Looking for one of the latest PI novels?
Listed below is a selection of private investigator novels scheduled to be released in June 2020. Included is a brief synopsis provided by the publisher along with information about where the book sits within their relevant series (or whether they are stand-alone novels). Click here for new releases from May 2020.
Lowcountry Boondoggle by Susan M. Boyer (pub. Henery Press)
9th book in the Liz Talbot series
Publishers Synopsis
Private investigators Liz Talbot and Nate Andrews thought they’d put Darius Baker’s troubles to rest - then his recently discovered son ropes him into a hemp farm investment with his college buddies. When a beloved Charleston professor - and potential investor - is murdered, Liz and Nate discover Darius keeps the PIs on speed dial. A shocking number of people had reasons to want the genteel, bowtie wearing, tea-drinking professor dead. Was it one of his many girlfriends or a disgruntled student? Or perhaps Murray was killed because his failure to invest meant the hemp farm trio’s dreams were going up in smoke? Though Liz’s long-dead best friend, Colleen, warns her the stakes are far higher than Liz imagines, she is hellbent on finding the no-good killer among the bevy of suspects. But will the price of justice be more than Liz can bear?
Black Sun Rising by Matthew Carr (pub. Pegasus)
Stand Alone
Publishers Synopsis
A riveting thriller combining real historical events and characters with a sinister detective story of eugenics, racism, and nationalist paranoia.
Barcelona, summer 1909.
When the scientist and explorer Randolph Foulkes is blown up in a random terrorist bomb attack, private detective Harry Lawton is hired by the man’s widow to identify the beneficiary of a large payment Foulkes had made shortly before his death. Lawton’s arrival in the Catalan capital coincides with a series of unusual killings that appear to have been carried out by a blood-drinking animal in the Ramblas district and adds another element of instability to a city already teetering on the brink of insurrection. Lawton soon meets and teams up with Esperanza Claramunt, a young anarchist whose lover was one of the victims of the “beast of the Ramblas,” and the Catalan crime reporter Bernat Mata, who has begun investigating these crimes.
So what begins as a straightforward investigation into presumed marital infidelity turns into something far more sinister, as Lawton probes Foulkes’ connections to the mysterious Explorers Club, the Barcelona political police, and an eccentric Austrian hypnotist. Adrift in a city gripped by rebellion and lawlessness, Lawton enters a labyrinth of murder, corruption, political conflict, and crazed racial pseudo-science where no one’s survival is guaranteed.
Black Deeds by Larry Darter (pub. Fedora)
7th book in the Malone Mystery series
Publishers Synopsis
In this latest thriller featuring the intrepid Los Angeles PI, Malone gets reacquainted with some old friends and meets new enemies in a troubling case that threatens to shake the City of Angels to its core.
An aspiring investigative reporter, Piper Lang has her cornflower blue eyes set on becoming more than just another pretty face in the newsroom of a major L.A. newspaper. She also has somebody sending her death threats and threatening to rearrange her lovely face if she keeps snooping into the goings on at a secretive Los Angeles-based female empowerment and entrepreneurial training group. It seems the shadowy company is operating with impunity like a multi-level marketing scheme that one of Lang’s sources claims is only a front for a dangerous sex cult.
Malone’s job is to keep the attractive and vivacious Piper healthy until she breaks the biggest story of her career. But after her primary source is almost murdered by two tough guys, Malone’s professional skills are put to the test in a deadly game–a game that may cost Malone and Piper Lang their lives.
When it seems clear Malone may be outgunned this time, series favorite L.A.P.D. detective Jaime Reyes comes to the rescue to provide backup. From the mansions of Bel Air to the film studios of Tinseltown, Malone will need to watch his step as he and Piper unravel a exploitative sex-cult. In L.A., all that glitters isn’t always gold.
In the Blood by Tom Fowler (pub. Independent)
9th book in the C.T. Ferguson series
Publishers Synopsis
C.T. Ferguson is shot and left for dead.
Will he live to solve his own attempted murder?
After wrapping up a routine case, private investigator C.T. Ferguson is gunned down and left floating in the Baltimore Harbor.
His police detective cousin Rich is frozen out of the investigation. No one thinks it was a random act of violence. It leaves two big questions.
Who did it? And why?
The answers will shake the Ferguson family to its foundation.
You’ll love this engrossing crime thriller because the one murder a detective never gets a chance to solve is his own.
The Art of Deception by Leonard Goldberg (pub. Minotaur)
4th book in the Daughter of Sherlock Holmes series
Publishers Synopsis
In the west end of London, an apparently crazed individual is on the loose, breaking into art galleries and private homes to slash valuable paintings of women. Despite Scotland Yard’s best efforts, the criminal remains at large and continues on his destructive path.
When Joanna and the Watsons are called in to solve the mystery, they soon discover that although the canvases have been slashed, their backings remain pristine, with no cuts or scratches. The criminal, it seems, is no mere vandal—he's searching for something hidden behind the portraits.
Suspicion soon falls on two skilled art restorers who previously worked at the gallery where all the vandalized art was purchased. When Joanna finds the body of one in a bricked off fireplace at the gallery, the other is left as the prime suspect. But then he's discovered dead as well. Luckily, Joanna has a plan for ensnaring the criminal once and for all. But it must not fail, or more paintings—and lives—will be lost.
Clean Hands by Patrick Hoffman (pub. Grove Atlantic)
Stand Alone
Publishers Synopsis
Corporate lawyer Elizabeth Carlyle is under a lot of pressure. Her prestigious New York law firm is working on their most high-stakes case in company history, defending a prominent bank that’s been accused of fraud. When Elizabeth gets the news that one of her junior associates has lost his phone—and the secret documents that were on it—she needs help. Badly.
Enter ex-CIA officer Valencia Walker, a high-priced fixer who gets called in when rich corporations, people and governments need their problems solved discretely. But things get complicated when the missing phone is retrieved: somebody has already copied the documents, and now they’re blackmailing the firm. The situation gets murkier still when stories about the documents start appearing in the press and a tragic suicide appears staged, hinting that darker forces may be churning below the surface. With billions of dollars on the line, Elizabeth and Valencia must maneuver and outmaneuver whomever is behind this, and, most importantly, keep their hands clean.
This is a world of private security, private diplomacy, and private justice. A sharply drawn cast of characters—dirty lawyers, black-market traders, Russian criminals, and extra-judicial actors, all take part in this breakneck tour through New York. Authentic, tense, and impossible to put down, Clean Hands gives a vivid look at the connections between corporations, government, and the underworld.
Some Like It Shot by Zara Keane (pub. Beaverstone Press)
6th book in the Movie Club series
Publishers Synopsis
It's summer on Whisper Island. Ex-cop-turned-private-investigator Maggie Doyle is looking forward to sun, fun, and romance. Instead, she gets bills, an assault allegation, and a busted wrist. To add insult to injury, there's a movie being filmed on the island, and Maggie's diva sister has been cast in it-her debut role. While other residents clamor for parts as extras, Maggie wants nothing to do with the shoot.
But when hotshot director Con Ryder asks Maggie to investigate a series of suspicious accidents on the movie set, she can't afford to refuse. Maggie and her UFO-obsessed assistant, Lenny, go undercover as extras, with Lenny intent on enjoying every second of the experience, and Maggie determined to solve the mystery and leave as quickly as possible. Maggie's hopes for a quick-fix solution are shot to pieces when the woman who accused her of assault turns up dead.
Riviera Gold by Laurie R. King (pub. Bantam)
16th book in the Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes series
Publishers Synopsis
It’s summertime on the Riviera, and the Jazz Age has come to France’s once-sleepy beaches. From their music-filled terraces, American expatriates gaze along the coastline at the lights of Monte Carlo, where fortunes are won, lost, stolen, and sometimes hidden away. When Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes arrive, they find their partnership pulled between youthful pleasures and old sins, hot sun and cool jazz, new affections and enduring loyalties.
Russell falls into easy friendship with an enthralling American couple, Sara and Gerald Murphy, whose golden life on the Riviera has begun to attract famous writers and artists—and some of the scoundrels linked with Monte Carlo’s underworld. The Murphy set will go on to inspire everyone from F. Scott Fitzgerald to Pablo Picasso, but in this summer of 1925, their importance for Russell lies in one of their circle’s recent additions: the Holmeses’ former housekeeper, Mrs. Hudson, who hasn’t been seen since she fled England under a cloud of false murder accusations.
When a beautiful young man is found dead in Mrs. Hudson’s front room, she becomes the prime suspect in yet another murder. Russell is certain of Mrs. Hudson’s innocence; Holmes is not. But the old woman’s colorful past has been a source of tension between them before, and now the dangerous players who control Monte Carlo’s gilded casinos may stop at nothing to keep the pair away from what Mrs. Hudson’s youthful history could bring to light.
The Riviera is a place where treasure can be false, where love can destroy, and where life, as Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes will discover, can be cheap—even when it is made of solid gold.
Vera Kelly Is Not a Mystery by Rosalie Knecht (pub. Tin House)
2nd book in the Vera Kelly series
Publishers Synopsis
When ex-CIA agent Vera Kelly loses her job and her girlfriend in a single day, she reluctantly goes into business as a private detective. Heartbroken and cash-strapped, she takes a case that dredges up dark memories and attracts dangerous characters from across the Cold War landscape. Before it’s over, she’ll chase a lost child through foster care and follow a trail of Dominican exiles to the Caribbean. Forever looking over her shoulder, she nearly misses what’s right in front of her: her own desire for home, connection, and a new romance at the local bar.
In this exciting second installment of the Vera Kelly series, Rosalie Knecht challenges and deepens the Vera we love: a woman of sparkling wit, deep moral fiber, and martini-dry humor who knows how to follow a case even as she struggles to follow her heart.
The Doom List by Gerard O'Donovan (pub. Severn House)
2nd book in the Tom Collins series
Publishers Synopsis
The Doom List - you'd rather be dead than be on it: the intriguing new 1920s mystery featuring Irish-born cop turned private investigator Tom Collins.
1922. 'Movie czar' Will H. Hays is on a mission to clean up Hollywood by compiling the Doom List - a list of 'undesirables' whom he plans to bar from screen work. Private investigator Tom Collins is hired to protect a leading lady's reputation at all costs, and is drawn into a case of scandal, forbidden passion, blackmail, and cold-blooded murder.