Two years ago, a hostile Prime Minister launched the Monochrome inquiry, investigating "historical over-reaching" by the British Secret Service “to investigate historical over-reaching.” Monochrome’s mission was to ferret out any hint of misconduct by any MI5 officer—and allowed Griselda Fleet and Malcolm Kyle, the two civil servants seconded to the project, unfettered access to any and all confidential information in the Service archives in order to do so. But MI5’s formidable First Desk did not become Britain’s top spy by accident, and she has successfully thwarted the inquiry at every turn.

Northern Ireland, spring 1981. Hunger strikes, riots, power cuts, a homophobic serial killer with a penchant for opera, and a young woman’s suicide that may yet turn out to be murder: on the surface, the events are unconnected, but then things—and people—aren’t always what they seem. Detective Sergeant Duffy is the man tasked with trying to get to the bottom of it all. It’s no easy job—especially when it turns out that one of the victims was involved in the IRA but was last seen discussing business with someone from the loyalist Ulster Volunteer Force.

On Christmas Eve, DCI Mackenzie Jones is called to a shooting at a remote farmhouse. Ralph Mallender believes his father lies dead inside. When three more bodies are discovered, it's clear a festive family gathering has turned into a gruesome tragedy. At first it seems like an open and shut case: a murder suicide committed by Ralph's volatile brother Cameron. Then new evidence makes Mack suspect the man who reported the crime is in fact the perpetrator. But Mack isn't the only one with a stake in the case.

London in the 1960s: gang wars, corrupt police, vice and pornography. Ex-boxer Charles Holborne has plenty of opportunities to build his reputation with the criminal classes as a barrister who delivers. But Charles, an East End boy made good, is not all he seems, and his past is snapping at his heels. When his philandering wife has her throat slashed, Holborne finds himself on the wrong side of the law and on the run. Can he discover the truth of the brutal slaying and escape the hangman's noose?

Meet Sukey Reynolds: proud mother, wonderful cook...and police photographer turned amateur detective. Years ago, Sukey was hoping to become a detective, but life took a different turn. Now she’s happy to be involved with the local police force, as long as she still gets to work the occasional murder case....

When Detective Mike West is called to investigate a murder in a Dublin graveyard, suspicion immediately falls on a local woman, Edel Johnson, whose husband disappeared some months before. But then she disappears. Evidence leads West to a small village in Cornwall, but when he arrives, he finds Edel has got there before him. Her explanation seems to make sense, but as West begins to think his suspicions of her are unfounded, she disappears again. Is she guilty? West, fighting an unsuitable attraction, doesn't want to believe it.

The year started badly and only got worse - blizzards, strikes, power cuts, and political unrest were the norm. For journalist Allie Burns, however, someone else's bad news was the unmistakable sound of opportunity knocking, and the year is ripe with possibilities. But Allie is a woman in a man's world. Desperate to get away from the "women's stories" the Glasgow desk keeps assigning her, she strikes up an alliance with wannabe investigative journalist Danny Sullivan. From the start, their stories create enemies.

This is collection of 18 crime stories with a diverse range of characters and scenarios, from guilt-ridden fraudsters to lovesick murderers.

Tea and sympathy have never been so deadly. Schoolteacher Adam Matthews just wants to help select a new headteacher and go home. The governors at Lindenshaw St Crispin’s have already failed miserably at finding the right candidate, so it’s make or break this second time round. But when one of the applicants is found strangled in the school, what should have been a straightforward decision turns tempestuous as a flash flood in their small English village.

Espionage. Blackmail. Revenge. Cunning. Slapstick. State secrets dating back to the fall of the Berlin Wall. All this and more in a tight package of five novellas by Mick Herron, CWA Gold Dagger-winning author of Slow Horses.

DI Kate Young is on leave. She’s the force’s best detective, but her bosses know she’s under pressure, on medication and overcoming trauma. So after her bad judgement call leads to a narrowly averted public disaster, they’re sure all she needs is a rest. But when Staffordshire Police summon her back to work on a murder case, it’s a harder, more suspicious Kate Young who returns. With a new ruthlessness, she sets about tracking down a clinical, calculating serial killer who is torturing victims and leaving clues to taunt the police.

On New Year's Eve, Rhys Lloyd has a house full of guests. His vacation homes on Mirror Lake are a success, and he's generously invited the village to drink champagne with their wealthy new neighbors. But by midnight, Rhys will be floating dead in the freezing waters of the lake. On New Year's Day, Ffion Morgan has a village full of suspects. The tiny community is her home, so the suspects are her neighbors, friends and family—and Ffion has her own secrets to protect. With a lie uncovered at every turn, soon the question isn't who wanted Rhys dead . . . but who finally killed him.

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.

Truth is a wild beast. Approach with patience and zeal, else it eludes you. Beatrice has developed a delicate nose for lies. It gets the old hound into trouble all the time - with criminals, Scotland Yard politics, and even her friends. Battling crime by day and her own demons by night, the question remains: justice or the law?

I’m Lucy, and I have a secret I have a beautiful home that I’m desperate to escape. But that’s not my secret. I tell my friends I’ve never wanted children when I always have. But that’s not my secret. My husband is a celebrated surgeon who tries to control me. But that’s not my secret. Adele knows. Once upon a time, I knew everything about her and she knew everything about me. Best friends forever. But now our secret is beginning to surface. I can trust her more than anyone. We made a pact. And she’s never do anything to hurt me. Would she?