The Screech Owls have never had such a wonderful surprise. A famous Russian billionaire has offered to pay and fly the whole team to his country. He wants the Owls to visit his homeland so the Russians can learn from the Screech Owls' style of play. The team will play in a tournament while they are there, but even before their first practice on Russian ice, Sarah is taken off the snowy streets. Her kidnappers want ten million rubles in exchange for her safe release! The billionaire wants to pay for Sarah's safe return, but Travis and his teammates decide to take matters into their own hands.

John McPhee's The Ransom of Russian Art is a suspenseful, chilling, and fascinating report on a covert operation like no other. It offers unprecedented insight into Soviet culture at the brink of the Union's collapse. In the 1960s and 1970s, an American professor of Soviet economics forayed on his own in the Soviet Union, bought the work of underground "unofficial" artists, and brought it out himself or arranged to have it illegally shipped to the United States. Norton Dodge visited the apartments of unofficial artists in at least a dozen geographically scattered cities. By 1977, he had a thousand works of art. His ultimate window of interest involved the years from 1956 to 1986, and through his established contacts he eventually acquired another eight thousand works—by far the largest collection of its kind. McPhee investigates Dodge's clandestine activities in the service of dissident Soviet art, his motives for his work, and the fates of several of the artists whose lives he touched.

The Screech Owls get an all-expenses paid trip from Canada to Ufa, Russia, when a Russian billionaire and hockey fan brings them there to teach young people how to play hockey their way. When Sarah is kidnapped for a ransom of ten million rubles, how

From award-winning author Meg Gardiner, co-author of Michael Mann’s Heat 2 JUDGE, JURY—AND EXECUTION. Rory Mackenzie vowed to never return to her hometown of Ransom River, California. But she comes back and does her civic duty. Now she’s juror number seven on a high-profile murder case. While most of the town is focused on the tense and shocking circumstances of the trial, Rory’s return to Ransom River dredges up troubling memories from her childhood that she can no longer ignore. And in the wake of a desperate attack on the courthouse, Rory realizes exposing these dark skeletons has connected her to an old case that was never solved, and that bringing the truth to light just might destroy her. You can’t go home again—and survive—in this mesmerizing crime novel by Meg Gardiner, “a top-tier mystery writer at the top of her game” (BookPage).

Treasure-hunting team Sam and Remi Fargo’s search for a Romanov fortune brings them into perilous contact with an ambitious neo-Nazi clan in this New York Times bestselling adventure. In 1918, a ransom of enormous size was paid to free the Romanovs from the Bolsheviks, but, as history knows, the Romanovs died anyway. And the ransom? During World War II, the Nazis stole it from the Russians, and after that--it vanished. Until now. When a modern-day kidnapping captures the attention of husband-and-wife team Sam and Remi Fargo, the couple soon learn that these long-lost riches may be back in play, held in trust by the descendants of a Nazi guerrilla faction called the Werewolves. It is their mission to establish the Fourth Reich, and their time is coming soon. As the Fargos follow the trail across Europe, Northern Africa, and South America, they know only one thing. This quest is greater than anything they have ever done--it is their chance to make someone answer for unspeakable crimes, and to prevent them from happening again.

In town to compete in a hockey tournament, the Screech Owls explore the historic sites of San Antonio between games and investigate when they discover that a secret and nefarious plot is in the works to destroy the Alamo.

When the world's foremost kidnap and ransom negotiator is snatched by a ruthless drug cartel, Jake Riley becomes ensnared in the effort to save him. But he's up against Los Zetas, an elite paramilitary organization renowned for its ferocity and skill. Now he and his colleagues must navigate the dark underbelly of Mexico, from raging street wars to perilous jungles, in an effort to rescue him before time runs out. After nearly losing her life on her last case, FBI Agent Kelly Jones may never do fieldwork again. Determined to regain her confidence, she joins Jake on his mission—and quickly realizes she's in over her head. Then in the slums of Mexico City, she encounters a former nemesis who's enacting a nightmarish ritual on the weak and vulnerable. Now she has one last, desperate shot to prove herself—by taking down a killer.

Italian law forbids paying ransom to criminals, and Marshal Guarnaccia must find the missing girl before her kidnappers decide to end her life. Two foreign girls are abducted from a Florence piazza in broad daylight. The unusual March snowfall has distracted everyone, even the marshal, who is unsure of what he has actually witnessed. One of the girls turns up in a village in the Chianti, claiming the kidnappers have released her to propose a ransom for the other victim. But the marshal thinks she’s lying.

In Special Assignments, Erast Fandorin, nineteenth-century Russia’s suavest sleuth, faces two formidable new foes: One steals outrageous sums of money, the other takes lives. “The Jack of Spades” is a civilized swindler who has conned thousands of rubles from Moscow’s residents–including Fandorin’s own boss, Prince Dolgorukoi. To catch him, Fandorin and his new assistant, timid young policeman Anisii Tulipov, must don almost as many disguises as the grifter does himself. “The Decorator” is a different case altogether: A savage serial killer who believes he “cleans” the women he mutilates and takes his orders from on high, he must be given Fandorin’s most serious attentions. Peopled by a rich cast of eccentric characters, and with plots that are as surprising as they are inventive, Special Assignments will delight Akunin’s many fans, while challenging the gentleman sleuth’s brilliant powers of detection. Praise from England: “Boris Akunin’s wit and invention are a source of constant wonder.” –Evening Standard “[Fandorin is] a debonair combo of Sherlock Holmes, D’Artagnan and most of the soulful heroes of Russian literature. . . . This pair of perfectly balanced stories permit the character of Fandorin to grow.” –The Sunday Telegraph “Agatha Christie meets James Bond: [Akunin’s] plots are intricate and tantalizing. . . . [These stories] are unputdownable and great fun.” –Sunday Express “The beguiling, super-brainy, sexy, unpredictable Fandorin is a creation like no other in crime fiction.” –The Times

"First published by Faber & Faber Limited (UK) 2020"--Title page verso.