David Rintoul
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As the first leaves of autumn begin to fall, Vice Questore Patta asks Commissario Guido Brunetti to look into a minor violation committed by the mayor's future daughter-in-law. Brunetti has no interest in helping his boss amass political favors, but has little choice but to comply. Then the sweet, simple-minded man who worked at the dry cleaner dies of a sleeping pill overdose, and Brunetti's wife, Paola, asks him to investigate. But why would anyone...
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"Robert Harris returns to the thrilling historical fiction he has so brilliantly made his own. This is the story of the infamous Dreyfus affair told as a chillingly dark, hard-edged novel of conspiracy and espionage. Paris in 1895. Alfred Dreyfus, a young Jewish officer, has just been convicted of treason, sentenced to life imprisonment at Devil's Island, and stripped of his rank in front of a baying crowd of twenty-thousand. Among the witnesses to...
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Detective Varg novel volume 1
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"The detectives who work in Malmo Police's Department of Sensitive Crimes take their job very seriously. The lead detective, Ulf Varg, prioritizes his cases above even his dog's mental health. Then there are detectives Anna Bengsdotter, who keeps her relationship with Varg professional even as she realizes she's developing feelings for him . . . or at least for his car, and Carl Holgersson, first to arrive in the morning and last to leave, who would...
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Detective Varg novel volume 3
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"Perplexing, unfathomable, and perhaps unimportant, the cases that Malmo's Department of Sensitive Crimes take on will test them to their limits. Life--and crime--is not always as it seems for Ulf Varg and the other fearless detectives in Malmo's Department of Sensitive Crimes. There are always surprising new cases to take on, and the latest batch is no exception. And that's not to mention Ulf's struggle to contain his feelings for his colleague Anna...
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"The Department of Sensitive Crimes is downsizing in light of a recent downturn of sensitive crime, and staff members are wondering who among them will be transferred elsewhere. As the bickering between colleagues intensifies, Ulf tries his best to stay above the fray. But when Anna, a longtime friend and coworker, appears to blame him for an old case that went sideways, it seems she may be putting her own job prospects above their friendship. In...
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"From the beloved and best-selling author of the No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series and La's Orchestra Saves the World, a heartwarming tale of hope and friendship set during World War II, in which a British farm girl, an American pilot, and a German soldier are brought together by an unlikely hero: a (very cute) border collie. Val Eliot, a land girl working on an English farm during the war, finds herself in charge of protecting a rescued border...
7) Dictator
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Cicero trilogy volume 3
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"There was a time when Cicero held Caesar's life in the palm of his hand. But now Caesar is the dominant figure and Cicero's life is in ruins. Exiled, separated from his wife and children, his possessions confiscated, his life constantly in danger, Cicero is tormented by the knowledge that he has sacrificed power for the sake of his principles. His comeback requires wit, skill and courage - and for a brief and glorious period, the legendary orator...
8) Munich
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"September 1938. Hitler is determined to invade Czechoslovakia. The British Prime Minister, Neville Chamberlain, is desperate to avoid what would certainly be the war following such a move. The city of Munich, Germany, is to be the site of an eleventh-hour meeting between them--a last desperate effort to preserve an already precarious peace. Aboard the plane flying Chamberlain to the meeting is Hugh Legat, a rising star of the British diplomatic corps,...
9) V2
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"Rudi Graf has dreamt since childhood of sending a rocket to the moon. Instead, along with his friend Werner von Braun, he has helped create the world's most sophisticated weapon - the V2 ballistic missile, capable of delivering a one-ton warhead that travels at three times the speed of sound. In a desperate gamble to avoid defeat, Hitler orders 10,000 to be built. Now, in the winter of 1944, Graf finds himself in a bleak seaside town in Occupied...
10) Earthly joys
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John Tradescant's fame and skill as a gardener are unsurpassed in seventeenth-century England, but it is his clear-sighted honesty and loyalty that make him an invaluable servant. As an informal confidant of Sir Robert Cecil, adviser to King James I, he witnesses the making of history, from the Gunpowder Plot to the accession of King Charles I and the growing animosity between Parliament and court.
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"A young Russian sits inside a tiny capsule on top of the Soviet Union's most powerful intercontinental ballistic missile--originally designed to carry a nuclear warhead--and blasts into the skies. His name is Yuri Gagarin. And he is about to make history. Traveling at almost 18,000 miles per hour--ten times faster than a rifle bullet--Gagarin circles the globe in just 106 minutes. From his windows he sees the earth as nobody has before, crossing...
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This daring tale of revenge and exotic intrigue is demonstrative of Stevenson's broad range and unique genius. "The Master of Ballantrae", first published in 1889, follows the conflict between two Scottish brothers of noble origins during the tumultuous Jacobite Risings of 1745. Greed and envy threaten to tear the brothers apart as a race for the family inheritance intensifies. James Durie, the protagonist and Master of Ballantrae, is as charming...
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Series
Detective Varg novel volume 2
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"In the second installment in the best-selling Detective Varg Novels, Ulf and his team investigate a notorious lothario--a wolf of a man whose bad reputation may, much to his chagrin, be all bark and no bite. The Department of Sensitive Crimes, renowned for taking on the most obscure and irrelevant cases, led by Ulf Varg, their best detective, is always prepared to take on an investigation, no matter how complex. So when Ulf is approached by the girlfriend...
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"From the best-selling author of Longbourn, a stunning new novel that follows an unnamed writer--Samuel Beckett--whose life and extraordinary literary gift are permanently shaped in the forge of war. When war breaks out in Europe in 1939, a young, unknown writer journeys from his home in neutral Ireland to conflict-ridden Paris and is drawn into the maelstrom. With him we experience the hardships yet stubborn vibrancy at the heart of Europe during...
15) The fox
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Former chief of the British Secret Intelligence Service Adrian Weston is awoken in the middle of the night by a phone call from the prime minister. Her news is shocking: the Pentagon, the NSA, and the CIA have been hacked simultaneously, their seemingly impenetrable firewalls breached by an unknown enemy known only as "The Fox". Even more surprisingly, the culprit is revealed to be a young British teenager, Luke Jennings. He has no agenda, no secrets,...
16) Armadale
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Allan Armadale makes a startling deathbed confession to be shared with his young son once he reaches adulthood-he murdered another man named Allan Armadale. It's a dark secret that inevitably looms over the child of the perpetrator and his victim.
Before dying, Allan Armadale reveals that he previously killed a man also named Allan Armadale. It's a revelation meant for his young son who discovers the information as an adult.
At this point, he's...
17) Black seconds
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In this sixth Inspector Sejer mystery, a little girl has vanished without a trace and Sejer must find her before it's too late.
18) Don't look back
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In Fossum's moody and subtle U.S. debut, the fifth in her Inspector Sejer series, the popular Norwegian mystery writer displays her mastery of psychological suspense. Richly drawn characters reveal much about Norwegian society, though the setting, a picturesque valley town northwest of Oslo, isn't distinctive. A little girl disappears from her middle-class neighborhood, then returns home unharmed. Meanwhile, the search party discovers the nude corpse...
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Thomas Fool volume 2
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"Fool alone has survived the wrath of both demon and angel, and now he faces his most thrilling and complex challenge. Troubling and deadly fires are spreading throughout Hell, and it is Fool{u2019}s job to sift the ashes and find their source. The clues he finds are mysterious and unsettling, implying something different from the usual litany of cruelty he sees. But one fact is the most disconcerting: the fires have left his masters at the Bureaucracy...
20) Hell fire
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"A gruesome tableau awaits Inspector Konrad Sejer in the oppressive summer heat: a woman and a young boy lay dead in a pool of blood near a dank camper. The details of the deaths of Bonnie Hayden and her five-year-old son Simon are mysterious. There is no sign of robbery or assault. Who would brutally stab a defenseless woman and her child? Sejer and his fellow investigator Jakob Skarre begin a hunt for the killer that will eventually lead them to...