Every month Amazon releases a new selection of Kindle books priced $3.99 or less.
We've looked through the January 2013 books and listed below those in the "Mystery & Thrillers" category. We've added a couple more here: a title that is misfiled under "Kids & Teens" and another that is listed under "Literature & Fiction".
Click on the book cover or title for more information or to purchase from Amazon.
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Beat the Reaper by Josh Bazell
A Pietro Brnwna/Peter Brown Mystery (1st)
Dr. Peter Brown is an intern at Manhattan's worst hospital, with a talent for medicine, a shift from hell, and a past he'd prefer to keep hidden. Whether it's a blocked circumflex artery or a plan to land a massive malpractice suit, he knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men.
Pietro "Bearclaw" Brnwna is a hitman for the mob, with a genius for violence, a well-earned fear of sharks, and an overly close relationship with the Federal Witness Relocation Program. More likely to leave a trail of dead gangsters than a molecule of evidence, he's the last person you want to see in your hospital room.
Nicholas LoBrutto, aka Eddy Squillante, is Dr. Brown's new patient, with three months to live and a very strange idea: that Peter Brown and Pietro Brnwa might-just might-be the same person …
Now, with the mob, the government, and death itself descending on the hospital, Peter has to buy time and do whatever it takes to keep his patients, himself, and his last shot at redemption alive. To get through the next eight hours — and somehow beat the reaper.
Winner of the 2009 Strand Critics Award for Best First Novel.
Damned in Paradise by Max Allan Collins
A Nathan Heller Mystery (9th)
On leave from the Chicago police department, Nate Heller goes to Hawaii to help family friend Clarence Darrow by investigating the rape and murder of a bride only to uncover a morass of bigotry, lies, and revenge.
Castle House Lodge. A century ago it was an exclusive resort hotel. But for years it's stood empty, a haunting shadow of its former glories. Now, after twenty-five years of rumors and ghost stories, the overgrown grounds are showing signs of being tended. The building itself has been repaired. Castle House has new occupants.
What was once a haven for the elite is now a madhouse, a private asylum for pregnant women. But are all the patients really insane? And is it just a coincidence that people have begun to disappear from the nearby town? David Shale's girlfriend is one of the missing, and he's determined to find the truth behind the mysterious Dr. Rockford and his house of secrets.
They're coming. They are a race of sadistic spirits known as the Curburide, and they are about to arrive in our world, bringing with them horrors beyond imagination. The secret to summoning — and controlling — them has fallen into the hands of a beautiful, sexy and dangerously insane woman.
Ariana has dedicated her life to unleashing the demons in our realm through a series of human sacrifices, erotic rituals of seduction and slaughter. As she crosses the country, getting ever closer to completing her blood-drenched mission, only three figures stand in her way: Joe, an unwilling hero who has seen the horrors of the Curburide before, Alex, a burgeoning witch … and a spiteful demon with plans of his own.
The Bum's Rush by G. M. Ford
A Leo Waterman Mystery (3rd)
When a homeless woman says she's the mother of a deceased rock idol, sometimes private eye Leo Waterman takes it upon himself to investigate the lady's claim. With the help of "the boys", a band of dissolute deputies, Leo begins a life-threatening pursuit of the truth nobody wants to hear.
Slow Burn by G. M. Ford
A Leo Waterman Mystery (4th)
Anticipating problems, a prestigious global restaurant convention hires Leo as Special Security Officer. His assignment: monitor the movements of two adversarial steakhouse competitors whose "beef" has previously made for some nasty confrontations and a food critic who's caught in between the warring factions. Leo sends the Boys off to shadow all three parties and report back to him. But even the simplest of plans can cascade into catastrophe. And Leo soon finds himself served up as the prime suspect in a murder … realizing that both his life and career are at stake.
A Friend of the Family by Lauren Grodstein
Pete Dizinoff, a skilled and successful New Jersey internist, has a loving and devoted wife, a network of close friends, an impressive house, and, most of all, a son, Alec, now nineteen, on whom he has pinned all his hopes. But Pete hadn't expected his best friend's troubled daughter to set her sights on his boy. When Alec falls under her spell, Pete sets out to derail the romance, never foreseeing the devastating consequences.
Pictures of You by Caroline Leavitt
Two women running away from their marriages collide on a foggy highway, killing one of them. The survivor, Isabelle, is left to pick up the pieces, not only of her own life, but of the lives of the devastated husband and fragile son that the other woman, April, has left behind. Together, they try to solve the mystery of where April was running to, and why.
As these three lives intersect, the book asks, How well do we really know those we love — and how do we forgive the unforgivable?
Cop Hater by Ed McBain
An 87th Precinct Novel (1st)
As a cop with the city's famed 87th Precinct, Steve Carella has seen it all. Or so he thinks. Because nothing can prepare him for the sight that greets him on a sweltering July night: fellow detective Mike Reardon's dead body splayed across the sidewalk, his face blown away by a .45.
Days later, Reardon's partner is found dead, a .45-caliber bullet buried deep in his chest. Only a fool would call it a coincidence, and Carella's no fool. He chalks the whole ugly mess up to a grudge killing … until a third murder shoots that theory to hell. Armed with only a single clue, Carella delves deep into the city's underbelly, launching a grim search for answers that will lead him from a notorious brothel to the lair of a beautiful, dangerous widow. He won't stop until he finds the truth — or until the next bullet finds him.
El Dorado Blues by Shaun Morey
An Atticus Fish Mystery (2nd)
In the badlands of southern Baja, retired expatriate billionaire Atticus Fish finds himself sabotaging illegal commercial longliners from his one-man submarine, and schooling boneheaded tourists in civility. But when archaeologist Duncan Rigby gets kidnapped while on the trail of the legendary Jesuit Treasure, intrepid PI Toozie McGill enlists Atticus to fire up his seaplane and fly off in pursuit. Finding the archaeologist is one thing; recovering the stolen jewels is something else altogether. Now that word of the Treasure is out, will Atticus and his sideckick, mescal bootlegger Skegs, stand a chance against the deadly wave of treasure hunters who wash up on Baja's shores?
The Home by Scott Nicholson
When twelve-year-old Freeman Mills arrives at Wendover, a group home for troubled children, it's a chance for a fresh start. But second chances aren't easy for Freeman, the victim of painful childhood experiments that gave him the ability to read other people's minds.
At Wendover, Freeman and the other children are subjected to more secret experiments, organized by a shadowy organization called The Trust. But the experiments do more than open up clairvoyant powers — the electromagnetic fields used in the experiments are summoning the ghosts of the patients who died at Wendover back when it was a psychiatric ward.
Now a new scientist has been brought into the project, an unstable and cruel pioneer in ESP studies who performed most of his work on a very special subject: his son, Freeman Mills.
Devil's Plaything by Matt Richtel
Journalist Nat Idle is nearly gunned down in Golden Gate Park. He quickly learns it was no random attack. Suddenly, in pursuit of the truth, he's running for his life through the shadows of Silicon Valley, a human lab animal caught in a deadly maze of neurotechnology and institutional paranoia. And his survival rests entirely in the hands of his eighty-five-year-old grandmother, Lane, who's suffering from dementia and can't remember the secret at the heart of the world-changing conspiracy.
Although it's been many years since the death of his father — an infamous serial killer known as Shame — Caleb Parker still struggles to free himself from his father's dark shadow. Caleb wishes only for a normal life without being branded a “killer's son,” but his dreams are shattered when a new string of murders surfaces that are all too reminiscent of Shame's terrible killings.
When the police label him the prime suspect, Caleb forges an unlikely partnership with true-crime author Elizabeth Line, a writer whose career began when she survived an encounter with Shame and who then went on to document his life — and death. As the body count begins to pile up, Elizabeth and Caleb come to the conclusion that one of them has been targeted by the killer, and a game of cat and mouse begins as they try to uncover the murderer's identity before becoming his next victims.
What Burns Within by Sandra Ruttan
A Nolan, Hart, and Tain Mystery (1st)
One year ago, a brutal case almost destroyed three cops. Since then they've lost touch with one another, avoiding painful memories, content to go their own ways. Now Nolan is after a serial rapist. Hart is working on a string of arsons. And Tain has been assigned a series of child abductions, a case all too similar to that one.
But when the body of one of the abduction victims is found at the site of one of the arsons, it starts to look like maybe these cases are connected after all …
Abuse of Power by Michael Savage
Jack Hatfield is a hardened former war correspondent who rose to national prominence for his insightful, provocative commentary. But after being smeared as a bigot and extremist by a radical leftist media-watchdog group, he ultimately loses his job and finds himself working in obscurity as a freelance news producer in San Francisco.
One afternoon Hatfield is on a ride-along with the SFPD bomb squad when a seemingly routine carjacking turns deadly, after police find several pounds of military-grade explosives in the jacked car. And when the FBI urges Hatfield to stay out of it, he knows he's onto something big.
This event will open up a shadowy trail that leads Hatfield from San Francisco to Tel Aviv, London, Paris, and back again, as he works with a stunning Yemeni intelligence agent and a veteran Green Beret to expose a terrorist group known as the Hand of Allah — and a plot within the highest corridors of power that will dwarf 9/11.
Child 44 by Tom Rob Smith
A Leo Demidov Mystery (1st)
Stalin's Soviet Union strives to be a paradise for its workers, providing for all of their needs. One of its fundamental pillars is that its citizens live free from the fear of ordinary crime and criminals.
But in this society, millions do live in fear … of the State. Death is a whisper away. The mere suspicion of ideological disloyalty — owning a book from the decadent West, the wrong word at the wrong time — sends millions of innocents into the Gulags or to their executions. Defending the system from its citizens is the MGB, the State Security Force. And no MGB officer is more courageous, conscientious, or idealistic than Leo Demidov.
A war hero with a beautiful wife, Leo lives in relative luxury in Moscow, even providing a decent apartment for his parents. His only ambition has been to serve his country. For this greater good, he has arrested and interrogated.
Then the impossible happens. A different kind of criminal-a murderer-is on the loose, killing at will. At the same time, Leo finds himself demoted and denounced by his enemies, his world turned upside down, and every belief he's ever held shattered. The only way to save his life and the lives of his family is to uncover this criminal. But in a society that is officially paradise, it's a crime against the State to suggest that a murderer-much less a serial killer-is in their midst. Exiled from his home, with only his wife, Raisa, remaining at his side, Leo must confront the vast resources and reach of the MBG to find and stop a criminal that the State won't admit even exists.
Winner of the 2009 Thriller Award for Best First Novel.
An Impartial Witness by Charles Todd
A Bess Crawford Mystery (2nd)
It is the early summer of 1917. Bess Crawford has returned to England from the trenches of France with a convoy of severely wounded men. One of her patients is a young pilot who has been burned beyond recognition, and who clings to life and the photo of his wife that is pinned to his tunic.
While passing through a London train station, Bess notices a woman bidding an emotional farewell to an officer, her grief heart-wrenching. And then Bess realizes that she seems familiar. In fact, she's the woman in the pilot's photo, but the man she is seeing off is not her husband.
Back on duty in France, Bess discovers a newspaper with a drawing of the woman's face on the front page. Accompanying the drawing is a plea from Scotland Yard seeking information from anyone who has seen her. For it appears that the woman was murdered on the very day Bess encountered her at the station.
Granted leave to speak with Scotland Yard, Bess becomes entangled in the case. Though an arrest is made, she must delve into the depths of her very soul to decide if the police will hang an innocent man or a vicious killer. Exposing the truth is dangerous — and will put her own life on the line.
A Bitter Truth by Charles Todd
A Bess Crawford Mystery (3rd)
When battlefield nurse Bess Crawford returns from France for a well-earned Christmas leave, she finds a bruised and shivering woman huddled in the doorway of her London residence. The woman has nowhere to turn, and propelled by a firm sense of duty, Bess takes her in.
Once inside Bess's flat, the woman reveals that a quarrel with her husband erupted into violence, yet she wants to return home—if Bess will go with her to Sussex. Realizing that the woman is suffering from a concussion, Bess gives up a few precious days of leave to travel with her. But she soon discovers that this is a good deed with unforeseeable consequences.
What Bess finds at Vixen Hill is a house of mourning. The woman's family has gathered for a memorial service for the elder son, who died of war wounds. Her husband, home on compassionate leave, is tense, tormented by jealousy and his own guilty conscience.
Then, when a troubled houseguest is found dead, Bess herself becomes a prime suspect in the case. This murder will lead her to a dangerous quest in war-torn France, an unexpected ally, and a startling revelation that puts her in jeopardy before a vicious killer can be exposed.
The Blessed and the Damned by Michael Wallace
The "Righteous" Novels (4th)
As the son of the prophet of Blister Creek, a polygamous enclave in Utah, Dr. Jacob Christianson has struggled for years to reconcile his faith with his skepticism about the fundamentalist practices of his community. Nevertheless, when his family and neighbors were threatened, Jacob stepped up time and again to lead the fight against those who would destroy them. Now Jacob and the residents of Blister Creek face a dangerous new challenge to their quiet existence.
Taylor Kimball Jr. wants to take over as prophet of Blister Creek — and he wants Jacob's sister Eliza by his side when he does it. With no room for personal reservations, Jacob forms a tenuous alliance with his father and the FBI. But Taylor Junior is as crafty as he is brutal, anticipating Jacob's plan and drawing him out to leave Blister Creek vulnerable to attack. And this time Taylor has come prepared, with a horrific new weapon capable of annihilating Blister Creek. If he has any chance of winning this fight, Jacob will have to decide, once and for all, just how far he is willing to go to protect his community.
The Mapping of Love and Death by Jacqueline Winspear
A Maisie Dobbs Mystery (7th)
August 1914. Michael Clifton is mapping the land he has just purchased in California's beautiful Santa Ynez Valley, certain that oil lies beneath its surface. But as the young cartographer prepares to return home to Boston, war is declared in Europe. Michael — the youngest son of an expatriate Englishman — puts duty first and sails for his father's native country to serve in the British army. Three years later, he is listed among those missing in action.
April 1932. London psychologist and investigator Maisie Dobbs is retained by Michael's parents, who have recently learned that their son's remains have been unearthed in France. They want Maisie to find the unnamed nurse whose love letters were among Michael's belongings — a quest that takes Maisie back to her own bittersweet wartime love. Her inquiries, and the stunning discovery that Michael Clifton was murdered in his trench, unleash a web of intrigue and violence that threatens to engulf the soldier's family and even Maisie herself. Over the course of her investigation, Maisie must cope with the approaching loss of her mentor, Maurice Blanche, and her growing awareness that she is once again falling in love.
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