Bestselling author Mark Frost makes a triumphant return to fiction with this riveting World War II thriller, based on a shocking real-life German operation run by "the most dangerous man in Europe." Fall 1944. Germany is losing, and the Americans are starting to hope they'll be home for Christmas. Lieutenant Colonel Otto Skorzeny, "Hitler's Commando," famed for his daring rescue of the imprisoned Mussolini, has just received orders for Operation Greif: He is to assemble a new brigade of 2,000 men, all of whom speak English, and send them behind Allied lines disguised as GIs, where they will wreak havoc in advance of a savage new offensive. And from those men, Skorzeny is to select a smaller group, made up of the twenty most highly skilled commandos fluent in American culture, to attempt an even more sinister mission--the second objective--which, if completed, not only would change the course of the war, but would change the course of history. Filled with real characters and details only recently released by the United States military, The Second Objective is historical fiction at its most pulse-pounding, its most unpredictable, and its most compulsively readable.

I'll not ask you to be mine ... I will never seek to blunt the fury in you, never, and will honour your will as my own. What say you? Can you be a soldier's wife? New England, 1673. Martha Allen, a young woman reviled by her family because of her refusal to marry, is packed off to be a servant in her cousin's home. She takes charge of the neglected household and annoys everyone around her - including a mysterious Welshman who works for the family, a man whose forceful nature matches her own. As they both gradually let their guard down, a fragile, uneasy friendship grows between the pair. Meanwhile, on the other side of the Atlantic, a band of assassins, driven by the will of Charles II, charter a ship to the New World. They have a single aim: to capture Thomas Morgan, the killer of Charles I, and bring him back to London where he will face an excruciating death. The Royalists want to see his head on a spike outside the Tower of London. As Martha begins to fall for the tall Welshman, he reveals a little of his past. It soon becomes clear that his life is in grave danger. As the threat of the assassins grows closer, can Martha find it in herself to be a traitor's wife? Praise for The Heretic's Daughter 'Absolutely compelling' Daily Mail 'A very fine novel ... a remarkably accomplished telling of a truly shocking tale' Daily Express

Alison lays unconscious in a hospital bed after a long-distance training run leaves her half-dead at the bottom of a deep ravine. While Rick is a faithful husband, Alison gave him many reasons to attempt to kill her. The question of who tried to kill Alison hangs in the air while Rick waits impatiently for her to awake and assure him he’s innocent.Blackboard Galaxy is a humorous science fiction story about a teacher who has dreamed of teaching in space. Now that she is living her dream, she must find ways to discipline students besides eating them, as that is the standard protocol among alien teachers. This story originally appeared in Issue 6 of Untied Shoelaces of the Mind. The author based this story on her experiences teaching middle school students. The line, "Does this look like a face that cares?" is a direct quote from a thirteen year old.

Since the death of her husband, Anne Dunne and her three children have struggled in every way. In a last ditch effort to save the family, Anne plans an elaborate sailing vacation to bring everyone together once again. But only an hour out of port, everything is going wrong. The teenage daughter, Carrie, is planning to drown herself. The teenage son, Mark, is high on drugs and ten-year-old Ernie is nearly catatonic. This is the worst vacation ever. Anne manages to pull things together bit by bit, but just as they begin feeling like a family again, something catastrophic happens. Survival may be the least of their concerns. Written with the blistering pace and shocking twists that only James Patterson can master, SAIL takes "Lost" and "Survivor" to a new level of terror.**

Jack has been on hiatus since the events in Harbingers. With his lover Gia's encouragement he dips a toe back into the fix-it pool. Christy Pickering's eighteen-year-old daughter is dating Jerry Bethlehem, a man twice her age. Christy sensed something shady and sinister about him, so she hired a private investigator to look into his past. But the PI isn't returning her calls. Will Jack find out why? Jack learns there's a very good reason for the unreturned calls: The PI is dead, a victim of a bizarre water-torture murder. As Jack delves into Jerry Bethlehem's past he learns that the man is not who he says he is. Who--and what--he is will have a devastating effect on Jack's life and future, adding another piece to the puzzle of who he really is and why he's been drafted into this cosmic shadow war.

Can you forgive the past? It's 1963 and a young German reporter has been assigned the suicide of a holocaust survivor. The news story seems straighforward, this is a tragic insight into one man's suffering. But a long hidden secret is discovered in the pages of the dead man's diary. What follows is life-and-death hunt for a notorious former concentration camp-commander, a man responsible for the deaths of thousands, a man as yet unpunished.

ROBIN COOK--New York Times-best selling author and master of the medical thriller--returns with another crackling tale of unchecked greed, medical malfeasance, adn starling science. PIA GRAZDANI is an exceptional yet aloof medical student working closely with Columbia University Medical Center's premier scientist on cutting-edge research that could revolutionize health care by creating replacement organs for critically ill patients. Thorough her work with the brilliant molecular geneticist Dr. Tobias Rothman, Pia knows she will be given the chance to fulfill her ambition to participate in medical discoveries that can help millions while bringing her a measure of personal peace that might once and for all push aside memories of her difficult and abusive childhood.But when tragedy strikes in the lab, Pia, with the help of infatuated classmate George Wilson, must investigate the unforeseen calamity in the hospital's supposedly secure biosafety lab. Meanwhile, two ex-Wall Street whiz kids think they have found another loadstone in the nation's multi-trillion dollar life insurance industry. They race to find ways to control actuarial data and securitize the policies of the aged and infirm to make another killing. As Pia and George dig deeper into the events at the lab one question remains unanswered: is someone attempting to manipulate private insurance information to allow investors to benefit from the deaths of others?

Neal Carey is not your usual private eye. A graduate student at Columbia University, he grew up on the streets of New York, usually on the wrong side of the law. Then he met Joe Graham, a one-armed P.I. who introduced him to the Bank, an exclusive New England institution with a sideline in keeping its wealthy clients happy and out of trouble. They pay Neal's college tuition, and Neal gets an education that can't be found in any textbook-- from learning how to trail a suspect to mastering the proper way to search a room. Now it's payback time. The Bank wants Neal to put his skills to work in finding Allie Chase, the rebellious teenage daughter of a prominent senator. The problem: Allie has gone underground in London, and to get her back, Neal has to follow her into the punk scene, a violent netherworld where drugs run rampant and rage is the name of the game. Up against punk junkies, antique book thieves, and murderous betrayal, Neal has his work cut out for him to save Allie-- and get back above ground for good.

As he wrung the water from his clothes he discarded his memories one by one. As mate of the Rangoon, he had been known as a bucko sailor, a hard case who struck first and questioned afterward, renowned for a temper as hot and swift as a glowing rapier. And the reputation had not helped him when the captain had been found dead in his cabin and when it was discovered that the safe was open and empty. Kurt Reid had been the last man to see the captain alive, so they thought. Shanghai stretched before him, and behind it lay all of China. If he could not escape there, he thought, he deserved to die. His only regret now was the lack of money he had been accused of stealing. A man does not go far on a few American dollars. “Vividly written, super-fast-paced.” —Ellery Queen

Gillian Flynn says, "Karin Slaughter is simply one of the best thriller writers working today." An apparent student suicide has brought medical examiner Sara Linton to the local college campus, along with her ex-husband, police chief Jeffrey Tolliver. But a horribly mutilated corpse yields up few answers. And a suspicious rash of subsequent "suicides" suggests that a different kind of terror is stalking the youth of Heartsdale, Georgia—a nightmare that is coming to prey on Sara Linton's loved ones. A small town is being transformed into a killing ground. And the key to a sadistic murderer's motive and identity may be held in the unsteady hands of a campus security guard—a former police detective driven from the force by the hellish memories that will never leave her. Lena Adams survived the unthinkable and has paid a devastating price. Now the survival of future victims may depend upon her ... when she can barely protect herself.

Bestselling author Peter Straub's Koko is a gripping psychological thriller in which horror and paranoia are indistinguishable from reality.Koko. Only four men knew what it meant. Now they must stop it. They were Vietnam vets-a doctor, a lawyer, a working stiff, and a writer. Very different from each other, they are nonetheless linked by a shared history and a single shattering secret. Now, they have been reunited and are about to embark on a quest that will take from Washington, D.C., to the graveyards and fleshpots of the Far East to the human jungle of New York, hunting someone from the past who has risen from the darkness to kill and kill and kill. From the Trade Paperback edition.

CLOSER… They found the town silent, apparently abandoned. Then they found the first body strangely swollen and still warm. One hundred fifty were dead, 350 missing. But the terror had only begun in the tiny mountain town of Snowfield, California. AND CLOSER… At first they thought it was the work of a maniac. Or terrorists. Or toxic contamination. Or a bizarre new disease. AND CLOSER… But then they found the truth. And they saw it in the flesh. And it was worse than anything any of them had ever imagined…

New York Times bestselling author Karin Slaughter is acclaimed for her novels of heart-stopping suspense, edge-of-your-seat intrigue, and richly imagined characters. And when Slaughter created detective Will Trent she broke the mold. While displaying an uncanny knack for reading people, solving puzzles, and cracking cases at the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, Detective Trent navigates the varied relationships with the women in his life: vice cop Angie Polaski, supervisor Amanda Wagner, partner Faith Mitchell, and Dr. Sara Linton. This gripping eBook bundle contains seven novels in the Will Trent series, including: TRIPTYCH FRACTURED UNDONE BROKEN FALLEN CRIMINAL UNSEEN Also includes the eBook novellas Snatched and Busted as well as a preview of Karin Slaughter’s highly anticipated thriller Cop Town! Praise for Karin Slaughter and her Will Trent thrillers “One of the best crime novelists in America.”—The Washington Post “Crime fiction at its finest.”—Michael Connelly “Slaughter writes with a razor. . . . Better than Cornwell can ever hope to be.”—The Plain Dealer “Slaughter will have you on the edge of your seat.”—Seattle Post-Intelligencer “Slaughter’s gift for building multilayered tension while deconstructing damaged personalities gives this thriller a nerve-wracking finish.”—USA Today*, on Triptych “Heart-pounding . . . Trent and Mitchell, a pair of complex and deeply flawed heroes, will leave fans clamoring for the next installment.”—Publishers Weekly* (starred review), on Fractured “A complicated spider web of secrets and tangles.”—Los Angeles Times*, on Undone   “Addictive . . . Slaughter is a terrific writer, and she keeps the emotional tension high throughout.”—The Atlanta Journal-Constitution*, on Broken   “An absolute master . . . Slaughter creates some wonderfully complex and mature female characters, a distinctive achievement in the world of thrillers.”—Chicago Tribune*, on Fallen “[A] hold-on-to-your-hat, nail-biting story . . . What raises Slaughter way above the sensational is her wonderful way with characters.”—The Washington Post*, on Criminal   “No one writes like Slaughter.”—The Huffington Post, on Unseen

D.C. Detective Alex Cross has seen a lot of crime scenes. But even he is appalled by the gruesome murders of two joggers in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park - killings that look more like the work of savage beasts than humans. Local police are horrified and even the FBI is baffled. Then, as Cross is called in to take on the case, the carnage takes off, leaving a trail of bodies across America and sweeping him to Savannah, Las Vegas, New Orleans, Los Angeles . . as his nemesis, the merciless criminal known as the Mastermind, stalks him, taunts him, and once again, threatens everything he holds dear...

The water and the air in the Fisher Valley were pristine before the coal seam gas companies arrived with government-endorsed gas exploration and development licences. Then they marched roughshod over the owners of privately owned, highly productive farming and grazing land, paying them little in the way of compensation. After drilling, they pumped water, sand and toxic chemicals at high pressure hundreds of metres into the ground in a process known as 'fracking', which exploded the coal seams and released the methane, while giving scant attention to the ground, air and water pollution they were creating. When little Charlie Paxton, aged only six, dies from a mysterious form of cancer, his father, Charles Paxton, swears to have his revenge. Charles is determined to stop the gas companies even if it means blowing up their wells and blocking their access to agricultural properties. But big gas is powerful and backed by rapacious governments who won't hesitate to use their police and army to smash through blockades. Can a small group of farmers, greens and conservatives stand against the might of big gas and the governments complicit in helping it? -- "I moved to the country for peace and quiet and little did I know that I would become embroiled in the battle of my life. Peter Ralph brings to light the everyday struggle of people who find their lives suddenly caught up with one of the most insidious industries in the world - Coal Seam Gas." (-Dayne Pratzky, a.k.a. 'The Frackman') -- The author, Peter Ralph, was a CEO of a large private company that he took public in the early nineties before becoming a successful share and derivatives trader. He now spends much of his time writing, and the breadth of his business career has provided him with a background and insights well suited to writing suspenseful business and topical novels. He is the author of "Collins Street Whores" and "The CEO," and co-authored "Pass the Sugar" with Joe Hachem.