Showing results by author "Al Lamanda" in All Categories

The Big Woods traces the history of the Boyd Family beginning in the 1850’s, through The Civil War and ending in 1871. It is a fast-paced, action and adventure western, laced wit history, humor, family and love.

On the night of the full moon in Wyoming Territory, somebody dies a horrible and ghastly death by being scalped. For months, the territory is held by the grip of fear and Governor Hale turns to Charles Porter, founder of the Illinois Detective Agency, for help. Porter's two top agents, James Duffy and Jack Cavill, are on holiday with their lady friends, so Porter assigns Joe Charles and Tom Adcock and scout/tracker Joseph Goodluck, a Mexican Comanche, to the assignment. Charles, Adcock, and Goodluck report to Governor Hale in Wyoming Territory. The most recent full-moon killing took place ...

John Bekker returns in an all new crime/mystery/thriller titled The Fellowship of the Bobs. All of his old favorites are along for the ride. His daughter Regan, girlfriend Sheriff Jame Morgan. His ex-partner Police Captain Walt Grimes and his best buddy, Oz, and, of course Wally Sample. Contacted by his old friend and former lawyer to the mob, Frank Kagan, Bekker takes on a new assignment, that of investigator for Kagan and another old friend and former prosecutor, Carly Simms. Simm’s partner, Campbell Crist, daughter of deceased mobster Eddie Crist and owner of the local, minor league ...

After the death of David Kleinfeld, Claire Evergreen’s intended, Claire resigns her position as sheriff of Smoky Point and moves over to the state police as the chief homicide investigator for Long island, New York. One year later, while not over his death, Claire has managed to look past it and resume her life. She remains close to Abby Kleinfeld, David’s father and former mob boss and also with her closest friend, Rose, now sheriff of Smoky Point. On an October morning, Claire catches a bad one. A young woman is found floating at a boat launch by a group of boaters. The young woman ...

Echoes of Dennis Lehane's Shutter Island: Publisher's Weekly. Readers will receive two shocks; the spin from mystery-suspense to sci fi, and then the identity of the killer. : The Mystery Gazette Isolated during a severe winter storm in 1959, the small community of Dunston Falls in northern Maine is completely cut off from the rest of the state. When town residents begin to experience strange occurrences such as unexplained migraines and hallucinations, the stage is set for a brutal killer to begin his handiwork. When Sheriff David Peck investigates the murders of two women, he slowly ...

A dying mob boss skips over his son and leaves his fortune to his daughter, a Catholic Nun assigned to Central Africa. After his death, the nun, Jenna Costello, flies to New York City to hear the terms of her father’s will. To her shock and the church’s dismay, Jenna’s father has cut his son Vincent out of the will and left his entire estate to Jenna, who plans to use the fortune to build a church and hospital in Africa. Outraged at being cutoff, Vincent has his mob lawyers hire a retired CIA mole to plan the accidental death of Jenna so he can claim his father’s fortune. The mole ...

Sinner or Saint? That’s the question on everyone’s mind that comes in contact with the mysterious stranger and lives to talk about it. The stranger is a killing machine who appears to pick his victims at random, but really uses a very select process to make his choice. And he can’t be stopped. Not by the police, the FBI or the special task force chasing him across the countryside. And the more he kills, the stronger he grows. Moving at breakneck speed, Messenger races to its shocking conclusion and the final twist will leave the reader breathless. This is Horror/Suspense at its finest.

Jarron Rourke returns in the fifth installment of The Apostle. He is settled into a daily life with girlfriend Jane Diaz, his niece Pepper and her pregnant friend Jill, when an assignment comes down from his boss, Bennington, The Attorney General for New York that has devastating consequences for all involved. A dying, Irish mobster that disappeared in Ireland, contacted Bennington and requested that Rourke meets with him before he dies. Rourke flies to Ireland where the dying mobster gives him a tell-all journal naming all the Irish and Italian mobsters in New York and outlines their long ...

Good, bad or indifferent, the job makes no difference to LT if the price is right. A jack-of-all-trades in the city’s underworld, LT is a true outlaw when it comes to solving your problems, generally at the point of a gun. In Noir, LT is hired by a doctor and his barren wife to help deliver the ransom money for a kidnapped, surrogate baby. According to the doctor, the young woman he hired to carry his surrogate baby demanded more money once the baby was born. It seemed simple enough a task, deliver the ransom and pick up the baby. Simple enough until a mysterious group of people murder ...

Just Another Day In The Life It’s an all out mob war in The Bronx. When seven million dollars disappears from a Las Vegas casino, the number one suspect is a mid-level Vegas mobster named Anthony. The problem is Anthony has vanished without a trace along with the money. Casino owner, a powerful mob boss named Viny Boots calls upon the highly regarded skills of organization hit man Michael DeSousa to track down Anthony and bring the stolen cash home. This takes Michael back to the Bronx in New York City where he and Anthony grew up in the legendary section known as Little Italy. Once in ...

Jarron Rourke, The Apostle, returns in another mystery/thriller titled Lockbox. One time a member of the Irish Mafia, Rourke was pardoned from prison and recruited by Federal Prosecutor Benning to become his investigator, Paired with Detective Jane Diaz, Rourke is tasked with finding the murderer of members of the Kruger family. Arthur Kruger, billionaire real estate developer, passed away at the age of 103 in a nursing home. At the reading of his will, in addition to the many millions he left family members, he bequeath his most prized possession to his five children, a locked box. A ...

Winner of the 2017 Nero Award for best mystery. Wally Sample is a degenerate gambler who owes money to every major casino and loan sharks everywhere. He is also the youngest heir to the Sample Iced Tea Corporation and upon his fortieth birthday, if he can prove to the courts that he is cured of his gambling addiction, will take his place as the sixth controlling member of the iced-tea giant. Problem is, a month short of turning forty, Wally’s gambling habit is worse than ever. In desperation, he turns to Frank Kagan, the family attorney who decades ago prepared the will for Wally’s ...

Jarron Rourke, The Apostle returns in the fourth installment of the series, titled Paradise. When the daughter of a powerful US Senator is kidnapped from Miami International Airport, the Senator turns to his old friend, Federal Prosecutor Bennington. The Senator’s daughter and her friend were on a Christmas break from college and seemingly vanished in plain sight. Bennington assigns the detail to Rourke, his top investigator. Teamed with his partner and girlfriend, Jane Diaz, Rourke dives into the investigation with little hope and sheer grit.. The trail in Miami, leads them to a sex ...

John Bekker returns in First Light to face the toughest challenge of his career. Hired by a man dying of cancer to locate the baby girl he gave up for adoption forty years ago, Bekker discovers the baby wasn't adopted but sold to a New York couple named Gertz. They named the child Sarah, and Sarah Gertz disappeared without a trace twelve years ago in Washington DC. Bekker uncovers evidence linking Sarah Gertz to the powerful Senator Oliver Koch, who is the next candidate for Vice-President. Twelve years ago, Koch and Sarah had an affair that left her pregnant. Bekker is convinced Koch had ...

LT and Candy return in another action-packed adventure as he takes on the most deadly case of his career. Hired by a distraught father to find his missing daughter, LT quickly finds himself immersed in a game of cat and mouse with the world’s most famous television chef Pablo Venable. Venable, traveling on a cruise ship is the last person to see the missing girl alive and although cleared by the FBI of any wrongdoing, he is more than just an innocent bystander. Much, much more. As LT closes in on Venable, the charming television cooking show host proves to be a dangerous adversary and ...

Rourke is a gifted investigator. He is also a gifted killer, having worked for his Irish Mafia brother as a street enforcer. After his brother is arrested, Rourke goes down with him and spends four years in prison before he is given a second chance at life as a free man. Recruited by the Justice Department to act as an investigator, Rourke’s freedom depends upon his willingness to investigate crimes for the Federal Prosecutor. In exchange for his talents, Rourke is allowed to keep his Central Park West condo and whatever money he had squirreled away in various banks, a considerable amount...

Jarron Rourke, The Apostle, is called back to action by the Federal Prosecutor after an innocent verdict is handed down by a grand jury of accused mobster Tony Roscoe. Arrested for murdering his wife, the grand jury set him free due to lack of evidence. A week later, a grand jury member is murdered, shot in the back of the head with a .32 caliber revolver. A week later, another jury member is killed in identical fashion. After the seventh jury member is killed, Federal Prosecutor Bennington calls in Rourke. Rourke, a onetime member of the Irish Mafia, was freed from prison by Bennington and...

From Edgar and Nero Award Nominee Al Lamanda. John Bekker is called back to action when his close friend Sheriff Jane Morgan seeks his help with a perplexing mystery. Norman Felton, a resident of Midnight Island, drove his car to the mainland county high school and, in an out-of-control rage, beat an exchange student nearly to death with a baseball bat before being shot by sheriff's deputies. Felton's fourteen-year-old daughter Amanda is missing, and with each passing day the odds of finding her grow slimmer. Bekker works around the clock ferreting out details until slowly the puzzle comes ...

When counterfeit money is reported in large amounts from thirteen towns and cities across the country and the U.S. Secret Service is at a loss as to its origin, President Cleveland turns to The Illinois Detective Agency for help. Old friends with Charles Porter, founded of the Illinois Detective Agency, Cleveland brings James Duffy and Jack Cavill, principal owners of the agency to Washington DC, where they accept the assignment. Duffy, Cavill and the rest of the agency members, Miss Potts, Quill, Harvey, Joseph Goodluck and Lester Holt start the investigation by visiting the thirteen ...

Claire Evergreen, Sheriff of small, Long Island beach community Smokey Point, returns in an all new mystery/thriller. After the summer ends and Smoky Point enters the fall season, hunters discover a dead body in the Smoky Point woods reserve when coyotes dig up an arm. Claire has the site excavated and is shocked to discover the naked body of a very old man. Claire brings in the FBI and State police to help identify the old man. Who turns out to be the older brother of Jewish Mafia leader, Abby Kleinfeld, a resident of Long Island. Kleinfeld identifies the body as being his older brother, ...