The charmingly amoral David Rathbone leads a small group of Palm Beach conmen. A task force of police and federal agents are trying to take them down, and Rita Sullivan goes undercover and flirts her way into David's bed. Sullivan and some of the other undercover cops start losing their per­spec­tive and get a little too close to their targets.

Fourteen years ago, Sam Bowden testified against Max Cady. Now Cady is out of prison and waging a war of terror against Sam and Carol and their children. Cady is cunning and ruthless and sooner or later he's going to start killing them. Bowden has always been a strong believer in the law, but until there's proof, there's little the law can do about Cady. Sam and Carol have to dig deeper to unearth their primal survival instincts.

Chris Flynn was an out-of-control teenager who spent time in a youth prison, but he's kept his nose clean since then. He's laying carpet one day when he finds $50,000 in cash under some floor­boards. He knows it's trouble and leaves it there–but someone else takes it. Then the original owners reappear and kill one of Chris's friends.

Pelecanos is known for both characters and plot, and examining how cir­cum­stances can lead flawed people to make decisions that cause events to spiral out of control. Chris and his …continue.

Every year when the snow first arrives in Norway, a woman disappears and there's a snowman in the vicinity. No one's noticed the pattern until now. Harry Hole, the alcoholic detective inspector, starts seeking the links between the cases.

Nesbø's novels are gripping but over the top.

Tucker may be a white guy but he's been cooking Chinese food since he was a child, and he's good at it—good enough to get a job at a Chinese restaurant as a cook. Then there's Corinne, trying to avoid the Chinese gangsters who are convinced she has their diamonds.

Lowry shows a light touch in this quirky and en­ter­tain­ing boy-meets-girl story.

A young woman from a prominent family is missing and the Edinburgh police are looking for her. In time, they find her body. A small wooden coffin is found near her home, and DI John Rebus links that to some cold cases, while DC Siobhan Clarke tracks down the mysterious Quizmaster on the Internet.

Another enjoyable and competent police procedural from Ian Rankin.

I mentioned last week that a few months ago we had listened to the audiobook of The Hot Rock, the first of the Dortmunder novels. I just finished reading it as an ebook on my phone. I enjoyed it a lot but I think I found it funnier when I heard it as an audiobook. Partly, the first time around, I didn't know what was coming next; partly, the narrator's skillful delivery gave me time to savor the humor. I read so fast that …continue.

First of the Bulldog Drummond novels.

Bored former army officer, Capt. Hugh Drummond, “late of the Royal Loamshires”, puts an ad­ver­tise­ment in the paper looking for adventure. He gets more than he expected when a young woman puts him on the trail of a master criminal who is organizing a would-be socialist putsch.

En­ter­tain­ing in a square-jawed, stiff-upper-lip sort of way.

Playback is the last Philip Marlowe novel completed by Raymond Chandler. Marlowe is hired to tail a woman who arrives on a train from the East. He follows her to a small town near San Diego, where she falls under the influence of a black­mail­er—and Marlowe starts to fall for her.

Not Chandler's best work—one is left feeling that both Chandler and Marlowe are old and tired and going through the mo­tion­s—but enjoyable none the less.