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Deadly Animals

Deadly Animals, Marie Tierney’s brilliantly plotted debut mystery, introduces readers to Ava Bonney: a 14-year-old English girl obsessed with decomposing bodies.
Deadly Animals, Marie Tierney’s brilliantly plotted debut mystery, introduces readers to Ava Bonney: a 14-year-old English girl obsessed with decomposing bodies.
Mystery & SuspenseMystery

Big Breath In

John Straley’s nonstop, high-octane Big Breath In introduces the unforgettable Delphine, a 68-year-old cancer patient-turned-investigator.
John Straley’s nonstop, high-octane Big Breath In introduces the unforgettable Delphine, a 68-year-old cancer patient-turned-investigator.
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5 gifts that will shoot to the top of any reader’s TBR

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Dark Sacred Night

Review by Bruce Tierney

Cold cases are a running theme this month, as Michael Connelly pairs series stalwart Harry Bosch with Renée Ballard in their first (but hopefully not their last) adventure together, Dark Sacred Night. Ballard first showed up in 2017’s The Late Show as a solo act, but she and Bosch work exceptionally well as a duo, investigating the unsolved 2009 murder of a young runaway. The case holds a personal component for Bosch, as the mother of the murdered girl is staying at his house. There aren’t many clues available after the passage of so much time, but Bosch is dogged in his pursuit, and his personal creed—everybody counts or nobody counts—gets a run for its money this time out. Connelly does an exceptional job of giving voice to both his protagonists. They share a bit of an outsider’s perspective—respected for their work but not always liked by their peers—and this is what makes them such a formidable team. My favorite Connelly books pair Bosch with protagonists from his other books, like Mickey Haller in The Lincoln Lawyer, and this latest pairing is truly inspired.

 

This article was originally published in the December 2018 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

 

Cold cases are a running theme this month, as Michael Connelly pairs series stalwart Harry Bosch with Renée Ballard in their first (but hopefully not their last) adventure together, Dark Sacred Night.

Mystery & SuspenseMystery

Broken Ground

Review by Bruce Tierney

It’s 1944, the closing days of World War II. Two men dig feverishly in a peat bog in Scotland to create a hole large enough to accommodate a pair of American motorcycles. Fast-forward to current day, when the granddaughter of one of the men decides to unearth the motorcycles. The first motorcycle has survived its lengthy incarceration beautifully, but there’s a dead body where the second should be. Enter Karen Pirie, cold case detective (because, hey, cases don’t get much colder than this), in the fifth installment of Val McDermid’s popular Karen Pirie series, Broken Ground. Things take a turn for the weird(er) when the body, supposedly buried for some 70 years, is discovered to be wearing a pair of Nikes. McDermid’s books are relentlessly excellent, with sympathetically flawed characters, well-crafted storylines, a clever twist or two and crisp dialogue. It’s no wonder she is considered the queen of Scottish crime fiction.

 

This article was originally published in the December 2018 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

 

It’s 1944, the closing days of World War II. Two men dig feverishly in a peat bog in Scotland to create a hole large enough to accommodate a pair of American motorcycles.

FictionAudioMystery

Lethal White

Review by Sukey Howard

After completing the Harry Potter series, J.K. Rowling started writing a mystery series under the pseudonym Robert Galbraith. And happily, her virtuosic talent as a spinner of stories with intricate plots and singular characters is front and center again. Lethal White is the fourth in the Cormoran Strike series, and it’s perfectly narrated by Robert Glenister, who can ace a wonderfully wide range of British accents. In Lethal White, Strike, a London private investigator with a reputation for unraveling high-profile cases, and his able, lovely (yes, their attraction thrums below the surface) assistant, Robin, are in the thick of it, investigating political blackmail and the murder of a Tory minister, all wrapped in a blur of populist politics, replete with a wild cast that includes radical lefties, conservative snobs and a mentally ill young man who desperately wants Strike’s help. After this 22-hour treat, I can’t wait for Strike five.

 

This article was originally published in the December 2018 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Lethal White is the fourth in the Cormoran Strike series, and it’s perfectly narrated by Robert Glenister, who can ace a wonderfully wide range of British accents.

Science Fiction & FantasyThriller

Someone Like Me

Review by Alice Gunther

Best known for zombie-apocalypse thriller The Girl With All the Gifts, M.R. Carey explores a subtler infestation in Someone Like Me, juxtaposing two troubled women whose coping mechanisms have taken on lives of their own. When Liz Kendall is assaulted by her abusive ex-husband, her body retaliates violently without her input, her hand operating “like a glove on someone else’s hand.” “She hadn’t willed this; she had only watched it, her nervous system dragged along in the wake of decisions made (instantly, enthusiastically) elsewhere.” Liz’s therapist speculates that, finding her life in danger, she created an alter ego to handle a task too repellant for the conscious Liz to touch. But once evoked, this restless new iteration of Liz—who appears to have arrived with an agenda of her own—is not so easily dispelled.

Meanwhile, 16-year-old Fran Watts suffers from hallucinatory episodes in the wake of a childhood trauma and draws comfort from the protective presence of “Lady Jinx,” a sword-wielding cartoon character from her favorite TV show. (Fran is conscious of Jinx’s unreality but regards her as a “cherished symptom.” “Maybe you’re my symptom,” the vision counters airily.) Part of the fun of both storylines is the question of whether these psychological visitations represent a real supernatural manifestation, and Carey is careful not to tip either hand too early in the game. (In a Stephen King-esque touch, he also cannily inserts smaller, odder questions to maintain our investment: why, Fran wonders, does her imagined companion have a speech impediment that the televised Jinx does not?)

At its bloodiest and most baleful, Someone Like Me can’t quite work up the Gone Girl level of feminist shock it aims for—the bent of its storyline forces goodhearted single mother Liz to remain frustratingly disassociated from her vengeful double “Beth”—but its human-focused horror should be a draw for the “Stranger Things” crowd. The unfolding friendship between Liz’s teenaged son Zac and the outcast Fran invites a similar sympathy for the freaks and loners of the world, and it’s not hard to imagine the hag-ridden Liz played by Winona Ryder. Before you start casting the Netflix adaptation, however, appreciate the features baked into the literary format, such as the changing icons in the chapter headings that hint at whose perspective is coming next. Just as The Girl With All the Gifts reengineered the zombie pandemic, Someone Like Me plumbs familiar horror premises to find a few new ingredients for the old Hyde formula.

 

ALSO IN BOOKPAGE: Read our Q&A with M.R. Carey.

Best known for zombie-apocalypse thriller The Girl with All the Gifts, M.R. Carey explores a subtler infestation in Someone Like Me, juxtaposing two troubled women whose coping mechanisms have taken on lives of their own.

Mystery & SuspenseSuspense

In the Galway Silence

Review by Bruce Tierney

Top Pick in Mystery, November 2018

Ken Bruen’s Jack Taylor series has been a mainstay of my professional and pleasure reading since the Shamus Award-winning The Guards (2001). The series follows the downfall of Galway cop Taylor and his efforts to climb out of the (very deep) hole he created for himself with his alcoholism and his exceptionally poor choices of friends and lovers. The opening pages of In the Galway Silence find Taylor a little more settled than before: There is a romantic interest that tentatively seems to be working out, a bit of money in the bank, and he has the drinking under control for the most part. When bad stuff starts happening, only Taylor’s harshest critic could assign the responsibility to him—although it goes without saying that Taylor is his own harshest critic. One child is kidnapped and brutalized, another murdered, and a killer is on the rampage. Taylor knows who the culprit is and is powerless to do anything about it. But you can push Taylor only so far, and when he snaps, he’s gonna go bat%#@& crazy, which is the high point of Bruen’s books for most readers. Taut plotting, a staccato first-person narrative, deeply flawed yet sympathetic characters and the windy, wet Irish milieu conspire to put Bruen’s novels into a class by themselves.

 

This article was originally published in the November 2018 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Ken Bruen’s Jack Taylor series has been a mainstay of my professional and pleasure reading since the Shamus Award-winning The Guards (2001).

Mystery & SuspenseSuspense

Forever and a Day

Review by Bruce Tierney

Occasionally an author’s estate or a publisher gets the idea to craft a prequel to a popular series, and Anthony Horowitz performs this duty for ace British spy James Bond in Forever and a Day. As the book opens, M (the big boss of MI6) is discussing the death of agent 007, which initially seems odd, as this is at the inception of Bond’s illustrious career. But it turns out that the 007 under discussion is the previous holder of that particular license-to-kill number, and Bond is quickly promoted to take on his predecessor’s responsibilities. His mission takes him to the south of France, where he engages the first of the legendary villains that will characterize the adventures of Bond’s later life. The book uses some source material from original Bond author Ian Fleming, and of all the Bond books that have come out since Fleming’s death, this one may hew closest to the originals. The racy English sports cars, check. The sultry femme fatale, check. The oversize (both in girth and in ego) villain, check. Oh, and here’s a bonus: For those who have ever wondered why Bond drinks his martinis shaken, not stirred, this book is where you will find the answer.

 

This article was originally published in the November 2018 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Occasionally an author’s estate or a publisher gets the idea to craft a prequel to a popular series, and Anthony Horowitz performs this duty for ace British spy James Bond in Forever and a Day.

Mystery & SuspenseSuspense

Go to My Grave

Review by Bruce Tierney

Catriona McPherson successfully channels the mystery chops of Agatha Christie and the dialogue skills of Noël Coward (apologies for the dated references, but this book has that sort of feel about it) in her standalone psychological thriller Go to My Grave. Back in 1991, there was a Sweet 16-ish party at a Scottish manor house that had seen better days, and something seriously awful happened. Now in present day, whether by happenstance or by design, several of the 1991 revelers find themselves back at the same B & B, which has been restored and is virtually unrecognizable. The eight guests are all family members, by blood or by marriage. But there is bad blood—and bad marriage—on display here, and another something awful is poised to take place. I’m not giving anything away to say that even a newbie reader of suspense fiction will feel a Stephen King-esque prickle of menace as things start to get out of hand, and even the most jaded of suspense aficionados should be gobsmacked by the twist at the end.

 

This article was originally published in the November 2018 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

 

Catriona McPherson successfully channels the mystery chops of Agatha Christie and the dialogue skills of Noël Coward (apologies for the dated references, but this book has that sort of feel about it) in her standalone psychological thriller Go to My Grave.

Mystery & SuspenseMystery

The Line

Review by Bruce Tierney

Martin Limón’s fine series of military police procedurals, set in South Korea in the mid-1970s, features George Sueño and his sidekick, Ernie Bascom—U.S. Army Criminal Investigation Division agents who are the go-to guys when there’s a murder or some similarly sensitive issue regarding the military in the Land of the Morning Calm. The Line finds our heroes investigating the murder of a young Korean soldier whose body is found a few feet north of the line dividing North Korea from South. Technically, Sueño and Bascom shouldn’t have dragged the body back across the line into the South, but they’ve never been sticklers for details like that. When a suspect presents himself, the powers that be are eager to pin the murder on him. Sueño and Bascom think the whole thing is just a little too pat, however, and despite explicit orders to the contrary, they decide to delve into the matter. They find themselves caught up in a criminal enterprise that involves fraud, smuggling and perhaps human trafficking, plus the aforementioned murder. I have read every Limón book since 1992’s Jade Lady Burning, and I have every intention of continuing to do so; they are that good.

 

This article was originally published in the November 2018 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Martin Limón’s fine series of military police procedurals, set in South Korea in the mid-1970s, features George Sueño and his sidekick, Ernie Bascom—U.S. Army Criminal Investigation Division agents who are the go-to guys when there’s a murder or some similarly sensitive issue regarding the military in the Land of the Morning Calm.

Mystery & SuspenseMysteryCozy Mystery

A Shot in the Dark

Review by Heather Seggel

Top Pick in Cozies, November 2018

In the 1950s, Brighton, England, was bucolic and lovely—if you disregard the hooligans, Teddy Boys and other criminal mischief- makers lurking about. In A Shot in the Dark, author Lynne Truss of Eats, Shoots and Leaves (2003) fame introduces Inspector Steine, a police captain who wants nothing more than for crime to simply relocate itself so he can enjoy his ice cream in peace. When a well-known theater critic is gunned down just before he’s supposed to share crucial evidence in an old case, earnest Constable Twitten is determined to buck departmental tradition and actually solve a crime. This farcical tale is packed with interwoven plotlines, clues strewn about like confetti and a comically oblivious chief inspector. It reads like a stage comedy, and in fact Truss has written four seasons’ worth of Inspector Steine dramas for BBC Radio. There are no dark and stormy nights here, just gorgeous seaside views marred by occasional corpses. The ’60s are coming, but for now, women are still largely ignored; this turns out to be its own kind of liberation, since who would suspect them? Sharp and witty, A Shot in the Dark is a good time.

 

This article was originally published in the November 2018 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

 

In the 1950s, Brighton, England, was bucolic and lovely—if you disregard the hooligans, Teddy Boys and other criminal mischief- makers lurking about.

Mystery & SuspenseMysteryCozy Mystery

Silver Anniversary Murder

Review by Heather Seggel

The town of Tinker’s Cove, Maine, is in an introspective mood at the start of Silver Anniversary Murder. A quarrelsome couple is renewing their vows, and everyone’s invited. Lucy Stone reaches out to her best friend, Beth, to reminisce about her own wedding day, only to learn that Beth has died. But was it suicide, or did one of Beth’s four ex-husbands help her off that balcony? To find out, Lucy goes back to New York City and reflects on her own past while searching for clues. This is bestselling author Leslie Meier’s 25th Lucy Stone mystery, but the small-town hospitality of Tinker’s Cove welcomes all readers, new and old alike. Lucy is observant by nature, and her reporter’s instincts are both an asset and a liability; anyone with something to hide had better do it well, or else keep Lucy out of the way. The resolution to this mystery takes a few unexpectedly dark turns, but Lucy lands on her feet. After all, it’s hardly her first time to be embroiled in matters of life and death.

 

This article was originally published in the November 2018 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

 

The town of Tinker’s Cove, Maine, is in an introspective mood at the start of Silver Anniversary Murder.

Mystery & SuspenseMysteryCozy Mystery

Bird, Bath, and Beyond

Review by Heather Seggel

E.J. Copperman’s second entry in the Agent to the Paws series, Bird, Bath, and Beyond, finds animal talent agent Kay Powell on the set of a TV show with a parrot whose owner has the flu. When the show’s (human) star turns up dead, the parrot is surprisingly talkative, and since he’s Kay’s client, she’s drawn into the search for a killer. The well-populated story zips along—Kay’s parents visit, the show’s cast and crew are all suspects, and the human-animal banter is snappy. Glimpses of show business at its best and worst (the hard work, the giant egos) and the ways animals are used on film give this clever tale a realistic feel. So far, Kay is two for two when it comes to adopting her animal clients. As the series evolves, what kind of zoo will she end up with? For cozy fans, it will be fun to find out.

 

This article was originally published in the November 2018 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

E.J. Copperman’s second entry in the Agent to the Paws series, Bird, Bath, and Beyond, finds animal talent agent Kay Powell on the set of a TV show with a parrot whose owner has the flu.

AudioMysteryHistorical Mystery

Murder on Millionaires’ Row

Review by Sukey Howard

I’m not a big fan of paranormal fiction, but Rose Gallagher, the protagonist of Erin Lindsey’s Gilded Age thriller Murder on Millionaires’ Row, is so disarmingly charming and fabulously feisty that I happily followed the spectral happenings that swirl around her from the get-go. Though 19-year-old Rose grew up in the rough-and-tumble Five Points, a notorious Dickensian slum in Lower Manhattan, she’s now a maid in a Fifth Avenue townhouse owned by Thomas Wiltshire, an elegant, eligible young Englishman. Rose, of course, has a full-throttle crush on her boss, and when he goes missing, she uses all her grit and innate talent to solve the mystery of his disappearance. When that’s achieved, she finds herself in Thomas’ world, in which special Pinkerton operatives investigate supernatural events, work with witches and return errant shades to the afterlife. This engagingly fun first installment in Lindsey’s new series is delightfully performed by Barrie Kreinik.

 

This article was originally published in the November 2018 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

 

I’m not a big fan of paranormal fiction, but Rose Gallagher, the protagonist of Erin Lindsey’s Gilded Age thriller Murder on Millionaires’ Row, is so disarmingly charming and fabulously feisty that I happily followed the spectral happenings that swirl around her from the get-go.

Mystery & SuspenseMystery

The 7½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle

Review by Stephenie Harrison

Conventional wisdom cautions, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” but thankfully, author Stuart Turton must not have gotten the memo. His debut novel, The 7½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle, is a daring and wildly imaginative spin on the tried, tested and true English manor house murder mystery trope that manages to be both comfortingly familiar and absolutely unlike anything readers have ever encountered before.

Turton’s devilishly devious debut opens in a forest with our protagonist screaming the name Anna. With his next inhalation, he realizes that not only does he have no idea who Anna is, but he also has no memory of anything at all—including his own identity. As he struggles to make his way out of the forest, a shot rings out, and a woman appears to be killed before his very eyes. In a panic, he manages to make his way to the foreboding and elegantly decaying estate of Blackheath in search of assistance. However, our narrator eventually comes to realize that the forest murder is but the first of many, and that solving this crime is not his ultimate objective. Rather, a mysterious masked man informs him that beautiful heiress Evelyn Hardcastle will be killed that night, and it is up to the protagonist to figure out who committed the crime. If he fails to uncover the killer before the day is done, he’ll wake up in a different guest’s body to relive the day and try again. After the eighth day, his memory will be wiped clean, and he’ll start the cycle all over again. Only when the murderer is unmasked will Blackheath release its hold on our dilettante detective and allow him to leave the grounds for good.

Blending elements from Quantum Leap, Groundhog Day and Clue, The 7½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle turns the conventional murder mystery novel on its head while simultaneously elevating the genre to new, exhilarating heights. Turton has crafted a dizzying game of cat and mouse that will keep readers on their toes as they attempt to keep up with the various loops through time and make sense of all the clues that are scattered by the various hosts over the course of the day. Initially the reader’s confusion mirrors that of the narrator, but this only increases the reader’s sense of satisfaction when the many pieces of Turton’s complex puzzle begin to slot into pace and all is made clear.

An intellectual thriller that would likely stump the likes of Agatha Christie and Arthur Conan Doyle, The 7½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle is a must-read for any reader wishing to give their little gray cells a workout.

Conventional wisdom cautions, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” but thankfully, author Stuart Turton must not have gotten the memo. His debut novel, The 7½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle, is a daring and wildly imaginative spin on the tried, tested and true English manor house murder mystery trope that manages to be both comfortingly familiar and absolutely unlike anything readers have ever encountered before.

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