Showing results by author "Linda Castillo" in All Categories

Newlywed Chief of Police Kate Burkholder is awakened by an urgent midnight call summoning her to a suspicious fire in the woods. When she arrives at the scene, she discovers a charred body. According to the coroner, the deceased, an Amish man named Milan Swanz, was chained to a stake and burned alive. It is an appalling and eerily symbolic crime against an upstanding husband and father.

On a crisp autumn day in Painters Mill, Chief of Police Kate Burkholder responds to a call only to discover an Amish man who has been violently killed with a crossbow, his body abandoned on a dirt road. Aden Karn was just twenty years old, well liked, and from an upstanding Amish family. Who would commit such a heinous crime against a young man whose life was just beginning? The more Kate gets to know his devastated family and the people—both English and Amish—who loved him, the more determined she becomes to solve the case.

The Slabaugh family are model Amish farmers, prosperous and hardworking, with four children and a happy extended family. When the parents and an uncle are found dead in their barn, it appears to be a gruesome accident: methane gas asphyxiation caused by a poorly ventilated cesspit. But in the course of a routine autopsy, the coroner discovers that one of the victims suffered a head wound before death—clearly, foul play was involved. But who would want to make orphans of the Slabaughs' children? And is this murder somehow related to a recent string of shocking hate crimes against the Amish?

A sadistic killer pushed Chicago cop Marty Hogan past her limits - and it was all caught on video. She lost her job, her sense of self, her entire world until an open detective position in small-town Texas gave her a chance at redemption. Police Chief Clay Settlemeyer knows all about mistakes and second chances - he's still earning his own, so he's willing to give Marty the opportunity to prove herself. But when her ex-partner is murdered, it looks like Chicago is coming to small-town Texas with a vengeance.

From Linda Castillo, the New York Times best-selling author of Sworn to Silence and Among the Wicked, this collection of stories featuring Chief of Police Kate Burkholder combines three amazing novellas for the first time together.

The peaceful town of Painters Mill is shattered when an Amish grandmother is brutally murdered on an abandoned farm. When Chief of Police Kate Burkholder arrives on the scene, she learns that the woman’s seven-year-old granddaughter is gone, abducted in plain sight. Kate knows time is against her - the longer the girl is missing, the less likely her safe return becomes. The girl’s family is a pillar of the Amish community, well-respected by all. But Kate soon realizes they’re keeping secrets - and the sins of their past may be coming back to haunt them....

Despite a happy childhood, successful entrepreneur Addison Fox has always yearned to find her birth mother. And with the unexpected death of her adoptive parents comes a renewed determination to fill in the missing pieces of her life - to find her "other" family. But she's too late. Addison is the sole survivor of her bloodline - a line that a killer is determined to make extinct. World-weary detective Randall Talbot has little regard left for life, but he may be the only man capable of saving hers....

Everyone in Painters Mill knows the abandoned Hochstetler farm is haunted. But only a handful of the residents remember the terrible secrets lost in the muted/hushed whispers of time - and now death is stalking them, seemingly from the grave. On a late-night shift, Chief of Police Kate Burkholder is called to the scene of an apparent suicide - an old man found hanging from the rafters in his dilapidated barn.

While enjoying a sleigh ride with his children, Amish widower Adam Lengacher discovers a car stuck in a snowdrift and an unconscious woman inside. He calls upon Chief of Police Kate Burkholder for help, and she is surprised to recognize the driver: fellow cop and her former friend, Gina Colorosa. Years before, Kate and Gina were best friends at the police academy and patrol officers in Columbus, but time and distance have taken them down two very different paths. Now, Gina reveals a shocking story of betrayal and revenge that has forced her to run for her life.

Summer has arrived with a vengeance in Painters Mill, and a macabre discovery by three Amish children brings the quiet to a grinding halt. Chief of Police Kate Burkholder arrives on scene to find the dismembered body of 21-year-old Samuel Eicher, a local Amish man who owned a successful landscaping business. What twisted individual murdered him in such a sadistic way?

New York Times best-selling author Linda Castillo is known as a “master of the genre” (People) for her pulse-pounding mystery series set in Amish country. Now, together for the first time in print, A Simple Murder features six original short stories starring whip-smart chief of police, Kate Burkholder.

When a young woman is found murdered in a Painters Mill motel, Chief of Police Kate Burkholder is shocked to discover she once knew the victim. Rachael Schwartz was a charming but troubled Amish girl who left the fold years ago and fled Painters Mill. Why was she back in town? And who would kill her so brutally?

Three days before Thanksgiving, two boys disappear without a trace. Eleven-year-old Aaron Kuhns is Amish. Kevin Dennison is 12 and "English". They're adventurers, explorers, and inseparable best friends. When they don't return home from what was supposed to be a fun afternoon of fishing, Chief of Police Kate Burkholder must find the missing boys before the first winter storm of the season bears down on Painters Mill.

In the quiet town of Painters Mill, an Amish family of seven has been found brutally murdered on their farm. Chief of Police Kate Burkholder and her small force have few clues, no motive, and no suspect. Formerly Amish herself, Kate is no stranger to secrets, but she can't get her mind around the senseless brutality of the crime. State agent John Tomasseti arrives on the scene to assist. He and Kate worked together on a previous case during which they began a tentative relationship, but each is wary of commitment. The disturbing details of this case will push them to their limits.

Seventeen-year-old Amish boy Noah Kline is struck by a car as he walks alongside a dark country road late one night in Painters Mill. Seriously injured, he lapses into a coma. Initially, Chief of Police Kate Burkholder believes it’s a straightforward hit-and-run, a driver that panicked and fled. But evidence soon emerges that the incident wasn’t accidental at all - and Kate uncovers a story of teenage passion and jealousy that may have led to attempted murder.

Newlyweds Chief of Police Kate Burkholder and John Tomasetti are happily spending their honeymoon at a beautiful Lake Erie cabin that was once part of an historic Amish settlement. But when a violent storm suddenly erupts, Lovina Nisley, the Amish owner of the cabin, goes missing. Lovina is in the early stages of Alzheimer’s disease, so it initially appears the elderly woman simply took the wrong path, but her disappearance takes an ominous turn when her husband reveals that a developer has been threatening them if they refuse to sell him their home.

Two years ago Joseph King was convicted of murdering his wife and sentenced to life in prison. He was a "fallen" Amish man and, according to local law enforcement, a known drug user with a violent temper. Now King has escaped, and he’s headed for Painters Mill. News of a murderer on the loose travels like wildfire and putting Chief of Police Kate Burkholder and her team of officers on edge. A nightmare scenario becomes reality when King shows up with a gun and kidnaps his five children from their Amish uncle’s house. He’s armed and desperate with nothing left to lose.

Chief of Police Kate Burkholder is called upon by the sheriff's department in rural, upstate New York to assist on a developing situation that involves a reclusive Amish settlement and the death of a young girl. Unable to penetrate the wall of silence between the Amish and "English" communities, the sheriff asks Kate to travel to New York, pose as an Amish woman, and infiltrate the community.

When a historic barn burns to the ground in the middle of the night, Chief of Police Kate Burkholder is called in to investigate. At first it looks like an accident, but when the body of 18-year-old Daniel Gingerich is found inside - burned alive - Kate suspects murder. But who would want a well-liked, hardworking Amish man dead? Kate delves into the investigation and discovers Daniel had a dark side. He was a sexual predator. His victims were mainly Amish women, too afraid to come forward, and he's been getting away with it for far too long. Now someone has stopped him, but who?

ver a decade ago, beloved Amish bishop Ananias Stoltzfus disappeared without a trace. When skeletal remains showing evidence of foul play are unearthed, his disappearance becomes even more sinister. The town’s elders arrive in Painters Mill to ask chief of police Kate Burkholder for help, but she quickly realizes she has a personal connection to the crime. The handsome Amish man who stands accused of the murder, Jonas Bowman, was Kate’s first love.