Southern Thrillers

Nevada Barr's award-winning mystery series captivates fans with vividly drawn wilderness settings and the resourceful sleuth, middle-aged park ranger Anna Pigeon. Deep South portrays Anna boldly confronting hostile teenagers, suspicious locals, and a resentful "old-boy" network as she struggles to solve a gruesome murder. Anna leaves behind her beloved Mesa Verde to take on a position as district park ranger of the Mississippi Natchez Trace Parkway.

After more than twenty years away from the law, Joe Hennessy is forced back into the courtroom. Trying to save his vineyard after years of drought, Hennessy returns to practice in Charleston, South Carolina–the city he walked away from after the murder of his ten-year-old son. When one of South Carolina's most powerful men is charged with possessing stolen artwork, Hennessy steps forward to defend him. But as Hennessy digs into the evidence, as he navigates the truth, he finds that the criminal charges are only the start of their problems…

Novelist Anne George injects murder, mayhem, and laughs into her popular mysteries. Nominated for an Agatha Award, this hilarious tale of two “60 something” sisters reveals the deadly consequences of a hasty real estate purchase. Retired Alabama school teacher Patricia Anne thinks her older sister, flamboyant Mary Alice, has lost her cotton-pickin’ mind. On a whim, Mary Alice bought the Skoot ’n’ Boot, the local country western night spot where she and her boyfriend hang out. Mary Alice insists it will be easy to run the club - until the previous owner is found executed.

Trauma surgeon Justin Wellington is accustomed to handling gunshot wounds… just not over his Cobb salad. When a lunch date with his best friend, the woman with whom he’s quietly and desperately in love – homicide detective Kathleen Murphy – becomes the scene of a drive-by shooting, Justin’s surgical skills are called upon to save the life of a young waitress. His heroism that day sets into motion a chain of events that brings him to the attention of a dangerous and disturbed individual, threatening his career, his own life and the lives of those he holds dear. Obsession: Because ...

When tech visionary Julian Yates is arrested for the brutal murder of his business rival, the evidence seems airtight—a damning video, financial motive, and a public feud gone too far. But defense lawyer Ryan Noble knows something’s off. The pieces don’t fit. It all seems too clean. As Noble digs deeper, he uncovers a web of deceit stretching from the heart of Georgia’s legal system to the dark corners of the internet. Behind the scenes, powerful interests are manipulating the truth—and Yates may be just another pawn in a far deadlier game. With corporate espionage, digital ...

A body in an alleyway. Blood on the accused. Witnesses to the crime. When a sleepy Georgian town is rocked by the brutal murder of the local prosecutor’s son, all the evidence points to one man: Marcus Brantley. His only hope rests in defense counsel, Ryan Noble, drawn back to the town he tried to forget by his mother’s cancer diagnosis. But Noble’s homecoming brings a case that could cost him everything. Unwelcome, outnumbered, and with the clock ticking, Noble must navigate a dangerous game of secrets and lies before time runs out—where hostility lurks behind every corner and he ...

A rising star is murdered. A crusader is accused. And in a town built on secrets, the truth is the darkest thing of all. Rosie Beckett had a bright future—a political intern with charm, ambition, and a long list of admirers. But her life ends on a quiet Georgian backstreet, her body found shot and thrown into a dumpster behind a row of houses in small southern town, Brunswick. And standing at the center of it all is Jake Tully. The host of a popular anti-corruption podcast, Tully has spent years exposing the dark secrets of the powerful, earning him fans—but too many enemies to count. ...

Patricia Campbell's life has never felt smaller. Her ambitious husband is too busy to give her a goodbye kiss in the morning, her kids have their own lives, her senile mother-in-law needs constant care, and she's always a step behind on thank-you notes and her endless list of chores. The one thing she has to look forward to is her book club, a close-knit group of Charleston women united by their love of true crime and paperback fiction. At these meetings they're as likely to talk about the Manson family as they are marriage, motherhood, and neighborhood gossip.

In Charleston, South Carolina, eighteen-year-old Alicia Fenton is arrested for the murder of her stepfather. In exchange for information that has been buried for twenty years, attorney Joe Hennessy joins her defense team. Desperate to know the truth about the past, Hennessy battles to prove Alicia is innocent. Fighting against corrupt cops, outlaw motorcycle gangs, and ruthless prisoners, the evidence leads Hennessy into the dangers of the criminal underworld.

Once the flashy, successful lawyer known for his in-your-face billboards—IN AN ACCIDENT? GET RICH—Jason Rich has fallen from grace, his reputation scrubbed of its glitz and his life stripped of the people he cares about. All thanks to meth kingpin Tyson Cade. But when Cade is shot and killed in the heart of his territory, things go from bad to worse for Jason as he is charged with his murder.

Biloxi’s best criminal defense attorney has never lost a case. Then his client’s beautiful wife is murdered, and America’s #1 lawyer suddenly becomes its #1 suspect. Stafford Lee Penney is a small-town lawyer with a big-time reputation for winning every case he tries. In his sharp suits...

Justice delayed is not justice denied... Avery Collins went to prison for seven years for a murder she did not commit. And now her best friend, and Private Investigator, Regina Baldwin, is investigating the case and finds corruption, deceit, sick greed and games at the highest level. The highest level. Little by little, one by one, Regina uncovers the powerful forces behind Becky Whitfield's murder. And, little by little, one by one, Regina, helps her best friend take just revenge on each of these men and women who ruined Avery's life so many years ago. Avery was once an innocent pawn ...

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ "Grisham meets To Kill a Mockingbird. I couldn't put it down." When defending your family means destroying everything you've built, how far will you go? Commander Jake Morrison has spent twelve years running from Mississippi—and he's built the perfect life to prove it worked. Naval Academy graduate. JAG Corps prosecutor. Promotion to Commander at thirty-one. Clean record. No mistakes. No looking back. Then the phone rings at 0200. His aunt, crying. Danny's been arrested. Murder. He confessed. The victim: Their childhood mentor, the one white man in Harmony Creek County who...

Regarded as a witch by the locals, Lydia bears silent testimony to her Appalachian town’s dark underside. The townspeople might believe the bad luck began when a night of teenage partying led to the preacher’s son falling to his death. But Lydia knows Peculiar’s troubles started when a local child never made it home from school, when an arsonist set the mountains ablaze, and when her own daughter seemingly vanished. The past can’t remain buried forever and now, from the swarming of the bees to the change in the auras she sees, Lydia knows the killer’s hold over the townspeople has...

Following in the path of her blockbuster Kay Scarpetta thrillers, Patricia Cornwell's novel is a testimony to the singular versatility and narrative power of one of the country's best-read storytellers. In Southern Cross, she casts her shrewd and knowing eye at the men and women in blue, in a...

Madeline Brimley left small-town Georgia many years ago to go to college and pursue her dreams on the stage. Her dramatic escapades are many, but success has eluded her, leaving her at loose ends. But then she gets word that not only has her beloved, eccentric Aunt Rose passed, but she's left Madeline her equally eccentric bookstore housed in an old Victorian mansion in the small college town of Enigma. But when she arrives in her beat-up Fiat to claim The Old Juniper Bookstore—and restart her life—Madeline is faced with unexpected challenges.

You’d think it was the perfect setup: living next door to the grumpy single dad who needs my help with his troublemaking kids—just until football season is over. Swoony stuff, right? You know who’s not swooning? Me. I’m as grumpy as he is, and I’m fairly certain that for NFL Coach Barrett King, it was hate at first sight. It’s nothing I’ll lose sleep over because 1) the feeling is mutual, and 2) I’m not a people person. Just me and my dog, Larry, moving around when the mood strikes, is what I prefer.

NEWLY EDITED AS OF 7/8/19!!!! An unstable beautiful woman is accused of murdering her wealthy husband. She claims she didn't do it. She is not to be trusted. Aidan Collins has his very first large case when his client, Marina Vasiliev, a drop-dead gorgeous mental patient, is accused of killing her wealthy husband. Marina insists that she didn't do it, but Aidan can't trust her. He knows Marina well, too well. After all, he met Marina in the mental hospital - he originally obtained her as a client when she was involuntarily committed, and he assisted her with getting out. Diagnosed with ...

A young black boy serving life in prison... A city on fire... One man stands between a life behind bars and total exoneration... Christian Davis, a former big-firm lawyer turned social justice warrior, has just been assigned the case of his life by the State of California. Jamel Jackson, a 16-year-old black boy, has just been convicted for the brutal rape of a prominent movie star. Christian digs into the case with gusto, as he examines the trial court transcript for any hint that the trial court might have erred in Jamel's case. As he gets into the investigation of the case, he's shocked...

They buried something beneath Cypress Hollow. Now it remembers. Lana Gray keeps to herself—curator of a half-forgotten museum in a swamp town most have already left behind. But when a local widow’s quiet unraveling leads to an unmarked shoe and a floor that seems to breathe, Lana stumbles into a pattern that stretches back decades. Maybe longer. The town is changing. The people are changing. And the roots run deeper than anyone knew. As memory distorts, nature recoils, and the soil begins to hum, Lana must decide whether to resist what’s waking beneath her—or become part of it. The ...