18 books like Third Girl
Prayers for rain
The master of the new noir, Dennis Lehane delivers a shattering tale of evil, depravity, and justice that captures the dark realism of Boston’s gritty blue-collar streets.Private Investigator Patrick Kenzie wants to know why a former client, a perky woman in love with life, could, within six months, jump naked from a Boston landmark -- the final fall in a spiral of self-destruction. What he finds…
Shares: Private investigators, Mystery
Mystic river
When they were children, Sean Devine, Jimmy Marcus, and Dave Boyle were friends. But then a strange car pulled up to their street. One boy got into the car, two did not, and something terrible happened -- something that ended their friendship and changed all three boys forever. Twenty-five years later, Sean is a homicide detective. Jimmy is an ex-con who owns a corner store. And Dave is trying to…
Shares: Mystery
Presumed Innocent
The novel that launched Turow's career as one of America's pre-eminent thriller writers tells the story of Rusty Sabicch, chief deputy prosecutor in a large Midwestern city. With three weeks to go in his boss' re-election campaign, a member of Rusty's staff is found murdered; he is charged with finding the killer, until his boss loses and, incredibly, Rusty finds himself accused of the murder.
Shares: Mystery
Red Dragon
Red Dragon is a novel by American author Thomas Harris, first published in 1981. The plot follows former FBI profiler Will Graham, who comes out of retirement to find and apprehend an enigmatic serial-killer nicknamed "The Tooth Fairy". The novel introduced the character Dr. Hannibal Lecter, a brilliant psychiatrist and cannibalistic serial-killer, whom Graham reluctantly turns to for advice and…
Shares: Mystery
The Line of Beauty
It is the summer of 1983, and twenty-year-old Nick Guest has moved into an attic room in the Notting Hill home of the Feddens: conservative Member of Parliament Gerald, his wealthy wife Rachel, and their two children, Toby--whom Nick had idolized at Oxford--and Catherine, highly critical of her family's assumptions and ambitions, who becomes both a friend to Nick and his uneasy…
Shares: Community pick
Dead Man's Folly
Whilst organising a mock murder hunt for the village fete hosted by Sir George and Lady Stubbs, a feeling of dread settles on the famous crime novelist Adriane Oliver. Call it instinct, but it's a feeling she just can't explain…or get away from. In desperation she summons her old friend, Hercule Poirot – and her instincts are soon proved correct when the 'pretend' murder victim is discovered…
Shares: Ariadne Oliver, Belgians, Hercule Poirot, English Detective and mystery stories
The Pale Horse
To understand the strange events at The Pale Horse inn, Mark Easterbrook knew he had to begin at the beginning. But where exactly was the beginning? Was it the savage blow to the back of Father Gorman's head? Or the priest's visit, just minutes before, to a woman on her death bed? Or was there a deeper significance to the violent squabble which Mark Easterbrook had himself witnessed earlier?The…
Shares: Ariadne Oliver, English Novelists, English Detective and mystery stories, England
Taken at the Flood
A few weeks after marrying an attractive young widow, Gordon Cloade is tragically killed by a bomb blast in the London blitz. Overnight, the former Mrs. Underhay finds herself in sole possession of the Cloade family fortune. Shortly afterwards, Hercule Poirot receives a visit from the dead man's sister-in-law who claims she has been warned by 'spirits' that Mrs. Underhay's first husband is still…
Shares: Translations from English, Poirot, Hercule Poirot, Private investigators
Peril at End House
Hercule Poirot is vacationing on the Cornish coast when he meets Nick Buckley. Nick is the young and reckless mistress of End House, an imposing structure perched on the rocky cliffs of St. Loo.
Poirot quickly takes a particular interest in the young woman. Recently, she has narrowly escaped a series of life-threatening accidents. Something tells the Belgian sleuth that these so-called accidents…
Shares: Poirot, Hercule Poirot, English Detective and mystery stories, London
Poirot Investigates
in published order, the first 10 Christie mystery books featuring Poirot are: 1) The Mysterious Affair at Styles, 2) The Murder on the Links, 3) Poirot Investigates, 4) The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, 5) The Big Four, 6) The Mystery of the Blue Train, 7) Black Coffee: A Mystery Play in Three Acts [Charles Osborne novelized the play in 1998 under the title, Black Coffee], 8) Peril at End House, 9)…
Shares: Belgians, Poirot, Hercule Poirot, English Detective and mystery stories
Poirot's Early Cases
With his career still in its formative years, we learn many things about how Poirot came to exercise those famous "grey cells" so well. Fourteen of the eighteen stories collected herein are narrated by Captain Arthur Hastings—including what would appear to be the earliest Poirot short story, The Affair at the Victory Ball, which follows soon on the events of The Mysterious Affair at Styles. Two…
Shares: Poirot, Hercule Poirot, English Detective and mystery stories, Private investigators
Mrs. McGinty's Dead
Poirot, disillusioned by the "senseless cruel brutality" of modern crime, pays no attention to the sad case of Mrs McGinty, an old woman apparently struck dead by her lodger for thirty pounds that she kept under a floorboard. When, however, he is asked by the investigating officer to take another look at the case to stop an innocent man going to the gallows, he realises that things may not be as…
Shares: Poirot, Hercule Poirot, English Detective and mystery stories, Private investigators
Evil Under the Sun
Set at the Jolly Roger, a posh vacation resort for the rich and famous on the southern coast of England, Evil Under the Sun is one of Agatha Christie’s most intriguing mysteries. When a gorgeous young bride is brutally strangled to death on the beach, only Hercule Poirot can sift through the secrets that shroud each of the guests and unravel the macabre mystery at this playground by the sea.
Shares: Belgians, Poirot, Hercule Poirot, Private investigators
Death on the Nile
The tranquillity of a cruise along the Nile was shattered by the discovery that Linnet Ridgeway ( Linnet Doyle) had been shot through the head. She was young, stylish, rich and beautiful. A girl who had everything... until she lost her life.
Hercule Poirot recalled an earlier outburst by a fellow passenger: 'I'd like to put my dear little pistol against her head and just press the trigger.' Yet…
Shares: Belgians, Poirot, Hercule Poirot, English Detective and mystery stories
The Clocks
Sheila Webb, typist-for-hire, has arrived at 19 Wilbraham Crescent in the seaside town of Crowdean to accept a new job. What she finds is a well-dressed corpse surrounded by five clocks. Mrs Pebmarsh, the blind owner of No. 19, denies all knowledge of ringing Sheila’s secretarial agency and asking for her by name — yet someone did. Nor does she own that many clocks. And neither woman seems to…
Shares: Poirot, Hercule Poirot, English Detective and mystery stories, Private investigators
The Labours of Hercules
The Labours of Hercules is a short story collection written by Agatha Christie and first published in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company in 1947. It features Belgian detective Hercule Poirot, and gives an account of twelve cases with which he intends to close his career as a private detective. His regular sidekicks (his secretary, Miss Lemon, and valet, George/Georges) make cameo appearances, as…
Shares: Poirot, Hercule Poirot, English Detective and mystery stories, Private investigators
Elephants Can Remember
E-book exclusive extras:1) Christie biographer Charles Osborne's essay on Elephants Can Remember;2) "The Poirots": the complete guide to all the cases of the great Belgian detective."The Ravenscrofts didn’t seem that kind of person. They seemed well balanced and placid…" And yet, twelve years earlier, the husband had shot the wife, and then himself — or perhaps it was the other way around, since…
Shares: Poirot, Hercule Poirot, English Detective and mystery stories, Private investigators
The Big Four
They are a vicious international quartet of criminals known as "The Big Four". Number One was a brilliant Chinese, the greatest criminal brain of all time; Number Two was a USAmerican multi-millionaire; Number Three was a beautiful Frenchwoman scientist; and Number Four was "the destroyer," the ruthless murderer with a genius for disguise, whose business it was to remove those who interfered with…
Shares: Poirot, Hercule Poirot, English Detective and mystery stories, Private investigators