Firsts on the 1st: New Series Characters Being Introduced in May 2010 Mysteries

The Hidden Staircase Mystery Books recently updated its list of May 2010 hardcover mysteries as well shelved new May paperbacks on The Mystery Bookshelf.

In this series monthly posts, which we call Firsts on the 1st, we're introducing readers to new series characters who will make their mysterious debut during May.

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Title: Wanna Get Lucky?
Author: Deborah Coonts
Series Character: Lucky O'Toole
Format: Hardcover

What we know about the character: Lucky O'Toole is the head of customer relations for the Babylon, a resort on the Las Vegas strip.

Her first case: A young woman plunges from a Las Vegas sightseeing helicopter, landing in the Pirate’s lagoon in front of the Treasure Island Hotel in the middle of the 8:30 Pirate Show. Almost everyone writes her off as another Vegas victim.

But Lucky O’Toole smells a rat. As head of Customer Relations at the newest, most opulent mega-casino and resort on the Strip, so she’s got a lot on her plate: the Adult Film industry’s annual awards banquet, a spouse-swapping convention, sex toy purveyors preying on the pocket-protector crowd attending ElectroniCon … Still, Lucky can’t resist turning over a few stones.

When a former flame is one of the snakes she uncovers, Lucky’s certain she’s no longer dealing with an anonymous Sin City suicide. To top it all off, Lucky’s best friend Teddie—Las Vegas’ finest female impersonator—presses to take their relationship to the next level. Leave it to Lucky to attract a man who looks better in a dress than she does.

Lucky must manage the Babylon’s onslaught of outrageous festivities, solve a murder, and struggle to keep her life and libido from spinning out of control … not to mention keep her balance in six inch heels.

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Title: Tressed to Kill
Author: Lila Dare
Series Character: Grace Terhune, Southern Beauty Shop
Format: Mass Market Paperback

What we know about the character: Grace Ann Terhune is a beautician in her mother's salon in St. Elizabeth, Georgia.

Her first case: St. Elizabeth offers charm, Southern hospitality-and, most recently, murder. When hairdresser Grace Terhune and her mother, Violetta, gussy up all the high-society ladies attending the town meeting, they find their snobbiest client dead. The police believe the mother-daughter duo did her in. But before things get snarled beyond repair, Grace sets out to clear their names.

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Title: The Poacher's Son
Author: Paul Doiron
Series Character: Mike Bowditch
Format: Hardcover

What we know about the character: Mike Bowditch is a game warden in Maine.

His first case: Mike returns home one evening to find an alarming voice from the past on his answering machine: his father, Jack, a hard-drinking womanizer who makes his living poaching illegal game. An even more frightening call comes the next morning from the police: They are searching for the man who killed a beloved local cop the night before -- and his father is their prime suspect. Jack has escaped from police custody, and only Mike believes that his tormented father might not be guilty.

Now, alienated from the woman he loves, shunned by colleagues who have no sympathy for the suspected cop killer, Mike must come to terms with his haunted past. He knows firsthand Jack’s brutality, but is the man capable of murder? Desperate and alone, Mike strikes up an uneasy alliance with a retired warden pilot, and together the two men journey deep into the Maine wilderness in search of a runaway fugitive. There they meet a beautiful woman who claims to be Jack’s mistress but who seems to be guarding a more dangerous secret. The only way for Mike to save his father now is to find the real killer -- which could mean putting everyone he loves in the line of fire.

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Title: Blood Oath
Author: Christopher Farnsworth
Series Character: Nathaniel Cade
Format: Hardcover

What we know about the character: Nathaniel Cade is a vampire sworn to protect the President and the United States from supernatural threats.

His first case: Zach Barrows is an ambitious young White House staffer whose career takes an unexpected turn when he's partnered with Nathaniel Cade, a secret agent sworn to protect the president. But Cade is no ordinary civil servant. Bound by a special blood oath, Cade has spent more than 140 years in service to the president, battling nightmares before they can break into the daylight world of the American dream.

Immediately Zach and Cade receive their first joint assignment: one that uncovers a shadowy government conspiracy and a plot to attack the Unites States with a gruesome new biological weapon. Zach soon learns that the world is far stranger, and far more dangerous, than he ever imagined ... and that his partner is the least of his problems.

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Title: Love Mercy
Author: Earlene Fowler
Series Character: Love Mercy Johnson
Format: Mass Market Paperback

What we know about the character: Love Mercy Johnson is a photojournalist and co-owner of the Buttercream Café in Morro Bay, California.

Her first case: She still listens for her husband's comforting laugh, but with her friend's help, Love is trying to move on. Then her 18-year-old estranged granddaughter shows up, forcing them both to confront old resentments. And when disaster strikes, they must discover if they can change their lives -- and the lives of those they love -- for the better.

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Title: The Insider
Author: Reece Hirsch
Series Character: Will Connelly
Format: Mass Market Paperback

What we know about the character: Will Connelly is a corporate attorney in San Francisco.

His first case: First Will's colleague hurtles to his death outside his office window. Within days, he's is a prime suspect in a murder, the target of an S.E.C. insider trading investigation, and a pawn in a complex criminal scheme involving the Russian mafia and a ruthless terrorist plot. Now, to top things off, he must ensure a deadly enemy doesn't gain access to the nation's most sensitive and confidential information -- that has the power to do incalculable, irrevocable harm.

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Title: A Timely Vision
Author: Joyce and Jim Lavene
Series Character: Dae O'Donnell, Missing Pieces
Format: Mass Market Paperback

What we know about the character: Dae O'Donnell is mayor of the small town of Duck, North Carolina.

Her first case: Dae is the person everyone turns to when they've lost something. One touch and Dae can find it, and missing pieces seem to find their way to her, whether she wants them to or not.

When Miss Mildred asks Dae to find her missing watch, Dae finds herself looking for more than mislaid jewelry -- she must prove the town matriarch isn't a cold-blooded killer.

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Title: Under the Eye of Kali
Author: Susan Oleksiw
Series Character: Anita Ray
Format: Hardcover

What we know about the character: Anita Ray helps her aunt manage a hotel in south India.

Her first case: In the middle of the tourist season in tropical South India, four American women meet over breakfast at Hotel Delite. Two of the women are traveling together, and three seem to be from the same city. All seems idyllic until one woman goes missing and another becomes deathly ill. Anita plunges into the mystery, to save a guest and her aunt's livelihood.

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Title: The Hangman's Row Enquiry
Author: Ann Purser
Series Character: Ivy Beasley
Format: Mass Market Paperback

What we know about the character: Ivy Beasley is an amateur sleuth living in a retirement residence in the Suffolk village of Barrington. She was introduced in the Round Ringford series.

Her first case: Ivy has found a silver lining in her golden years as an amateur sleuth.

She teams up with Gus, a mysterious newcomer to the small English village of Barrington who can't resist a little excitement even as he strives to keep his past a secret, and her own cousin, a widow with time on her hands and money in her purse. Together they're determined to solve the murder of Gus's elderly neighbor.

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Title: Follow Me Down
Author: Marc Strange
Series Character: Orwell Brennan
Format: Hardcover

What we know about the character: Orwell Brennan is a police chief in a rural town in Ontario.

His first case: A man, hanging from a tree at the edge of the forest that surrounds Dockerty, Newry County, has been shot with arrows, two of which pin his belly to the tree trunk. Orwell, Dockerty’s chief of police, wonders whether it’s a hunting accident when a sergeant tells him it’s been ruled a murder. He also tells the chief that it’s now in the hands of Metro Homicide and outside his concern. But Orwell has never listened much to those telling him to mind his own business, and this case has far too many unanswered questions to suit him. He decides he can’t and won’t let it go until he knows what really happened—no matter whose toes he steps on.

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For a list of more mysteries scheduled for publication during May, please visit our New Mysteries home page. If you're interested in new paperbacks, visit The Mystery Bookshelf, where you can discover a library of new mysteries, also updated with May 2010 releases.

Please also visit the Hidden Staircase Mystery Books where we are committed to providing readers and collectors of mystery books with the best and most current information about their favorite authors, titles, and series.

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Harlequin Mira Mystery and Suspense Titles for May 2010

eHarlequin.com has announced the May 2010 titles for their Mira imprint, the brightest stars in women's fiction. From all titles available, we've only listed those that are mystery, thriller, or suspense on this page. For more information or to purchase any of the books below, click on the book title or book cover. (Previous months titles can be found on the backlist page.)

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The Hypnotist by M. J. Rose
The Reincarnationist Series (3rd in series)

An FBI agent, tormented by a death he wasn't able to prevent, a crime he's never been able to solve and a love he's never forgotten, discovers that his true conflict resides not in his past, but in a…Past Life.

Haunted by a twenty-year-old murder of a beautiful young painter, Lucian Glass keeps his demons at bay through his fascinating work as a Special Agent with the FBI's Art Crime Team. Currently investigating a crazed art collector who has begun destroying prized masterworks, Glass is thrust into a bizarre hostage negotiation that takes him undercover at the Phoenix Foundation—dedicated to the science of past-life study—where, in order to maintain his cover, he agrees to submit to the treatment of a hypnotist.

Under hypnosis, Glass travels from ancient Greece to nineteenth-century Persia, while the case takes him from New York to Paris and the movie capital of the world. These journeys will change his very understanding of reality, lead him to question his own sanity and land him at the center of perhaps the most audacious art heist in history: the theft of a 1,500-year-old sculpture from the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

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Out of Sight by Stella Cameron
A Court of Angels Thriller (3rd in series)

Psychic master talent Sykes Millet can vanish at will, read minds and control others with hypnosis. What Sykes cannot do is escape his destiny—an ancient curse foretelling the misery his dark beauty may bring to everyone he loves.

Poppy Fortune knows all too well the burden of having paranormal talent. The supernatural world has fractured her entire family—now it's keeping at bay the one man she wants more than life.

Driven by hatred for the Millets, a killing force has attacked New Orleans. The evil Embran race has no conscience and intends to terrorize the city into submission. Sykes and Poppy must set aside old distrust and use their bonded talents to save their families, themselves … and New Orleans.

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Bargain with the Devil by F. J. Chase
A Peter Avakian Mystery (2nd in series)

Security consultant Peter Avakian's job is to keep people safe, and that's not always easy. Even his Special Forces training couldn't have prepared him for a routine business proposal that was anything but. By simply acknowledging the offer, Avakian becomes snarled in a complex plot to stage a political coup in central Africa. With no way out, he turns to the CIA—and is forced to become their mole inside the conspiracy.

Pulled into a shadow world of nations battling over the world's oil supply, drug dealers financing revolutions, and gunrunners on sale to the highest bidder, it's all Avakian can do to stay alive. And that may depend less on his lethal skills than on two women: a CIA agent and a South African reporter after a story. Will they save him, or will they betray him?

It's anyone's guess, especially his.

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Maps of Hell by Paul Johnston
A Matt Wells Mystery (3rd in series)

I fell into the deepest of holes. I am no one.

I awake in a windowless room—naked, filthy, bruised, robbed of my every memory. I feel inexplicably drowned in a sea of hatred and rage. I … don't know who I am. But I know I must escape.

Crime writer Matt Wells could never have conjured a plot this twisted—a secretive militia running sick brainwashing experiments in the Maine wilderness, himself a subject. He knows they've been subconsciously feeding him instructions … but for what?

Taunted by maddening snatches of a life he can't trust as his own, Matt's piecing it together: three gruesome killings he's blamed for … and a woman … someone from his past he should remember.

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14 by J. T. Ellison
A Taylor Jackson Mystery (2nd in series)

Ten victims, each with pale skin and long dark hair. All have been slashed across the throat, the same red lipstick smeared across their lips. In the mid-1980s the Snow White Killer terrorized the streets of Nashville, Tennessee. Then suddenly the murders stopped. A letter from the killer to the police stated that his work was done. Now four more bodies are found, marked with his fatal signature. The residents of Nashville fear a madman has returned, decades later, to finish his sick fairy tale.

Homicide Lieutenant Taylor Jackson believes the killings are the work of a copycat killer who's even more terrifying. For this monster is meticulously honing his craft as he mimics famous serial murders … proving that the past is not to be forgotten.

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Thriller 2: Stories You Just Can't Put Down by Clive Cussler, editor
Anthology

When some of the top thriller writers in the world came together in Thriller: Stories to Keep You Up All Night, they became a part of one of the most successful short-story anthologies ever published.

The highly anticipated Thriller 2: Stories You Just Can't Put Down is even bigger. From Jeffery Deaver's tale of international terrorism to Lisa Jackson's dysfunctional family in the California wine country to Ridley Pearson's horrifying serial killer, this collection has something for everyone. Twenty-three bestselling and hot new authors in the genre have submitted original stories to make up this unforgettable blockbuster.

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Keep up to date by subscribing to eHarlequin.com's free newsletter that contains the latest information about their series of books as well as informing you about subscriber-only special offers and new products. Click on the banner below to subscribe for free:

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Foyle's War Returns This Sunday on PBS

This Sunday, May 2nd, the first of three new episodes comprising the sixth series of Foyle's War airs on PBS Masterpiece Mystery! (Check your local listings for exact times.)

Cancelled by ITV in 2007, the series was brought to a close in 2008 with the final episode ("All Clear") taking place on VE Day. But high ratings for the final series and fan complaints over the cancellation caused the network to reconsider its decision, the result being the commissioning of three new episodes that take place during the summer of 1945.

In this Sunday's episode, "The Russian House", the war is over in Europe, the dawn of a new era at hand, and much has changed — for Samantha "Sam" Stewart (Honeysuckle Weeks) and Paul Milner (Anthony Howell) at least. Detective Chief Superintendent Christopher Foyle's (Michael Kitchen) retirement ambitions have hit another snag, and he's still bound to his old job and a new case. A Russian POW is on the run, an eminent resident is dead, and Milner, as the new Detective Inspector in the Brighton police force and eager to be out of Foyle's shadow, is on the case. Milner has his eye on an obvious suspect in the murder, but Foyle is taking a more circumspect view of the case. Why is the War Office so intent on tracking down one particular Russian POW anyway? The answer will put Foyle in grave danger like never before, and shed a searing light on secrets of the British government.

Foyle's War is, without question (at least in our minds), one of the finest examples of television series crime drama ever produced. Those who have seen previous episodes will be thrilled to discover that the quality of writing and production are as high as ever in these new episodes, and will welcome Michael Kitchen as DCI Christopher Foyle back into their homes; newcomers will be scrambling to see how it all began. (MBN note: Acorn Media provided us with a complimentary set of the sixth series DVDs to preview.) DVD sets of the previous series are available on our website Mysteries on TV: Foyle's War, as individual sets and as the complete set, Foyle's War: From Dunkirk to VE-Day. The sixth series will be available on DVD on June 1st, and may be pre-ordered.

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Mystery Book Review: The Third Rail by Michael Harvey

Review of The Third Rail by Michael Harvey

Chicago private investigator Michael Kelly is drawn into a deadly cat-and-mouse game when an unknown killer inexplicably includes him in his plans in The Third Rail, the third mystery in this series by Michael Harvey.

Read the full text of our review at Mysterious Reviews.

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The Third Rail
Michael Harvey
A Michael Kelly Mystery

Knopf (Hardcover)
ISBN-10: 0-307-27250-8 (0307272508)
ISBN-13: 978-0-307-27250-8 (9780307272508)
Publication Date: April 2010
List Price: $24.95

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Mysterious Reviews is your source for the latest mystery, suspense, thriller, and crime novel reviews, edited by the Hidden Staircase Mystery Books.

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More Prime Time Crime Pilot Status Updates for the 2010 Fall Season

A few days ago we gave an update on how The Hollywood Reporter was sizing up the new fall season (with our own emphasis on crime dramas). Today Variety is providing their view on which pilots have a chance to be picked up by the networks.

NBC, with the most open slots to fill, is said to be adding staff for its remake of The Rockford Files, a good sign that it's a go. Also looking good are The Chase, about federal marshals tracking down fugitives, the conspiracy thriller The Event, and The Cape, about a former cop who becomes a masked superhero to clear his name.

Over at CBS, the remake of Hawaii Five-O seems to be a sure thing. Other than that, the only other show mentioned is the Criminal Minds spin-off, which may be considered as a mid-season replacement.

ABC seems likely to pick up the Dana Delaney medical examiner series Body of Evidence and the cop show 187 Detroit.

Leading Fox crime drama pilots include Breakout Kings, about a team of ex-cons who team up with US marshals, the Chicago-based police drama Ride-Along, and the legal thriller Pleading Guilty, based on the Scott Turow Kindle County novels. The con man drama Midland, also under consideration, is thought to be more appropriate for its sister network, FX.

Finally, the CW is said to be sure to go with the remake of La Femme Nikita.

The network announcements for the 2010 fall season are expected in mid-May.

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