To Die For

The world’s most beloved mystery writers celebrate their favorite mystery novels in this gorgeously wrought collection, featuring essays by Michael Connelly, Kathy Reichs, Ian Rankin, and more. In the most ambitious anthology of its kind, the world’s leading mystery writers come together to champion the greatest mystery novels ever written. In a series of personal essays that reveal as much about the authors and their own work as they do about the books that they love, over a hundred authors from twenty countries have created a guide that will be indispensable for generations of readers and writers. From Agatha Christie to Lee Child, from Edgar Allan Poe to P. D. James, from Sherlock Holmes to Hannibal Lecter and Philip Marlowe to Lord Peter Wimsey, Books to Die For brings together the best of the mystery world for a feast of reading pleasure, a treasure trove for those new to the genre and for those who believe that there is nothing new left to discover. This is the one essential book for every reader who has ever finished a mystery novel and thought…I want more!

A radical revaluation of how contemporary society perceives death—and an argument for how it can make us happy. “He who would teach men to die would teach them to live,” writes Montaigne in Essais, and in How to Die: A Book about Being Alive, Ray Robertson takes up the challenge. Though contemporary society avoids the subject and often values the mere continuation of existence over its quality, Robertson argues that the active and intentional consideration of death is neither morbid nor frivolous, but instead essential to our ability to fully value life. How to Die is both an absorbing excursion through some of Western literature’s most compelling works on the subject of death as well as an anecdote-driven argument for cultivating a better understanding of death in the belief that, if we do, we’ll know more about what it means to live a meaningful life.

When a member of an exclusive book club is checked out, spunky librarian Trudell Becket must sort fact from fiction to solve the murder. The Cypress Arete Society is one of the town’s oldest and most exclusive clubs. When assistant librarian Trudell Becket is invited to speak to the group about the library, its modernization, and her efforts to bring printed books to the reading public, her friend Flossie invites herself along. Flossie has been on the book club’s waiting list for five years, and she’s determined to find out why she’s never received an invitation to join. But not long after Tru and Flossie arrive for the meeting, they’re shocked to find the club’s president, Rebecca White, dead in the kitchen. Rebecca was a former TV actress and local celebrity, but was not known for being patient or pleasant. She’d been particularly unkind to the book club’s host for the evening, who also happens to be the mother of Detective Jace Bailey, Tru’s boyfriend. And Rebecca had made it clear that she didn’t think Flossie was book club material. With her boyfriend and one of her best friends wrapped up in a murder, Tru has to work fast to figure out who cut Rebecca’s story short before the killer takes another victim out of circulation....

An epic battle between a boy, a boat, and a shark, with extra material including a fact page on tiger sharks, a black and white diagram of a dory, and a list of suggested reads For his birthday, Christos takes his father's mackerel dory on his first solo trip. He plans to fish and then camp overnight on a local island. But things go terribly, terrifyingly wrong when Christos runs the dory aground on a reef, attracting a 12-foot tiger shark as company for the most harrowing night of his life--a night during which he decides what he would be willing to die for.

When a boy finds a girl's body in the ditch on prom night...he becomes the primary suspect in her murder. Prom dreams. Prom Screams. Mario Woods is looking forward to one normal night before he graduates. He's spent most of high school riding solo. But when fate lands him a date for prom, he figures this might be his chance to be less of a loner. Only, prom turns out to be a disaster. Just when Mario thought the night couldn’t get any worse, he sees something on the side of the road while driving home. That something is Prom Queen Maribelle Starr—murdered and left for dead. All Mario wanted was to go to prom...but somehow, he ended up in hell.

When hordes of people descend on the picturesque village of Nasely for the annual celebration of its most famous resident, murder mystery writer Agnes Crabbe, events take a dark turn as the festival opens with a shocking death. Each year the residents are outnumbered by crowds dressed as Crabbe's best-known character, the lady detective Millicent Cutter. The weekend is never a mild-mannered affair as fan club rivalries bubble below the surface, but tensions reach new heights when a second Crabbe devotee is found murdered. Though the police are quick to arrive on the scene, the facts are tricky to ascertain as the witnesses, suspects and victim are all dressed as Miss Cutter. And they all want to solve that crime too...

New York Times bestselling author Kate White returns with another mystery for true crime writer, Bailey Weggins as victims seem to be getting a little too relaxed at a spa, and Bailey is the only one who can figure out the truth. Bailey Weggins, the very clever and the very irreverent true crime writer for Gloss, a leading women's magazine, is in desperate need of a little R&R after solving the murder of her boss' nanny. A trip to the Cedar Inn and Spa seems like the perfect remedy. Bailey, totally full of Zen after her deep tissue massage, looks forward to all of the other treatments. Getting ready for bed, she realizes she forgot the Rolex that her father gave her before he died. She and Piper, her massage therapist, go back, only to discover a dead body getting a seaweed wrap. The body turns out to be Anna, another massage therapist. Detective Beck arrives, and against her better judgment, Bailey becomes infatuated with him, forgetting her tepid relationship with her boyfriend. Bailey learns that one of Anna's clients died of heart failure after she worked on him. Then the spa owner's second husband, who was clandestinely pursuing Anna, becomes suspect number one. But Anna's past also provides numerous suspects. Was she killed by a client who'd been rebuffed? Or by a male therapist who she'd apparently spurned? Or the son of the heart attack victim who blames the spa for this father's death? Or by someone from her deeper past? Bailey keeps digging, getting closer to the truth. Then there's a second horrifying murder at the inn, and it's clear that Bailey's life is in danger. Nothing prepares her for the answer she finds as she finally discovers who the murderer is.

National bestselling author Lucy Burdette returns to Key West for another delectable dish of secrets, intrigue, and murder. Peace and quiet are hard to find in bustling Key West, so Hayley Snow, food critic for Key Zest magazine, is taking the afternoon off for a tranquil lunch with a friend outside of town. As they are enjoying the wild beach and the lunch, she realizes that her husband Nathan’s dog, Ziggy, has disappeared. She follows his barking, to find him furiously digging at a shallow grave with a man’s body in it. Davis Jager, a local birdwatcher, identifies him as GG Garcia, a rabble-rousing Key West local and developer. Garcia was famous for over-development on the fragile Keys, womanizing, and refusing to follow city rules—so it’s no wonder he had a few enemies. When Davis is attacked in the parking lot of a local restaurant after talking to Hayley and her dear friend, the octogenarian Miss Gloria, Hayley is slowly but surely drawn into the case. Hayley’s mother, Janet, has been hired to cater GG’s memorial service reception at the local Woman’s Club, using recipes from their vintage Key West cookbook—and Hayley and Miss Gloria sign on to work with her, hoping to cook up some clues by observing the mourners. But the real clues appear when Hayley begins to study the old cookbook, as whispers of old secrets come to life, dragging the past into the present—with murderous results.