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Crime, Thrillers and Mystery — page 11
514 public-domain crime, thrillers and mystery books, summarised. Page 11 of 11.
The Diamond Master
Jacques Futrelle
An impossibly perfect diamond arrives in the mail for New York's leading jeweler, sparking a high-stakes conspiracy that threatens to collapse the global economy. This is a battle of wits between the titans of the gem trade and a brilliant, enigmatic man who claims to hold the power to manufacture diamonds at will.
Dames
Murray Leinster
The fog of the Inside Passage offers no sanctuary for a drowning fugitive, only a bizarre theater where the volatility of human desire proves more lethal than the sea.
Spies Die Hard!
Arnold Marmor
The high-stakes game of inter-planetary espionage turns on a single, desperate gamble when a traitor seeks sanctuary, forcing an operative to decide between her own survival and the cold requirements of her mission.
Oscar the Detective
Old Sleuth
A master of the quick change and the sharp observation, a gentleman detective navigates the seedy underbelly of New York to untangle a web of international theft and hidden lineage.
Respectfully mine
Randall Garrett
The galaxy’s most daring thief turns a simple museum relic into a high-stakes, planet-wide shell game, proving that the best way to hide a lie is to make everyone else believe in it.
The Second-Story Man
Upton Sinclair
A home invasion becomes a harrowing moral reckoning when a desperate laborer confronts the very man who destroyed his life. This tense, one-act drama strips away the comforts of wealth to reveal the brutal cost of corporate ambition.
Two girls and a mystery
May Hollis Barton
When an ordinary teenager inherits a dilapidated estate, she finds herself caught in a web of ghostly noises, sinister strangers, and a hidden fortune waiting to be unearthed.
Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 152, January 31, 1917
Various
The world of 1917, seen through a lens of biting satire, finds humor in the face of global catastrophe. This collection of wit exposes the absurdities of wartime life, from bureaucratic blunders to the pretenses of leadership.
Witness
George H. (George Henry) Smith
A highly advanced computer with a distinct personality becomes the sole witness to a brutal murder, forcing its human protectors to confront the legal and emotional implications of a machine's testimony.
Murder by the clock
Rufus King
When a wealthy man collapses into a fatal terror inside a bedroom cupboard, a meticulous police lieutenant steps into a household thick with hidden grudges, elaborate forgeries, and lingering madness.
The Ivory Snuff Box
Frederic Arnold Kummer
A newlywed detective is whisked away from his bride on a secret European mission to recover a stolen diplomatic relic.
Strange Alliance
Bryce Walton
A psychology professor and his student discover they share an ancestral, supernatural inheritance that transcends their academic rationalism. They flee a provincial town, only to face a final confrontation with the superstitions they both loathe and embody.
Ghost Beyond the Gate
Mildred A. (Mildred Augustine) Wirt
The frozen river holds a secret, and the girl who masters the ice is the only one who can navigate the dark currents of a local mystery. When an ordinary winter outing turns into a search for her missing father, nothing is as it seems.
Happy Rain Night
Dean Evans
On a dark Martian night of synthetic rain, a vengeful wife and a high-ranking security chief cross paths in a glittering city of gamblers, unraveling a web of betrayal and murder.
Stephen H. Branch's Alligator, Vol. 1 no. 15, July 31, 1858
Unknown
A blistering 1858 New York polemic tears into the private scandals, political corruption, and moral decay of the city's most powerful editors, mayors, and millionaires.
Shock Absorber
E. G. Von Wald
When a desperate military command fakes a psychic corps officer to manage mutinous space crews, the new captain's arrival sets off a quiet, psychological war behind enemy lines.
The crimson butterfly
Edmund Snell
A British district officer’s routine in remote Borneo is shattered by a mysterious, self-styled magician and a lethal, venomous insect. This atmospheric thriller blends colonial-era suspense with a strange, exotic menace.
The Lost Ambassador
E. Phillips (Edward Phillips) Oppenheim
This is a classic tale of international intrigue where a gentleman soldier stumbles into a web of conspiracy, shifting loyalties, and dangerous liaisons. It offers a brisk, atmospheric tour through the high-stakes world of pre-war espionage.
Asteroid of the Damned
Frederik Pohl
A cynical lawman tracks a drug kingpin to a lawless asteroid, only to realize he must bargain for his life with the planet's obsession: common scrap metal.
Ham Sandwich
James H. Schmitz
This brisk, clever tale follows a police detective infiltrating a fraudulent psychic institute to dismantle a sophisticated confidence scheme. It explores the blurred lines between genuine latent power and the manipulative power of suggestion.
Murder Beneath the Polar Ice
Hayden Howard
The Arctic ice pack masks a silent, high-stakes game of cat and mouse where the line between a scavenger hunt and a global catastrophe blurs. Deep beneath the surface, human survival relies on the fragile, deadly machinery of the Cold War.
Zero Data
Charles Saphro
Lonnie Raichi stole the world’s greatest treasures behind an invisible suit, but forgot that light never lies to a cop who understands physics.
Gunman's bluff
Edgar Wallace
A wealthy London banker vanishes into the underworld, leaving his bride, a relentless detective, and a suave jewel thief to untangle a web of forgery and betrayal.
An Incident on Route 12
James H. Schmitz
The hunter has become the hunted, but in a way he could never have imagined. A desperate criminal finds himself caught in a trap, realizing too late that his stolen prize is merely bait for a far more alien harvest.
The Leak
Jacques Futrelle
The Thinking Machine applies cold, absolute logic to a financial mystery that has baffled the experts, proving that even the most invisible crime leaves a trail for a mind that refuses to accept the impossible.
Stolen Souls
William Le Queux
Through tales of hypnotism, international espionage, and fractured memories, this collection explores the perilous intersection of love, betrayal, and the hidden motives driving society’s elite.
The monster of Grammont
George Goodchild
Two English travelers arrive at a remote French château, only to find themselves ensnared in a murderous conspiracy involving a terrifying, hooded figure and a race for a hidden secret.
Conscience
Hector Malot
A brilliant physician, driven by crushing poverty and a desperate need to secure his professional future, commits a calculated murder that entangles an innocent family in a web of legal ruin.
Decidedly Odd
William MacHarg
A psychologist uses a primitive lie detector to unmask a dangerous double agent who is manipulating a young woman through a secret, rhythmic language.
Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 152, February 21, 1917
Various
A singular window into the anxieties, absurdities, and grim endurance of British home life during the deep winter of the Great War.
The Little Red Bag
Jerry Sohl
The mundane routine of a business trip transforms into a desperate, silent battle of will when a passenger discovers a ticking bomb inside a stranger's luggage. This high-stakes encounter explores the burden of an unwanted power.
Mask of Death
Paul Ernst
A mysterious figure calling himself Doctor Satan threatens a lavish Maine resort with a weapon that distorts the flow of time itself.
Midnight In Beauchamp Row: 1895
Anna Katharine Green
The isolation of a winter storm provides the backdrop for a chilling confrontation between a young bride, a mysterious intruder, and a secret that threatens to destroy everything. A single night of terror unravels the foundations of a marriage, revealing the dark lengths to which one man will go to secure a fortune.
The Gray Phantom
Herman Landon
HOOK A retired criminal mastermind emerges from his secluded hermitage to hunt a ruthless usurper who has weaponized his own past methods to terrorize New York.