Bøker av Dolores Hitchens

Unable to stop herself from investigating another murder, Rachel Murdock gets plenty of help from Samantha, the cat who follows her wherever she goes; her much less adventurous sister Jennifer; and Lieutenant Mayhew, who is grateful to have another sharp mind on the case.Miss Rachel, her sister, and her cat are watching with undisguised interest a bandy-legged man who is spying on a house across the street until a speeding black sedan runs him down. The sisters are curious to know why the man was murdered-and just as baffled about what happened to the mysterious tenants of the house, who disappear the next day.Their investigations take Miss Rachel and Samantha to the small mountain town of San Cayetano, where she gets entangled in a property conflict that could have deadly consequences.

THE ABDUCTORIt begins with a name whispered to a teacher in the schoolyard... "Marion....Marion." Someone is lurking in the bushes, but they run off before Miss Moynton can confront them. There is indeed a Marion in her class, so she tells the principal about the event. She even goes the parent''s house to ask if someone was supposed to pick up Marion from school. But Marion''s mother has other concerns, and doesn''t take the question seriously. However, another nearby family, the Trents, have a daughter named Marilyn, and they have every reason to fear this schoolyard stalker. They have been living in fear of a man who blames the husband for his wife''s death, and keeps threatening them on the phone. When the new substitute teacher, Marion Kennick, is kidnapped with one her students, it looks like the stalker has finally decided to strike. THE BANK WITH THE BAMBOO DOORMarlie Renick lives in a town full of secrets. Her own secret is tormenting her. She is pregnant by a man who is not her husband. Then there is Dr. Ferrie, who carries the secret of temptation. He is being blackmailed for his affair with a young woman he refers to as "the barracuda." His wife holds another, much darker secret, one that changes her entire life. And Jim Griffin, the young man who appears so innocently in Karen Evans''s gardening store, is anything but what he seems. Their lives, and many others, all intersect when a conniving lothario leads them to a bricked-up cellar wall that hides the greatest secret of them all. 

Rediscover one of America’s pioneering women crime writers with this classic noir starring a Long Beach private investigator reminiscent of Raymond Chandler’s Philip Marlowe“Are you trying to tell me you don''t want the job, Mr. Sader?” It started as a missing persons case and grew more puzzling with the discovery of another strangely coincidental disappearance. Private eye Jim Sader finds himself deep in a multilayered intrigue revolving around oil and real estate and the sleazy underpinnings of Long Beach, California, in the 1950s. Taut, suspenseful, and gritty, many consider Sleep with Strangers to be Dolores Hitchens’ best novel.

Private eye Jim Sader returns in a hard-hitting thriller set in the dark corners of sunny southern California"You''re playing with a child''s life": The search for a kidnapped boy leads private detective (and ex-alcoholic) Jim Sader through a labyrinth of well-hidden family secrets and into the heart of an elaborate and malevolent deception. With little to go on--a tight-lipped client, an anonymous letter, a mother who is supposed to be dead--Sader must rely on his wits to find the child even as he outraces the demons that dog him. Sleep with a Slander has been called "the best hard-boiled private eye novel written by a woman—and one of the best written by anybody" (1001 Midnights: The Aficionado''s Guide to Mystery and Detective Fiction).

STAIRWAY TO AN EMPTY ROOM Monica Marshall’s sister Biddy has been murdered by her husband. Biddy has a daughter, Winifred, and with the husband on death row, Monica agrees to take charge of her. Winifred is anxious to leave the house where she has been living with Biddy. The house and the woman who runs it seem so unpleasant to Monica. But nothing prepares her for Stevens. He is managing a mountain retreat where Monica takes her new charge for a getaway--she hates him immediately. Strangely enough, Winifred recognizes the couple in another cabin. Soon Monica realizes that there is something very strange going on here. Her brakes fail … later she almost drowns in the lake. And Stevens is becoming very protective of young Winifred. What do all these people have to do with Biddy’s death, and what is really going on here?...      TERROR LURKS IN DARKNESS Kitty has the fright of her life one night when she takes what she is told is a short cut and ends up  on a dead end street in the rain. And to make matters worse, there is a savage dog outside her car, causing her to wreck the front end trying to avoid it. Fortunately, the owner of the dog appears and calms the dog, then drives her home. But imagine Kitty’s shock when she finds out that Sunny, the woman who told her about the short cut, is found dead later that night on the same road, her throat savaged. Of course, everyone hated Sunny, but that doesn’t explain her strange death. And now Kitty’s roommate, Ardis, has gone missing … and two of her friends are asking her to lie about what she knows. No wonder inspector Doyle doesn’t believe her story—she has no idea what to believe herself!