I'm challenging myself to branch out from just cozies and classic mysteries this year and need recommendations for a "hard" mystery (cop thriller type) and a romantic suspense.. her'e's the catch, I can't do any violence.  I can't handle descriptions of bodies, killings, or gore... any "clean" recommendations that will fit in these catagories?

I think the Leslie Glass books are light on descriptions of gore, etc. but I could be wrong.  It doesn't particularly bother me, so I don't tend to notice.   Mary Higgins Clark is remarkably sanitized.  So much so that it tends to bug me a little, but there's obviously a market for it.

Try Ed McBain books, there are many to choose from, he is classy.

Don't think you are going to like "hard" detective/cop fiction, though!  Too violent for your tastes.  My best friend is like you, I send her carefully screened books I have read, keep the rougher stuff to trade here!

The love & romance forum has several thread scattered throughout on romantic supsense or you could post a new thead asking. I'm drawing a blank and I read some romantic suspense..I think Catherine Coulter's FBI series was mentioned (I've only read the 1st 2 in that series and that pushed my limit on what I could take..not necessarily graphic but the subject matter in those 2), suzanne brockmann's troubleshooters series is popular too and starts with 'unsung hero'.most characters carryover book to book or show up later..starts off with a Seal team andFBI counterinetlligence then becomes 'troubleshooters'.

thanks for the rec's guys... we've got something by each of those authors here at the store... so I can start perusing for my challenge. :)

You might try someting in the Harlequin Intrigue line. They have a nice mix of romance & suspense and are light on the gore. They also are of a size to give you a nice bite of story, but not go on needlessly for another 100 pages with descriptive filler, which I find some of the mass market mysteries do, just to meet that criteria.

Silhouette Books also has a romantic mystery line. I haven't read any. I've heard that they are more focused on the romance than the mysteries.

If you like the silhouette line, Merline Lovelace has a codename danger series she started I think in the lat 90's...4 have been republished in 2 volumes of 2 each and she's added to the line over the years. some are more 'far out' than others (like hot as ice about an air force pilot from 60 yrs prior being frozen and found...good but far out, and one of her laters ones , closer enounters, deals with a ghost but the others I think have been pretty straight forward) night of the jaguar is the first.

also if you want mostly suspense try Merline Lovelace's Cleo North trilogy - I really enjoyed those 3 books and there's a romance though not overly descriptive. the First Mistake - The Middle Sin - The Last Bullet. these are fullsize stories and good.

Sam, a good friend of mine has written several romantic suspense novels under the name Selena Montgomery.  One of my favorites is "Never Tell."

I've just started a new (to me) series that involves police, an amateur detective, and art theft.  These books might fit your challenge as they definitely aren't written in the modern cozy style, although I have not found them to be gory.  The author is Iain Pears, and the first in the series is The Raphael Affair.