Showing results by author "Marcia Muller" in All Categories

There's trouble in Sharon McCone's quiet San Francisco apartment building. Madame Anya, with her cards, her tamed crow, and her candles, had predicted evil for Molly Antonio. Linnea Carraway, drinking heavily and careening in the wake of a divorce, had argued with her. Now the sweet, elderly lady lies dead in her apartment. Linnea, last to see Molly alive, is the prime suspect and if Sharon means to clear her best friend, she has to find the murderer fast.

The most renowned American authors in Western fiction are brought together in one bang 'em-up, shoot-it-out collection! Including titles by Louis L'Amour, Brian Garfield, Marcia Muller, Bill Pronzini, Thomas Thompson, John M. Cunningham, Chad Oliver, Donald Hamilton, Loren D. Estleman and Owen Wister.

San Francisco is home to more than 200 privately owned streets. Most are alleyways, but a select few are lined with mansions and elaborate gardens. When several luxury estate homes are targeted in a series of so-called pranks, Sharon is hired by a coalition of concerned owners to investigate. But as things escalate—an attempt on Sharon’s life, an explosion at a meth lab, and a shocking murder—Sharon realizes far more is at play than a few misdemeanors gone wrong. The case takes a sudden turn when one of McCone & Ripinsky’s most trusted employees is implicated.

The McCone Files gathers all of Sharon's short cases into a single volume covering her entire career as staff investigator at All Souls Legal Cooperative in San Francisco. From the death of a clown in Diablo Valley to the disappearance of a young socialite on the Golden Gate Bridge, from the murder of a teenage gang leader in San Francisco to the drowning of an aged Japanese herb-gatherer, and from streets filled with juvenile runaways to the quietness of a mausoleum, Sharon investigates.

Mystery Writers of America is proud to present Deadly Anniversaries, a collection of crime and mystery stories from some of the best contemporary authors, all of whom have been invited to put their own unique spin on what it means to recognize a certain day or event every year. An anniversary can take many forms, and by the time this group of best sellers and award winners is through, none of us will ever look at anniversaries the same way again. Edited by Marcia Muller and Bill Pronzini, this collection features original stories from 20 industry giants.

It's Sharon McCone's first case as staff investigator for All Souls Legal Cooperative. She knows nothing about antiques, yet she has an affection for Salem Street with its charming mix of antique and curio shops. Now elderly dealer Joan Albritton has been found dead, stabbed with an antique dagger. Her neighbors are shocked. Recurring vandalism has them frightened. Ferreting out the facts will take Sharon from the chaotic jumble of the junk dealer's establishment to a museum where San Francisco's most elegant socialites gather.

Bobby Foster, car-hop at the chic Cafe Comedie, is going to the gas chamber. He's already confessed to the murder of Tracy Kostakos, the club's rising star. But two years after the crime, Tracy's body is still missing and Bobby's confession is full of holes. All Souls Legal Cooperative's final appeal sends San Francisco's number-one P.I., Sharon McCone, behind the footlights into the super-charged arena of anxious club owners and aspiring young hopefuls...into the fractured world of Tracy's priviledged family and the mind of a young comedienne who was not the good little girl they thought they knew....

Sharon McCone has chosen a guy who respects her as a professional and shares her passions. But living together in her beloved little house on Church Street may be another matter entirely. The looming crisis of who will compromise first is delayed when Hy heads out of town on business and McCone dives into one of her most baffling cases yet - the disappearance of Laurel Greenwood, who vanished twenty-two years before without a trace.

Complacency can make a person careless, and Sharon McCone, who makes crime her business, should know that better than most. One minute she's riding high with her detective agency expanding, her bank account growing, and her only "problem" a marriage proposal from her lover, Hy Ripinsky, that's kicking up her longtime fears of commitment. The next minute, in the time it takes for a single phone call to bring bad news, she stands to lose everything.

When new clients Jay and Camilla Givens come to Sharon McCone with Camilla's stories of devil worshippers performing human sacrifices in San Francisco, the detective is skeptical, to say the least. However, when she discovers that Jay is involved with the treasure hunting group the Night Searchers, she starts looking into what exactly he and the other participants are up to after dark. As she digs deeper into the Searchers, Sharon joins their ranks in order to find out more - while someone is searching for her.

Three years ago, Caro Warrick was acquitted for the murder of her best friend, Amelia Bettecourt, but the lingering doubts of everyone around Caro is adversely affecting her life. Sharon McCone is confident that she can succeed where other detectives have failed (though at times it's hard to shake her own misgivings about what happened), but when Caro is brutally beaten right at Sharon's doorstep, the investigation takes on a whole new course. How many more people remain at risk until Amelia's murderer is finally caught? This audio includes a bonus McCone story, "Skeleton in the Closet"!

After Sharon McCone's father dies of a sudden heart attack, she immediately heads to San Diego to scatter his ashes and clear out his house. In a box of legal papers, she finds a 1959 petition for adoption of a child called Baby Girl Smith - an infant who, from the day of adoption, has been known as Sharon Elizabeth McCone. No one in Sharon's family will discuss the adoption, so she begins her own search for the truth. Her quest takes her deep into Indian country, to the Flathead Reservation in Montana.

Settled in to their new home after they lost their house in a fire, and fully established in their new shared offices, private investigator Sharon McCone and her business partner husband, Hy, are finally starting to feel comfortable. That calm is shattered when Hy's former colleague, Gage Renshaw - a shady troublemaker whom they presumed dead - reappears, and it's unclear what he wants from his prosperous former associate.

Can the true identity of the Sherlock Holmes imposter be revealed at last? Sabina Carpenter and John Quincannon are no stranger to mysteries. In the five years since they opened Carpenter and Quinncannon, Professional Detective Services, they have solved dozens, but one has eluded even them: Sherlock Holmes or, rather, the madman claiming his identity who keeps showing up with a frustrating - though admittedly useful - knack for solving difficult cases.

It starts when Sharon McCone's acquaintance tells her that someone was pretending to be McCone at a party. The mysterious woman is handing out McCone's business cards, advising clients, and picking up men for intimate encounters. The woman's physical resemblance is uncanny. Her knowledge of McCone's life is chilling.

To tourists, bay-windowed Victorian mansions are quaint, peaceful symbols of old San Francisco, but on the secluded hill above Steiner Street, the gingerbread has sparked a bitter battle. Ambitious developers are pushing for restoration and residents are fighting for their homes… until a controversial restorationist is found dead on the job, awash in garish housepaint. Private investigator Sharon McCone is called in only to discover a second bitter feud, this time between the developers and members of the city's powerful architectural community.

In Locked In, San Francisco private eye Sharon McCone was shot in the head and suffered from locked-in syndrome: almost total paralysis but with an alert, conscious mind. Now, as Sharon struggles to regain control over her body, she realizes that it may not be possible to return to her old life. But when Sharon's friend from physical therapy goes missing, she must call upon those closest to her to find out the truth behind the disappearance.

A full-fledged pilot for several years, Sharon McCone is due for the biannual flight review required by the FAA. Her former flight instructor, Matty Wildress, invites her to fly up to the small Sonoma County town of Los Alegres for the evaluation. The test isn't due for several months, however, and McCone suspects Matty has more than safe flying on her mind.

Shot in the head by an unknown assailant, Sharon McCone finds herself trapped by Locked-In Syndrome: almost total paralysis but an alert, conscious mind. As Sharon lies in her hospital bed, furiously trying to break out of her body's prison and discover her attacker's identity, all the members of her agency fan out to find the reason why she was assaulted.

P.I. Sharon McCone is sick and tired of San Francisco's persistent rainy weather, so she jumps at the chance to investigate the sabotage of a movie being filmed on the Hawaiian island of Kauai. The documentary is based on the writings of Elson Wellbright, a descendant of a missionary family and scholar of Hawaiian culture and history. Wellbright's son is bankrolling the project and has angered many members of the family, who aren't anxious for the film to be completed.