New Releases by Robert Barnard

Scotland Yard Superintendent Perry Trethowan is enjoying a vacation evening at a cozy Yorkshire pub when an old woman shows him an original, unpublished Bronte manuscript. Trethowan agrees to engage in a little literary detective work, but he doesn’t realize that for a criminal the manuscript is motive for theft, torture—and murder.

Hexton-upon-Weir was ruled by its women: they set the tone, they made the decisions, they called the tune. When they decided to band together to block the appointment of a new vicar who was not only unacceptably High Church but - of all ugly things - celibate to boot, they managed to create merry hell. As the town was riven by faction and counter-faction, Helen Kitterage tried to remain aloof, but before long she was drawn into the maelstrom, as, during the down''s fête, ill-will and conspiracy degenerated into murder. Helen was convinced that somewhere among the secrets of this murderous Cranford there must be found some key shame that someone had thought it worth killing to keep unknown. In this tart and witty updating of the traditional English village mystery, ''the chameleon talent of Mr Barnard'' (Sunday Times) is demonstrated once again through that sharp ear and eye that led the Washington Post to exclaim: ''One of the funniest men writing mysteries today has to be Robert Barnard.''

Chetton Hall was one of the glories of Jacobean domestic architecture, and the Spenders had lived in Chetton ever since their founder had peculated the money to build it while he was the King’s Secretary of Monopolies. Over the years they had accumulated accrustations of dignity, to say nothing of wealth. Which made it doubly shocking when the Earldom descended to Percy Spender, who was ‘not quite’, not to mention his family, who were not at all. When the family descends on Chetton for his sixtieth birthday, accompanied by various hangers-on, their main obsession is to discover his intentions for the future of the place. Hardly less interested is his man of business, and his neighbours, who feel sadly the diminished glory of the house. The Spenders, in fact, have always felt like birds in a guilded cage at Chetton. Before the celebrations are over, one of the birds is a very dead duck indeed. The traditional country house party murder is turned on its head, given a few twists, and ends up much reinvigorated in this witty and lively whodunit by a writer who, as described in The Times Literary Supplement, ‘can write most under the table with one hand behind his back.’ ‘Mr Barnard always maintains an exceptionally high level, being as much littérateur as mystery story writer; fortunately, he never lets his literary flair get in the way of his mysteries.’ New York Times Book Review

The Burleigh school was dying. It would be called a mercy killing were it not for the little band of inept, eccentric, or otherwise unemployable teachers who depended on this absolutely awful English boys’ academy for their meagre livelihoods. A lack of funds, facilities, and foresight had brought Burleigh to the very edge of extinction. Now someone planned to give it one final, deadly push. Malice was afoot behind the ivied walls, trailing hard on the heels of Hilary Frome, Headmaster Crumwallis’s unfortunate choice for the next headboy. For when something sinister popped up in the punch on Parents’ Evening, when nasty pranks became no joke, the next event at bloody Burleigh was bound to be . . . simply murder. ‘Crackerjack entertainment . . . deserves the kind of raves heaped up on his other prize whodunits.’ Publishers Weekly ‘There is no one quite like Robert Barnard in his ability to combine chills and chuckles and to sprinkle the whole with delicious irony.’ San Diego Union ‘The wryest wit and most scathing satire in today’s mystery.’ Chicago Sun-Times

Rosemary Sheffield has a sort of "reverse epiphany" one day while walking in the park: she no longer believes in God. This sudden loss of faith is at first entirely liberating, but the situation gradually becomes more complicated. Rosemary is, after all, the beloved wife of the vicar at St. Saviour''s parish. A storm of controversy erupts in her husband''s church congregation, but Rosemary, with the words "I do not believe," leaves behind the scandal and gossip for a seaside sojourn in Scarborough. Here she meets Stanko, a Bosnian refugee who illegally entered the country. But what begins as a supportive friendship launches an ungodly chain of events-and Rosemary soon finds herself back at home caught up in a murder investigation. "Barnard''s trademark seamless plotting and riotous sense of humor stand out wonderfully in his latest whodunit." "Booklist" "His plots are downright Mozartian in their effortless complexity" "New York Newsday"

A mysterious envelope arrives on Eve McNabb''s doorstep soon after she has buried her mother, a woman who kept many secrets. The puzzling letter inside this envelope hints at an illicit passion between the letter writer and Eve''s mother, May McNabb. Even when she was a child, Eve sensed that there were parts of May''s life she would never understand. She would never know the details of her parents'' marriage or why her father suddenly disappeared from her life. While Eve has always believed that her father was dead, she begins to wonder whether her mother''s life as a widow had been a ruse. Will she have to question everything her mother has told her? Could her father be alive and well? The letter writer may have some answers, but how can Eve find him or her? With only a blurred postmark for a clue, Eve sets out to locate the writer and journey into her own past. What she never suspected was that questions can be dangerous, perhaps even deadly... Filled with piercing wit and illuminating insight into the human condition, Robert Barnard''s Last Post proves yet again that he is one of the great masters of mystery.

A new mystery set at one of England''s stately homes and featuring beloved Yorkshire cop, Charlie Peace. By Diamond Dagger award winner Robert Barnard.

From Robert Barnard, the internationally acclaimed Diamond Dagger–winning crime writer . . . Kit Philipson has always felt like something of a stranger in his family. Growing up as the only child of professional parents in Glasgow, Scotland, he had every advantage. His mother was a teacher; his father, a journalist, escaped from Nazi Germany at the age of three on one of the 1939 Kindertransports. But on her deathbed, Kit’s mother tells him he was adopted and that his birth name was Novello. Soon, vague memories of his early life begin to surface: his nursery, pictures on the wall, the smell of his birth mother when she’d been cooking. And, sometimes, there are more disturbing memories—of strangers taking him by the hand and leading him away from the only family he had ever known. A search of old newspaper files reveals that a three-year-old boy named Peter Novello was abducted from his parents’ holiday hotel in Sicily in 1989. Now the young man who has known himself only as Kit sets out to rediscover his past, the story of two three-year-old boys torn from their mothers in very different circumstances. Kit’s probing inquiries are sure to bring surprises. They may also unearth dangerous secrets that dare never be revealed. With sharp wit and deep insight, Robert Barnard sweeps away all preconceptions in this powerful study of maternal love and the danger of obsession.

Vernon Watts may have been beloved by the millions of faithful viewers of the long-running soap opera Jubilee Terrace but his fellow cast members knew him for what he was -- an egotistical former music-hall performer whose untimely death in a pedestrian accident was not something to be universally regretted. Sadly, though, director Reggie Friedman soon fills the supposed void by asking Hamish Fawley, an equally unpleasant former member of the Jubilee Terrace troupe, to rejoin the soap. Hamish was never much liked. Now he''s more obnoxious than ever. The mood on the set is not exactly serene, a situation made worse when the police receive an anonymous letter suggesting that Vernon Watts''s "accident" may in fact have been murder. Did one of his fellow actors push Vernon into the oncoming traffic? Detective Inspector Charlie Peace faces tough challenges as he probes the make-believe world of skilled thespians to find a possible killer. With a cast of suspects who are trained to emote on cue, Charlie will need all of his policeman''s instincts if he''s to avert further tragedy. Writing with his usual acerbic wit and penetrating insight into human foibles, acclaimed master of mystery Robert Barnard gives us another winning entry in his magnificent body of work.

It can be a bit of an embarrassment when your old man is done in. Particularly, when you are a rising inspector with CID, and hated his guts. Particularly, when your old man was at the time subjecting himself to a do-it-yourself version of a Spanish Inquisition torture. And wearing spangled tights. What it meant was that Perry Trethowan had to go back to the home of his ancestors and do a bit of semi-official sleuthing. Like the Sitwells and the Mitfords, the Trethowans proved that Birth and Artistic Talent could go together. The Trethowans, though, made one hope it didn''t happen too often. Perry''s father had been a dilettante composer so minor that he stopped composing long before he started decomposing. His Uncle Lawrence, head of the family, was a poet of sorts, one of his aunts a stage designer, another an overgrown schoolgirl who had never grown out of her Thirties crush on Adolf Hitler. And that''s only the older generation. Perry goes with fear and trembling back into the lions'' den, and finds that his worst forebodings are mere shadows of the grisly reality.

From master of mystery Robert Barnard comes a brilliantly witty and piercingly observant new suspense novel featuring one of the most dysfunctional families ever to grace crime fiction. Meet the Cantelos of Leeds, England. To call the Cantelos dysfunctional is actually a wild understatement. But is one of them also a killer? Clarissa Cantelo, a skilled clairvoyant, apparently thought so. Believing that her sixteen-year-old nephew, Merlyn Docherty, was in peril, she sent him into hiding in Italy, far away from the rest of her family. She told them he was dead. It was safer that way. Now Clarissa herself has died, and Merlyn, a successful lawyer and civil servant who still lives abroad, has returned to Leeds to claim his inheritance. First, he must prove his identity. Is he really Merlyn or, as some of his long-lost relations say they suspect, is he an imposter? Merlyn doesn''t mind confirming his identity, but he''d at least like to move into the house that Aunt Clarissa left him in her will while he gets to know some of his relatives. And the house may hold some clues to the Cantelos'' past. What is the dreadful family secret that has upset relations between mothers and daughters, husbands and wives, filling even the youngest generation with fear? If Merlyn discovers the truth, buried under decades of deception, his life may once again be in danger. Merlyn must start at the beginning if he is to find the answers. All roads seem to lead back to his grandfather, the formidable Merlyn Cantelo, renowned in the family as an object of both fear and loathing. Though the old man who caused such pain to his family died years ago, his malevolence lives on. Somebody wants young Merlyn gone. With help from police detectives Mike Oddie and Charlie Peace, Merlyn must find that person before the Cantelo curse works its evil again. Wickedly observant and full of his trademark sly twists, The Graveyard Position proves once more that Robert Barnard is in a class of his own.

Master of mystery Robert Barnard, internationally acclaimed for his suspenseful, witty literary gems, cleverly mixes past and present in A Cry from the Dark, an intriguing tour de force sweeping from 1930s Australia to contemporary London. Bettina Whitelaw has come a long way from her childhood in the little outback town of Bundaroo, Australia. Many years have passed, a lifetime really, but she''s never forgotten what happened there on the evening that changed her life forever. How could she forget the school dance, her taunting classmates, dancing with the strange but brilliant English boy, Hughie Naismyth? How could she forget what happened next, when, overheated and exhilarated by the music and the moment, she wandered off alone into a secluded, wooded area? Now a renowned, elderly author living in London''s elegant Holland Park, Bettina faces a flood of memories as she works on her memoirs, even though her focus is more on the frightening things that are happening today. Someone has recently entered her home and gone through her desk. The intruder is clearly not an ordinary burglar. It must be someone she knows. She''s been a little lax in handing out keys, so the suspects are many -- her nephew, Mark; her agent, Clare; her friends, Peter or Katie. Or it could be someone else. What does Bettina possess that this person would want to steal? A puzzle that at first seems mildly disturbing soon turns deadly serious. Someone is willing to kill -- but why? Does the answer rest in Bundaroo or nearer to home? A Cry from the Dark shows us vintage Robert Barnard as he slyly lays the clues that lead to his trademark surprise -- and poignant -- ending.

Robert Barnard, one of the great contemporary masters of classic mystery, returns with a brilliant new tale of passion and deception. Well-known actress Caroline Fawley has given up a successful stage and television career for love and life in the country. International business titan Marius Fleetwood can''t marry her. He already has a wife, though he claims they are "just friends." But Marius has done something very special for Caroline: he has "bought" her Alderley, an elegant country home. If he should die, he''s arranged to leave her enough money to maintain the extensive house and gardens. Of course, some inquisitive villagers would be happier if Caroline and Marius were respectably wed. People in small towns know all, and they will talk, especially about a glamorous actress. Caroline''s adolescent children, Stella and Alexander, seem to accept Marius''s weekend visits without distress. And older daughter Olivia, an opera singer on the rise, is too involved in her own career and romantic intrigues to express much interest in her mother''s personal life. Caroline is happy and the world is good. Until one day when Caroline''s life begins to fall apart. First, a mysterious young man backpacking his way through the countryside arrives at the door. He says his name is Peter Bagshaw, but Caroline sees instantly that he must be related to Marius; perhaps he''s even his son. What else has Marius hidden from Caroline? Who is this man, Marius Fleetwood? Is everything about him a lie? When a murder occurs, detectives Mike Oddie and Charlie Peace must probe the lives of numerous suspects who had good reason to kill. As always in a Barnard mystery, the fun is in the details, the characters, the twists. With big houses, wealth, opera, and obsessive devotion as some of his ingredients, Robert Barnard gives us a witty, richly nuanced novel worthy of the crime-writing star that he is.

Matt Harper, a television and radio personality and a former professional soccer player, has just bought Elderholm, an old stone house in Leeds in the north of England. It''s ideal for him, his partner Aileen, and her three children. Even the attic space seems just right -- the perfect place for a game room or a children''s retreat. But as Matt and his decorator tour the property, they find something that will put the attic off-limits for a long time to come: a tiny child''s skeleton that has clearly been there for years. What happened to the child, and how did its skeleton get into the attic? Detective Sergeant Charlie Peace and his forensic team think the child''s remains have been in the attic for thirty years. Thirty years? Matt remembers that time. It was 1969 and he was seven years old. He was in the neighborhood, spending the summer with an aunt. That was the summer that Elderholm''s owner left her house empty when she went to visit a daughter in Australia. What happened that summer? What memories lie deep in Matt''s consciousness? Where are the other children from that summer who now, of course, are adults? Who killed the little child and why was he or she never reported missing? And who has now written to Matt, assuring him that he had no part in what occurred, that he had gone home to London before it happened? As Matt struggles to recover his memory of that strange summer, both he and Charlie Peace ponder what it means to love and lose a child and how one thoughtless decision can change a life forever. Richly evocative and deeply poignant, The Bones in the Attic is crime writing at its best from one of the great contemporary masters of mystery.

After an unemployed man is incapacitated by his wife''s death, his children, to avoid state care, take over the house and the housekeeping, but their charade is threatened by the discovery of the body of Dad''s nosy ex-girlfriend in their own backyard

Award-winning author Robert Barnard, hailed by critics for his brilliant novels of suspense, proves himself equally master of the short story with this delightful first collection. 16 tantalizing stories show ingenious killers at work in cozy English villages, sophisticated London neighborhoods, and the darkly paneled walls of academe.

Available to American readers for the first time, Britain''s spectacular Crime Club Diamond Jubilee commemorative volume is packed with the best in suspense fiction. This exclusive collection includes devilishly clever tales by Robert Barnard, Sarah Caudwell, Reginald Hill, Charlotte MacLeod, John Malcolm, and others.

Intrusion Detection Systems has long been considered the most important reference for intrusion detection system equipment and implementation. In this revised and expanded edition, it goes even further in providing the reader with a better understanding of how to design an integrated system. The book describes the basic operating principles and applications of the equipment in an easy to understand manner. This book was written for those security directors, consultants, and companies that select the equipment or make critical decisions about security systems design. Mr. Barnard provides sufficient detail to satisfy the needs of those interested in the technical principles, yet has included enough description on the operation and application of these systems to make Intrusion Detection Systems, Second Edition a useful reference for any security professional.

***Winner of the National Crime Short Story Prize*** Robert Barnard''s contribution ''Sins of Scarlet'' won the National Crime Short Story Prize. A woman contemplating suicide on Beachy Head finds a bench dedicated to the memory of herself. An art lover in Venice conducts a spree of mutilations as a response to the Surrealist Movement. At Heathrow Airport, armed police take up positions to apprehend the wrong man... The latest showcase of shorts from the CWA celebrates the ‘who’ in the whodunnit, the psyche behind the psychological profile. Husbands lead double lives, psychologists confuse perpetrators with ex-partners, neighbours reassess the people they thought they knew. It seems if there’s one thing you can’t classify or slap an ID card on, it’s the id. The collection includes stories by two recipients of the Crime Writers’ Association ‘Diamond Dagger’ lifetime achievement award (Peter Lovesey and Robert Barnard), and an American Grand Master awardee (Edward D Hoch, who has published more crime short stories than anyone else, ever!).