Thrilling Thirteen: 13 Mysteries/Thrillers

Thrilling Thirteen Synopses

FBI agent Nick Bracco can't stop a Kurdish terrorist from firing missiles at random homes across the country. The police can't stand watch over every household, so Bracco recruits his cousin Tommy to help track down this terrorist. Tommy is in the Mafia. Oh yeah, it gets messy fast. As fast as you can turn the pages.

A killer is loose in San Francisco, and he's collecting body parts. SFPD has no witnesses and no suspects, but FBI Agent Abby Kane believes a dead hiker found ten miles north of the city is the key to solving those crimes. The detective involved with the case thinks Abby might be chasing a ghost down a rabbit hole, but the more Abby digs, the more she begins to think the killer is playing a game and there's an audience cheering him on.

Canadian Intelligence Service Agent Justin Hall — combat-hardened in operations throughout Northern Africa — has been demoted after a botched mission in Libya. When two foreign icebreakers appear in Canadian Arctic waters, Justin volunteers for the reconnaissance mission, eager to return to the field. His team discovers a foreign weapons cache deep in the Arctic, but they are not aware that a spy has infiltrated the Department of National Defense. The team begins to unravel a treasonous plan against Canada, but they fall under attack from one of their own. Disarmed and stripped of their survival gear, they are stranded in a remote location. Now the team must survive the deadly Arctic not only to save themselves, but their country.

Three-year-old Mallory Scott has disappeared from her home in the exclusive Bal Harbour neighborhood of North Miami. With no eye witnesses and very few clues, Rick and Rachel Scott have experienced every parent’s worst nightmare. After weeks of looking for their daughter, Rachel’s hopelessness and desperation has grown out of control at the lack of leads in her daughter's case. When another toddler vanishes in a nearby city, Rachel begins to wonder if there is a connection. She leaves her socialite life and high-profile real estate career to help find him. As the search for Mallory and the missing toddler continues, Rachel uncovers a startling secret that will change her life forever — and she discovers just how far she is willing to go to find her own daughter.

Sandy Banks is the last of The Four Horsemen, a vigilante group of ex-cops determined to right the injustices of a broken court system. But now the project is disintegrating, putting him in the middle of chaos. Betrayed by his final partner, blackmailed by the project head and pursued by federal agents bent on busting the case wide open, Sandy scrambles to escape this mayhem with his soul intact.

Justin Hall is in Lagos, Nigeria, to handle the exchange of a Canadian diplomat who has been taken hostage for ransom by local rebels. The dangerous exchange goes sideways, and Justin wonders if he can trust his team. He turns to an old asset, a woman working for the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation. With her help and after the arrival of Carrie O’Connor, Justin’s partner in the Canadian Intelligence Service, they discover the unexpected truth about the diplomat’s kidnapping. With time running out and no one else to turn to, Justin and Carrie are thrust into a game of shadows as they devise a clever plan to turn the tables on the kidnappers.

What would happen if a military recruiter refused to take no for an answer? In this gripping thriller, Samuel Ackerman has one dream: to become a Navy SEAL. But after dropping out of the legendary unit's training program known as Hell Week, he is forced to become a recruiter in his small hometown. In order to earn a return trip to SEAL training, he must have a successful turn as a recruiter. As he soon proves, he will stop at nothing to get what he wants.

Mark Taylor's life changes forever when he finds an antique camera in an Afghan bazaar. Back home in Chicago, he discovers that the camera has a strange and unique ability — it produces photographs of tragedies yet to happen. Gifted with powers to change destiny, what drives him to risk his life for others? And when presented with photos of 9/11 a day before it happens, what else can he do but attempt to save lives and thwart catastrophe? In this prequel to No Good Deed, find out how Mark Taylor was gifted with powers to change destiny. What drove him to risk his life for others, and why did everything go so wrong on that fateful September day?

Carl is a Yankee cop in a small Texas border town. Isabella is a beautiful Mexican woman that everyone in town loves, including the hapless Pete and the wealthy, powerful Jack…but most of all, Carl. Part romance, part police procedural, IN THE SHADOW OF EL PASO contains two short stories. Both stories explore love, race, class and the ambiguity that exists on the southern border.

Three very different women have been murdered and NYPD Detective Stephanie Chalice wants to know why. Her case begins on the Roosevelt Island tram. The conductor has been shot, but lying next to him is the real mystery: a woman who might appear to have died of natural causes if not for the handwritten note stuffed in her mouth that simply reads "Look back!” When a second woman is found dead with a rag in her mouth and another cryptic note found nearby, Chalice realizes that a psychopath is stalking Manhattan, on the prowl for a very special type of woman. Part of the murderer’s twisted game is leaving intentional clues for the police, clues designed not only to taunt, but also to do something much worse. Chalice will uncover startling truths about who she really, but will it help her to discover the killer’s real purpose before another woman dies?

A young man disappears in the wilderness of the California mother lode. He leaves behind a gold-flecked rock and a vial of liquid mercury. He is a misfit in the modern world, a throwback to the Gold Rush days. A venture capitalist — whose gold country is Silicon Valley — hires forensic geologists Cassie Oldfield and Walter Shaws to track his missing brother. Following one of the 'lost rivers' of California, Cassie and Walter plunge into the dark history of the legendary lands, into the dark past of the brothers, into a poisonous sibling feud that threatens both lives and the land. And the question then becomes: which brother is on the hunt?

Stephanie Ann "Sam" McRae's busy, but orderly life as a Maryland lawyer takes a chaotic turn when two clients are accused of murder. A poor, black girl is accused of killing her mother. A young man suspected of embezzlement is accused of murdering his boss. The cases collide in a bizarre way involving girl gangs and computer pornography. Sam ventures into the heart of DC's suburban ghettos to find answers. A maniacal killer who'll do anything to hide them stalks her. After a nearly disastrous confrontation, Sam must do business on the run. As the body count grows, Sam races to learn the truth and clear her clients before she becomes the next victim.

A major earthquake sees ex-Special Forces soldier-turned-bodyguard Charlotte ‘Charlie’ Fox on a transport plane headed for the scene of devastation. The way things are coming apart at home with Sean Meyer, she welcomes the chance to get away. Tasked as security advisor to the specialist team at the centre of relief efforts, Charlie knows it won’t be easy. The team members are willing to put themselves in constant danger as a matter of course. But what kind of other risks are they prepared to take? As Charlie soon discovers, it’s not just the ground beneath her feet that cannot be relied on. Her predecessor died conveniently while investigating rumours that the team were on the take, Charlie’s been instructed to quietly uncover whether his death was as accidental as the official verdict suggests. If it was an accident, why are they so obviously lying to her? Charlie must move with care through a shifting landscape to find the answers before there are more than just earthquake victims buried in the rubble. And when disaster strikes she will learn not only whom she can trust, but whether she can survive the darkness that comes with a total absence of light.