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Best Hispanic and Latinx titles of 2024 (so far)

Celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month (September 15 to October 15) by reading one of these excellent books by Hispanic and Latinx authors.
Celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month (September 15 to October 15) by reading one of these excellent books by Hispanic and Latinx authors.
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Mystery & SuspenseFictionSuspense

Characters with secrets—and stories—to tell

Behind the Book by Lisa Unger

In some respects, the germ for Darkness, My Old Friend took hold a long time ago. Its prequel, Fragile, was loosely based on an event from my own past. In high school, a girl I knew was abducted and murdered. The event—a shocking, horrifying thing—reverberated through the small town where I grew up. And I felt its impact for many years. I wouldn’t say the incident haunted me, but my thoughts returned to that time quite often. Finally, the story, or at least a heavily fictionalized version of it, found its way onto the page when I sat down to write Fragile.

During that process, I met Jones Cooper. When he first showed up in Fragile, he was the husband of my main character Maggie and I didn’t think he had an especially big role to play. As it turned out, he was a critical character. The entire book hinged on his past deeds, and how he’d sought to escape them.

When Fragile was done, I was still thinking about Jones. He and I don’t have that much in common. He is an older guy, in his late 40s. He has retired from his career as a detective, and he isn’t totally sure what he’s going to do next. His marriage is under a tremendous strain as he deals with how his past actions have affected his present, and what they mean for his future. He’s in therapy (very reluctantly). I kept wondering: How is he going to move forward? He has this tremendous darkness within him; how is he going to conquer that? What is he going to do with his life? He can’t just putter around the house! He’s too smart, too interesting.

Usually when I have that many questions and worries about a character, I have no choice but to explore him further on the page. And so began Darkness, My Old Friend, the next chapter of the story.

In a safe, picture-perfect town, the very worst possible thing occurred on a bright and sunny day when all was exactly as it should be.

We had to remain in The Hollows, of course, because Jones is part of that place, and it is part of him. This fictional town from Fragile was at first just a place I came up with because it was similar, if not identical, to the area where I grew up—some hybrid of that spot and an ideal town I had in my head. Near to the city but removed enough to be peaceful and close to nature, The Hollows had a hip, picturesque downtown center, safe streets, a coffee shop, a yoga studio. Again, I didn’t think very much of it at first. But it too evolved and became something more than I expected.

As I did with Jones, I came to sense a great darkness within The Hollows. It has a history, a spirit and a personality. It has wants and needs; it has an agenda. It’s not malicious precisely. Not exactly. I’m not quite sure what The Hollows is up to, to be honest. But I delved a little deeper in Darkness, My Old Friend. And I’m not done with it yet. Or, rather, it’s not done with me.

Shortly after I started writing, a girl by the name of Willow Graves appeared in the narrative. All I knew about her was her misery at living in The Hollows; she hated it. "THE HOLLOWS SUCKS," was what she was writing in her notebook when I first saw her, sitting in her English class, bored to tears. Her mother Bethany, a best-selling novelist, had moved them from New York City after a bitter divorce from Willow’s stepfather. Willow was getting into trouble. So Bethany thought that The Hollows, far from Manhattan and all its temptations, was a safer place for her wild child. Little did she know that trouble finds a girl like Willow anywhere, maybe especially in The Hollows.

I had a lot more in common with Willow than with Jones. In many ways, with her quasi-gothic look, and her rebel’s heart, her penchant for—ahem—storytelling, she reminds me of the girl I was a million years ago. She was out of place, the misfit in a small town, filled with lots of self-imposed angst. She was sure that anyplace was better than The Hollows. I felt for Willow, wished I could tell her to just hang in there. And to try, try, to stay away from that dark place inside. If you follow, I wanted her to know, you can’t always find your way home. But most of us have to learn that lesson that hard way, and Willow was no exception.

It’s the juxtaposition of disparate things that fascinates me: Dark and light, death and life, bad and good. The thin, blurry line between those things keeps me up at night, churning out the pages. And when that line exists within a character, as it does with most of the people who populate Darkness, My Old Friend, I am obsessed with it.

I suspect that my obsession with this idea began more than 25 years ago, when I was a girl, not unlike Willow, living in a place not unlike The Hollows. In a safe, picture-perfect town, the very worst possible thing occurred on a bright and sunny day when all was exactly as it should be. I know Fragile came from there, and Darkness, My Old Friend is certainly an evolution of that story. In a way, maybe all my books began there. Maybe I’m still the girl trying to understand all the many different ways something so horrible could happen to someone so innocent on an ordinary day.

 

Best-selling writer Lisa Unger takes on the dark side of small-town life in Darkness, My Old Friend, her sixth novel. She divides her time between New York City and Florida. Visit her website for more information.

In some respects, the germ for Darkness, My Old Friend took hold a long time ago. Its prequel, Fragile, was loosely based on an event from my own past. In high school, a girl I knew was abducted and murdered. The event—a shocking, horrifying thing—reverberated through the small town where I grew up. And I […]
FictionSuspense

Ending the ‘Child 44’ trilogy

Behind the Book by Tom Rob Smith

One of the most exciting challenges in writing a trilogy of novels is trying to create connections that go beyond having a set of characters return. Of course, there are no rules to writing, but it strikes me that if you’re going to stipulate that there are three books rather than an undefined number, you need to make creative use of that decision.

As someone who enjoys wandering around old churches, whether in England or on my research trips to Russia, I’ve seen lots of triptych paintings. The form offers a way of presenting three images that can be viewed in any order, images which exist in their own right but which are at their most powerful when considered together.

The number three has powerful signals for any writer—suggesting a three-act structure, implying that the books are telling an over-arching story that will come to a satisfying conclusion. But a trilogy is not one enormous novel being split into three parts. The reader must be taken on a journey during each individual novel. Furthermore, since many readers will come to the novels in a different order, readers should be allowed to build the experience in their own way. It must be as fascinating for a reader to construct their relationship to the novels by starting at the end as it is for a reader who has followed them from the beginning.

In the broadest sense, my three novels not only tell the history of the main character Leo Demidov, they tell the story of the Soviet regime, beginning with the Stalinist paranoia and fear, followed by the moral confusion that followed the dictator’s death, which is at the center of my second book, The Secret Speech, and ultimately ending with Agent 6 and the depiction of an empire in decay, expressed through the occupation and invasion of Afghanistan.

Yet beyond historical and biographical chronology, the books within a fiction trilogy must reflect upon each other in some way. With Child 44, I wanted to use the criminal investigation to explore the society in which the crimes took place—not to concentrate on the forensic, or procedural, but to look at the way in which Communist Russia tried to claim there was no crime in its Utopian society at a time when a series of terrible murders were taking place. In a sense, it was about a reaction to the crimes, rather than crimes. It was about one man fighting against a political system that refused to allow him access to the truth. 

With Agent 6 I mirrored this approach, fascinated by the emotional impact of a brilliant and determined detective trying to solve the murder of someone he loves, in a time when geopolitics make it entirely impossible to reach the crime scene. How do you live with knowing that the investigation has been nothing more than a cover-up—and being unable to petition those responsible, unable even to set foot in the country where the crime took place? Once again detective Leo Demidov comes up against political obstacles in his attempt to solve the most important case in his life.

Going further, I used the structural device of echoes and parallels across the three books to take very different angles on similar ideas. In Child 44 Leo Demidov is an officer of the MGB, part of the secret police apparatus. Leo witnesses the brutality of the secret police, he is part of its brutality and he turns his back on it. In Agent 6, he is sent as a Soviet advisor to Afghanistan, where he is ordered to help create an Afghan secret police. He watches with dismay and despair as a young idealistic Afghan woman makes the same mistakes he did, becoming a State Security officer in order, she believes, to build a better country. It was fascinating to reverse the relationship that I created in Child 44.

In similar fashion, the combination of characteristics that Leo embodies as a young man seen in Child 44 are found in the American Communist Jesse Austin, a character based on the singer and athlete Paul Robeson, in Agent 6. The two are a curious pair, similar on many levels, both passionate believers, yet whereas Leo’s idealism cracks, Austin’s remains unbreakable even when his career and wealth are taken from him, even when confronted with the awful truth of the Soviet regime.

So, with the trilogy at a close, I hope I’ve created three books that not only stand on their own but also dance with each other.

After graduating from Cambridge, Tom Rob Smith spent time as a TV screenwriter before publishing his best-selling debut novel, Child 44, in 2008. In Agent 6, Smith’s Russian hero Leo Demidov takes on his most personal case yet—one that takes nearly 20 years to solve.

RELATED CONTENT
Read a review of Agent 6.

Read an interview with Tom Rob Smith for Child 44.

Read a review of The Secret Speech.

One of the most exciting challenges in writing a trilogy of novels is trying to create connections that go beyond having a set of characters return. Of course, there are no rules to writing, but it strikes me that if you’re going to stipulate that there are three books rather than an undefined number, you […]
Mystery & SuspenseMystery

Review

Review by bookpagedev

Joseph Klempner begins his tale of murder and its aftermath by describing its setting a small, ordinary community in upstate New York called Flat Rock. Flat Rock is small enough to fill every public office with volunteers, and small enough to route weekend calls to police headquarters to the Officer on Call. It is through this quite ordinary relay system that Bass McClure, Flat Rock’s volunteer Fish and Game Warden, receives a phone call that proves to be less than ordinary.

Jonathan Hamilton a 30-year-old man most of the town charitably calls slow has called to say his grandparents have been hurt. McClure, long familiar with the Hamilton family, arrives at the main house of the estate to find Jonathan rocking, making trapped animals noises, and covered in blood. Saying to Jonathan, Show me, McClure is lead to an upstairs bedroom, two bodies, and a mess of blood. An investigation begins.

The investigation, conducted by McClure and Deke Stanton, turns up what appears to be solid evidence that Jonathan has brutally killed the two people he loves most in the world. Evidence seems to suggest the motive for the murders supposedly committed by a man most would label retarded was greed.

Because a double murder carries a possible death penalty and New York has recently placed special emphasis on cases in which the death penalty applies, the state calls Matthew Fielder to defend Jonathan. A graduate of Death School, and a firm believer that death is different, Fielder collects a team to assist him in developing a defense for what seems indefensible. With the expertise of a private investigator named Gunn and a social worker named Hillary, plus input from Jonathan’s family, Fielder makes a decision on how to best defend his client only to find his decision was based on inadequacies and clouded by his own prejudices.

Klempner, who has a background in criminal defense, does the expected, delivering an intriguing look at the nuances of the law; he also delivers the unexpected. He winds his courtroom drama around the landscape, characters, and subplot narratives in the same way a favorite uncle strings together seemingly unrelated anecdotes until, without understanding exactly how it happened, you realize a powerful story has been told and you have learned something in the telling.

Jamie Whitfield is a published author and teacher. She lives in Hendersonville, Tennessee.

Joseph Klempner begins his tale of murder and its aftermath by describing its setting a small, ordinary community in upstate New York called Flat Rock. Flat Rock is small enough to fill every public office with volunteers, and small enough to route weekend calls to police headquarters to the Officer on Call. It is through […]
Mystery & Suspense

Jane Eyre inspires a life—and a novel

Behind the Book by Joanna Campbell Slan

I grew up in a chaotic, violent household. Notice I chose the word “household” rather than “home.” To me a “home” is a place of solace, renewal and love. None of those adjectives describe the rundown house in Vincennes, Indiana, the dwelling I shared with my alcoholic parents and two sisters.

Although he wasn’t averse to shoves and slaps, my father’s real forte was emotional abuse. “You will never be able to support yourself. You’ll come running back to me,” he told me, over and over.

I worried that he was right. There seemed to be no way out, no escape. Just an endless horizon of more of the same.

My only respite was reading. “You always have your nose in a book,” my mother would sneer.

Books offered a portal to other worlds, fantastical universes so unlike the one I knew that the fiction seemed obvious. But one book, long forgotten at the back of a bookshelf, gave me more than a mental vacation. It gave me hope. It saved my life. It served as a fingerpost pointing the way to freedom.

That book was Jane Eyre.

Through the rough spots—and there were many—Brontë’s heroine sustained me. “What would Jane do?” I often wondered.

Recall, Gentle Reader, that the subtitle of Jane Eyre calls the tale “An Autobiography.” How was I to know that this story was fiction? To me it rang true. I understood being small, insignificant and plain. At age 10, I had unruly curly hair, glasses, buck teeth and a scar that traced an angry path across my right cheek.

“No one is ever going to love you but me,” my father told me repeatedly, his eyes teary and his mouth quivering with sadness.

The mirror confirmed that he was right, and my mother never corrected him.

But I was no longer alone. Jane Eyre shared my afflictions. Lacking the power of beauty and bankrupt in a world where money begets choices, we were often at the mercy of others. Then Jane finished her education at Lowood Institution—and everything changed. 

Charlotte Brontë’s classic provided me with an answer to my prayers: I would get an education. Turning the pages quickly, I hatched a plan. I would go to college. I would get a degree. Even if I wasn’t attractive, I could be respected. Although I longed for love, I could settle for a tranquil environment.

Much later I learned that “education” comes from the Latin “educo,” meaning, “to lead out of.” Thus, education led Jane—and me—out of the bleak future predicted for us. At Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana, I held down a full-time job, managing a pet shop. In addition, I tutored other students and wrote a weekly column for the local newspaper, the Muncie Star.

Through the rough spots—and there were many—Brontë’s heroine sustained me. “What would Jane do?” I often wondered. The strong-willed orphan became a talisman, my personal lucky penny.

Little wonder that after the launch of my first successful mystery series, the plucky governess came to mind as the perfect protagonist for a new series called “The Jane Eyre Chronicles.” Nor should it be surprising that Jane’s first adventure, Death of a Schoolgirl, sends her to the rescue of a group of schoolgirls who have been largely abandoned by their parents.

Jane Eyre exhibits the important qualities of an amateur sleuth: a passion for justice, curiosity, an understanding of human nature and a mind that grasps patterns. Because she is slight and not terribly attractive, she blends in. Just like any survivor of abuse, Jane tends to be hyper-vigilant.

But she is also strong. Actually, we are strong. In ways I could have never once imagined.

Joanna Campbell Slan is the author of the Kiki Lowenstein mystery series and 11 nonfiction books (including many on scrapbooking). Death of a Schoolgirl is the first novel in her new series, the Jane Eyre Chronicles. It stars Jane Eyre as an amateur sleuth and picks up where Charlotte Brontë’s novel left off.

I grew up in a chaotic, violent household. Notice I chose the word “household” rather than “home.” To me a “home” is a place of solace, renewal and love. None of those adjectives describe the rundown house in Vincennes, Indiana, the dwelling I shared with my alcoholic parents and two sisters. Although he wasn’t averse […]
Mystery & Suspense

Behind the book: Success of home repair series is no mystery

Behind the Book by Jennie Bentley

I never planned to write cozy mysteries. Back 10 years ago or so, when I first decided to try my hand at becoming an author, I thought I’d write romance novels. I was young, not too long married (i.e. I was having sex regularly), and someone had told me it was easy to get published in romance.

Hah. 

Needless to say that didn’t work out. I got pregnant, had a couple of kids, and didn’t write for a few years. Instead, we bought a cheap little house in what’s diplomatically called a ‘transitional neighborhood,’ and I became a stay-at-home mom. Because it was our first house and we were poor as the proverbial church mice, I did things like refinish the floors and paint the walls and re-glaze the tub while the kids were napping. And then we sold that house and bought another, and then another, and then another . . . and pretty soon I decided I’d better get a real estate license, because the way we were buying and selling houses, someone was getting rich, but it wasn’t me. 

I went back to writing eventually, once my eldest son started school and the youngest got lonely enough to welcome the idea of daycare, but I no longer felt the urge to write romance. There was precious little of that commodity in my own life, with two boys under six underfoot, and with two boys under six underfoot, violence was a bigger part of my daily life than sex, anyway. 

So I wrote what I knew, a mystery about a new-minted real estate agent who walks into an empty house and finds a dead body. 

In an ironic twist on what happened five years earlier, someone told me that books about realtors are notoriously hard to sell, but I’d learned my lesson from last time, so of course I didn’t listen. Of course, this time the advice was right on. 

A Cutthroat Business was not an easy sell, although it got there in the end. On its way to publication, though, one of the many editors who passed on the manuscript, nonetheless liked it well enough to hand it off to a friend at Berkley Prime Crime, who called with a question. Given my background in real estate and renovation, would I be interested in creating a series about a renovator for them? Something to capitalize on the current interest in HGTV and "Extreme Makeover: Home Edition." Something with a hot handyman in tight jeans and a low-slung tool belt, and with tips for do-it-yourself projects in the back.

The result was Fatal Fixer-Upper, the first book in the Do-It-Yourself home renovation mystery series. The story introduces Avery Baker, a New York textile designer, who inherits her Aunt Inga’s decrepit Victorian cottage, and who travels to the wilds of Maine to spend the summer renovating it, with the help of local handyman Derek Ellis. (He’s the guy with the tight jeans and the power tools. Just FYI.) 

Of course, as anyone who has ever tried to renovate a house knows, the path is seldom smooth. There’s wood rot and leaking pipes and falling bricks and termites . . . and in Avery’s case, there’s also murders current and past, scheming relatives, a missing history professor, a fake Frenchman, a boatload of valuable antiques, two Maine coon cats, ties to Marie Antoinette, and Derek’s perfect—and perfectly annoying—ex-wife. 

At the end of the book, with mysteries solved and house sparkling, Avery decides to stay in Maine and continue to renovate houses, thus paving the way for my new release, Spackled and Spooked.

The decision to continue renovating is one I understand. In the nine years since we bought that first little house in the transitional area, we’ve bought—and renovated—nine more. Our current project is a mid-century ranch, just like the one Avery is working on in Spackled and Spooked. Big and rambling, with sprawling rooms, big windows, and a sort of open and airy feel. But while the worst thing I’ve encountered is a complicated plumbing problem, Avery gets unexplained footsteps in the hallway when no one is there, a skeleton in the crawlspace, and murder in the neighborhood. And Avery is on the hunt again, knee-deep not only in drywall and paint, but in murder and mayhem and mysteries old and new.

And it goes on from there. Just like me and my list of projects, which include a couple of cottages, a couple of ranches, a craftsman bungalow, and a brick Tudor, Avery is looking at a list of upcoming projects, as well. Most of them more exciting than mine, I have to admit. Renovation is easier on the page than in the flesh. Avery’s from-Victorian-carriage-house-into-romantic-retreat-for-two is arriving in March 2010, titled Plaster and Poison. After that, there’s a 1783 Colonial on an island off the coast that needs renovating, and a little craftsman cottage in the historic district, that gets a quick flip while the TV cameras are rolling. That’ll take me, and Avery, into 2011 or thereabouts.

By then, I’ll probably be on to another project of my own, too. So many houses, so little time.

Jennie Bentley is the author of the Do-It-Yourself Home Renovation mysteries from Berkley Prime Crime. Book 1, Fatal Fixer-Upper was released in November 2008, and went on to become a bestseller for the Independent Mystery Booksellers Association. You can learn more about Jennie and the DIY-series on her website.

I never planned to write cozy mysteries. Back 10 years ago or so, when I first decided to try my hand at becoming an author, I thought I’d write romance novels. I was young, not too long married (i.e. I was having sex regularly), and someone had told me it was easy to get published […]
Mystery & SuspenseMystery

Review

Review by bookpagedev

What distinguishes the recent work of Michael Connelly from other current mysteries is his emphasis on the psychological terrain of his central character, Detective Harry Bosch. A man ravaged by inner demons, Bosch struggles to control them without losing grasp of his latest case. In Angels Flight, Bosch is confronted with his most difficult challenge to date: a prominent African-American attorney’s murder.

Set in a racially polarized Los Angeles, Howard Elias’s shooting threatens to trigger a series of bloody race riots unless Bosch can find the murderer. Elias, a civil rights attorney, has a reputation as an enemy of the LAPD, arguing countless lawsuits against the embattled police force. When Elias and a woman are found dead on a train car, Bosch is recruited by police brass to solve the case as quickly as possible.

Matters are complicated by the fact that Elias was killed just two days before arguing his biggest case against the department. Although the murder resembles a robbery-homicide, certain circumstances point to a possible inside job by rogue cops seeking to silence the black lawyer.

In typical Connelly fashion, there are clever turns and twists in the plot as the city simmers toward a massive racial meltdown. Bosch races against time to find the killers, before everything erupts. His superiors do not want him to turn up any evidence that would implicate the department, but everything suggests that the people involved could be members of the LAPD.

Fans of classic police procedurals will enjoy the well-researched investigation, with its numerous clues, lab findings, legwork, suspects, and astonishing dead-ends. Bosch, walking a tightrope between protesting blacks and fearful whites, seeks the truth despite stonewalling tactics by his department and threats from the black community. With a whiz-bang ending, Bosch uncovers the bitter truth that defies all he has ever believed about his profession or his community. This is sleuthing with smarts and suspense. Connelly’s eighth detective thriller, Angels Flight sets the bar for the standard of this type of fiction even higher and clears it with room to spare.

What distinguishes the recent work of Michael Connelly from other current mysteries is his emphasis on the psychological terrain of his central character, Detective Harry Bosch. A man ravaged by inner demons, Bosch struggles to control them without losing grasp of his latest case. In Angels Flight, Bosch is confronted with his most difficult challenge […]
Mystery & SuspenseSuspense

Review

Review by bookpagedev

Pilot Airie may be losing his mind. Twenty years ago, Pilot’s sister, Fiona, disappeared without a trace. Nothing has been the same since. The disappearance caused his family to unravel; his father left, his brother grew distant, and his mother now sees ghosts. Pilot has now taken it upon himself to pull it all together again, assuming that he doesn’t unravel first.

Raveling is a genuinely gripping and eloquent debut novel by Peter Moore Smith. This novel has the basic structure of a mystery an unsolved disappearance, puzzled and puzzling characters, suspicions on all sides but it is more a psychological exploration than a straight mystery. Smith doesn’t focus on the details of the disappearance. This is not a book with detailed passages on forensics or lab reports. His focus is on the characters and their interactions.

The story begins as Pilot returns home from California, where his brother found him living on a beach. Because his mother’s vision is failing, Pilot has agreed to live at home to help her. All is going well until he begins to hear voices: the electricity in light bulbs talks to him, the woods behind the house beckon to him.

Eventually Pilot is hospitalized. There, his counselor Katherine takes an interest in his case. As she probes deeper into his past, trying to find a trigger for his psychotic episode, she becomes fascinated with the stories of his lost sister. What could have caused her disappearance? Who could have taken her without leaving a single trace? As she digs deeper into Pilot’s memories, things really start to get interesting.

Raveling is an unusual mystery. It starts slowly, as if the reader has stepped into a story already in progress. But the deeper into the book readers get, the deeper the mystery becomes, and the greater the urge to read on. Unlike many mysteries, in which the unfolding of the story provides a greater understanding, Raveling offers little in the way of clues. This is primarily due to the fact that the protagonist, Pilot, may not be entirely sane.

Yet Pilot’s struggle with his sanity is one of the most intriguing and appealing aspects of the book. The entire story is told from his point of view, that of a medicated schizophrenic. If he himself cannot be certain of the facts, cannot be sure of his own perceptions, how can the reader? There are times when the reader must ponder the question, Is this a clue or a delusion? This uncertainty adds immensely to the pleasure of reading this book. Smith’s descriptions of Pilot’s deluded worldview are beautifully written and captivating, providing insight into his state of mind.

If you enjoy a literary mystery, or enjoy discovering a talented new writer, Raveling is the book for you.

Wes Breazeale is a writer in the Pacific Northwest.

Pilot Airie may be losing his mind. Twenty years ago, Pilot’s sister, Fiona, disappeared without a trace. Nothing has been the same since. The disappearance caused his family to unravel; his father left, his brother grew distant, and his mother now sees ghosts. Pilot has now taken it upon himself to pull it all together […]
Mystery & SuspenseSuspense

Review

Review by bookpagedev

To police investigators, the significance of a criminal’s first victim is clear: The first victim is generally the one that is handled carelessly. It’s only later the criminal mind thinks to start making better preparations, thinks to plan more carefully. When the crime being investigated involves the death and possible murder of illegal immigrants, that sloppy criminal mentality may be the only thing working in Lou Boldt’s favor.

Readers of Ridley Pearson’s previous thrillers will be familiar with the adventures of Boldt, John LaMoia, Daphne Matthews, and others associated with the Seattle Police Department. Pearson, the winner of the first Raymond Chandler Fulbright fellowship at Oxford University, does not let down the pace in this intricately plotted suspense thriller that teams up Boldt with an uncomfortable mix of television news reporters and Immigration and Naturalization Service officers all with different agendas.

Pearson’s trademark cameo characters add spice and verisimilitude to the story line: Chinese matriarch Mama Lu who, in the world of jazz, is a ballad, not bebop ; Dr. Virginia Ammond, the Seattle Aquarium’s expert on the scales of the Snake River Coho; Doc Dixon, the medical examiner who, digging in a grave for evidence, complains, It’s not in the job description! Once again, Pearson combines violent action with careful attention to detail and fascinating glimpses of cutting-edge forensic science to craft a story that moves from the dark territory of dockside gangs and casual violence to the domain of corruption in high places and the murderous significance of the first victim. Robert C. Jones is a reviewer in Warrensburg, Missouri.

To police investigators, the significance of a criminal’s first victim is clear: The first victim is generally the one that is handled carelessly. It’s only later the criminal mind thinks to start making better preparations, thinks to plan more carefully. When the crime being investigated involves the death and possible murder of illegal immigrants, that […]
Mystery & SuspenseSuspense

Review

Review by bookpagedev

Pilot Airie may be losing his mind. Twenty years ago, Pilot’s sister, Fiona, disappeared without a trace. Nothing has been the same since. The disappearance caused his family to unravel; his father left, his brother grew distant, and his mother now sees ghosts. Pilot has now taken it upon himself to pull it all together again, assuming that he doesn’t unravel first.

Raveling is a genuinely gripping and eloquent debut novel by Peter Moore Smith. This novel has the basic structure of a mystery an unsolved disappearance, puzzled and puzzling characters, suspicions on all sides but it is more a psychological exploration than a straight mystery. Smith doesn’t focus on the details of the disappearance. This is not a book with detailed passages on forensics or lab reports. His focus is on the characters and their interactions.

The story begins as Pilot returns home from California, where his brother found him living on a beach. Because his mother’s vision is failing, Pilot has agreed to live at home to help her. All is going well until he begins to hear voices: the electricity in light bulbs talks to him, the woods behind the house beckon to him.

Eventually Pilot is hospitalized. There, his counselor Katherine takes an interest in his case. As she probes deeper into his past, trying to find a trigger for his psychotic episode, she becomes fascinated with the stories of his lost sister. What could have caused her disappearance? Who could have taken her without leaving a single trace? As she digs deeper into Pilot’s memories, things really start to get interesting.

Raveling is an unusual mystery. It starts slowly, as if the reader has stepped into a story already in progress. But the deeper into the book readers get, the deeper the mystery becomes, and the greater the urge to read on. Unlike many mysteries, in which the unfolding of the story provides a greater understanding, Raveling offers little in the way of clues. This is primarily due to the fact that the protagonist, Pilot, may not be entirely sane.

Yet Pilot’s struggle with his sanity is one of the most intriguing and appealing aspects of the book. The entire story is told from his point of view, that of a medicated schizophrenic. If he himself cannot be certain of the facts, cannot be sure of his own perceptions, how can the reader? There are times when the reader must ponder the question, Is this a clue or a delusion? This uncertainty adds immensely to the pleasure of reading this book. Smith’s descriptions of Pilot’s deluded worldview are beautifully written and captivating, providing insight into his state of mind.

If you enjoy a literary mystery, or enjoy discovering a talented new writer, Raveling is the book for you.

Wes Breazeale is a writer in the Pacific Northwest.

Pilot Airie may be losing his mind. Twenty years ago, Pilot’s sister, Fiona, disappeared without a trace. Nothing has been the same since. The disappearance caused his family to unravel; his father left, his brother grew distant, and his mother now sees ghosts. Pilot has now taken it upon himself to pull it all together […]
Mystery & SuspenseSuspense

Review

Review by bookpagedev

After a wedding day fiasco, Seattle FBI agent Andie Henning is ready for an assignment any assignment. The one she’s given is a doozy, and could prove to be a real career-maker or career-killer.

A possible serial murderer appears to have claimed three lives. The first two are males so similar as to be twins. The third is a woman, strangled and displayed with the same MO. Andie is not an experienced profiler, but she’ll be working with one, the nearly burned-out Victoria Santos. The agents notice the killer seems to target victims in pairs. The next victim may well be a woman, which leads the investigators to power attorney Gus Wheatley.

Gus’s wife is missing. After years of a loveless marriage, the distracted head of a huge and powerful law firm is shocked to learn that his wife did not pick up their young daughter from tumbling class. In fact, Beth Wheatley has disappeared, and it doesn’t take long for everyone involved to realize the third victim fits Beth’s description but it isn’t her, only a lookalike. Is Beth Wheatley to be the next victim? A phone call, which could only have come from Beth, forces Gus to admit the possibility that she may not be an innocent captive. Victim or accomplice? This becomes the central question of James Grippando’s new novel. The author also explores the definition of spouse abuse, for although there are suspicions of physical abuse, it turns out that Gus has only ignored his wife. Suddenly thrust into the uncomfortable role of both father and mother, Gus’s life and routine are altered forever. The emotions swirling around him are as realistically heart-wrenching as those of his grieving daughter.

After solid reviews for his previous thrillers, The Abduction and Found Money, ex-trial lawyer Grippando enters John Sandford territory with this tale in which an FBI agent faces her first undercover mission, a father faces his first true experience with fatherhood, and Seattle faces yet another serial killer. Under Cover of Darkness packs a punch as it examines themes recognizable from the evening news, especially with its references to Waco and similar situations. It’s a gripping tale that crests with a surprise twist and a satisfying climax.

Bill Gagliani is the author of Shadowplays, an e-book collection of dark fiction from Ebooksonthe.net.

After a wedding day fiasco, Seattle FBI agent Andie Henning is ready for an assignment any assignment. The one she’s given is a doozy, and could prove to be a real career-maker or career-killer. A possible serial murderer appears to have claimed three lives. The first two are males so similar as to be twins. […]
Mystery & SuspenseSuspense

Arson and murder

Review by bookpagedev

In Don Winslow’s second mystery, California Fire and Life, police officer Jack Wade takes the stand to testify at the trial of a man accused of arson and murder. But dramatic surprise testimony by his nemesis a fellow cop reveals that Wade has perjured himself and in fact beat a confession out of the accused.

This gripping scene would play out at the climax of many a murder mystery, but instead serves as the backstory of Winslow’s novel with a twist. Wade, now an insurance investigator after being drummed out of the force for his perjury, is the hero of the book. He wrung the confession from the obviously guilty mob-connected arsonist to protect an eyewitness. Wade’s post-trial career as an insurance adjuster has him scratching the ashes of fires that consume property, memories, and sometimes lives. The remnants left by years of fires, coupled with the embers of his disgrace, have burned out most of Wade’s idealism, leaving smoldering disillusion quenched only by early-morning sessions with his vintage surfboard. One morning he finds himself at the charred ruins of a posh coastal mansion in which a beautiful woman lies dead. Wade believes from the start that the owner, wealthy Nicky Vale, set the fire that claimed the life of his estranged wife. However, Wade’s nemesis from his trial declares the fire accidental.

Wade’s instincts, and the encouragement of his boss (whose motto is " We don’t pay people to burn their homes down"), compel him to try to assemble evidence of Vale’s guilt, incidentally saving his company the hefty insurance claim. The path of Wade’s investigation takes him to a chief suspect who hides a tangle of deception even from those who believe they know his secrets. The reader soon learns whether Vale set the fire, but further surprises are yet in store. A veteran arson investigator himself, Winslow lets his 15 years of experience speak through Wade, from the detective’s joyful discovery of his vocation at fire school, to his years of bitterness as he inspects fires deliberately set. The insatiable hunger of fire as well as that of criminals, developers, insurance executives, lawyers, cops, old flames, and other vivid supporting characters is matched by the reader’s hunger to consume the story of California Fire and Life.

Gregory Harris is a writer and editor living in Indianapolis.

In Don Winslow’s second mystery, California Fire and Life, police officer Jack Wade takes the stand to testify at the trial of a man accused of arson and murder. But dramatic surprise testimony by his nemesis a fellow cop reveals that Wade has perjured himself and in fact beat a confession out of the accused. […]
Mystery & SuspenseMystery

Review

Review by bookpagedev

Most mystery novelists would give their writing hand to have just one successful series. At last count, Edgar Award-winning author Lawrence Block has three a number of cloak-and-dagger espionage novels starring libidinous secret agent Evan Tanner; a darker group of suspense stories featuring alcoholic ex-cop Matthew Scudder; and the whimsical tales of Mrs. Rhodenbarr’s favorite son Bernie, a bookstore owner who moonlights as a cat burglar. Ever the opportunist, Bernie is constantly on the lookout for the unguarded bauble, the unbolted door.

A chance encounter with lovely (and lively) Alice Cottrell affords him the opportunity for some nourishing larceny. It seems Alice is the one-time lover of legendary writer-recluse Gulliver Fairborn, whose Nobody’s Angel was the coming-of-age novel of its generation. At the tender age of 14, Alice moved in with Fairborn, a free spirit some 20 years her senior. Three years later, inexplicably, Fairborn disappeared, his only contact with the outside world an occasional letter and manuscript sent to his literary agent, one Anthea Landau. If these letters could be obtained, they would be worth a small fortune. Or so Alice says . . .

Shortly afterward, in another part of Manhattan, one Jeffrey Peters, aka Peter Jeffries, aka Bernie Rhodenbarr, picks the locks of Anthea Landau’s apartment. To Bernie’s chagrin, the agent lies dead in her bed freshly dispatched, judging by the aroma of gunpowder in the closed room. A pounding at the door convinces our intrepid intruder that he must make good his getaway.

Sadly, Bernie is not as quick of foot as of wit. He is apprehended in mid-escape, and cuffed and dragged downtown to be arraigned for murder. Things take a turn for the weird when the lovely Alice turns out to be one Karen Kassenmeier, a professional thief . . . and get weirder still when the body of Karen Kassenmeier turns up on the floor of Bernie’s apartment. Red herrings abound, everyone has a secret (or two, or three), and nothing is what it seems. With the constabulary breathing down his neck, Bernie must extract the proverbial hare from his Homburg, and pronto.

The Burglar in the Rye, the ninth in the Bernie Rhodenbarr series, has a healthy dose of irreverent humor, a classic gather-all-the-suspects-in-one-room climax, and of course more twists than Lombard Street.

Bruce Tierney is a writer, songwriter, and art dealer.

Most mystery novelists would give their writing hand to have just one successful series. At last count, Edgar Award-winning author Lawrence Block has three a number of cloak-and-dagger espionage novels starring libidinous secret agent Evan Tanner; a darker group of suspense stories featuring alcoholic ex-cop Matthew Scudder; and the whimsical tales of Mrs. Rhodenbarr’s favorite […]
Mystery & SuspenseSuspense

Review

Review by bookpagedev

In the last novel written before his death, the preeminent chronicler of the mafia concludes his mob trilogy with the depiction of yet another memorable, aging chieftain. Don Raymonde Aprile, the Mafia leader in Omerta, is the latest in a long line of Mario Puzo’s characters who have tried to put centuries of vendetta behind them and become upright pillars of the American community. Unlike Vito Corleone, from Puzo’s The Godfather, or Domenico Clericuzio, from The Last Don, Don Raymonde meets with some success by keeping his three children away from the family business at the expense of his adopted nephew, Astorre Viola.

As he did in the two earlier novels, Puzo manages to imbue his less-than-savory characters with a sense of nobility by highlighting their redeeming qualities and downplaying their amorality. The crimes Viola commits during the course of the novel are portrayed as acts of justified vigilantism rather than misdeeds motivated by money. Although Puzo once again focuses on the complex relationship of loyalty and betrayal, the actual violence and bloodshed are more restrained in this novel, which was completed shortly before the author died in July, 1999.

Another new feature in Omerta is the character Kurt Cilke, an FBI agent who was responsible for bringing down many of the leaders of the Mafia in the years immediately prior to the novel’s action. The novel follows the quasi-legal dealings of Don Raymonde’s family and an attempt by a corrupt South American syndicate to take over the family banks for their own illicit purposes.

Puzo’s plot moves quickly as Cilke, Viola, and the syndicate work to gain the advantage on their opponents. Viola’s faction seems outnumbered, yet his sense of honor forbids him to break omerta, a code of conduct which forbids informing about crimes. The fact that Viola is willing and able to live by this ethical code, no matter how strange it might seem, is what distinguishes him from his antagonists.

By championing character whose ways of life are both traditional and reprehensible to modern civilization, Puzo forces the reader to consider the underpinnings of the larger society.

In the last novel written before his death, the preeminent chronicler of the mafia concludes his mob trilogy with the depiction of yet another memorable, aging chieftain. Don Raymonde Aprile, the Mafia leader in Omerta, is the latest in a long line of Mario Puzo’s characters who have tried to put centuries of vendetta behind […]

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