A list of the top 15 mystery hardcover bestsellers for the week ending June 22nd, 2012 has been posted by the Hidden Staircase Mystery Books.
The stand-alone thriller Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn retains the top spot this week, though only by a tiny margin over last week's highest debuting title, the spy thriller Mission to Paris by Alan Furst.
Three new titles enter the list this week.
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New at number 9, Lizzy Tucker and Diesel return for the second in this series, Wicked Business by Janet Evanovich.
Lizzy Tucker's once normal life as a pastry chef in Salem, Massachusetts, turns upside down as she battles both sinister forces and an inconvenient attraction to her unnaturally talented but off-limits partner, Diesel.
When Harvard University English professor and dyed-in-the-wool romantic Gilbert Reedy is mysteriously murdered and thrown off his fourth-floor balcony, Lizzy and Diesel take up his twenty-year quest for the Luxuria Stone, an ancient relic believed by some to be infused with the power of lust. Following clues contained in a cryptic nineteenth-century book of sonnets, Lizzy and Diesel tear through Boston catacombs, government buildings, and multimillion-dollar residences. On their way they'll leave behind a trail of robbed graves, public disturbances, and general mayhem.
Diesel's black sheep cousin, Gerwulf Grimoire, also wants the Stone. His motives are far from pure, and what he plans on doing with the treasure, no one knows … but Lizzy Tucker fears she's in his crosshairs. Never far and always watching, Grimoire has a growing, vested interest in the cupcake-baker-turned-finder-of-lost-things. As does another dangerous and dark opponent in the hunt — a devotee of lawlessness and chaos, known only as Anarchy.
Treasures will be sought, and the power of lust will be unmistakable as Lizzy and Diesel attempt to stay ahead of Anarchy, Grimoire, and his medieval minion, Hatchet, in this ancient game of twisted riddles and high-stakes hide-and-seek.
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The prequel to Savages, Kings of Cool by Don Winslow, comes in at number 11.
In Savages, Ben and Chon, twenty-something best friends, risk everything to save the girl they both love, O.
Now, Winslow reaches back in time to tell the story of how Ben, Chon, and O became the people they are. Spanning from 1960s Southern California to the recent past, The Kings of Cool is a breathtakingly original saga of family in all its forms — fathers and sons, mothers and daughters, friends and lovers. As the trio at the center of the book does battle with a cabal of drug dealers and crooked cops, they come to learn that their future is inextricably linked with their parents' history. A series of breakneck twists and turns puts the two generations on a collision course, culminating in a stunning showdown that will force Ben, Chon, and O to choose between their real families and their loyalty to one another.
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The first in a new series, The Risk Agent by Ridley Pearson, debuts at number 13.
A Chinese National working for an American-owned construction company is grabbed off the streets of Shanghai in broad daylight. His one-man security detail goes missing as well.
Rutherford Risk is a firm specializing in extraction: the negotiation for, and the recovery of hostages. Private investigation is illegal in today's China. Operating within her borders will be difficult at best.
The security company recruits two unique outsiders to do their bidding. Grace Chu is a forensic accountant hired to follow the money; John Knox is a civilian with unparalleled training in both combat and culture. Grace's top-notch American education and Chinese military service make her an unassuming, but effective, operative, while Knox's take-no-prisoners attitude brings them perilously close to harm. Following the money leads to more complex — and dangerous — consequences than either anticipated. Who is actually behind the kidnapping? And more important, can Knox and Grace locate the two hostages ahead of the deadline?
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