Fiction : Thrillers

Already an underground sensation, a high-tech thriller for the wireless age that explores the unthinkable consequences of a computer program running without human control—a daemon—designed to dismantle society and bring about a new world order. Technology controls almost everything in our modern-day world, from remote entry on our cars to access to our homes, from the flight controls of our airplanes to the movements of the entire world economy. Thousands of autonomous computer programs, or daemons, make our networked world possible, running constantly in the background of our lives, trafficking e-mail, transferring money, and monitoring power grids. For the most part, daemons are benign, but the same can’t always be said for the people who design them. Matthew Sobol was a legendary computer game designer—the architect behind half-a-dozen popular online games. His premature death depressed both gamers and his company’s stock price. But Sobol’s fans aren’t the only ones to note his passing. When his obituary is posted online, a previously dormant daemon activates, initiating a chain of events intended to unravel the fabric of our hyper-efficient, interconnected world. With Sobol’s secrets buried along with him, and as new layers of his daemon are unleashed at every turn, it’s up to an unlikely alliance to decipher his intricate plans and wrest the world from the grasp of a nameless, faceless enemy—or learn to live in a society in which we are no longer in control. . . . Computer technology expert Daniel Suarez blends haunting high-tech realism with gripping suspense in an authentic, complex thriller in the tradition of Michael Crichton, Neal Stephenson, and William Gibson. more...

Price: $9.99

From the celebrated imagination of Dean Koontz comes a powerful reworking of one of the classic stories of all time. If you think you know the legend, you know only half the truth. Now the mesmerizing saga concludes. . . . As a devastating hurricane approaches, as the benighted creations of Victor Helios begin to spin out of control, as New Orleans descends into chaos and the future of humanity hangs in the balance, the only hope rests with Victor’s first, failed attempt to build the perfect human. more...

Price: $9.99

From the New York Times -bestselling author who sets the standard for intense, powerful crime-writing comes a blistering thriller featuring Joe Pike and Elvis Cole. The Watchman put Joe Pike, Elvis Cole's strong, taciturn partner, front and center, and not only won Robert Crais new audiences but remarkable reviews. The South Florida Sun-Sentinel said "Robert Crais elevates crime fiction" and now with The First Rule he does it again. The organized criminal gangs of the former Soviet Union are bound by what they call the thieves' code. The first rule is this: A thief must forsake his mother, father, brothers, and sisters. He must have no family-no wife, no children. We are his family. If any of the rules are broken, it is punishable by death. Frank Meyer had the American dream-until the day a professional crew invaded his home and murdered everyone inside. The only thing out of the ordinary about Meyer was that- before the family and the business and the normal life-a younger Frank Meyer had worked as a professional mercenary, with a man named Joe Pike. The police think Meyer was hiding something very bad, but Pike does not. With the help of Cole, he sets out on a hunt of his own-an investigation that quickly entangles them both in a web of ancient grudges, blood ties, blackmail, vengeance, double crosses, and cutthroat criminal­ity, and at the heart of it, an act so terrible even Pike and Cole have no way to measure it. Sometimes, the past is never dead. It's not even past. The First Rule is the most astonishing novel yet from the master of the crime thriller. more...

Price: $14.99

New York Times–bestselling author Karen Robards weaves a complex tale of political conspiracy and a steamy love affair, in her sizzling new novel Pursuit. W hen rookie lawyer Jessica Monaghan gets the call from John Riordan, the senior partner at the illustrious law firm for which she works, she thinks the plum assignment he offers her might be a life-changing moment. And she’s right, it is—only not in the way she hopes. It’s late on a Saturday night, and Riordan is busy—and, Jess can tell, well on his way to being drunk. He needs Jess to meet First Lady Annette Cooper, for whom Riordan is a personal lawyer, at a Washington, D.C., hotel. Jess is thrilled: This high-profile assignment must mean she’s on her way to bigger things. But bigger isn’t always better. Jess doesn’t remember much; only that in the course of the meeting with Annette Cooper she ended up in the backseat of a speeding car. All she knows is that the car crashes en route, killing the First Lady. Badly injured, Jess is the only survivor of what is trumpeted around the world as a tragic accident. Although she has no memory about the events leading up to the accident, Jess still wonders: Was it really an accident? The FBI agent on the case, Mark Ryan, senses Jess is hiding something. As Ryan’s suspicions grow, Jess’s world starts falling apart. Riordan suddenly dies of a heart attack, and his personal secretary also dies in a car accident on the way to his funeral. In fact, everyone who might possibly know the details about the First Lady’s meeting is dead. And then Jess understands: if she remembers that night, she’ll be dead too. Terrified and certain the First Lady’s death was no accident, Jess has only Mark Ryan to turn to. . . . more...

Price: $7.99

From America's #1 bestselling crime writer comes the extraordinary new Dr. Kay Scarpetta novel. The "book of the dead" is the morgue log, the ledger in which all cases are entered by hand. For Kay Scarpetta, however, it is about to have a new meaning. Fresh from her bruising battle with a psychopath in Florida, Scarpetta decides it's time for a change of pace-not only personally and professionally, but geographically. Moving to the historic city of Charleston, South Carolina, she opens a unique private forensic pathology practice, one in which she and her colleagues-including Pete Marino and her niece, Lucy-offer expert crime-scene investigation and autopsies to communities that lack local access to competent death investigation and modern technology. It seems like an ideal situation, until the new battles start-with local politicians, with entrenched interests, with someone whose covert attempts at sabotage are clearly meant to run her out of town. And that's even before the murders and other violent deaths begin. A young man from a well-known family jumps off a water tower. A woman is found ritualistically murdered in her multi-million-dollar beach home. The body of an abused young boy is discovered dumped in a desolate marsh. Meanwhile, in distant New England, problems with a prominent patient at a Harvard-affiliated psychiatric hospital begin to hint at interconnections that are as hard to imagine as they are horrible. Scarpetta has dealt with many brutal and unusual crimes before, but never a string of them as baffling, or as terrifying, as the ones that face her now. Before she is through, that book of the dead will contain many names-and the pen may be poised to write her own. The first name in forensics. The last name in suspense. Once again, Patricia Cornwell proves her exceptional ability to entertain and enthrall. more...

Price: $9.99