2024 Summer Reading: Parlor (Investigative Mysteries)

When it comes to law and order, East Texas plays by its own rules--a fact that Darren Mathews, a black Texas Ranger, knows all too well. Deeply ambivalent about growing up black in the lone star state, he was the first in his family to get as far away from Texas as he could. Until duty called him home. When his allegiance to his roots puts his job in jeopardy, he travels up Highway 59 to the small town of Lark, where two murders--a black lawyer from...

In the days of the British Raj in 1919, Captain Sam Wyndham, a former Scotland Yard detective newly arrived in Calcutta, is confronted with the murder of a British official who was found with a note in his mouth warning the British to leave India.

Ansel Packer is scheduled to die in twelve hours. He knows what he's done, and now awaits execution, the same chilling fate he forced on those girls, years ago. But Ansel doesn't want to die - he wants to be celebrated, understood. Through a kaleidoscope of women - a mother, a sister, a homicide detective - we learn the story of Ansel's life. As the clock ticks down, these three women sift through the choices that culminate in tragedy, exploring the...

"A myth-busting, 100-year history of the Mexican drug trade that reveals how an industry founded by farmers and village healers became dominated by cartels and kingpins. The Mexican drug trade has inspired prejudiced narratives of a war between north and south, white and brown; between noble cops and vicious kingpins, corrupt politicians and powerful cartels. In this first comprehensive history of the trade, historian Benjamin T. Smith tells the real...

"A gripping tour de force of investigative journalism that takes us deep into the investigation behind one of the most frightening and enigmatic serial killers in modern American history, and into the ranks of a singular American police force: the Anchorage PD Most of us have never heard of Israel Keyes. But he is one of the most ambitious, meticulous serial killers of modern time. The FBI considered his behavior unprecedented. Described by a prosecutor...

"From the detective who found The Golden State Killer, a memoir of investigating America's toughest cold cases and the rewards--and toll--of a life solving crime. I order another bourbon, neat. This is the drink that will flip the switch. I don't even know how I got here, to this place, to this point. Something is happening to me lately. I'm drinking too much. My sheets are soaking wet when I wake up from nightmares of decaying corpses. I order another...

Drawing on thousands of pages of recently discovered government documents, wiretap transcripts, and Al Capone's handwritten personal letters, "New York Times" bestselling author Jonathan Eig tells the dramatic story of the rise and fall of the nation's most notorious criminal in rich new detail.