Tank & Fizz: The Case of the Slime Stampede
The Case of the Slime Stampede is the first book in the Tank & Fizz mystery series about two crime-solving monsters living under a mountain.
When Gravelmuck Elementary’s cleaning slimes escape and destroy the schoolyard with their acidic ooze, all claws and tails point to Mr. Snag, the school’s caretaker, as the culprit. Determined to clear Mr. …
Rock the Boat
Bring the roof down. Rock the boat.
Webb believes that if you want to reach your dreams, you have to live life loud. Make sure that when you look back, you have no regrets. But when a shady music producer steals one of Webb’s songs, Webb finds out how hard it is for a kid on his own in Nashville to get justice. With the help of an unlikely ally, W …
Tru Detective
Truman’s parents are out of town, and he has made plans with his girlfriend, Natalia. When she doesn’t show up, he is angry. But when he finds out she has been murdered, Truman becomes the prime suspect. With no alibi, he must try to find the truth behind his girlfriend’s violent death. But the more he digs, the more he realizes he doesn’t …
The Boardwalk
Gulliver Dowd is finally on the verge of unraveling the mystery behind his sister's murder when the man who is supposed to give him the scoop, NYPD Detective Sam Patrick, is gunned down on the Coney Island Boardwalk. As Dowd delves into Patrick's accidental shooting, he uncovers a pattern of corruption and deceit involving organized crime and the …
In Plain Sight
News stories of the less fortunate, the socio-economically disenfranchised in North America are too often presented to fascinate or horrify their consumers with a construct of stereotypes which commodify and intentionally erase the real lives of people “covered” by the popular media.
In compiling this collection of seven life stories from Vanc …
The Law and the Lawless
The far-ranging officers of the BC Provincial Police covered an area larger than California, Oregon, and Washington combined. In Yukon, a force of nineteen Mounties were charged with upholding the law across all of Arctic Canada. Set in frontier towns and rural communities from Vancouver Island to the Rocky Mountains to Herschel Island, Yukon, the …
Black Sun Descending
Silas Pearson is plagued by nightmares. In them, his wife, Penelope, who has now been missing for four years, shows him where murder victims are buried across the Colorado Plateau. One such dream leads him to the Atlas Mill tailings site, outside Moab, Utah. There, Silas discovers the corpse of anti-uranium-mining activist Jane Vaughn, who went mis …
Saboteurs
At Trickle Creek in northern Alberta, Wiebo Ludwig thought he’d buffered his tiny religious community from civilization, but in 1990 civilization came calling. A Calgary oil company proposed to drill directly in view of the farm’s communal dining room. Ludwig wrote letters, petitioned, forced public hearings, and discovered the provincial regul …
Alibi
Fifteen-year-old Christine is visiting her eccentric great-aunt in historic Witcombe, where a pickpocket has been victimizing tourists. Aunt Maude owns an antique store and also runs the town’s ghost walk, which gives Christine the opportunity to meet local characters and visitors, including a mysterious young man who seems to know far too much a …
Innocence on Trial
In early-1980s Vancouver, Ivan Henry was an ex-convict still adjusting to civilian life when he was detained on a break-and-enter charge. A short time later he found himself on trial for ten charges of sexual assault—crimes he vehemently denied committing. Henry spent twenty-seven years in prison before a 2010 DNA test proved his innocence and se …
Savour
ReLit Long Shortlist, 2015
Savour is the follow-up to Bateman's award-winning debut novel, Nondescript Rambunctious, and the second book in a trilogy about a dark, suspected serial killer named Oliver. Savour retains the dark threads of sociopathic depravity that ran through the debut novel, but is once again tempered with a tender ray of humanity. …
A Rock Fell on the Moon
In its heyday in the 1950s and '60s, the remote community of Elsa, 300 miles north of Whitehorse in the Yukon Territory, was the epicentre of one of the world's most lucrative silver mining operations--an enterprise that far surpassed the riches produced during the iconic Klondike gold rush. For twelve of those years, Gerald Priest was the chief as …
Homecoming
Fiona’s dad comes home after sixteen months and eight days in jail. Along with her mother and family friends, she awkwardly welcomes him home. Uncle David is there, because he picked Dad up at jail. Dad’s best friend Simon, his wife May and neighbor Elisabeth are also at the house to greet Dad. He’s been away so long, it’s an uncomfortable …
Vancouver Confidential
#1 on the BC Bestseller List
Vancouver Confidential is a collaboration of artists and writers who plumb the shadows of civic memory looking for the stories that don't fit into mainstream narratives.
We honour the chorus line behind the star performer, the mug in the mugshot, the victim in the murder, the teens in the gang, and the "slum" in the path …
The Innocence Device
The year is 2147. Chago, twenty-four, is a prisoner in a world made up only of prisoners and those who guard them. The only bright spot in Chago’s life is his son, Jim-Jim, whose mother is a guard. In an effort to resolve overcrowding in the prison, the warden introduces the Innocence Device, a high-tech machine he claims can determine innocence …
If It Bleeds
If It Bleeds is the first novel in a series of mysteries featuring rookie reporter Nicole Charles.
Nicole Charles didn’t go to journalism school to become a gossip columnist, but the job fell into her lap right out of school and her immigrant work ethic just won’t let her quit to find something she’d like better. It’s a good job, but she str …
Search and Rescue
When a young woman goes missing on a nature trail, small-town journalist Claire Abbott is first on the scene, as usual. The clues to the woman’s whereabouts are misleading, but Claire has a sixth sense—what the fire chief calls a "radar for crime." Trusting her intuition, Claire insists that the search and rescue team look elsewhere for clues t …
The Judgement Game
You live in the country of Torcia, a society defined by sex, and free and addictive behaviour. You read vignettes about criminal and civil offences in the homes, streets, and prisons of Torcia. Traditional systems of crime and punishment don't seem to be working. The Judgement Game invites you to find out what has gone wrong and what can be done ab …
Hair-Trigger
Well into his forties, Derrick Rowe finds himself chasing stray women and stealing cash from the bookstore he manages. Having decided it's time to stop spinning his wheels, he's recently turned to robbing banks. Meanwhile, he bails his friend Jack Lofton out of jail, a burly fellow in an alcoholic free-fall of his own. Rowe soon enlists both Lofton …
The Boom Room
Detective Mervin Pratt is enjoying a quiet dinner at his favorite Italian restaurant when he’s called in to assist at a murder scene at a popular downtown nightclub. The manager has been stabbed to death in his office. The lead investigator, Detective Gordon, no friend of Pratt’s, sees it as an open-and-shut case. He has the suspect, motive and …
Juba Good
Juba, South Sudan.
RCMP Sergeant Ray Robertson has spent eleven and a half months serving with the United Nations in the world’s newest country. He’s tired of the chaotic traffic and jostling crowds that fill the narrow streets. Tired of the choking red dust that blows into the capital from the desert. He can’t wait to get back to his wife and …
Final Crossing
Will and Big O are brothers and best friends—and small-time crooks. Ever since their dad went to prison, they’ve been stealing to survive.
On a ferry ride from the big city, they hatch a plan for one more score: they’ll break into the cars on the ferry during the trip and scrape together enough to get out of town. And maybe out of the criminal …
Bike Thief
Nick just wants to replace the TV his sister accidentally broke before their foster parents find out.
To repay the debt, the sixteen-year-old has to steal bikes, break them down and rebuild them to sell. But the debt and the violence keep growing. Even Nick’s own beloved fixed-gear bike—the fixie he built with his dad—is up for grabs. Should N …
On the Outside
From the passage of Bill C-10, with its punitive, tough-on-crime provisions, to sensationalist media accounts of dangerous ex-convicts, it is no wonder that Canada is perceived as a country increasingly taking a hard line on crime. In reality, the vast majority of prisoners who serve out their sentences will never see the inside of a prison cell ag …
Topspin
Kat is thrilled to be competing in a junior tennis championship at Melbourne Park for the first time.
But things are off to a horrible start. Kat's doubles partner, Miri, is sneaking around at night and asking Kat to cover for her. She's also playing terribly, almost costing them their match. Miri's boyfriend, Hamish, one of the top competitors, see …
Black Liquor
Dennis E. Bolen’s Black Liquor continues his exploration of modern disconnection and the disparate paths taken by those railing against the austere landscape of their lives.
Imbued with lyrical evocations of lost childhood, mature love and deep friendship contrasted against brutal depictions of grueling labour, industrial mishap, historical misfor …
A Woman Scorned
Vancouver city councilor George Hamilton Nash has left his wife of twenty years and moved into a posh West End condo. A wealthy man about town, Nash appears to be enjoying all the pleasures the city has to offer—until he turns up dead. The note left behind indicates suicide, and the police are satisfied with this. But Sebastian Casey, a reporter …
Who I'm Not
Danny has survived everything life has thrown at him: being abandoned at birth, multiple abusive foster homes, life as a con man in training. But when his latest "protector" dies suddenly, Danny has to think fast or he'll be back in foster care again. He decides to assume the identity of a boy who disappeared three years before. If nothing else, he …
The Great Bike Rescue
The summer is off to a lousy start when Levi's bike is stolen from outside the corner store. He feels even worse because he didn't lock it. But when his best friend Riley's locked bike is stolen the very next day, the boys are determined to get both of them back. When they discover there has been a string of bicycle thefts in the area, the friends …
Always Love a Villain on San Juan Island
In the fourth mystery in the Islands Investigations International series, Noel Franklin and Kyra Rachel are called to Moresby University on San Juan Island to investigate a case of possible plagiarism. As they look into the theft, the two get to know the small island’s university. They soon discover another, more menacing crime: the daughter of a …
