Gone By Midnight - Tor/Forge Blog

Listen to an Audiobook Excerpt of Gone by Midnight by Candice Fox!

March 24, 2020May 3, 2024admin

Did you know that Gone by Midnight by Candice Fox is also available as an audiobook? That’s right, you can listen to the adventures of the rag-tag team of private investigators, Ted Conkaffey and Amanda Pharrell, as they solve the newest crime plaguing the Australian town of Crimson Lake.

All three books in the series are narrated by Euan Morton, who has been playing King George in the musical Hamilton on Broadway since 2017. His narration for the first book in the series, Crimson Lake, won the 2019 Audie Award for Best Thriller/Suspense Audiobook. He’s also narrated other Forge audiobooks, like The Devil’s Half Mile by Paddy Hirsch, so he has a knack for telling a chilling and thrilling story out loud. Read more about Gone by Midnight and listen to the first three chapters below!

Crimson Lake is where people with dark pasts come to disappear—and where others vanish into thin air…

When Sara Farrow’s son goes missing from a locked hotel room, she frantically turns for help to Crimson Lake’s unlikeliest private investigators—disgraced cop Ted Conkaffey and convicted killer Amanda Pharrell.

Just the sort of twisted puzzle that gets Amanda’s blood pumping, the disappearance couldn’t have come at a worse time for Ted. He has just this one week with Lillian, the daughter he barely knows…but the clock is ticking for the lost boy.

Amanda and Ted’s search dredges up the area’s worst characters, and the danger they uncover could well put Ted’s own child in deadly peril.

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Lists

5 Things You Might Not Know About Candice Fox

February 24, 2020February 25, 2020torforge2 Comments

By Alison Bunis

With her blend of vivid, eccentric characters and engrossingly horrific crimes, every book from Australian author Candice Fox is a thrill to read. She’s a New York Times bestseller with James Patterson and their Harriet Blue series, and her next book opens in a new windowGone by Midnight, the next book in the Crimson Lake series, will be out on March 10.

We know the wait is tough, but we’re making it easier with some fun facts to pass the time about mystery-writing superstar Candice Fox.

She’s Spent Christmas at a Prison

No, not as an inmate. When she was young, her dad worked as a parole officer at the local prison, and every year they had a company Christmas party there. The food was prepared by the inmates, who were then put in lockdown for the night. Then the kids would go on tour where they saw the exercise yard, the mental ward, inmates in their cells, and collections of confiscated shivs. She’s sure they’ve stopped doing that by now, though…

Her Mother Took Care of a *Lot* of Children During Candice’s Childhood

In addition to her five siblings, there were usually six foster kids living with Candice and her family at any given time. From her experiences living with them, she heard various dark stories of what her foster siblings had gone through giving her a different perspective into how grim the world could be – a view that was probably further enforced by the fact that a favorite family outing spot was the local cemetery, where the kids could run and play but it wasn’t too crowded for their mom to keep an eye on them.

She Got Into Crime Early

Too early, some might say. Candice recalls picking up her first true crime book, called Killer Kids, at the age of seven. When she first met her future collaborator James Patterson, she mentioned that she’d been a fan since she read his book Kiss the Girls when she was twelve years old. A shocked Patterson replied that her mother really should have hidden away the crime books better.

She Describes Her Mother as a “Functional Hoarder”

One of Candice’s mother’s favorite pastimes was, and still is, looking through piles of what other people are throwing out to see what can be taken home. When she was growing up, the whole family would ride around in a minivan with their mom and go “scabbing,” as they called it. Some of her mom’s most memorable finds were a huge disco ball, five (at least) pairs of mannequin arms, a giant papier-mâché flamingo, a life-sized mannequin in a full bridal outfit, and three sheds full of hubcaps.

Her First Computer Was a Piece of Trash

Literally – it came from one of her mom’s scabbing outings. Candice began asking her mother for her own laptop so she could remove her writing from the family computer and keep her siblings from reading it and making fun of it as only siblings can do. Not long after, her mom proudly brought back an old, bulky laptop with a green screen that had to be plugged in at all times. It was no longer cutting-edge, but Candice was thrilled to be able to keep her writing private.

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Lists / What's New

Eight Mysteries We Can’t Wait to Solve This Year

January 2, 2020May 3, 2024admin1 Comment

By Alison Bunis

The new year is finally here. Take a deep breath and savor the clean slate. But what’s that scent drifting in? Is that…new book smell?? Of course it is! Forge has a whole new lineup of fantastic mysteries for 2020, and they’ll be bringing you all the new book smell, mysterious thrills, and page-turning plot twists your heart could ever desire. To get you excited, here are just a few of the books you can look forward to this year from Forge. On your marks…get set…read!

opens in a new windowBlame the Dead by Ed Ruggero (3/3/20)

opens in a new windowThe nurses of the US Army’s Field Hospitals contend with heat, dirt, German counterattacks, and a flood of horribly wounded GIs. At the 11th Field Hospital near Palermo, Sicily, in the summer of 1943, they also live with the constant threat of violent assault by one of their own—until someone shoots Dr. Myers Stephenson in the head. Former Philadelphia beat cop turned Military Police lieutenant Eddie Harkins is assigned the case, and he has no idea how to investigate a murder. But Eddie is determined to get to the truth. As his investigation gets more complicated and more dangerous, it becomes clear that this hospital unit is rotten to its core, that the nurses are not safe, and that the patients who have survived Nazi bullets are still at risk in this place that is supposed to save them.

opens in a new windowGone By Midnight by Candice Fox (3/10/20)

opens in a new windowIt’s every parent’s nightmare. Four young boys are left alone in a hotel room while their parents dine downstairs. When Sara Farrow checks on the children at midnight, her son has disappeared. Distrustful of the police, Sara turns to Crimson Lake’s unlikeliest private investigators: disgraced cop Ted Conkaffey and convicted killer Amanda Pharrell. For Ted, the case couldn’t have come at a worse time. Two years ago a false accusation robbed him of his career, his reputation, and most importantly, his family. But now Lillian, the daughter he barely knows, is coming to stay in his ramshackle cottage by the lake. With Lillian at his side, Ted must dredge up the area’s worst characters to find the missing boy. The clock is ticking, and the danger he uncovers could put his own child in deadly peril.

opens in a new windowDo No Harm by Max Allan Collins (3/10/20)

opens in a new windowThe latest book in the Nathan Heller series picks up in 1954, with Heller taking on the Sam Sheppard case: a young doctor is startled from sleep and discovers his wife brutally murdered. He claims that a mysterious intruder killed his wife. But all the evidence points to a disturbed husband who has grown tired of married life and yearned to be free at all costs. Sheppard is swiftly convicted and sent to rot in prison. But just how firm was the evidence…and was it tampered with to fit a convenient narrative that settled scores and pushed political agendas?

opens in a new windowDead West by Matt Goldman (6/2/20)

opens in a new windowIn Matt Goldman’s fourth standalone entry in the Nils Shapiro series, Nils accepts what appears to be an easy, lucrative job: find out if Beverly Mayer’s grandson is throwing away his trust fund in Hollywood after his fiancée’s tragic death. But nothing is what it seems in Los Angeles. Nils quickly suspects that Ebben Mayer’s fiancée was murdered, and that Ebben himself may have been the target. As Nils moves into Ebben’s inner circle, he discovers that everyone in Ebben’s professional life—his agent, manager, a screenwriter, a producer—seem to have dubious motives at best. With Nil’s friend Jameson White, who has come to Los Angeles to deal with demons of his own, acting as Ebben’s bodyguard, Nils sets out to find a killer before it’s too late.

opens in a new windowOf Mutts & Men by Spencer Quinn (7/7/20)

opens in a new windowGet ready for another canine crime caper, narrated by the world’s fluffiest PI: Chet the dog. When Chet and his human, Bernie Little of the Little Detective Agency. arrive to a meeting with hydrologist Wendell Nero, they’re greeted by a shocking sight—Wendell has been killed. What did the hydrologist want to see them about? Is his death a random robbery, or something more? Chet and Bernie, working for nothing more than an eight-pack of Slim Jims, are on the case. As Chet and Bernie look into Wendell’s work, their search leads to a struggling winemaker who has received an offer he can’t refuse. Meanwhile, Chet is smelling water where there is no water, and soon Chet and Bernie are in danger like never before…

opens in a new windowThe First to Lie by Hank Phillippi Ryan (8/4/20)

opens in a new windowWe all have our reasons for being who we are—but what if being someone else could get you what you want? After a devastating betrayal, a young woman sets off on an obsessive path to justice, no matter what dark family secrets are revealed. What she doesn’t know—she isn’t the only one plotting her revenge.

An affluent daughter of privilege. A glamorous manipulative wannabe. A determined reporter, in too deep. A grieving widow who has to choose her own reality. Who will be the first to lie? And when the stakes are life and death, do a few lies really matter?

opens in a new windowAnd Now She’s Gone by Rachel Howzell Hall (9/22/20)

opens in a new windowIsabel Lincoln is gone.

But is she missing?

It’s up to Grayson Sykes to find her. Although she is reluctant to track down a woman who may not want to be found, Gray’s search for Isabel Lincoln becomes more complicated and dangerous with every new revelation about the woman’s secrets and the truth she’s hidden from her friends and family—even as Grayson is forced to confront secrets from the past she thought she’d finally left behind.

opens in a new windowA Resolution at Midnight by Shelley Noble (10/13/20)

opens in a new windowIt’s Christmas in Gilded Age Manhattan. For the first time ever an amazing, giant ball will drop along a rod on the roof of the New York Times building to ring in the New Year. Everyone plans to attend the event. But the murder of a prominent newsman puts something of a damper on the festivities. And when a young newspaperwoman is the target of a similar attack, it’s clear this is not just a single act of violence but a conspiracy of malicious proportions. Really, you’d think murderers would take a holiday. Something absolutely must be done. And Lady Dunbridge is happy to oblige.