Books like The thief-taker by T. F. Banks

Eccentric, arrogant, and ingenious, Sherlock Holmes remains the world's most popular and influential fictional detective. In four novels and fifty-six short stories, Holmes with his trusted friend Dr. Watson, steps from his comfortable quarters at 221B Baker Street into the swirling fog of London. Combining detailed observation with brilliant deduction, Holmes rescues the innocent, confounds the guilty, and solves the most perplexing puzzles crime has to offer. Volume I of The Complete Sherlock Holmes begins with Holmes's first appearance, A Study in Scarlet, a chilling murder novel complete with bloodstained walls and cryptic clues. This is followed by the baffling The Sign of Four, which introduces Holmes's cocaine problem and Watson's future wife. Volume I also includes the story collections The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, and concludes with the tale "The Final Problem," in which Conan Doyle, tired of writing Holmes stories, kills off his famed sleuth. (back cover) ---------- Contains: - [Adventures of Sherlock Holmes](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL262421W/The_Adventures_of_Sherlock_Holmes) [Scandal in Bohemia](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL14930611W/A_Scandal_in_Bohemia) [Red-headed League](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL14930336W/The_Red-Headed_League) [Case of Identity](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL14929939W/A_Case_of_Identity) [Boscombe Valley Mystery](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL18495288W/The_Boscombe_Valley_Mystery) [Five Orange Pips](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL1518120W/Five_Orange_Pips) [The Man with the Twisted Lip](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL14930258W/The_Man_With_the_Twisted_Lip) [Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL1518317W/Adventure_of_the_Blue_Carbuncle) [Adventure of the Speckled Band](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL262561W/Adventure_of_the_Speckled_Band) [Adventure of the Engineer's Thumb](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL1518318W/Adventure_of_the_Engineer's_Thumb) [Adventure of the Noble Bachelor](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL14929841W/Adventure_of_the_Noble_Bachelor) [Adventure of the Beryl Coronet](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL14929825W/Adventure_of_the_Beryl_Coronet) [Adventure of the Copper Beeches](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL1518116W/Adventure_of_the_Copper_Beeches) - Hound of the Baskervilles - [Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL262598W/Memoirs_of_Sherlock_Holmes) [Silver Blaze](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL1518358W/Silver_Blaze) [Adventure of the Yellow Face](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL20571966W/Adventure_of_the_Yellow_Face) [Adventure of the Stockbroker's Clerk](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL20619319W/Adventure_of_the_Stockbroker's_Clerk) [Adventure of the Gloria Scott](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL20619337W/Adventure_of_the_Gloria_Scott) [Adventure of the Musgrave Ritual](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL20619374W/Adventure_of_the_Musgrave_Ritual) Adventure of the Reigate Squire Crooked Man [Adventure of the Resident Patient](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL16090759W) Adventure of the Greek interpreter [Naval Treaty](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL14930289W/The_Naval_Treaty) Final Problem - [Sign of Four](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL262585W/The_Sign_of_Four) - [Study in Scarlet](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL16290253W/A_Study_in_Scarlet)

Seattle investigator J. P. Beaumont is handed a hush–hush special assignment: find out what really happened in the shooting death of an ex–con. At first, everything seems straightforward, but the deeper Beau digs, the more complicated it becomes. The ex–con really had turned over a new leaf and his murder has nothing to do with, say, a drug deal gone bad. Someone targeted DeShawn for death. Meanwhile, Beau's lover and fellow cop, Mel, is looking into cold cases, in order to close them once and for all. But suddenly, her investigation has tentacles reaching to Beau's, and the two begin to uncover a nightmarish conspiracy that could involve people in high places, even within the halls of law enforcement.

Instead of robbing a bank, Dortmunder tries to steal the whole building. Encyclopedias are heavy, and John Dortmunder is sick of carrying them. While in between jobs, the persistent heist-planner is working an encyclopedia-selling scam that's about to blow up in his face. The cops are on their way when his friend Kelp pulls up in a stolen Oldsmobile, offering a quick escape from the law and a job that's too insane to turn down. Kelp's nephew is an FBI washout who's addicted to old-time pulp novels and adventure stories. He tried being a cop, and now he wants to be a ro.

Bank robber. Prisoner. Let out of jail only on the condition that he capture his cousin. Well, it might take a thief to catch a thief, but Gideon didn't plan on being caught himself—at least not by a bright-eyed female full of vinegar…and honey. Sweet, warm honey.

At 8:15 in the morning, a small commuter plane carrying forty-seven passengers crashes into an apartment building in Granada Hills, California. Shock waves ripple through Los Angeles, as L.A.P.D. Lieutenant Peter Decker works overtime to calm rampant fears of a 9/11-type terror attack. But a grisly mystery lives inside the plane's charred and twisted wreckage: the unidentified bodies of four extra travelers. And there is no sign of an airline employee who was supposedly on the catastrophic flight.Decker and his wife, Rina, have personal reasons for being profoundly shaken by the tragedy, since the "accident" occurred frighteningly close to their daughter Hannah's school. Luckily, their child and her schoolmates escaped unscathed. But the fate of the unaccounted-for flight attendant—twenty-eight-year-old Roseanne Dresden—remains a question mark more than a month after the horrific event, when the young woman's irate stepfather calls, insisting that she was never onboard the doomed plane. Instead, he claims, she was most likely murdered by her abusive, unfaithful husband. But why, then, was Roseanne's name included on the passenger list?Under intense pressure from the department to come up with answers, Decker launches an investigation that carries him down a path of tragic history, dangerous secrets, and deadly lies—and leads him to the corpse of a three-decades-missing murder victim. And as the jagged pieces slowly fall into place, a frightening picture begins to form: a mind-searing portrait of unimaginable evil that will challenge Decker's and Rina's own beliefs about guilt and innocence and justice.Combining relentless suspense with intense, multilayered human drama, The Burnt House is Faye Kellerman at her mesmerizing best.

Upon its original publication, River of Darkness awed readers who look for intelligent, well-plotted psychological mysteries. This "fine, frightening piece of work" (Kirkus Reviews) introduces inspector John Madden who, in the years following World War I, is sent to a small village to investigate a particularly gruesome attack. The local police dismiss the slaughter as a botched robbery, but Madden detects the signs of a madman at work. With the help of Dr. Helen Blackwell, who introduces him to the latest developments in criminal psychology, Madden sets out to identify and capture the killer, even as the murderer sets his sights on his next innocent victims.

No villain is safe in 1903 Egypt as feisty archaeologist Amelia Peabody embarks on her ninth adventure.According to an ancient Egyptian papyrus, dreaming of a large cat means good luck. And that's just what Amelia Peabody could use, as her growing family matures in the new century. What's more, Amelia's dashing husband Emerson has received a mysterious warning not to enter the Valley of the Kings. To Emerson's annoyance, Amelia's meddling distracts her attention as she exposes a fraudulent spiritualist, saves a marriage, and plays matchmaker. But diabolical forces are at work when an unknown tomb reveals a shocking murder -- and the Peabody family dodges bullets from an assassin determined to put an end to their discoveries.

For countless readers, one of life's great pleasures is the mesmerizing magic of a Victorian mystery by New York Times bestselling author Anne Perry. Her dramas of good and evil unfolding inside London's lavish mansions and teeming slums hold us spellbound. Now, in Dark Assassin, she sweeps us into a darkly compelling world that we never dreamed existed.A Thames River Police superintendent struggling to win the respect of his men, William Monk is on a patrol boat near Waterloo Bridge when he notices a young couple standing at the bridge railing, apparently engaged in an intense discussion. The woman waves her arms and places her hands on the man's shoulders. A caress or a push? The man grasps hold of her. To save her or to kill her? Seconds later, the pair plunge to their death in the icy waters. Monk can't help but wonder, was it an accident, a suicide, or a murder? It seems impossible to determine the truth, but haunted by the woman's somber beauty, he is impelled to try.Mary Havilland was her name, and she had planned to marry Toby Argyll, the fair-haired man who shared her fate. Mary's father, an engineer employed by the Argyll Company, had recently died--a suicide, according to the police and Mary's sister. But Mary's friends tell Monk that she suspected her father had been murdered because of his stubborn insistence that the Argyll Company's current project--the construction of a splendid new sewer system for the metropolis--was so badly flawed that it put the entire city in peril from flood and fire. Monk is now faced with the mysteries of the three deaths. Aided by his intrepid wife Hester, he starts looking for answers and is soon treading a slippery path that takes him from the luxurious drawing rooms where powerful men hatch their unscrupulous plots to a world beneath the city where poor folk fight starvation. In nightmarish tunnels, Monk and Hester find true friends, among them Scuff, a young mudlark; Sutton the ratcatcher; and Snoot, Sutton's clever terrier. For once, even Monk's old enemy, Superintendent Runcorn, is on his side. As rainfall strains the fragile manmade underground, Monk must connect the clues before death strikes again.With characters as vivid as Dickens's, gripping courtroom scenes, breathless horrors beneath the earth, and a plot that twists and turns toward a stunning denouement, Dark Assassin is absolutely one of Anne Perry's best.From the Hardcover edition.

Radcliffe Emerson, the irascible husband of fellow archaeologist and Egyptologist Amelia Peabody, has earned the nickname "Father of Curses" -- and at Mazghunah he demonstrates why. Denied permission to dig at the pyramids of Dahshoor, he and Amelia are resigned to excavating mounds of rubble in the middle of nowhere. And there is nothing in this barren area worthy of their interest -- until an antiquities dealer is murdered in his own shop. A second sighting of a sinister stranger from the crime scene, a mysterious scrap of papyrus, and a missing mummy case have all whetted Amelia's curiosity. But when the Emersons start digging for answers in an ancient tomb, events take a darker and deadlier turn -- and there may be no surviving the very modern terrors their efforts reveal.

Mrs. Jeffries must swim upstream to catch a killer.Successful local Michael Provost had no enemies, yet he was found dead off the Chelsea Vestry Wharf. With the help of her staff, Mrs. Jeffries dives into an investigation that leads to an earlier crime—and even more questions.

The year is 1969. Rock 'n' roll, psychedelic drugs, and peace-loving hippies are thriving in Britain. But in the aftermath of a rock music festival, cold reality strikes when a woman is found murdered in her sleeping bag, callously left among the debris in the concert's wake. Detective Inspector Stanley Chadwick is the hard-headed, straitlaced copper assigned to the case who must reluctantly enter a counterculture world to find a killer. When clues lead him to an up-and-coming rock band, the Mad Hatters, with whom the victim was connected, Chadwick experiences firsthand the dangers of this dark new world of sex, drugs, and rock 'n' roll.In the present day, Detective Chief Inspector Alan Banks is called to the scene of a murder victim who turns out to be a freelance journalist working on a piece for MOJO magazine about the classic rock band the Mad Hatters. Since the sixties, the band has gone through a number of tragedies, losing one member to madness and another to the shallow end of a swimming pool. Putting their checkered past behind them, the Mad Hatters have now revamped their sound and are set to celebrate their forty years in the biz by embarking on their first big concert tour in years.Banks and Detective Inspector Annie Cabbot discover that the dead journalist was onto something big hidden in the band's past, and had stirred up some very serious trouble. As Banks and Annie dig deeper into the phenomenon of the Mad Hatters, they find more than they bargained for, and soon realize that their generation's former free-love lifestyle often comes with a deadly price.In the course of twin narratives, Robinson expertly weaves the stories of two interconnected murders that occur decades apart. As only he can, Robinson has created a novel that is as explosive as your favorite rock album and a plot that moves at breakneck speed, traversing through the tumultuous swinging sixties to present day and back again. Piece of My Heart is an extraordinary thrill ride that uncovers the gritty and violent underbelly of the generation of peace, love, and harmony.

On a warm summer night, an attractive woman hurtles north in a blue Peugeot with a hastily scrawled address in her pocket, while, back in London, a desperate man leaves an urgent late-night phone message on his brother's answering machine. By sunrise the next morning, the woman is found inside her car along an otherwise peaceful country lane, shot, execution-style, through the head.Welcome to the idyllic Yorkshire Dales, where Detective Inspector Annie Cabbot arrives on the scene and discovers, to her surprise, a slip of paper in the dead woman's pocket that bears the name of her colleague and erstwhile lover, Detective Chief Inspector Alan Banks. Banks, meanwhile -- already haunted and withdrawn after nearly dying in the fire that destroyed his home -- has gone missing just when he's needed most, and has left plenty of questions behind.As Annie struggles to determine whether or not Banks is safe -- and what role he may have played in the woman's murder -- Banks himself investigates the mysterious disappearance of his estranged brother, Roy, whose late-night call for help brings Banks back to London. Working from Roy's swank apartment, Banks makes the rounds to Roy's old haunts and slowly inhabits the life of his younger brother -- the black sheep of the family, who always seemed to sail a little too close to the wind. As the trail of clues about Roy's life and associations draws Banks into a dark circle of conspiracy and corruption, mobsters and murder, Banks suddenly realizes he's running out of time to save Roy, and by digging too deep, he may be exposing himself and his family to the same -- possibly deadly -- danger.

Mrs. Jeffries Victorian Mystery series #20 "Mrs. Jeffries is the Miss Marple of Victorian Mystery."—The Paperback ForumSir George Braxton was found lying face down in a frozen fountain with the back of his skull bashed to bits. The case is complicated by a distinct lack of holiday cheer in the victim's three argumentative middle-aged daughters and their sullen houseguests. Even the cranky cat hates everyone. To top it all off, the Home Secretary has called in Inspector Witherspoon over the heads of some touchy local lads, making matters stickier than a plum pudding. Only the help of his housekeeper, Mrs. Jeffries, and her crime-solving staff will give the poor Inspector any chance of sleeping in heavenly peace on Christmas Eve…She keeps house for Inspector Witherspoon…and keeps him on his toes. Everyone's awed by his Scotland Yard successes—but they don't know about his secret weapon. No matter how messy the murder or how dirty the deed, Mrs. Jeffries' polished detection skills are up to the task…proving that behind every great man there's a woman—and that a crimesolver's work is never done.

Mrs. Jeffries Victorian Mystery series #19 Sir Edmund Leggett is flattered to be stalked by a young lady--who makes herself scarce after he's murdered in cold blood. The police hold the young woman to blame. But Inspector Witherspoon has other ideas and consults his housekeeper, Mrs. Jeffries--who always gets to the heart of the matter.

Anne Perry's bestselling Victorian novels offer readers an elixir as addictively rich as Devonshire cream or English ale--enticing millions into a literary world almost as real as the original. While flower sellers, costermongers, shopkeepers, and hansom drivers ply their trades, the London police watch over all. Or so people believe. . . .Early one morning, Thomas Pitt, dauntless mainstay of the Special Branch, is summoned to Long Spoon Lane, where anarchists are plotting an attack. Bombs explode, destroying the homes of many poor people. After a chase, two of the culprits are captured and the leader is shot . . . but by whom?As Pitt delves into the case, he finds that there is more to the terrorism than the destructive gestures of misguided idealists. The police are running a lucrative protection racket, and clues suggest that Inspector Wetron of Bow Street is the mastermind. As the shadowy leader of the Inner Circle, Wetron is using his influence with the press to whip up fears of more attacks--and to rush a bill through Parliament that would severely curtail civil liberties. This would make him the most powerful man in the country.To defeat Wetron, Pitt finds that he must run in harness with his old enemy, Sir Charles Voisey, and the unlikely allies are joined by Pitt's clever wife, Charlotte, and her great aunt, Lady Vespasia Cumming-Gould. Can they prevail? As they strive to prevent future destruction, nothing less than the fate of the British Empire hangs in precarious balance.From the first sentence to the last, Long Spoon Lane is a miracle of suspense, of plot and counterplot, bluff and counterbluff, in a take-no-prisoners battle between good and evil. It is possibly the very best of all the wonderful Charlotte and Thomas Pitt novels.From the Hardcover edition.

Millions of readers who love New York Times bestselling author Anne Perry and her novels cherish the magical passport she provides into the age of Victoria at its brilliant zenith. It was an unforgettable time when rich and powerful Englishmen contrived to make themselves even richer and more powerful. When Englishwomen were the glittering ornaments of an opulent society, rolling over cobblestones in their costly carriages, entertaining the chosen few in their elegant drawing rooms. Thoughts of the poor, rotting in London slums and in British dominions east and west of Suez, seldom troubled this prideful aristocracy. But a shocking murder was soon to remind them of their ever-present vulnerability.In the first gray of a mid-September morning, Thomas Pitt, mainstay of Her Majesty's Special Branch, is summoned to Connaught Square mansion where the body of a junior diplomat lies huddled in a wheelbarrow. Nearby stands the tenant of the house, the beautiful and notorious Egyptian woman Ayesha Zakhari, who falls under the shadow of suspicion. Pitt's orders, emanating from Prime Minister Gladstone himself, are to protect--at all costs--the good name of the third person in the garden: senior cabinet minister Saville Ryerson. This distinguished public servant, whispered to be Ayesha's lover, insists that she is as innocent as he is himself. Could it be true?In the dead man's less-than-stellar reputation, Pitt finds hope. But in ancient Alexandria, where the victim was once an army officer, hope grows dim. For there, Pitt receives intimations of deadly entanglements stretching from Egyptian cotton fields to Manchester cotton mills, from the noxious London slum known as Seven Dials to the madhouse called Bedlam.Meanwhile, in a packed courtroom at the Old Bailey, time is ticking away for Ayesha and Saville. With Pitt and his clients racing against the hangman, the trial reaches its pulse-pumping climax.