Showing results by author "Belinda Bauer" in All Categories

The dead can't speak to us, Professor Madoc had said. But that was a lie. The body Patrick Fort is examining in anatomy class is trying to tell him all kinds of things. But no one hears what he does, and no one understands when he tries to tell them. Life is already strange enough for Patrick - being a medical student with Asperger's Syndrome doesn't come without its challenges. And that's before he is faced with solving a possible murder, especially when no one believes a crime has even taken place.

"Jack's in charge," said his mother, as she disappeared up the road to get help. "I won't be long." So 11-year-old Jack and his two sisters wait on the hard shoulder in their stifling, broken-down car, bickering and whining and playing I-Spy until she comes back. But their mother doesn't come back. She never comes back. And after that long hot summer day, nothing will ever be the same again. Three years later, Jack's 15 and still in charge.

Felix Pink is retired. Widowed for more than a decade and a painfully literal thinker, he has led a life of routine. He occupies himself volunteering as an Exiteer - someone who sits with terminally ill people as they die by suicide, assisting with logistics and lending moral support. When Felix lets himself into Number 3 Black Lane, he’s there to keep a dying man company as he takes his final breath. But just 15 minutes later, Felix is on the run from the police. Now he must discover whether what went wrong was a simple mistake - or deliberate, a murder.

A woman gets involved with a psychic who may be able to find her missing son. Five footprints are the only sign that four-year-old Daniel Buck was ever here. Every day, Anna Buck guards the little prints in the cement. Polishing them to a shine. Keeping them safe. Spiraling toward insanity. Anna is desperate for hope, which she's not getting from the police or her husband, James. So when a woman tells her she's found a true psychic, a "shut eye", she grasps at it. Maybe he can tell her what happened to her son.

Debut author Belinda Bauer crafts an incredibly moving first novel in Blacklands. Twelve-year-old Steven is determined to put an end to his family’s misery and find the remains of his uncle, who was believed to be murdered as a child by a local pedophile. Steven spends his days digging for clues around his grandmother’s home, but when his search fails to unearth anything new, he reaches out to the only person with answers—the accused murderer now serving life in prison.

Crime reporter Eve Singer's career is on the downward slope when a spate of bizarre murders - each carefully orchestrated and advertised like performance art - begin in her territory. Covering these very public crimes revives her byline, and when the killer contacts Eve to discuss her coverage of his crimes, she is suddenly on the inside of the biggest murder investigation of the decade. But as the killer becomes increasingly obsessed with her, Eve realizes there's a thin line between inside information and becoming an accomplice to murder.

The sensational new crime novel from the best-selling author of Snap. Pensioner Felix Pink is about to find out that it’s never too late...for life to go horribly wrong. When Felix lets himself in to Number Three Black Lane, he’s there to perform an act of kindness and charity: to keep a dying man company as he takes his final breath. But just 15 minutes later Felix is on the run from the police - after making the biggest mistake of his life.

The eight-year-old boy had vanished from the car and, as if by slick, sick magic, had been replaced by a note on the steering wheel reading, "You don't love him." At the height of summer, a dark shadow falls across Exmoor; more children are stolen, each disappearance marked only by the same brutal accusation. No explanations, no ransom demands, and no hope.

On the beaches and cliffs of North Devon, lone women have become victims in a terrifying game where only one player knows the rules - and, when those rules change, the new game is murder. But that madman on the loose feels very far from the crumbling, seaside home of 10-year-old Ruby Trick. Instead of living in fear of him, she lives in fear of school bullies, the dark forest crowding her house into the sea, and the threat of her parents' divorce. So when she decides to help her father catch the killer, it seems like a good way to keep her father close.

On a stifling summer's day, 11-year-old Jack and his two sisters sit in their broken-down car, waiting for their mother to come back and rescue them. 'Jack's in charge,' she said. 'I won't be long.' But she never comes back. Three years later, mum-to-be Catherine wakes to find a knife beside her bed, and a note that says: 'I could have killed you'. Meanwhile Jack is still in charge - of his sisters, of supporting them all, of making sure nobody knows they're alone in the house, and - quite suddenly - of finding out the truth about what happened to his mother. But the truth can be a dangerous thing....

“The dead can't speak to us,” Professor Madoc had said. But that was a lie. Sometimes, only an outsider can get to the truth. Patrick had been on the outside all his life. Thoughtful, but different, infuriating even to his own mother, his life changes when he follows an obsession with death to study anatomy at university. When he uncovers a crime that everybody else was too close to see, he proves finally that he has been right all along: Nothing is exactly as it seems. And there have been many more lies closer to home....

Steven Lamb digs holes on Exmoor, hoping to lay to rest the ghost of his uncle, who disappeared aged 11 and is assumed to have fallen victim to the serial killer Arnold Avery. Only Steven's Nan is not convinced her son is dead. Steven is determined to heal the widening cracks in his family before it's too late. And if that means presenting his grandmother with the bones of her murdered son, he'll do it. So the boy takes the next logical step, carefully crafting a letter to Arnold Avery in prison.

This is how it begins. Lone women terrorised and their helpless families forced to watch - in a sick game where only one player knows the rules. And when those rules change, the new game is Murder. Living with her parents in the dank beach community of Limeburn, ten-year-old Ruby Trick has her own fears. Bullies on the school bus, the forest crowding her house into the sea, and the threat of divorce. Helping her Daddy to catch the killer might be the key to keeping him close. As long as the killer doesn't catch her first...

How do you solve the impossible?

Five footprints are the only sign that Daniel Buck was ever here. And now they are all his mother has left. Every day Anna Buck guards the little prints in the cement. Polishing them to a shine. Keeping them safe. Spiralling towards insanity. When a psychic offers hope, Anna grasps it. Who wouldn't? Maybe he can tell her what happened to her son.... But is this man what he claims to be? Is he a visionary? A shut eye? Or a cruel fake preying on the vulnerable? Or is he something far, far worse?

At the height of summer a dark shadow falls across Exmoor. Children are being stolen from cars. Each disappearance is marked only by a terse note – a brutal accusation. There are no explanations, no ransom demands... and no hope. Policeman Jonas Holly faces a precarious journey into the warped mind of the kidnapper if he's to stand any chance of catching him. But – still reeling from a personal tragedy – is Jonas really up to the task?

Shipcott in bleak mid-winter: a close knit community where no stranger goes unnoticed. So when an elderly woman is murdered in her bed, village policeman Jonas Holly is doubly shocked. How could someone have killed and left no trace? Jonas finds himself side-lined as the investigation is snatched away from him by an abrasive senior detective. Is his first murder investigation over before it’s begun?

Eve Singer needs death. With her career as a TV crime reporter flagging, she'll do anything to satisfy her ghoulish audience. The killer needs death, too. He even advertises his macabre public performances, where he hopes to show the whole world the beauty of dying. When he contacts Eve, she welcomes the chance to be first with the news from every gory scene. Until she realizes that the killer has two obsessions. One is public murder. And the other one is her.

Pensionisten Felix Pink finder snart ud af, at det aldrig er for sent til at livet kan gå frygteligt galt. Da Felix lukker sig selv ind i Black Lane nummer tre, er det for at udføre en velgørenhedssgerning: At sidde ved en døende mands side, mens han drager sit sidste suk... Men bare et kvarter senere er Felix på flugt fra politiet efter have begået sit livs største fejl. Hans verden bliver vendt på hovedet, da han må finde ud af, hvem der i virkeligheden bærer skylden, eller om der er noget meget mere dystert på spil. Alt imens han skal holde sig ét skridt foran politiet.

Drengen ville ha´sandheden - morderen ville lege... Dyster Viden er en skarp, isnende og psykologisk blændende debutkrimi, der får dig til at sidde med tilbageholdt åndedræt på det yderste af stolen... Billy Peters forsvandt for 18 år siden. Alle i byen Shipcott, Somerset, tror at Billy blev myrdet – især efter at den pædofile seriemorder Arnold Avery indrømmer at han dræbte seks andre børn og begravede dem på den samme øde hede, som omgiver byen. Billys mor er den eneste der tror, at han er i live.