The death of a 90 year old woman with a heart condition should not be suspicious. DS Harbinder Kaur certainly sees nothing to concern her in carer Natalka's account of Peggy Smith's death, but then Natalka reveals that Peggy lied about her heart condition and that she was sure someone had been following her, and that Peggy Smith had been a 'murder consultant' who plotted deaths for authors and knew more about murder than anyone has any right to. And when clearing out Peggy's flat ends in Natalka being held at gunpoint by a masked figure, well then DS Harbinder Kaur thinks that maybe there is no such thing as an unsuspicious death after all. Told with Elly Griffiths' characteristic charm, urbane and witty and hugely popular. 344pp, paperback.

A young woman emerges from a coma. Who is she, and why was she dumped unconscious in a hospital car park upon a dark night? She is unable to recall anything, even her name. Then Ada Shaftsbury, a boisterous shoplifter she meets in a homeless hostel, takes up her cause and names her Rose. Peter Diamond is already investigating a suspicious death - a woman has plunged from the roof of Bath's Royal Crescent during a party, and none of the guests seem to know who she is. Badgered by Ada and galvanised by another gruesome death, Diamond takes on the case and is soon forced to admit that Rose is the key. But she has disappeared, and Diamond's own dark night is just beginning. Lovesey amply demonstrates his gifts as the grand master of the contemporary whodunnit in this elaborate plot with architecture as perfect as the city he writes about. 344pp, paperback.

The charity fair at Seagrave Hall is a key date in the Saxford St Peter calendar and a chance for the villagers to nose around the house and grounds and cross paths with the rich and famous. New resident Eve Mallow is particularly excited by this year's special guest, the explorer Verity Nye, engaged to the heir to the Hall. Eve loves Verity's determination and she can't wait to meet her, but when they talk, Verity hints that she has something troubling on her mind. So after the festival mood is tragically interrupted by Verity's fall from a third-floor window, Eve can't be sure that it's an appalling accident especially when one small boy claims he saw someone behind her. Soon Eve finds herself tasked with writing Verity's obituary. As she dusts off her notebook and begins her interviews alongside her trusted dachshund sidekick Gus, she realises she has a fine array of suspects before her. Could it be a corrupt charity manager, the distraught fiancé, or jealous cousin Cora? And can Eve find out before her questions cause the killer to turn on her? 279pp, paperback.

Kay Scarpetta has been training at the Dover Port Mortuary, mastering a groundbreaking forensic procedure and it is not long before these new skills need to be put into practice. A young man drops dead eerily close to her home and when his body is examined, there are stunning indications that he may have been alive when his body was locked inside the cooler. When the revolutionary 3D radiology scans reveal internal injuries unlike any Scarpetta has ever seen, she realizes she is fighting a cunning and uniquely cruel enemy. Now it is a race against time to discover who and why, before more people die. 'One of our best crime writers writing today.' - Guardian. 488pp, paperback.

Late one night a man walks into the luxurious home of disgraced banker Harry McNamara and his wife Julie. The man launches an unspeakably brutal attack on Harry as horror-struck Julie watches, frozen by fear. It looks like Harry's many sins - corruption, greed and betrayal - have finally caught up with him. An hour later the intruder, J. P. Carney, hands himself in, confessing to the assault. The police have a victim, a suspect in custody and an eye-witness account, but Julie remains troubled. Has Carney's surrender really been driven by a guilty conscience, or is this confession the first calculated move in a deadly game? You will be addicted from the very first page in this brilliantly dark tale which is well plotted and beautifully written. 421pp, paperback.

Five years ago, Erin Kennedy moved to New York following a family tragedy. She now lives happily with her detective husband in the scenic seaside town of Newport, Long Island. When she answers the door to Danny's police colleagues one morning, it's the start of an ordinary day, but behind her, Danny walks to the window of their fourth floor apartment and jumps to his death. 18 months later, Erin is in court, charged with her husband's murder. Over that year and a half, she has learned things about Danny she could never have imagined. She thought he was perfect. She thought their life was perfect. But it was all built on the perfect lie. A fabulous page turner that will keep you guessing to the end and keep you up all night. 388pp, paperback.

Five years after being sacked as Chief Medical Examiner, Dr Kay Scarpetta is back with a vengeance. Her return as a consultant pathologist in the mysterious death of a teenage girl ruffled a few feathers, yet Gilly Paulsson's death has stumped the best in the business. There is no obvious cause and nothing suspicious except the fact that Gilly shouldn't be dead. Then Scarpetta uncovers trace evidence - Gilly was murdered, but why? For Scarpetta what began as a forensic puzzle expands into a larger and far more alarming picture, but still the vital pieces are missing. Who is the person tightening a noose around her and her loved ones? A real thriller from the expert. 457pp, paperback.

June 1917 and while German bombers raid London from above, a man's body is fished from the Thames below. With no identifying items or labels about his person, Detective Inspector Marmion and Sergeant Keedy waste precious time struggling to name the anonymous victim before they can properly begin their investigation. One by one family and business associates are traced, which only makes the list of suspects ever longer. Between the interminable presence of war and closer to home pitched battles in the East End between rival gangs, Marmion must carefully tread a dangerous path to lead him towards the killer. 'Marsten has tapped into a rich vein of inspiration.' - Daily Mail. 378pp, paperback.

The body of a woman is found on Bruno, Chief of Police's patch in St Denis. She was discovered with her neck broken beside the ruined Templar chateau of Commarque in the heart of the Dordogne. An accidental fall, or was she pushed? The 11th century chateau has never been associated with the fabled hidden treasure of the Templars, but a sensational story in the local press about the unknown woman's death throws light on the chateau and the cave beneath it. When a Templar scholar is found brutally tortured and left for dead, Bruno must race to find the perpetrator before they strike again, while the village of St Denis holds its breath, waiting to see if a centuries-old mystery might finally be solved and uncovered when a local journalist publishes the sensational story around the woman's death. The victim carries no identification and her fingerprints are not known to the French police or Interpol. The only clue is that her dentistry looks American, but Bruno's enquiries at local hotels and gites yield no trace of a missing foreign woman. 343pp, paperback.

The gifted Venetian detective returns in his 31st case, this time investigating the Janus-faced nature of yet another Italian institution. What role can or should loyalty play in the life of a police inspector? It's a question Commissario Guido Brunetti must face when he is approached for a favour by Elisabetta Foscarini, a woman he knows only casually. However her mother was good to Brunetti's mother, so he feels obliged to at least look into the matter privately. Foscarini's son-in-law Enrico Fenzo has alarmed his wife by confessing their family might be in danger because of something he's involved with. Since Fenzo is an accountant, Brunetti logically suspects that the cause of danger is related to the finances of a client, yet his clients seem benign - an optician, a restaurateur, a charity established by his father-in-law. However when Foscarini's daughter's place of work is vandalized, Brunetti asks his own favours - that his colleagues assist his private investigation which soon turns official as they uncover the dark nature and the wobbly line between the criminal and non-criminal world. Written in an elegant, witty prose, Donna Leon uses the relatively small canvas of Venice for rips about Italian life, sexual styles and best of all the kind of ingrown business and political corruption that seems to lurk just below the surface. Endpapers have maps, 294pp with fairly large print.