Christmas Suspense Mysteries

When Lily returns home to her aunt's manor house, she discovers that in order to inherit, she and her estranged cousins must stay together over the Christmas week and take part in a family tradition: the annual treasure hunt. But as they are drawn deeper into the game, the clues seem to point not to the deeds to the manor house, but to the key to a 20-year-old mystery: what really happened to Lily's mother? As a snowstorm cuts them off from the village, it becomes apparent that the game has turned deadly and that Lily is fighting for more than just an inheritance.

England, 1927. When Lord Edgington hears of a failed attack on an eccentric viscount, it’s the perfect excuse to get out of seeing horrible relatives over Christmas. With his loyal grandson and their golden retriever along for the ride, he sets off to investigate, but on arriving at the snowbound manor house on the English coast, they find that the wrong man has been killed. It is not the rich tyrant who lies dead on the floor of the grand salon, but one of his many bickering heirs.

When Sasha receives a call from her old university friend Gabby inviting her to spend Christmas at Gabby’s remote Scottish lake house, Sasha knows she shouldn’t go. Twelve years ago, on Christmas Eve, when Sasha and her five closest friends were celebrating the festive season, something truly horrific happened that would change the course of their friendship forever. Something that meant Sasha hasn’t spoken to any of them since that night.

December 1860. Headed for the morning shift at the Swindon Locomotive Works is an army of men pouring out of terraced houses built by the GWR, a miniature town and planned community that aims to provide for its employees from cradle to grave. Unfortunately, boilersmith Frank Rodman is headed for the grave sooner than he'd expected, or he will be once his missing head is found. Colbeck, the Railway Detective, finds his investigation into Rodman's murder mired in contradictions.

When Holly White's fiancé cancels their Christmas Eve wedding with less than two weeks to go, Holly heads home with a broken heart. Lucky for her, home in historic Mistletoe, Maine is magical during Christmastime - exactly what the doctor prescribed. Except her plan to drown her troubles in peppermints and snickerdoodles is upended when local grouch and president of the Mistletoe Historical Society, Margaret Fenwick, is bludgeoned and left in the sleigh display at Reindeer Games, Holly's family tree farm.

Cinnamon Peters is one tough cookie. Every year at Christmas River's annual Gingerbread Junction Competition, pie baker extraordinaire Cinnamon aims to win, taking down any competitor who gets in her way. But when she finds a dead body in the woods behind her pie shop just days before the big competition, Cinnamon realizes that there's much more to worry about than cookies, frosting, and gumdrops. Someone's out to bring Cinnamon down. And they're playing dirty.

Fashion designer turned amateur sleuth Maddie Springer can't wait to spend the holidays with her boyfriend, LAPD Detective Jack Ramirez. It's their first Christmas together, and Maddie wants it to be perfect. But between her zany family and wacky friends, Maddie's having a hard time finding alone time with her man. But come Christmas morning, this is one holiday she'll be sure to remember - naughty or nice!

Colorful Christmas lights dapple the family homes in the idyllic lakeside town of Sweet Haven when Jennifer Dean, a young librarian at the local elementary school, is brutally murdered. There are witnesses and her boyfriend Travis Blake confesses to the crime...but something doesn't quite add up. Blake is a third generation Army Ranger, awarded the Silver Star for his heroism in Afghanistan - how could a beloved son of this tight-knit burgh commit such a grisly deed?

First came a sinister warning to Poirot not to eat any plum pudding...then the discovery of a corpse in a chest, but what can link these baffling cases? The little grey cells of Monsieur Hercule Poirot! Feast yourself on these intriguing crime mysteries from the distinctive hand of the queen of crime fiction.

Edgar Award-winning editor Otto Penzler collects more than 50 of his all-time favorite holiday crime stories - many of which are difficult or nearly impossible to find anywhere else. From classic Victorian tales by Arthur Conan Doyle, Robert Louis Stevenson, and Thomas Hardy, to contemporary stories by Sara Paretsky and Ed McBain, this collection touches on all aspects of the holiday season, and all types of mysteries. They are suspenseful, funny, frightening, and poignant.

When a body turns up in the dumpster behind Caroline's Cupcakes, Holly White is horrified to learn her best friend, Caroline, is the main suspect. Everyone in town, including Mistletoe, Maine's sheriff, saw Caroline fighting with the victim on the night of his death. Worse, Caroline's fingerprints are all over the murder weapon, a custom-designed marble rolling pin. Now, just 10 days before Christmas, Holly's up to her jingle bells in holiday shenanigans and in desperate need of a miracle.

It’s Christmas, and things are looking good at the Slocombe house. Thea’s daughter Jessica has come to stay, much to her stepdaughter Stephanie’s delight. But then things take a turn for the worse. A local family, the Frowses, finds themselves increasingly harassed by an aggressive landlord. When Beverley Frowse goes missing, Thea and Stephanie both feel they should do their best to help her husband and son to solve the mystery.

On 1st of December, renowned puzzle setter, loner and Christmas sceptic Edie O’Sullivan finds a hand-delivered present on her doorstep. Unwrapping it, she finds a jigsaw box and, inside, six jigsaw pieces. When fitted together, the pieces show part of a crime scene – blood-spattered black and white tiles and part of an outlined body. Included in the parcel is a message: ‘Four, maybe more, people will be dead by midnight on Christmas Eve, unless you can put all the pieces together and stop me.’ It’s signed, Rest In Pieces.

Christmas in Birmingham means the Frankfurt Christmas Market. Loved and hated by brummies in equal measure, it certainly makes life interesting for West Midlands Police. But when the body of a homeless man is found behind a market stall early one Sunday morning, it looks like Christmas might be cancelled for DI Zoe Finch and her team. And when they discover that the victim has a history that makes his death politically sensitive, things get even more complicated.

It's Christmas 1909, and for once Lady Hardcastle - respectable gentlewoman, amateur spy - and her lady's maid, Florence Armstrong, are setting sleuthing aside. They are invited to the festivities up at The Grange, as guests of Sir Hector and Lady Farley-Stroud. But barely have corks been popped and parlour games played when a mysterious crime comes to light.

It’s just before Christmas, 1953. Grasby and Juggers are investigating a puzzling murder in the remote village of Uthley’s Bay. A fisherman has been found dead on the beach, with a stocking wound tight round his throat. Hundreds of pairs of stockings, in neat cellophane bags, soon wash up on the shore. A blizzard cuts off Grasby and Juggers from help, and the local innkeeper is murdered. Any remaining Christmas cheer goes up in smoke as the villagers refuse to talk, leaving the two detectives chasing false leads in the snow.

James Patterson's BookShots. Fast-paced, high-impact entertainment. Two stolen paintings disappear from a Park Avenue murder scene - French detective Luc Moncrief is in for a merry Christmas.

It’s Christmas, and James and Beth are preparing for Harrington’s festive dinner and dance. This year, famous diva Olivia Dupre is singing; a wedding is taking place, and they’re hosting a reunion of PALs - ex-army comrades from the Great War. When Olivia falls ill and claims she’s been poisoned, James puts his sleuthing hat on. But things take a sinister turn when a further attack takes place.

After a busy year fighting crime, DCI Ryan and his team of murder detectives are enjoying a festive season of goodwill, mulled wine and, in the case of DS Phillips, a stottie cake or two - that is, until a freak snowstorm forces their car off the main road and into the remote heart of Northumberland. Their Christmas spirit is soon tested when they’re forced to find shelter inside England’s most haunted castle, where they’re the uninvited guests at a ‘Candlelit Ghost Hunt’. It’s all fun and games - until one of the guests is murdered.

DI James Walker is ready for a quiet family Christmas in the sleepy village of Kirkby Abbey. But when he opens an early Christmas present left on his doorstep, he soon realises it is no gift. Inside is a gruesome surprise and a promise - 12 days, 12 murders. Not long after, the first body is found, half frozen in the snow. As the blizzards descend, panic spreads through the remote Cumbrian village - there’s a killer amongst them, and with 11 more victims to go, anyone could be next.... Can James stop the killer before they strike again?