomes disturbingly clear that the killer is amongst them....

Joseph O'Loughlin appears to have the perfect life: a beautiful wife, a loving daughter, and a successful career as a clinical psychologist. But nothing can be taken for granted. Even the most flawless existence is only one loose thread away from unravelling. All it takes is a murdered girl, a troubled young patient - and the biggest lie of his life.

Small-time private investigator Ray Lovell veers between paralysis and delirium in a hospital bed. But before the accident that landed him there, he had promised to find Rose Janko. Rose was married to the charismatic son of a travelling gypsy family, Ivo Janko. When Ray starts to investigate her disappearance he's surprised that her family are so hostile towards him.

It starts with just one body - tortured, mummified and then discarded. Its discovery reveals a nightmare world of hidden lives. Of lost identities, secret rituals and brutal exploitation, where nobody can be trusted. This is the darkest, most complex case the police have ever seen. This is the world of the Crow Girl.

The second novel from the acclaimed author of Kill the Father, this thriller is multilayered, complex, full of twists and turns and satisfyingly dark - one of those novels you just have to read late into the night. A high-speed train from Milan draws into the station in Rome, and an horrific discovery in one carriage rocks the city. Preliminary investigations are put in the hands of Deputy Police Commissioner Colomba Caselli. The police receive a message claiming responsibility for the act and announcing more murders to come....