<div>Terror places its stamp on a woman unwittingly caught up in a dangerous game in this gripping thriller from the author of A Collection of Strangers. Jennifer Burch is just a small-town midwestern girl trying to stay afloat in New York City with her husband, a struggling playwright. But an odd request from her Uncle Baxter promises some relief. Always the black sheep of the family, he&rsquo;s asked Jennifer to hand-deliver one of the letters he left with her when he last visited&mdash;and he&rsquo;s sent her $300 for her trouble. Since they could use the money, Jennifer complies. But the man she gives it to is soon found dead, stabbed in the lobby of her own apartment building. Asked to deliver another letter for some more money, Jennifer&rsquo;s suspicions grow. Something happened a long time ago in Central America that connects Baxter to the letter recipients. And now they&rsquo;re fearing for their lives. Jennifer&rsquo;s had enough, but her husband hasn&rsquo;t. He thinks there&rsquo;s more money to be made if they play their cards right. The only way out now is to uncover the truth&mdash;about an international conspiracy of deadly proportions . . . Praise for Dolores Hitchens &ldquo;High-grade suspense.&rdquo; &mdash;San Francisco Chronicle on Stairway to an Empty Room/Terror Lurks in Darkness &ldquo;Dolores Hitchens wrote crime novels that were both tough and compassionate, with a sharp eye for the emotional scars that violence leaves.&rdquo; &mdash;MysteryTribune &ldquo;Almost unbearable suspense . . . Holds the reader to the last punctuation mark.&rdquo; &mdash;Greensboro News &amp; Record on The Grudge</div>

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The Baxter Letters

<div>The beloved author of the Rachel Murdock Mysteries introduces an amateur sleuth who knows murder is never academic&mdash;especially when it comes to love. Professor Pennyfeather is on his way to the desert town of Superstition to help a former student, now an army man. Tick Burrell is a charming troublemaker who&rsquo;s got himself in a bit of a bind. He&rsquo;s due to inherit a fortune when he marries, but until then, his aunt, Martha Andler, holds the purse strings in her iron grip. And now that Tick&rsquo;s engaged for the third time, he wants Pennyfeather to help him convince Martha his intentions&mdash;and his bride-to-be&mdash;are serious. But Superstition has become a hot destination for Tick&rsquo;s exes, both of whom want to win him back. One is a flighty gold digger; the other a striking and sharp-witted beauty. And his no-nonsense fianc&eacute;e is in the Women&rsquo;s Army Corps. When Tick&rsquo;s aunt is found axe-murdered in her hotel room, Pennyfeather must decide who among them stands to benefit the most . . . Amidst the sage and cactus of the small army town, danger lurks, and Pennyfeather, who has Tick&rsquo;s best interests at heart, may be the next victim of a brutal and greedy killer. &ldquo;The story is just as engaging as The Cat Saw Murder and Pennyfeather, while less active and daring than Miss Murdock, proves himself to be more than capable as a detective in this gruesome premiere. . . . The story is rife with traditional detective novel motifs and abounds with fair play and puzzling clues.&rdquo; &mdash;Pretty Sinister Books Bring the Bride a Shroud was originally published under the pseudonym D. B. Olsen.</div>

Bring the Bride a Shroud

<div>Native American lore infuses a southwestern mystery featuring the indomitable Rachel Murdock and her cat, Samantha. The notes&mdash;short and sharp&mdash;seem to strike at the heart of each recipient&rsquo;s insecurities and darkest secrets. Signed &ldquo;Kachina,&rdquo; they&rsquo;ve been sent to a group of friends who met in college, including Rachel Murdock&rsquo;s goddaughter, Gail. When Gail wants to unmask the letter writer by inviting the group to her house in Arizona, she asks Rachel for help. Unable to resist, Rachel scoops up her cat, leaving her sister behind on a tour through the Southwest. As the seven friends reconnect, familiar grievances and new resentments emerge. And when one woman&mdash;as prickly as the cacti dotting the desert landscape&mdash;is killed by a rattlesnake bite, the party takes an even darker turn. A thunderous storm soon washes out the roads, and the group is left on their own with a dead body and a murderer in their midst. Now Rachel must use her knowledge of human nature to unmask a killer before another life is snuffed out. &ldquo;You will never regret having made the acquaintance of Miss Rachel Murdock.&rdquo; &mdash;The New York Times The Cat Wears a Mask was originally published under the pseudonym D. B. Olsen. Praise for Dolores Hitchens &ldquo;High-grade suspense.&rdquo; &mdash;San Francisco Chronicle on Stairway to an Empty Room/Terror Lurks in Darkness &ldquo;For those who enjoy Little-Old-Lady detectives, this should be a pleasing mystery, particularly if active LOLs are preferred. . . . Both interesting and unusual is the motive for murder.&rdquo; &mdash;Mystery*File on Cats Don&rsquo;t Smile</div>

The Cat Wears a Mask

<div>A family torn apart by tragedy becomes the victim of a merciless killer in this gripping thriller from the twentieth-century author of The Baxter Letters. Bad things have happened in the Stoddard household, but nothing as grim as what&rsquo;s to come. One day, young Davie gets a phone call, an anonymous voice threatening to do lewd and horrible things to his teenage sister unless he follows instructions. A little over a week later, another call, this one telling Davie to watch what his father does with his keys when he gets home at night&mdash;and to be ready to swipe them when asked. Briefly, Davie almost recognizes the voice, but then the moment passes. Gripped by terror, Davie doesn&rsquo;t know who to turn to. The recent tragic death of his three-year-old brother has isolated each member of his family in their own separate worlds. And now, someone dangerously close to them stands to gain from their fracture&mdash;unless Davie can summon a courage far beyond his years . . . Praise for Dolores Hitchens &ldquo;High-grade suspense.&rdquo; &mdash;San Francisco Chronicle on Stairway to an Empty Room/Terror Lurks in Darkness &ldquo;Dolores Hitchens wrote crime novels that were both tough and compassionate, with a sharp eye for the emotional scars that violence leaves.&rdquo; &mdash;MysteryTribune &ldquo;Almost unbearable suspense . . . Holds the reader to the last punctuation mark.&rdquo; &mdash;Greensboro News &amp; Record on The Grudge</div>

A Collection of Strangers

<div>This crime novel from the authors of The Man Who Followed Women features two Los Angeles railroad detectives and explosive suspense. Tommy Collins has escaped from a midwestern prison, using dynamite to blast his way out&mdash;and killing a nurse in the process. The explosion was felt over a thousand miles away, where Tommy&rsquo;s sister lives in fear in Los Angeles. She has squirreled her mother and younger sister away, afraid Tommy will come after them for turning him in to the cops. Aftershocks also shake the LA office of railroad detectives Chuck Reeves and veteran John Farrel when some remote railway yards become the targets of mysterious detonations. Connections are made, and the detectives quickly realize Tommy holds a violent grudge against the railroad for firing him from his job. And with nothing to lose, his rampage is getting worse the closer he gets to his desperate family . . . &ldquo;Almost unbearable suspense . . . Holds the reader to the last punctuation mark.&rdquo; &mdash;Greensboro News &amp; Record</div>

The Grudge

<div>Three women are caught in the grip of the past in this Southern gothic mystery from the beloved twentieth-century American author. There&rsquo;s nothing to stop Pock Myles, single and unattached, from traveling to Louisiana to comfort her recently widowed and pregnant sister, Rye. But this is no ordinary visit. Recently, there have been bizarre happenings at Larchwood, the vast estate where Rye&rsquo;s staying with their aunt. When Pock arrives, Rye takes her to the nearby cemetery where her husband is buried&mdash;and his grave desecrated. An odd doll and cruel messages had previously been left there, and now, scorched into the surrounding grass are the words Not Here. Pock is caught off guard by her aunt&rsquo;s dismissal of such things as a prank&mdash;and by her most unwelcoming attitude. One thing&rsquo;s certain: something wrong and unexplained stalks the halls of Larchwood. A strange evil seems directed at Rye, and it&rsquo;s up to Pock to uncover it . . .</div>

In a House Unknown

<div>A love triangle shapes this intricate murder mystery from the popular twentieth-century author of the Rachel Murdock series. When a policeman shows up at her door one morning, Doris Chenoweth is sure her husband, Sargent, is home&mdash;but she&rsquo;s wrong. He&rsquo;s been found dead in his car at the edge of a reservoir. With no one else to turn to, Doris calls her elderly uncle Chuck, knowing he has no real reason to help her since they&rsquo;ve fallen out of touch. But to Doris&rsquo;s relief, Chuck comes to her aid, armed with his law degree. Acting as her attorney, he delves into her husband&rsquo;s affairs&mdash;business and romantic. The revelations come fast and furiously, pointing to infidelity, shady stock investments, and a betrayal of the worst kind. And when Chuck realizes Doris has secrets of her own&mdash;ones that could land her in jail&mdash;he must determine which is a greater motive for murder: love or money . . . Praise for Dolores Hitchens &ldquo;High-grade suspense.&rdquo; &mdash;San Francisco Chronicle on Stairway to an Empty Room/Terror Lurks in Darkness &ldquo;Dolores Hitchens wrote crime novels that were both tough and compassionate, with a sharp eye for the emotional scars that violence leaves.&rdquo; &mdash;MysteryTribune &ldquo;Almost unbearable suspense . . . Holds the reader to the last punctuation mark.&rdquo; &mdash;Greensboro News &amp; Record on The Grudge</div>

The Man Who Cried All the Way Home

<div>Danger appears like a runaway train when a railroad detective investigates a strange stalking in this gripping novel from the authors of One-Way Ticket. When railroad cop Mike Kernehan stumbles upon a trespasser in a Los Angeles railyard one night, he has no idea where the case will take him. It seems the lonely middle-aged man has a penchant for following women, which is what has drawn him there. But what was a woman doing in the railyard all alone? Meanwhile, Mike&rsquo;s also investigating a series of stolen and missing shipments. Thousands of dollars in goods have been taken from trains coming into LA, but no one can figure out where or how the thieves are striking. With veteran detective John Farrel, Mike heads to the barren outskirts of the city looking for motives and means, only to realize that&mdash;like the stalker&mdash;they, too, should have kept their eyes on the woman who liked to watch trains . . . Praise for Dolores Hitchens &ldquo;High-grade suspense.&rdquo; &mdash;San Francisco Chronicle on Stairway to an Empty Room/Terror Lurks in Darkness &ldquo;Dolores Hitchens wrote crime novels that were both tough and compassionate, with a sharp eye for the emotional scars that violence leaves.&rdquo; &mdash;MysteryTribune &ldquo;Almost unbearable suspense . . . holds the reader to the last punctuation mark.&rdquo; &mdash;Greensboro News &amp; Record on The Grudge</div>

The Man Who Followed Women

<div>Murder is personal for a Los Angeles railroad detective in this thriller from an author known for her &ldquo;tough and compassionate&rdquo; crime novels (MysteryTribune). Vic Moine has followed in his late father&rsquo;s footsteps to become a detective for a big Los Angeles railroad line, much to the chagrin of his rich girlfriend&rsquo;s family. But his father&rsquo;s old friend Rock is happy to hear it. Vic has confided in Rock about his latest case: someone is forging freight claims with counterfeit company checks. Meanwhile, an old woman who lives near the freight yards has seen prowlers scaling the fence at night. When Rock is found dead from what seems to be a drunken accident at the very same freight yards, Vic is suspicious, but he&rsquo;s no homicide detective . . . Then, the name on the forged checks leads Vic to people with a connection to Rock&rsquo;s past cases: two men and two women&mdash;one of them capable of the most vicious kind of evil. Praise for Dolores Hitchens &ldquo;High-grade suspense.&rdquo; &mdash;San Francisco Chronicle on Stairway to an Empty Room/Terror Lurks in Darkness &ldquo;Almost unbearable suspense . . . Holds the reader to the last punctuation mark.&rdquo; &mdash;Greensboro News &amp; Record on The Grudge</div>

One-Way Ticket

<div>This classic mystery features a family feud, feline intervention, and the spirited septuagenarian sleuth from The Cat Saw Murder. A strange encounter with a little girl named Claudia and a dead toad sparks Rachel Murdock&rsquo;s obsessive curiosity, and she winds up renting the house next door just to see how things play out. But soon after she and her cat Samantha move in, Rachel realizes they&rsquo;ve landed right in the middle of a deadly love triangle that&rsquo;s created animosity among the three families who now surround her. When Rachel finds Claudia&rsquo;s great-grandmother dead in her basement, she reaches out to a friend in the LAPD to solve the crime. They soon learn the three households have been torn apart by one husband&rsquo;s infidelity and a complicated will that could lead to a fortune. In a house plagued by forbidden love, regret, and greed, Rachel will have to trust her intuition, as well as Samantha&rsquo;s instincts, to survive&mdash;and keep Claudia out of the hands of a killer whose work has just begun . . . &ldquo;You will never regret having made the acquaintance of Miss Rachel Murdock.&rdquo; &mdash;The New York Times The Alarm of the Black Cat was originally published under the pseudonym D. B. Olsen. Praise for Dolores Hitchens &ldquo;High-grade suspense.&rdquo; &mdash;San Francisco Chronicle on Stairway to an Empty Room/Terror Lurks in Darkness &ldquo;For those who enjoy Little-Old-Lady detectives, this should be a pleasing mystery, particularly if active LOLs are preferred. . . . Both interesting and unusual is the motive for murder.&rdquo; &mdash;Mystery*File on Cats Don&rsquo;t Smile</div>

The Alarm of the Black Cat

<div>A newlywed might be newly dead in this feline-flavored mystery featuring a septuagenarian sleuth who&rsquo;s &ldquo;an appealing Jessica Fletcher antecedent&rdquo; (Publishers Weekly). Priscilla Beckett has left a trail of suspicious exes in her wake&mdash;three former husbands who are convinced she tried to kill them. But this black-widow-to-be has found groom number four, and they&rsquo;re happily honeymooning at a desert dude ranch. The fourth time might be the charm for the murderous Priscilla, which is why Rachel Murdock is called in. With her contrarian sister and stealthy cat at her side, Rachel expects to find a dead body. She does&mdash;it&rsquo;s just not who she thought it would be . . . &ldquo;The setting a phony dude ranch; the cast of characters, a set of ex-husbands, a lost sweetheart, a bride of uncertain antecedents, the owners and servant and guests of the ranch&mdash;and Miss Rachel to the rescue, annoying the local authorities, but turning up the right evidence at the right time . . . a pleasant antidote for the tough school.&rdquo; &mdash;Kirkus Reviews Praise for Dolores Hitchens and her mysteries &ldquo;You will never regret having made the acquaintance of Miss Rachel Murdock.&rdquo; &mdash;The New York Times &ldquo;High-grade suspense.&rdquo; &mdash;San Francisco Chronicle &ldquo;For those who enjoy Little-Old-Lady detectives, this should be a pleasing mystery, particularly if active LOLs are preferred . . . Both interesting and unusual is the motive for murder.&rdquo; &mdash;Mystery File </div>

The Cat and Capricorn

<div>The senior super-sleuth is the odds-on favorite to discover if a killer stalks the Hollywood Hills in the final Rachel Murdock mystery. Though not a professional private eye, Miss Rachel Murdock has gained notoriety in certain Los Angeles circles for her crime-solving skills. They come in handy after she witnesses an extraordinary event: a woman being thrown into the window of a pet store. Said woman is Ruth Rand, an actress desperate to find her missing niece, Lila. She is convinced that Lila&rsquo;s husband, a former jockey, killed her. It doesn&rsquo;t help that he&rsquo;s the one responsible for Ruth ending up on the pet store floor. When Rachel agrees to help her, she&rsquo;s drawn into the sordid world of horse racing and gambling. But the more she learns about the lives of those involved, the more she&rsquo;s willing to bet that the truth lies in the haunting figure of Lila&rsquo;s one-eyed cat. Praise for Dolores Hitchens and her mysteries &ldquo;You will never regret having made the acquaintance of Miss Rachel Murdock.&rdquo; &mdash;The New York Times &ldquo;High-grade suspense.&rdquo; &mdash;San Francisco Chronicle &ldquo;For those who enjoy Little-Old-Lady detectives, this should be a pleasing mystery, particularly if active LOLs are preferred . . . Both interesting and unusual is the motive for murder.&rdquo; &mdash;Mystery File </div>

Death Walks on Cat Feet

<div>A spry seventy-year-old sleuth and her feline companion sniff out clues to a crime: “The observant Rachel is an appealing Jessica Fletcher antecedent.” —Publishers Weekly A letter has arrived at the home shared by the elderly Murdock sisters and their black cat, Samantha. It stirs Rachel’s curiosity, and Jennifer’s alarm, as she fears her sibling will once again head off on a dangerous adventure in detection. The letter-writer is an old friend’s granddaughter who explains that a bizarre drawing of a hand has been slipped under her door, making her very uneasy, and she’d appreciate Rachel’s sleuthing skills. Leaving a furious Jennifer behind and toting Samantha in her travel basket, Rachel departs Los Angeles to visit Prudence Mills and assess any possible threat to her. There’d been conflict over her late father’s business dealings, and Prudence’s little sister encountered a prowler in her bedroom. Even more troubling, Prudence’s face has been scarred by an unseen attacker—and for some reason, she fears telling the police. Now, in the snowy mountains, Rachel will be entangled in a chilling mystery—and, as a child of pro-temperance activists, visit a bar for the first time in her seventy years . . . “Dolores Hitchens has been writing novels of mystery and suspense, under a variety of names and in a variety of styles, but always entertainingly and often achieving something more than casual entertainment.” —The New York Times Catspaw for Murder was previously published under the pseudonymD. B. Olsen</div>

Catspaw for Murder

<div>A drunken man is shot dead on his doorstep in this classic mystery starring the &ldquo;observant [and] appealing&rdquo; seventy-year-old sleuth (Publishers Weekly). Walking home wearily from an evening spent poring over the books of the Parchly Heights Methodist Ladies&rsquo; Aid searching for a fifty-eight-cent error, Miss Jennifer Murdock becomes witness to a terrible scene: A man, stumbling drunk, arrives home&mdash;and just as he fumbles with his keys, gunfire erupts and kills him on the spot. Jennifer is determined not to tell her sister, Rachel, anything about it. After all, Rachel considers herself a sleuth, or as Jennifer views it, a busybody who pokes her nose in places it doesn&rsquo;t belong. What she doesn&rsquo;t know is Rachel has just had a visit from a member of that same household, a meek eighteen-year-old taken in after she was orphaned and treated like a servant. Young Shirley has been alarmed by a series of nasty pranks&mdash;and now she&rsquo;s heartbroken, and even more frightened, after finding her pet bird dead. There&rsquo;s something awful going on in the house on Chestnut Street, and neither her prim and proper sister nor Det. Lt. Stephen Mayhew can stop Rachel from finding out what it is . . . &ldquo;Rachel has never yet failed to solve a murder mystery. Never before have her methods been quite so devious and unorthodox as they are in this story.&rdquo; &mdash;The New York Times The Cat Wears a Noose was previously published under the pseudonymD.B. Olsen</div>

The Cat Wears a Noose

<div>A sleuthing English professor looks into the sordid secret life of a student who&rsquo;s gone missing . . . When a young woman comes to Professor Pennyfeather and confides that her cousin Ernestine&mdash;one of his English students&mdash;is missing, he&rsquo;s surprised to hear that the bookish girl in his class is a very different person outside of school. Apparently, in the evenings, she transforms herself into a femme fatale and looks for na&iuml;ve young sailors at the waterfront dancehalls, enjoying fancy nights out at their expense before verbally abusing and abandoning them. Now she hasn&rsquo;t been seen in two days, and her cousin fears she&rsquo;s taken one too many risks. The professor decides it&rsquo;s time to do some research. He wants to know what happened to Ernestine, and what caused the orphaned heiress to pursue this secret life&mdash;one that just may have led to her death . . .</div>

Something About Midnight

<div>A San Francisco police detective becomes obsessed with a sculptress&rsquo;s apparent suicide&mdash;and hounds his new wife into helping him solve the case . . . When Officer Charles confronts a man acting erratically early in the morning on a quiet residential street in San Francisco, he presumes it&rsquo;s a case of public intoxication&mdash;until the man blurts out that Mabel Edwards has hanged herself. The sculptress, who&rsquo;d been working on a menacing-looking Druid statue, is indeed dead. And when the shaken officer briefly leaves the scene, his only witness disappears. When Det. Lt. Stephen Mayhew, on his honeymoon in San Francisco, hears about the death from his old pal Charles, he&rsquo;s not convinced it was suicide&mdash;especially after he hears the nasty comments made by Mabel&rsquo;s elderly neighbors. To his new bride&rsquo;s dismay, he&rsquo;s soon obsessed with his hunch, peppering everyone with questions and asking poor Sara to help him re-create the crime scene. How can she say no? That&rsquo;s what she gets for marrying a policeman . . . Previously published under the name D.B. Olsen</div>

Dolores Hitchens
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Books By Dolores Hitchens (16 Books)