Barbara Paul

A human lie detector sets off in search of a revolution There are 1,500 hand grenades in Alabama's Styx River, and none of them work. Rebels are attacking UN peacekeeping forces in Burma and Honduras, but just when the battle gets started, they find their guns don't fire. Someone is selling defective weaponry to violent men around the globe, and the United Nations needs to find him. In a world where even the good men are liars, it will take Shelby...

A headstrong young soprano must solve a murder to save her friend The Metropolitan Opera has no time for illness. So when its principal baritone succumbs to a head cold on the eve of Carmen, house diva Geraldine Farrar doesn't hesitate to recommend a replacement: the hungry young American Jimmy Freeman. He's raw, talented, and desperately in love with her-something she doesn't mind at all. But when Freeman is passed over in favor of Philippe Duchon,...

History's greatest tenor searches for a killer at the Metropolitan Opera Giacomo Puccini has always been a flirt. When he isn't writing the most popular operas the world has ever known, he has an eye for the ladies, and he doesn't care if his wife, Elvira, knows it. But after the composer participates in a harmless bit of chitchat with a servant girl, Elvira explodes with jealousy, driving the girl from the house and spreading lies so terrible that...

The freelance hit man known as Pluto takes a unique approach to his profession: clients don't know they've hired the assassin until after the murder. Pluto looks for a conflict between two people, kills one of them, and invoices the other. No one is ever foolish enough to deny payment; Pluto always collects his fee. When Lt. James Murtaugh of the New York Police Department takes on the case, Pluto begins stalking the investigating officer, leading...

A clumsy robotics researcher scrambles to cover up a double homicide Despite his name, King Sarcowicz is hardly regal. A rumpled scientist, he spends every waking minute in his lab, tinkering with the robots he thinks will make human soldiers obsolete. It seems impossible that this gentle soul could create a killing machine, and in fact, he never will. Long before his robot is operational, King himself will become a killer. Working late in his lab,...

A pair of impossible murders leads Marian Larch to a ring of hired assassins Virgil is a businessman, and his product is murder. With operatives scattered across New York, he needs only a few thousand dollars and a photo to erase an unsuspecting citizen from the earth. Virgil's business is boutique, exclusive, and highly confidential. None of his killers know his face. None of them even know his last name. The system is perfect, unbreakable-until...

When their unforgiving lender is murdered, a group of young jewelry associates jumps to a variety of deadly conclusions When the partners of Ellandy Jewels accepted a loan to keep their store afloat, they had no idea that Vincent Farwell would make their lives a living hell. The rich old miser is as unforgiving as a loan shark, and he never misses a chance to remind them that they're in his debt. Finally, Vincent demands full repayment of the loan-$1.5...

A playwright searches the theater for a crazed saboteur Sylvia Markey sits in her dressing room, holding her cat's head in her hands. Just the head-the body is nowhere to be found. This gruesome act of violence was committed just a few minutes before curtain, and Sylvia has no time to grieve. She collects herself, and gets ready to perform. She makes it halfway through the second act before her nerves get the best of her, and she vomits onstage. As...