Books in Matthew Hope series

Private detective Otto Samalson sees the tail—a black Toronado he can’t shake. One dark window rolls down, exposing the barrel of a gun, and the detective is dead. Otto had already known his days were numbered and said as much to his friend, attorney Matthew Hope. Having hired Otto to watch a cheating husband for a client, Matthew is now left with only Otto’s tape recorder, filled with proof of an affair. But could the evidence lead to something larger, something that would drive a man to kill? Meanwhile, a mysterious woman is on the run, her face and name unknown to all except two stepsisters who couldn’t care less if a violent pair of Cubans got their hands on her. If Matthew can decipher the clues in Otto’s evidence, there’s a chance he could reach the girl first and save her life. A chilling addition to the Matthew Hope series from Ed McBain, Cinderella is the tale of a woman known by many names and the men who will do anything to find her.

Jack McKinney is a bright-eyed twenty-year-old in the business of buying a snapbean farm with forty grand in cash, and attorney Matthew Hope assists with the deal—until Jack’s found dead in his condo, stabbed fourteen times. The backwoods seller wants his forty grand pronto, but nobody can find the cash. And when Matthew pays a visit to the McKinney ranch, he gets more than he bargained for. Jack’s mother, Veronica, is a woman who looks half her years, with cool gray eyes to match her ambivalent attitude toward her son’s death. The only thing more dangerous than Veronica is daughter Sunny, the mirror image of her mother and a girl who can hold her liquor. Everyone seems to have a theory about the missing money, but Matthew’s the only one who can get to the bottom of the bum deal. The fourth installment of Ed McBain’s Matthew Hope Mysteries, Jack and the Beanstalk delivers our lawyer into a world of seedy folks, sour deals, and a family gone afoul.

Matthew Hope is a divorce lawyer in the town of Calusa, Florida, where the Gulf waters are warm and the women on the beach topless. One such woman, Michelle Benois Harper—a striking beauty with cascading black hair—enters Matthew’s office revealing swollen eyes and a bruised and battered body. After making a statement with the cops saying her husband did it, her body is found on the beach, burned beyond recognition. George N. Harper is a hulking man with pockmarks, flaring nostrils, and rheumy eyes—the ugliest accused man Matthew has ever seen. But something’s not quite right about the case—Harper loved his wife. Yet the cops and lawyers are ready to hang the man who could extinguish such a beautiful woman, and it’s up to Matthew to prove his innocence. An instant classic in the Matthew Hope series from Ed McBain, Beauty and the Beast pairs the good-hearted lawyer with a client who tests his prejudices and proves beauty may be skin deep, but ugly is in the bones.

Sarah Whittaker is a green-eyed beauty with a love for Danny Kaye and white knights. Lawyer Matthew Hope can see all this clearly, despite the fact that whenever they meet the two are under constant surveillance by the mental institution staff. You see, Sarah’s crazy…or is she? Sarah pleads with Matthew to take her case, claiming that her mother wrongfully had Sarah committed in order to seize her inheritance money. And while the mother and doctors in question seem shady, almost cloying in their belief that Sarah is a paranoid schizophrenic, Matthew can’t tell day from night, or Rose Red from Snow White. Meanwhile, the corpse of a woman about Sarah’s age washes ashore in a town nearby. Is there a connection? Is Sarah Whittaker really pure as snow? Is she the Virgin Queen she says she is? It’s up to Matthew to find out. In Ed McBain’s Snow White and Rose Red, Matthew Hope plunges into the noir, twisted world of the most complicated of mysteries—the human mind.

When three Vietnamese immigrants are found murdered and savagely mutilated in Calusa, Florida, police finger wealthy landowner Stephen Leeds as the prime suspect. The now-deceased trio had recently been acquitted of raping Leeds’s wife, Jessie. From his jail cell, Leeds insists that, while they may have gotten what they deserved, he didn’t dispense the vigilante justice. That’s enough for attorney Matthew Hope to take on the case. But every piece of evidence ties his client to the grisly killings, from Leeds publicly vowing to avenge his wife’s assault to the discovery of his wallet at the scene. And it doesn’t help matters that Hope is going up against Assistant State Attorney Patricia Demming, who is dead-set on seeing Leeds fry for the crime. Acclaimed author and fan favorite Ed McBain blends powerful suspense with master storytelling for a thrilling and charged tale of two men—one whose life hangs in the balance and one who must follow a convoluted trail of secrets, seduction, and sabotage to get to the truth.

A long shadow looms above her. Then a hand clamps over her mouth and a blade sinks into her back. Blood splatters on the film reel case beside her, and a young life is cut short. Lawyer Matthew Hope gets a call from Carlton Markham, who’s been arrested for his filmmaker wife’s murder but says he didn’t do it. Witnesses fly forward to proclaim his guilt, but Markham’s not giving up that easily on his innocence. And when Matthew digs deeper into the victim’s business—from heavy financial backers to sleazy egomaniacs—he finds she may not have been the perfect lady she had seemed. The one piece of evidence that could set Markham free and finger the real killer is the victim’s film reel. Only it’s gone, along with the film’s sexy star. Now Matthew needs to infiltrate the seedy side of the film industry in order to find the missing reel and solve the murder. From master storyteller Ed McBain, Puss in Boots is another Matthew Hope Mystery classic, the tale of a woman who aimed too high and the many men who fell for it all.

When Victoria Miller and her backing band, Wheat, broke out with a string of gold records in the sixties, the sultry chanteuse seemed shy of crowds, refusing to perform in public. Years after her last success, Victoria makes her stage debut, but the magic is long gone, and shortly after that, so is she—the victim of a brutal murder. Victoria’s six- year-old daughter, Allison, is missing too, but nobody’s come forward for a ransom. The only clue is a mysterious call—I’ll be stopping by to collect—but who’s collecting, and what? Even if Allison could be found, lawyer Matthew Hope can’t seem to locate Victoria’s missing will with Allison’s guardianship. And when Victoria’s old producer comes forward, claiming Victoria wasn’t quite the natural talent she’d seemed to be, Matthew’s left wondering who gave her the golden touch and why they’d take it back right now. Part of Ed McBain’s masterful Matthew Hope series, Rumpelstiltskin finds the good-hearted lawyer in a plot where everyone’s a suspect, and all debts are paid in full.

Matthew Hope is a divorce lawyer in the town of Calusa, Florida, where the Gulf waters are warm and the women on the beach topless. One such woman, Michelle Benois Harper—a striking beauty with cascading black hair—enters Matthew’s office revealing swollen eyes and a bruised and battered body. After making a statement with the cops saying her husband did it, her body is found on the beach, burned beyond recognition. George N. Harper is a hulking man with pockmarks, flaring nostrils, and rheumy eyes—the ugliest accused man Matthew has ever seen. But something’s not quite right about the case—Harper loved his wife. Yet the cops and lawyers are ready to hang the man who could extinguish such a beautiful woman, and it’s up to Matthew to prove his innocence. An instant classic in the Matthew Hope series from Ed McBain, Beauty and the Beast pairs the good-hearted lawyer with a client who tests his prejudices and proves beauty may be skin deep, but ugly is in the bones.

When three Vietnamese immigrants are found murdered and savagely mutilated in Calusa, Florida, police finger wealthy landowner Stephen Leeds as the prime suspect. The now-deceased trio had recently been acquitted of raping Leeds’s wife, Jessie. From his jail cell, Leeds insists that, while they may have gotten what they deserved, he didn’t dispense the vigilante justice. That’s enough for attorney Matthew Hope to take on the case. But every piece of evidence ties his client to the grisly killings, from Leeds publicly vowing to avenge his wife’s assault to the discovery of his wallet at the scene. And it doesn’t help matters that Hope is going up against Assistant State Attorney Patricia Demming, who is dead-set on seeing Leeds fry for the crime. Acclaimed author and fan favorite Ed McBain blends powerful suspense with master storytelling for a thrilling and charged tale of two men—one whose life hangs in the balance and one who must follow a convoluted trail of secrets, seduction, and sabotage to get to the truth.