Inspector Montalbano enjoys simple pleasures - delicious food, walks along the water, the occasional smoke - yet these are just the backdrop to his duties as a detective. His latest case is the killing of the wealthy Cosimo Barletta. Thought to be a widower living out a quiet life by the sea, Cosimo's sudden death by gunshot to the neck opens up his past to scrutiny. What Montalbano uncovers is Cosimo's trove of salacious photographs, used to extort young women, and a history full of greed and corruption.

A woman’s cryptic dying words in a Venetian hospice lead Guido Brunetti to uncover a threat to the entire region in Donna Leon’s haunting 29th Brunetti novel. When Dottoressa Donato calls the Questura to report that a dying patient at the hospice Fatebenefratelli wants to speak to the police, Commissario Guido Brunetti and his colleague, Claudia Griffoni, waste no time in responding.

Brilliant, fearless, incorruptible, Andrew Trevayne was a self-made millionaire at 35, former undersecretary of state, current head of one of the nation's most prestigious foundations. Now, at the express wish of the president, Trevayne undertakes an investigation into the "secret government" - and is swept up in a tidal wave of intrigue and danger beyond the corridors of official power...into a nightmare maze where Mafia leaders and billionaires mingle...where Congress and even the presidency itself can be bought and sold.

Stefan Lindman, a young police officer recently diagnosed with mouth cancer, decides to investigate the murder of his former colleague, but is soon enmeshed in a mystifying case with no witnesses and no apparent motives. Terrified of the disease that could take his life, Lindman becomes more and more reckless as he unearths the chilling links between Molin's death and an underground neo-Nazi network that runs further and deeper than he could ever have imagined.

Why we think it’s a great listen: How do you one-up a book that’s already a global literary phenomenon? Hire Simon Vance to (flawlessly) interpret the loves, lives, and murders of Sweden’s cold and secret-filled world. A spellbinding amalgam of murder mystery, family saga, love story, and financial intrigue. It's about the disappearance 40 years ago of Harriet Vanger, a young scion of one of the wealthiest families in Sweden.

Carl Mørck used to be one of Denmark’s best homicide detectives. Then a hail of bullets destroyed the lives of two fellow cops, and Carl - who didn’t draw his weapon - blames himself. So a promotion is the last thing he expects. But Department Q is a department of one, and Carl’s got only a stack of cold cases for company. His colleagues snicker, but Carl may have the last laugh, because one file keeps nagging at him: A liberal politician vanished five years earlier and is presumed dead. But she isn’t dead...yet.

Everyone is always telling Stone Barrington that he’s too smart to be a cop, but it’s pure luck that places him on the streets in the dead of night, just in time to witness the horrifying incident that turns his life inside out. Suddenly he is on the front page of every New York newspaper and his life is hopelessly entwined in the increasingly shocking life (and perhaps death) of Sasha Nijinsky, the country’s hottest and most beautiful television anchorwoman.

Since moving to Austin to ease the pain of tragic mistakes, Paris Gibson has led a life of virtual isolation, coming alive only at night when she hosts her popular radio show. Then one listener - who identifies himself as "Valentino" - tells Paris that the girl he loves jilted him because of Paris's on-air advice. He intends to exact revenge by killing the girl and then coming after Paris. Desperate to stop the sinister Valentino, Paris enlists the help of the police - including crime psychologist Dean Malloy, the very man she had hoped never to meet again....

On the 85th floor of a glittering high-rise in Los Angeles, Robert Tarza steps into the lobby of the Marbury Marfan law firm to discover his partner Simon Rafer lying in a pool of blood - an ornate dagger plunged into his back. Robert had worked with Simon for decades, and their relationship was fraught with conflict. But he never imagined he would wind up as the prime suspect for his colleague’s murder. As the evidence stacks up against him with frightening speed, he quickly falls from his respected position to that of a criminal dragged through the tabloids.

It was a crime of senseless violence. On a cold night in a remote Swedish farmhouse, an elderly farmer was bludgeoned to death, his wife left to die with a noose around her neck. As if this didn't present enough problems for Ystad police inspector Kurt Wallander, the dying woman's last word, his only tangible clue, were foreign. If publicized, they could be the match that would inflame Sweden's already smoldering anti-immigrant sentiments.

The study of twins and the genetics of aggression totally consumes research scientist Jeannie Ferrami. An accomplished and headstrong researcher, Jeannie has developed a sophisticated software program to identify identical twins reared apart. But Jeannie's breakthrough project is threatened by the appearance of a sudden impossibility - identical twins born weeks apart to different mothers at separate locations.

Mary Higgins Clark sends chills down listeners' spines with the story of Lacey Farrell, a rising star on the Manhattan real estate scene. One day, while showing a luxurious skyline co-op, Lacey is witness to a murder - and to the dying words of the victim.... The dying woman is convinced that the attacker was after her dead daughter's journal - which Lacey gives to the police, but not before making a copy for herself. It's an impulse that later proves nearly fatal.

It all begins with a call to the police. A 16-year-old boy, Roger Eriksson, has gone missing in the town of Västerås. A search is organized and a group of young scouts makes an awful discovery in a marsh: Roger is dead. Meanwhile, Sebastian Bergman, psychologist, criminal profiler, and one of Sweden's top experts on serial killers, is in Västerås to settle his mother's estate following her death. Sebastian has withdrawn from police work after the death of his wife and daughter in the 2004 tsunami.

Successful movie producer Wolf Willett is stunned when he sees his own death reported in a major newspaper. It says he was a victim in a triple homicide during a sordid tryst with his wife and a friend. But who is the unidentified corpse? Why can't Wolf remember anything about the night in question? And who wants him dead?

In his 16th Matthew Scudder novel, All the Flowers Are Dying, New York Times best-selling author Lawrence Block takes the series to a new level of suspense and a new depth of characterization. Block puts Scudder, and the listener, at the very edge of the abyss.