In the Pacific there is an island that looks like a big fish sunning itself in the sea. Around it, blue dolphins swim, otters play, and sea elephants and sea birds abound. Once, Indians also lived on the island. And when they left and sailed to the east, one young girl was left behind.

This is the story of Karana, the Indian girl who lived alone for years on the Island of the Blue Dolphins. Year after year, she watched one season pass into another and waited for a ship to take her away. But while she waited, she kept herself alive by building a shelter, making weapons, finding food, and fighting her enemies, the wild dogs. It is not only an unusual adventure of survival, but also a tale of natural beauty and personal discovery.

My ridiculously long name is Lady Victoria Georgiana Charlotte Eugenie. Thirty-fourth in line for the throne, I am, as they say, flat broke. When my brother, Binky, Duke of Glen Garry and Rannoch, cut off my meager allowance, I bolted from Scotland – and my engagement to Fishface (I mean, Prince Siegfried)- for London, where I have:

1. built a fire in the hearth -entirely on my own, thank you very much
2. fallen for an absolutely unsuitable Irish peer
3. made a few quid housekeeping incognita, and
4. been summoned by the Queen herself to spy on her playboy son

Less than thrilled with this last bit, I’m wondering what to do when an arrogant Frenchman -who was trying to swipe our family estate! – winds up dead in my bathtub. Now, my new job is to clear my very long family name…

Northern Virginia is ragged and ill-equipped. The battle of Gettysburg has broken the back of the Confederacy and decimated its manpower. Then Andries Rhoodie, a strange man with an unplaceable accent, approaches Lee with an extraordinary offer. Rhoodie demonstrates an amazing rifle; its rate of fire is incredible, its lethal efficiency breathtaking–and Rhoodie guarantees unlimited quantities to the Confederates.

The name of the weapon is the AK-47.

Susanna, Lady Appleton, is ordered by Queen Elizabeth to assist Eleanor Madderly with an herbal she is preparing. The queen’s emissary failed to mention that a man had been murdered at Madderly Castle–and that part of Susanna’s mission is to solve that crime. Traitorous forgery, hidden identities, and secret passages all make her task the more dangerous.

London, 1852. On the shocking discovery of a passenger’s body on the Great Western Railway excursion train, Detective Inspector Robert Colbeck and his assistant, Sergeant Victor Leeming, are dispatched to the scene. Faced with what initially appears to be a motiveless murder, Colbeck is intrigued by the murder weapon – a noose. When it emerges that the victim had worked as a public executioner, Colbeck realizes that this must be intrinsically linked to the killer’s choice of weapon.

However, the further he delves into the case, the more mysterious it becomes. When a second man is strangled with a noose on the train, Colbeck knows that he must act quickly; can he catch the murderer before more lives are lost?

Walter Mosley’s Easy Rawlins has few illusions about the world–at least not about the world of a young black veteran in the late 1940s in Southern California. His stint in the Army didn’t do anything to dissuade him from his belief that justice doesn’t come cheap, especially for men like him. “I thought there might be some justice for a black man if he had money to grease it,” Easy says.

Fired from his job on the line at an aircraft plant, he’s in danger of losing his home, symbol of his tenuous hold on middle class status. That’s a good enough reason to accept a white man’s offer to pay him for finding a beautiful, mysterious Frenchwoman named Daphne Monet, last seen in the company of a well-known gangster.

1773: The Massachusetts colony is torn between patriots who want independence from British rule and loyalists who support the King. At the center is the educated and beautiful Abigail Adams?wife of John Adams, the leader of the Sons of Liberty, a secret organization opposing the Crown.

When a murder occurs in the home of their friend and fellow patriot, Rebecca Malvern, John is accused of the gruesome crime, which was seemingly perpetrated to obtain a secret Sons of Liberty document. With both her husband?s good name and the fate of the Sons of Liberty at stake, Abby must uncover a conspiracy that could cost them all their freedom?and their lives.

Sano Ichiro, the shogun’s most honorable investigator of events, situations, and people, looks forward to the comforts that his arranged marriage promises. However, the death of the shogun’s favorite concubine interrupts the couple’s wedding ceremony and shatters any hopes the samurai detective had about enjoying a little peace with his new wife.

After Sano traces the cause of Lady Harume’s death to a self-inflicted tattoo, he must travel into the cloistered, forbidden world of the shogun’s women to untangle the complicated web of Harume’s lovers, rivals, and troubled past to identify her killer. To make matters worse, Reiko, his beautiful young bride, reveals herself to be not a traditional, obedient wife, but a headstrong, intelligent, aspiring detective bent on helping Sano with his new case. Sano is horrified at her unladylike behavior, and the resulting sparks make their budding love as exciting as the mystery surrounding Lady Harume’s death.

At 15, Miss Mary Russell is of above average intelligence and has dealt with great tragedy. Living with an oppressive aunt for her guardian, daily jaunts onto the Sussex Downs are a way for young Mary to escape. For a few hours, Mary wanders the countryside and reads the books that will prepare her for entering into her degree program at Oxford. But one day, Mary stumbles upon an older gentlemen who will alter the course of her life.

Years into his early retirement, Sherlock Holmes, presently dedicating himself to the study of bees, sees the wit and advanced intelligence in the youth before him. An unlikely friendship soon develops as The Great Detective molds Mary Russell into his worthy apprentice in the art of detection. And as the years go by, and the world changes under the effects of World War I, the pair take on a difficult case of child abduction. Soon they find themselves under pursuit by a master criminal who will threatens their lives, test their detective skills, and the strength of their friendship.