Showing results by publisher "Isis Publishing Ltd" in Literature & Fiction

Driven by amateur whisky-nut Adam, four late-thirties ex-university mates are heading to Islay—the remote Scottish island world famous for its single malts—with a wallet full of cash, a stash of coke and a serious thirst. Over a weekend soaked in the finest cask strength spirit, they meet young divorcee Molly, who Adam has a soft spot for, her little sister Ash who has all sorts of problems and Molly's ex-husband Joe, a control freak who also happens to be the local police. As events spiral out of control, they are all thrown into a nightmare that gets worse at every turn.

The Wentworth Asylum, once used to house thousands of people, now lies abandoned. People insist it is inhabited by an ex-inmate who now chops down those who enter with her ax. After two teenagers turn up dead in the asylum, a television crew head to the asylum in the hopes of catching footage of the haunting. And to ensure their safety, Jack Nightingale is sent with them. But is it merely an ax-wielding murderer which awaits them?

Employed by wealthy widow Vivienne Creswell to find out more about her husband’s death, Jack Nightingale finds himself in Florida. Dan Creswell’s body was found in his third floor apartment, ripped to shreds and with the footprints of a giant cat found at the scene. But he couldn’t have been killed by a cat...right?

Mum-to-be Rachel did everything right, but it all went wrong. Her son, Luke, was stillborn, and she finds herself on maternity leave without a baby, trying to make sense of her loss. When a misguided well-wisher tells her that 'everything happens for a reason', she becomes obsessed with finding that reason. She remembers that on the day she discovered her pregnancy, she'd stopped a man from jumping in front of a train, and she’s now certain that saving his life cost her the life of her son.

Mining diamonds is a lucrative business, but it soon proves itself deadly. Shortly after Kubu joins the CID, the richest diamond mine in the world is robbed of 100,000 carats of diamonds in transit. The robbery is well-executed and brutal. Police immediately suspect an inside job, but there is no evidence of who it could be. 

It’s festival time in Athens, and Philocles is looking forward to the holiday. Visitors are coming from across the Hellenic world for eight days of sporting competitions, musical contests and sacred rites to honour Athena, the city’s patron goddess. Thousands will flock to the Pnyx to be enthralled by three-day performance of Homer’s Iliad, an entertainment unique to the Great Panathenaia. Taking part is the highest honour and greatest challenge for an epic poet.

The last thing psychotherapist Harry Hope expects on his walk home one evening is to be knifed. At first, he thinks it’s a random event. But as the police investigate further, seemingly unrelated attacks, Harry is shocked to discover that every victim is linked to him - and that his name is on a death list. Why? Teaming up with his old friends DI Theo McCannon and DS Libby Harding, Harry is forced to delve into the dark and twisted world of a cold and calculating killer.

At the peak of her career as lead singer of a legendary 1980s indie band, Meredith Vincent was driven off the international stage by a horrific incident. Now living a quiet existence in a cottage on the grounds of an old stately home, she has put her past behind her and come to terms with her new life. When a body is found in the manicured gardens of her home, and a series of inexplicable and unsettling events begin to occur, it becomes clear that someone is watching, someone who knows who she is…. Someone who wants vengeance.

A super recogniser is someone who is outstanding at remembering faces, and when Magnus is stuck with a tricky case his colleague suggests his young cousin from Vik, who could identify every sheep in his flock at the age of 12, to help with the case. But this leads Magnus to a murder.... 

Strange things are going on in Black Dog Wood, near the village of Nasely. There are rumours that it’s become a popular dogging spot, and there have been alleged sightings of a werewolf-like monster. And then someone discovers a blindfolded skeleton, bizarrely buried standing up. When the secretary of a prestigious girl’s boarding school is found murdered, all of the evidence points to the local MP. His only chance to avoid prosecution for a crime that he claims he didn’t commit is to hire ex-homicide detective Frank Shunter. 

'You don’t mean you're going to divorce him?' Miss Spanner said with horror. A sophisticated, emotive novel, Chatterton Square concerns the complex web of relationships between two neighbouring families, the Blacketts and the Frasers. Framed by the advance of the Second World War, the subtle mechanics of marriage and love are laid bare through the observation of three of the marital options open to the mid-century woman: unmarried, separated, miserably married. 

The Tree of Heaven follows the fortunes of the Harrison family as the children grow up in the shadow of the First World War and Dorothy's brothers go off to the trenches, while she becomes involved with the suffrage movement, and later joins a version of the Women's Social and Political Union. 

The book opens with Neville celebrating her 43rd birthday and contemplating middle age now that her children are grown. Her mother, in her 60s, seeks answers to her melancholy in Freudianism. Her sister, Nan, a writer who has hitherto led a single and carefree life in London, experiences the loss of love and with it her plan for the future. And Neville's principled daughter, Gerda, who is determined not to follow her mother's generation into the institute of marriage, finds herself at an impasse with the man she loves. 

David Tompkins thinks it is a splendid idea to open a tea garden at his Kentish cottage. His wife, Germayne, is not so sure. The local villagers are divided on the matter, and not necessarily supportive, particularly Mr Perch at the Dolphin, who sees it as direct competition to Mrs Perch's own tea garden. It doesn’t bode well when the official opening coincides with a break in the beautiful weather. 

Forced into retirement, history professor Ellen Kershaw finds herself at a loose end. So when she is contacted by a reclusive billionaire, with an unusual proposition, her interest is piqued. Theodore Shepherd is funding a museum for diaries, and he wants Ellen to curate it. A live-in position at a Gothic stately home in the middle of Dartmoor, it's just the escape she needs whilst she works out what to do with the rest of her life. Ellen soon finds herself immersed in the stories and diaries that await her.

It's 1666. The Great Plague has passed. Londoners celebrate survival in different ways. They drink. They gamble. They indulge in carnal delights. But 666 is the number of the Beast, the year foretold when Christ will return. A gang of fanatics - the Saints - choose to hasten that prophesied day. They will kidnap, rape, murder. Above all they will kill a king. Two men - the highwayman William Coke and the thief-taker Pitman - are recruited to stop them.

Stella Ainsworth has settled for suburban peace with a pedantic husband, a dissatisfied daughter and a clutch of beloved grandchildren - who all take her presence in their lives for granted. Then Cameron Keene, her boyfriend from her teenage years who'd left for America to become a rock icon of the '60s, returns to England. Much to Stella's astonishment, Cameron announces in an interview that his most famous song, which became a legendary love anthem across the world, was written about Stella and that he has come back to find her.

When Josie Welford settles in the idyllic West Country village of Kings Duncombe, she honestly believes she can bury her past. The widow of one of Britain’s most wanted criminals, she knows what it’s like to be an outsider and fervently wishes for a fresh start in life. But she soon finds herself on the wrong side of the locals and she begins to wonder just how far their threats will go... A feisty and highly likeable character, Josie leads the listener through a tantalizingly twisted murder mystery to a deliciously rich ending.

At the height of the Cold War, words are weapons and secrecy reigns. These are challenging times to be a writer and a wife, as Nell Benjamin knows only too well. One bright November day in 1963, the dazzling young president arrives in Texas and Nell receives a phonecall that overturns the world as she knows it. In the shocking aftermath, whilst America mourns, Nell must come to terms with both a tragedy and a betrayal that shatters every illusion of the man she thought she knew better than anyone else.

Tasia McFarland is a washed-up singer desperate to get back to the top of the charts. As her star begins to rise again, the tabloids uncover the fact that Tasia is the ex-wife of the US president - which is one reason the world takes notice when she is killed by a bullet to the neck in front of a crowd of fans. Suicide is suspected, but when the ballistics report comes up empty, the authorities call on Jo Beckett to do a psychological autopsy. As Jo sifts through the facts, she only finds more questions....