Showing results by author "T. Jefferson Parker" in All Categories

Laguna: a place where a crazed killer has turned paradise into a Disneyland of depraved violence - with a fiery vengeance - and where homicide cop Tom Shephard unravels a grisly mystery. It reaches back across 40 years of sordid sex, blackmail, and suicide into the dark corners of his own past.

Private Investigator Roland Ford has taken a job for a fellow Marine and a rising politician, Dalton Strait. Strait is contending with unexplained bombings of government buildings in his district...but that is not why he hired Ford. Strait's wife, Natalie, has gone missing, leaving behind a cryptic plea for help. Strait has made many enemies during his time in politics - including some of his own family members - all of whom could be looking for revenge. But as Ford digs into the details of a troubled marriage, Natalie's disappearance becomes more and more complicated.

Roland Ford - once a cop, then a marine, now a private investigator - is good at finding people. But when he’s asked to locate an Air Force veteran who’s escaped from a mental institution, he realizes he’s been drawn into something deep and dark. What he doesn’t know is why a shroud of secrecy hangs over the disappearance of Clay Hickman - and why he’s getting a different story from everyone involved. In a flash, what began as just a job becomes a life-or-death obsession for Ford.

When hired by a beautiful and enigmatic woman to find her missing younger sister, private investigator Roland Ford immediately senses that the case is not what it seems. He is soon swept up in a web of lies and secrets as he searches for the teenager, and even his new client cannot be trusted. His investigation leads him to a secretive charter school, skinhead thugs, a cadre of American Nazis hidden in a desert compound, an arch-conservative celebrity evangelist - and, finally, to the girl herself.

Stromsoe has tried to put the past behind him and was rescued from the abyss by a former colleague who offers him a job at his private security firm. Stromsoe's first assignment is to protect local television personality Frankie Hatfield from a stalker. But the further Stromsoe is drawn into this case, the more he finds that the net of intrigue is wide and ultimately leads back to the man who killed his family. As events conspire against him, Stromsoe learns that prison is no safeguard against revenge.

Laguna Beach, California, 1968. The Age of Aquarius is in full swing. Folks from all over are flocking to Laguna, seeking peace, love, and enlightenment. Matt Antony is just trying get by. Matt is 16, broke, and never sure where his next meal is coming from. Mom’s a stoner, his deadbeat dad is a no-show, his brother’s fighting in Nam...and his big sister, Jazz, has just gone missing. The cops figure she’s just another runaway hippie chick, enjoying a summer of love, but Matt doesn’t believe it. Not after another missing girl turns up dead on the beach.

Joe Trona is scarred in more ways than one. Rescued from an orphanage by Will Trona, a charismatic Orange County politician who sensed his dark potential, Joe is swept into the maelstrom of power and intimidation that surrounds his adoptive father's illustrious career. Serving as Will's right hand man, Joe is trained to protect and defend his father's territory - but he can't save the powerful man from his enemies.

While reporting on a Tijuana animal shelter, journalist Bettina Blazak falls in love with one of her story’s subjects—an adorable Mexican street dog who is being treated for a mysterious gunshot wound. Bettina impulsively adopts the dog, who she names Felix after the veterinarian who saved him. In investigating Felix’s past, Bettina discovers that his life is nothing like what she assumed. For one thing, he’s not a Mexican street dog at all.

When he’s not riding waves, modeling for surfing magazines, or posting viral content for his many fans, Casey Stonebreaker spends his days helping with the family restaurant—catching fish in the morning and bartending at night. Casey’s love for the ocean and his willingness to expose illegal poachers on his platforms puts him on a collision course with a crime syndicate eager to destroy anyone threatening their business.

Tim Hess is a semiretired veteran cop staring at a death sentence - his own. Detective Merci Rayborn, young enough to be his daughter, is brash, impatient, and not someone from whom Hess wants to be taking orders. He certainly isn't planning on falling in love with her. Together, they must track down a psychopathic killer who's been abducting beautiful young women from the malls of Orange County.

Returning hero and private investigator Roland Ford is on the trail of a mysterious killer who is beheading CIA drone operators and leaving puzzling clues at each crime scene. His troubled friend Lindsay Rakes is afraid for her own life and the life of her son after a fellow flight crew member is killed in brutal fashion. Even more terrifying is the odd note the killer left behind: "Welcome to Caliphornia. This is not the last."

Ex-cop Jim Weir thought he'd seen it all during his years on the force. That is until he saw the body of his sister Annie, brutally used by a monster in human form, then carelessly discarded. He'd never seen such grief ravage the face of his friend and brother-in-law Ray Cruz, a good cop on the Newport Beach Police Department. When Weir learns that the only witness swore the killer made his escape in a Newport Beach squad car, his disbelief turns to confusion and outrage.

There were two men in Rebecca Harris's life: Joshua Weinstein - the tough, dark, passionate, Jewish FBI agent she was engaged to; and John Menden - the blond, WASP, slick newsman who was her lover. Both men silently knew of the other's existence in Rebecca's life - and each hoped that when she made her ultimate decision between them, he would be the chosen one. Now they must become allies to solve her murder.

My life was ordinary until three years ago when I was thrown out of a downtown hotel window. My name is Robbie Brownlaw, and I am a homicide detective for the city of San Diego. I am 29 years old. I now have synesthesia, a neurological condition where your senses get mixed up. Sometimes when people talk to me, I see their voices as colored shapes provoked by the emotions of the speakers, not by the words themselves. I have what amounts to a primitive lie detector.

Life seems to explode when a young prostitute is found brutally murdered and Merci's boyfriend emerges as the primary suspect. As the lead investigator on the case, she must do the unthinkable - expose and arrest her lover. Sifting through the clues with a growing sense of panic and outrage in her gut, Merci has to work hard to balance where the truth is leading her against where her heart is telling her to go.

Hollywood vs. The Author is a collection of non-fiction anecdotes by authors who’ve had the pleasure of experiencing the development room firsthand - some who have successfully managed to straddle the two worlds, seeing their works morph into the kinds of feature films and TV shows that make them proud, and others who stepped blindsided into that room after selling their first or second novels. All the stories in this collection illustrate the great divide between the world of literature and the big or small screen.

ATF agent Sean Ozburn is deep undercover, supporting the sicarios of the North Baja Cartel, when he suddenly goes completely dark, leaving Charlie Hood and the support team from Operation Blowdown with a safe house full of bodies and no explanation. Sean’s only communication in the following days consists of a series of haunting digital videos sent to his desperately worried wife, Seliah.

Lew Gale, a former Marine sniper, now an Orange County California Sheriff’s detective, is assigned to track and shoot a mountain lion that has killed a man in Caspers Park, located in the rugged country east of Laguna Beach, California. The victim is Bennet Tarlow, a rich developer and man-about-town in upscale coastal Orange County. The investigation takes a chilling turn when Lew and his new partner, Daniela Mendez, discover that Bennet was dead long before the lion got to him. And while Bennet might have been the first to die, he certainly will not be the last.

Orange groves uprooted for tract houses, people flooding into Orange County, and strange new ideas in the air about war, music, sex, and drugs, and new influences including Richard Nixon and Timothy Leary. But for the Becker brothers, the past is always present and it comes crashing back when the body of the lovely and mysterious Janelle Vonn is discovered in an abandoned orange packinghouse. The Beckers and Vonns have a history, beginning with a rumble between the brothers of each clan. But boys grow up.

Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputy Charlie Hood is attached to the ATF, working undercover on the Iron River that flows across the U.S.-Mexican border. The diamond fillings he wears in his left canine glimmer, distracting the men who sell the illegal firearms that enable the unspeakable violence on both sides of the map. Spotting the sparkle when “Charlie Diamonds” opens his mouth is often their first step toward life behind bars.