Spring Trade Paperbacks: Fiction/Mystery & Suspense

Alaska Northwest Books

The Big Both Ways (May; $16.95, cloth $25.95) by John Straley. In 1935, a man, a woman, a child and a yellow bird row up Alaska’s Inside Passage to escape the law.

Berkley Prime Crime

The Shadow Walker (Aug., $14) by Michael Walters kicks off a new crime series set in contemporary Mongolia.

Bitter Lemon Press

Havana Gold (June, $14.95) by Leonardo Padura takes Lt. Mario Conde into the world of fraud and corruption in postrevolutionary Cuba in the fourth of the Havana Quartet series.

Bleak House

Yellow Medicine (May, $24.95) by Anthony Neil Smith. When deputy Billy Lafitte is kicked off the force in Gulfport, Miss., he’s given a second chance in rural Minnesota.

Bloody Brits Press

(dist. by Consortium)

Mouths of Babes: A Saz Martin Mystery (Apr., $14.95) by Stella Duffy combines celebrity and teenage angst as Saz examines heroes and their flaws.

Cheops Books

(dist. by Book Clearing House)

The Black Stone (May; $19.95, cloth $26.95) by Linda Cargill imagines a coconspirator escaping the Twin Towers disaster and striking again.

Frog Books

(dist. by Random House)

Sweetpea’s Secret (July, $14.95) by Renay Jackson depicts secret hit man–cum–mortgage broker/playboy Horace “Sweetpea” Boudreaux out for revenge.

Midnight Ink

Shadow Waltz: A Marjorie McClelland Mystery (Apr., $13.95) by Amy Patricia Meade finds Marjorie and Creighton solving a case instead of planning their wedding.

Murder at Hotel Cinema: A Five-Star Mystery (June, $15.95) by Daniel Craig turns an opening night bash into a horror scene when the celebrity guest of honor dives to her death.

Thomas Nelson

House of Dark Shadows and Watcher in the Woods (July, $14.99 each) by Robert Liparulo. These first titles in the Dreamhouse Kings series follow the King family managing a mysterious house.

Oak Tree Press

The Pot Thief Who Studied Pythagoras (June, $12.95) by J. Michael Orenduff. A pottery dealer’s life goes awry when an art scam results in a murder charge.

Ohio Univ. Press/Swallow Press

Separate from the World: An Ohio Amish Mystery (June; $12.95, cloth $24.95) by P.L. Gaus examines how views on heredity and inbreeding clash between Amish and “English” cultures.

Pemberley Press

(dist. by IPG)

Lethal Legend (Apr., $17.95) by Kathy Lynn Emerson offers the final installment of the “Nelly Bly”–inspired Diana Spaulding historical series. $2,000 ad/promo.

Serpent’s Tail

Shadow of Light (June, $14.95) by James E. Cherry. The festering racial tensions in a Tennessee town come to a boil after a black grandmother is raped and shot by white teenagers.

Simon & Schuster UK

(dist. by Trafalgar Square/IPG)

The Death Chamber (Apr., $16.95) by Sarah Rayne exposes a vacant jail’s family secrets.

St. Martin’s Minotaur

Severance Package (June, $13.95) by Duane Swierczynski centers on a Company’s employees who find out they’re about to be terminated—literally.

Sunstone

The Natural Selection (Aug., $24.95) by Ona Russell blends fact with fiction in this murder mystery set against the backdrop of the Scopes trial.

Washington Square Press

The Lying Tongue (Mar., $14) by Andrew Wilson narrates a struggle set in Venice between a reclusive expatriate novelist and his would-be biographer. Ad/promo.

Wizards of the Coast Discoveries

The Man on the Ceiling (Mar., $17.95) by Melanie and Steve Rasnic Tem. This fictionalized family memoir is replete with horrors and loyalty challenges.