Dame Beatrice Joliffe, a founder of the Wrens (Women's Royal Navy Society) and notorious on the 1920s London social scene, has been found dead in her room at the Ritz. And even though two police officers, Bill Armitage and Tilly Westhorpe, were on the premises at the time, neither observed anything suspicious. Both of the officers are assigned to the case under Commander Joe Sandilands.

As Sandilands tracks down Dame Beatrice's relatives, a woman who worked as the dame's companion turns up dead. Before Sandilands can resolve the case, his boss closes it on orders from an even higher authority. But with the insight of his colleagues and his own growing suspicions about the dame's interests and behavior, Sandilands secretly continues to work on the case. Set in 1926, The Bee's Kiss is well-written and multi-layered. The several twists at the end of the novel follow logically from the story but still manage to be delightfully surprising.

Minette Walters doesn't rip her stories from the headlines. She carefully pries headlines up to excavate the underlying truth, holding up the squirmy creatures that live in the dark with tweezers for closer examination.

Connie Burns has seen evil firsthand. She reported on it from West Africa, and now is covering Iraq. Man's inhumanity is her beat, but one man in particular is an elusive subject. She believes this violent mercenary uses Third World conflict as a cover for serial murder. She goes after the story when she spots him in Baghdad, but in the shifting sands of contract security work, he escapes. After she's kidnapped and released three days later without harm, she doesn't pursue the story any further. She's too terrified.

Accused of inventing her kidnapping for attention, she retreats to an isolated house in a bucolic English village where her defenses are no match for her fear. But a blunt-spoken woman farmer with no love for false convention helps her prepare for the mercenary's return. In the process they learn Connie's elderly landlady may have been confined in the same prison--one of deliberately-inflicted fear.

As Connie gathers courage and conducts her personal war on terror, she learns how it works, both abroad and at home--and so does the reader. Timely and illuminating, full of emotional power, intelligence, and wit, this brilliant mystery is crime fiction at its best.

Elizabeth Glendinning has been a success on both sides of the courtroom, putting defendants behind bars and setting them free, but there's one case she regrets winning. She creates a plan to right the wrong, but a serious heart condition prevents her from seeing it through. Still, she dies with a smile on her face, knowing that she's given the key to the problem to a trustworthy monk. Trouble is, Father Anselm isn't quite sure what he's meant to unlock with it.

In this tangled garden of puzzles, Brodrick lays out a winding plot in which the paths of several characters cross and diverge. Each of the beguilingly Dickensian characters knows just enough of Elizabeth's plan to be in a constant state of hopeful bafflement. The reader is in much the same condition as Elizabeth's co-conspirator, Blind George, a homeless man with a brain injury that has erased the memory of the injustice he needs to set right. With him, we have to recreate the past from fragments.

This book, the sequel to The Sixth Lamentation, is not for the impatient reader in a hurry to race from one excitement to the next. Brodrick's narrative style is as complex and original as the eccentric world he invents. But readers who enjoy Carol O'Connell or Frances Fyfield won't mind turning these pages slowly. That way, they can savor each one.

Medical Examiner Maura Isles has seen it all, but even she is shocked when she's called away from midnight mass to the bloody scene of a homicide. With Detective Jane Rizzoli she ponders the meaning of the ritualistic butchery, and the scrawl on the wall that says in Latin "I have sinned." Whoever the killer is, it's just the start.

The weather is as brutal as the crimes, with Boston gripped in a Christmas cold snap. Soon the police are being assisted--whether they want help or not--by the mysterious and powerful Mephisto Club, whose members meet in Boston's exclusive Beacon Hill to delve into the historical roots of evil. Can ancient sacred texts reveal its source? Does evil have genetic roots that explain human wickedness as something that isn't really human at all?

Tess Gerritsen has mastered the art of propelling readers through gallons of blood, personal angst, gut-wrenching anxiety, and non-stop action. This time, her medical mystery contains the twisty DNA of a Da Vinci clone, combining apocryphal religious texts with genetic theory that, if you pause long enough to catch your breath and think, sounds uncomfortably similar to 1930s eugenics, evil spread through inbreeding with a tainted race. Though neither its theology nor its science bears close scrutiny, most readers will enjoy the fast-paced ride and will be too busy turning the pages to notice.

The tragic murder of a black teenager forces three men--homicide detective Gus Ramone; his ex-partner Dan "Doc" Holiday, who now works as a limo driver; and a retired legendary detective named T.C. Cook, whose track record for solving crimes back in the 1980s before crack cocaine blanketed the inner city was impeccable--to come together to solve the crime, which is chillingly similar to a series of unsolved killings twenty years earlier that involved all three men and which have continued to haunt them.

Working at the top of his game, Pelecanos has crafted a superb novel--one of his best--that builds on familiar themes from his previous work. The struggles of troubled characters trying to find redemption, of "good" guys attempting to maintain their straight path when everyone around them seems to be giving in, is delicately and subtly explored. His extraordinary characterizations expose the hypocrisy of his most noble characters as well as the humanity--however little of it still remains--within his vilest, most disturbing ones. The Night Gardener is the real deal--old fans will savor this dark tale while new fans will be hard pressed to find a better starting point.

When West Point cadet Leroy Fry's body is found hanging from a tree in an out-of-the-way part of the campus, his death appears to be a suicide. But a few hours later, his body has gone missing, and when it is rediscovered near the West Point ice house, Fry's heart has been ripped out.

Gus Landor, a retired detective living in the area, is called in by school officials to look into Fry's death. It is 1830 and West Point is young; if word of the crime gets out, the school's reputation could be tarnished. So Gus must investigate quietly, assisted by cadet Edgar Allen Poe. Poe is just beginning his career as a poet and feels somewhat out of place as a West Point cadet. But, a brilliant observer, Poe takes to detective work and develops a father-son relationship with Landor, who has lost his own daughter. Poe's character is particularly well-drawn, and Bayard's writing is lyrical. Bayard does not take a false step in this novel, and the solution to the mystery is startling and impressive.

Framed for a crime he didn't commit, professional thief Brandon Vale is rescued from prison by the man who put him there, former FBI agent Richard Scanlon. Scanlon and Presidential Advisor Edwin Hamdi need Brandon's unique talents for a heist involving $250 million dollars, the price demanded by a Ukrainian crime boss for the purchase of 12 black-market nuclear warheads. Caught between going back to jail for life or working for the government, Brandon chooses to join Scanlon's team.

Catherine Juarez is assigned as Brandon's handler. It's a first-time job for her, and not one she relishes. But her feelings toward Brandon change from distrust to admiration when the original heist turns into a more hazardous adventure. Danger surrounds them as they travel from Las Vegas to the Ukraine to the Middle East, always just one step ahead of someone who wants them both dead.

Mills' eighth novel is a rollicking good thriller with serious political overtones. Brandon is a master at planning bloodless crimes. Faced with bombs, he's a run-for-the-hills guy rather than a hero. Catherine is more gung-ho, an idealist fired with patriotic fervor. Their relationship is conflicted, but because Mills allows them to play out the scenes in ways true to their personalities, that conflict adds to the plot's tension. Another plus is Mills' ability to create detailed settings without resorting to Tom Clancy-like minutiae. Add an unexpected ending to a complicated plot, crisp pace, and unusual characters, and what you have here is an unbeatable adventure story.

Gideon Oliver has accompanied his wife, Julie, to a consortium in the Scilly islands (off the Devon/Cornwall coast). The consortium, brainchild of self-made millionaire Vasily Kozlov, is intended to skewer academia. In Elkins' capable hands, it skewers the bloviated scientists present. Julie, a most endearing character, is able to bring Gideon down to earth when he gets on his own academic high horse.

Gideon's experience as a forensic archeologist is called on when bones are discovered on a local beach, a discovery which finally yields the secret of both a two-year-old murder and another at the consortium. The fog bound island is a suitable locale for the dark mystery. Collaborating with Gideon are the two policemen on the island--Mike Clapper, a complex and well realized character, whose brilliant career was derailed, and the personable Kyle Robb, whose university education annoys Clapper no end.

As one who slept through high school science, I am impressed at Gideon Oliver's ability to tell a life story through some bone fragments. I am even more impressed at Aaron Elkins' ability to craft an absorbing mystery for those of us who are scientifically challenged.