Time Is a Killer

London, 1952. Dick Bourton is not like the other probationer policemen in Notting Hill. He's older, having fought in Europe and then Korea. And he's no Londoner, being from Cotswold farming stock. Then there's Anna, the exotically beautiful White Russian fiancée he has brought back to these drab streets and empty bombsites. She may as well come from a different planet.  The new copper also has a mind of his own. After an older colleague is shot by a small-time gangster they are chasing in a pea-souper fog, something nags at Bourton's memory. 

Penguin presents the audiobook edition of The Darkness by Ragnar Jonasson. A young woman, an asylum seeker from Russia, is found murdered on the seaweed-covered rocks of the Vatnsleysuströnd in Iceland. Detective Inspector Hulda Hermannsdottir of the Reykjavik Police is called to investigate this - the final case in her career before she is forced into retirement. When Hulda starts to ask questions, it isn't long before she realises that no-one can be trusted and that no-one is telling the whole truth.

A dead river. A dying town. A killer's secrets.... In an isolated country town ravaged by drought, a charismatic young priest opens fire on his congregation, killing five men before being shot dead himself. A year later, journalist Martin Scarsden arrives in Riversend to write a feature on the anniversary of the tragedy. But the stories he hears from the locals don't fit with the accepted version of events. Just as Martin believes he is making headway, a shocking discovery rocks the town.

In an idyllic resort on the island of La Réunion, Liane Bellion and her husband, Martial, are enjoying the perfect moment with their six-year-old daughter. Turquoise skies, blue sea, palm trees, a warm breeze. Then Liane disappears. She goes up to her hotel room between three and four p.m. and never comes back. Her husband, worried, goes to the room along with the concierge - the room is empty, but there is blood everywhere. Despite his protestations of innocence, the police view Martial as their prime suspect.

Giverny. During the day, the home of the famous artist Claude Monet and the gardens where he painted his water lilies. But once the tourists have gone, there is a darker side to the peaceful French village. This is the story of 13 days that begin with one murder and end with another. Jérôme Morval, a man whose passion for art was matched only by his passion for women, has been found dead in the stream that runs through the gardens.

An elderly woman of striking beauty is found murdered in Orleans, France. Her identity has been cleverly erased, but the method of her death is very specific: she has been killed in the manner of traitors to the Resistance in World War Two. Tracking down her murderer leads police inspector Inès Picaut back to 1940s France, where the men and women of the Resistance were engaged in a desperate fight for survival against the Nazi invaders.

From the refugee camps of Greece to the mountains of Macedonia, a 13-year-old boy is making his way to Germany and safety. Codenamed 'Firefly', he holds vital intelligence: unparalleled insight into a vicious ISIS terror cell and details of their plans. But the terrorists are hot on his trail, determined he won't live to pass on the information. When MI6 become aware of Firefly and what he knows, the race is on to find him. Luc Samson, ex-MI6 agent and now private eye, finds himself recruited to the cause. Fluent in Arabic thanks to his Lebanese heritage, Samson's job is to find Firefly, win his trust and get him to safety.

On the night of 22 December 1980, a plane crashes on the Franco-Swiss border and is engulfed in flames. Out of 169 passengers. 168 are killed instantly. The miraculous sole survivor is a newborn baby. But the identity of the child is unknown, and two families - one rich and affluent, and the other poor - step forward to claim her. So begins a private investigation that wil go on for the next 18 years.... The novel opens on the eve of the girl's 18th birthday.

Successful novelist Kit Carradine has grown restless. So when British Intelligence invites him to enter the secret world of espionage, he willingly takes a leap into the unknown. But the glamour of being a spy is soon tainted by fear and betrayal, as Carradine finds himself in Morocco on the trail of Lara Bartok - a mysterious fugitive with links to international terrorism.

When a troubled model falls to her death from a snow-covered Mayfair balcony, it is assumed that she has committed suicide. However, her brother has his doubts, and calls in private investigator Cormoran Strike to look into the case.Strike is a war veteran - wounded both physically and psychologically - and his life is in disarray. The case gives him a financial lifeline, but it comes at a personal cost: the more he delves into the young model's complex world, the darker things get - and the closer he gets to terrible danger...

Everyone's invited. Everyone's a suspect. In a remote hunting lodge, deep in the Scottish wilderness, old friends gather for New Year. The beautiful one. The golden couple. The volatile one. The new parents. The quiet one. The city boy. The outsider. The victim. Not an accident - a murder among friends.

One rain-swept February night in 1809, an unconscious man is carried into a house in Somerset. He is Captain John Lacroix, home from Britain's disastrous campaign against Napoleon's forces in Spain. Gradually Lacroix recovers his health but not his peace of mind - he cannot talk about the war or face the memory of what happened in a village on the gruelling retreat to Corunna. After the command comes to return to his regiment, he sets out instead for the Hebrides, with the vague intent of reviving his musical interests and collecting local folk songs. 

On a stifling summer's day, 11-year-old Jack and his two sisters sit in their broken-down car, waiting for their mother to come back and rescue them. 'Jack's in charge,' she said. 'I won't be long.' But she never comes back. Three years later, mum-to-be Catherine wakes to find a knife beside her bed, and a note that says: 'I could have killed you'. Meanwhile Jack is still in charge - of his sisters, of supporting them all, of making sure nobody knows they're alone in the house, and - quite suddenly - of finding out the truth about what happened to his mother. But the truth can be a dangerous thing....

The police make a terrible discovery in a suburb of Copenhagen. A young woman has been killed and dumped at a playground. One of her hands has been cut off, and above her hangs a small doll made of chestnuts. Young detective Naia Thulin is assigned the case. Her partner is Mark Hess, a burned-out investigator who's just been kicked out of Europol's headquarters in The Hague. They soon discover a mysterious piece of evidence on the chestnut man - evidence connecting it to a girl who went missing a year earlier and is presumed dead, the daughter of politician Rosa Hartung. 

Is Alice here? Did she make it? Is she safe? In the chaos, in the night, it was impossible to say which of the four had asked after Alice's welfare. Later, when everything got worse, each would insist it had been them. Five women reluctantly pick up their backpacks and start walking along the muddy track. Only four come out the other side.