Detective Mary Joe Court sleeps with a shotgun beside her bed and a lovable bull mastiff at her feet. For the past 12 years, she’s hidden from a nightmarish past, but with every passing day, her scars fade, and her heart grows lighter. Now, for the first time in her life, she looks forward to her future. She’s happy. Then she finds the body. Someone shot the victim in her chest and left her to die in a cheap motel. Joe knew her well. She grew up with her. They were sisters, of a sort.

A man in hiding. A gang of outlaws searching for retribution. This is no time for cupcakes. Today is Brody Steele’s first day as the new owner of The Red Herring, Pleasant Valley, Maine’s only mystery bookstore. The cute shop has a loyal customer base as well as an ornery cat. Unfortunately, Brody doesn’t know the first thing about running a legitimate business, he doesn’t want to be in the small town, and he hates cats. On top of all that, he hasn’t read a book since high school. When a cute woman walks into the store, he thinks his bad luck is about to change.

At the end of a particularly grueling summer day, Ash is heading home to his wife and kids when he discovers a pair of bodies, shot execution style, in the front seat of a crashed vehicle. As the first officer on the scene, Ash finds himself and his department 20 minutes behind a killer in a race where every second counts. With two victims down and a third unaccounted for, the clock is ticking and Ash must find the killer before he strikes again.

He’s the new owner of Rockafellers, a vintage record store struggling to find customers. Much of that is due to Headbangers, a competitor with a better product mix and an aggressive owner. There is also a local do-gooder group who wants Owen to fall in line with their vision for a kinder, gentler Costa Buena. None of that worries Owen, though, because he is determined to be the number one used-music store on the boardwalk - even if that means stepping on a few toes. But when a murder occurs shortly after his arrival, he’s identified as prime suspect number one.

No one ever thinks the unthinkable will happen... When Grace Hughes’s family was murdered outside their suburban home the police told her it was a senseless tragedy. Just another madman with a gun. Happens every day in America. One year later and still overwhelmed by grief, Grace struggles to make sense of her shattered world. Then Grace meets two abandoned children in desperate need of help and she discovers a newfound sense of purpose. But as Grace starts to heal, secrets about her husband’s past unfold.

Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Detective Stilwell has been "exiled" to a low-key post policing rustic Catalina Island, after department politics drove him off a homicide desk on the mainland. But while following up the usual drunk-and-disorderlies and petty thefts that come with his new territory, Detective Stilwell gets a report of a body found wrapped in plastic and weighed down at the bottom of the harbor. Crossing all lines of protocol and jurisdiction, he starts doggedly working the case.

We’ve all dreamed of ditching everything and running off to another country—but almost no one actually ever does. Well, Val feels like she's almost no one. Invisible to her husband and dissatisfied with her life, deep in her soul Val yearns to be someone else. Someone sexy. Someone happy. So she buys a ticket and takes off to Italy, with only her favorite romance novel to guide her.

To defend her client, she must dig up a town’s darkest secrets. Defense attorney Cass Leary thought she’d escaped her hometown for good. But after leaving her high-paying job in Chicago, she decides to revisit her troubled past. When someone murders the beloved high school basketball coach and Cass steps in to defend the girl accused of the crime, she doesn’t expect the death threats that follow.... Confronting the town that shunned her as a child, she unearths secrets that some would kill to keep buried.

Blake Wilder is plagued with nightmares from her dark and twisted past. Fourteen years ago, her entire family was taken from her. Her parents murdered and her sister taken. At the age of 22, Blake joined the FBI in hopes of one day discovering the truth behind the mysteries of her own past.

Meet Stephanie Plum, a bounty hunter with attitude. In Stephanie’s opinion, toxic waste, rabid drivers, armed schizophrenics, and August heat, humidity, and hydrocarbons are all part of the great adventure of living in Jersey. She’s a product of the “burg,” a blue-collar pocket of Trenton where houses are attached and narrow, cars are American, windows are clean, and (God forbid you should be late) dinner is served at six.

How can a girl who was raised in a trailer park be working at a top D.C. law firm? Cadence Elliott beat graduates from the country's best law schools to the job. No Ivy-League pedigree. No powerful Washington connections. She got there on merit. Cadence found her exceptional drive as a teen when she learned she could never trust her mother again, when she realized the adults who claimed to be looking out for her were liars. She wanted to make damn sure she'd never have to rely on anyone else, ever again. Becoming a lawyer meant she could be someone who stood up for the powerless.

Ash Rashid is a former homicide detective who can't stand the thought of handling another death investigation. In another year, he'll be out of the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department completely. That's the plan, at least, until his niece's body is found in the guest home of one of his city's most wealthy citizens. The coroner calls it an overdose, but the case doesn't add up. Against orders, Ash launches an investigation to find his niece's murderer.

Former NSA agent Eve Wicker has faced many hardships and tragedies in life. Needing to be closer to her ailing father, Eve takes a position as her hometown Sheriff. A position she never imagined would open many old wounds from her past. When she receives a phone call about a body in the woods, She drives up to the crime scene. There, she grabs the attention of the town’s mountain recluse. Roman Pike, a big burly ex-marine who’s as abrasive as he is brash.

Thomas Austin was once a prominent NYPD detective, known for locking up a psychopathic serial killer dubbed "The Holiday Baby Butcher". Now retired in a small beach town in the Pacific Northwest, Austin runs a little café, trying to overcome the loss of his wife, a DA who was gunned down only one year ago.

Gela Nathaniel, head of Royal Hastings University’s new Multimedia Art course, must find six students from all walks of life across the United Kingdom for her new master’s program before the university cuts her funding. The students are nothing but trouble from day one. When the examiner, the man hired to grade students’ final workssifts through the students’ final essays, texts, and message boards, he becomes convinced that someone is in danger…or already dead.

Detective Mary Joe Court sleeps with a shotgun beside her bed and a lovable bull mastiff at her feet. For the past 12 years, she’s hidden from a nightmarish past, but with every passing day, her scars fade, and her heart grows lighter. Now, for the first time in her life, she looks forward to her future. She’s happy. Then she finds the body. Someone shot the victim in her chest and left her to die in a cheap motel. Joe knew her well. She grew up with her. They were sisters, of a sort.

Ash Rashid is a former homicide detective who can't stand the thought of handling another death investigation. In another year, he'll be out of the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department completely. That's the plan, at least, until his niece's body is found in the guest home of one of his city's most wealthy citizens. The coroner calls it an overdose, but the case doesn't add up. Against orders, Ash launches an investigation to find his niece's murderer.

At the end of a particularly grueling summer day, Ash is heading home to his wife and kids when he discovers a pair of bodies, shot execution style, in the front seat of a crashed vehicle. As the first officer on the scene, Ash finds himself and his department 20 minutes behind a killer in a race where every second counts. With two victims down and a third unaccounted for, the clock is ticking and Ash must find the killer before he strikes again.

Military veteran Amelia Storm returns to her hometown of Chicago when her beloved police officer brother is killed in the line of duty. Now she is a special agent with the FBI. No longer a scared girl, she vows to avenge her brother and do what she can to end the city's deep wells of corruption.

The first nine John “Slim” Hardy mysteries collected together for the first time.