News Blog @ Wellington City Libraries

Enjoy the latest mysteries that have landed on our shelves this month:

The blind goddess / Anne Holt ; translated [from the Norwegian] by Tom Geddes.“A small-time drug dealer is found battered to death on the outskirts of the Norwegian capital, Oslo. A young Dutchman, walking aimlessly in central Oslo covered in blood, is taken into custody but refuses to talk. When he is informed that the woman who discovered the body, Karen Borg, is a lawyer, he demands her as his defender, although her specialty is civil, not criminal, law. A couple of days later, Hansa Larsen, a lawyer of the shadiest kind, is found shot to death. Soon police officers Håkon Sand and Hanne Wilhelmsen establish a link between the two killings… Their maverick colleague in the drugs squad, Billy T., reports that a recent rumor in the drug underworld involves drug-dealing lawyers. Now the reason why the young Dutchman insisted on having Karen Borg as a defender slowly dawns on them: since she was the one to find and report the body, she is the only Oslo lawyer that cannot be implicated in the crime. As the officers investigate, they uncover a massive network of corruption leading to the highest levels of government…” (Description from Amazon.com)

Black skies / Arnaldur Indriadason ; translated from the Icelandic by Victoria Cribb.
“A man is making a crude leather mask with slits for eyes and mouth, and an iron spike fixed in the middle of the forehead. It is a ‘death mask’, once used by Icelandic farmers to slaughter calves. He has revenge in mind. Meanwhile, with Detective Erlendur absent, his colleague Sigurdur Oli is in the spotlight. A school reunion has left Sigurdur Oli dissatisfied with life in the police force. Iceland is enjoying an economic boom and young tycoons are busy partying with the international jet set. In contrast, Sigurdur Oli’s relationship is on the rocks and soon even his position in the CID is compromised: when he agrees to visit a couple of blackmailers as a favour to a friend he walks in just as a woman is beaten unconscious. When she dies, Sigurdur Oli has a murder investigation on his hands. The evidence leads to debt collectors, extortionists, wild parties. But when a chance link connects these enquiries to the activities of a group of young bankers, Sigurdur Oli finds himself investigating the very elite he had envied…(From Syndetics Summary)

Bones are forever / by Kathy Reichs.
“In Reichs’ latest Temperance Brennan novel, the forensic anthropologist discovers the bodies of several babies in a seedy Montreal apartment. The babies appear to have been born to the same woman, an Edmonton prostitute who’s on an RCMP list of missing women (a list compiled as part of an investigation into a man who killed prostitutes). Brennan and Quebec cop Andrew Ryan fly out to Edmonton to try to track down the mother, and Brennan reunites with a local cop with whom she had a previous personal relationship. Although the writing equals Reichs’ customary quality, the novel’s pace is unusually slow; Brennan is normally juggling a couple of primary cases, with others intruding on her time, but here she’s mostly focused on a single investigation, and the story tends to drag on, rather than zipping from scene to scene. It’s not a bad book by any means and definitely should be recommended to fans of the series…(Adapted from Syndetics summary)

Hour of the wolf : an Inspector Van Veeteren mystery / Håkan Nesser ; translated from the Swedish by Laurie Thompson.“‘Hakan Nesser, the godfather of Swedish crime … His Van Veeteren novels have a puckishness and sprightliness that too often elude his younger, gloomier pretenders … Nesser has thus far only been a minor player in the British Nordic crime scene: Hour of the Wolf should be the book to change that’ Metro. ‘The Swedish novelist Hakan Nesser is in another league, exhibiting a skill and consistency rare in crime ¬fiction. Hour of the Wolf, translated by Laurie Thompson is one of his finest novels, starting with a road accident and unravelling its terrible consequences. The victim is a 16-year-old boy, struck by a car while walking home late at night, and the accident sets in motion a series of murders. One of the victims is related to Nesser’s detective, Chief Inspector Van Veeteren, who has retired to become an antiquarian bookseller. The ex-policeman’s old team rallies to obtain justice for their much-loved former boss in a novel that combines a clever plot with authentic emotion’ Sunday Times…” (Adapted from Amazon.co.uk)

Watching the dark / Peter Robinson.
“When Detective Inspector Bill Reid is found murdered in the tranquil grounds of the St Peter’s Police Treatment Centre, and compromising photographs are discovered in his room, DCI Banks is called in to investigate. Because of the possibility of police corruption, he is assigned an officer from Professional Standards, Inspector Joanna Passero, to work closely with him, and he soon finds himself and his methods under scrutiny. It emerges that Reid’s murder may be linked to the disappearance of an English girl called Rachel Hewitt, in Tallinn, Estonia, six years earlier. The deeper Banks looks into the old case, the more he begins to feel that he has to solve the mystery of Rachel’s disappearance before he can solve Reid’s murder, though Inspector Passero has a different agenda…Meanwhile, DI Annie Cabbot, just back at work after a serious injury, is following up leads in Eastvale. Her investigations take her to the heart of a migrant labor scam involving a corrupt staffing agency and a loan shark who preys on the poorest members of society. As the action shifts back and forth between Tallinn and Eastvale, it soon becomes clear that crimes are linked in more ways than Banks imagined, and that solving them may put even more lives in jeopardy…” (From Syndetics sumamry)

The beautiful mystery / Louise Penny.
“*Starred Review* An entire mystery novel centering on Gregorian chants (whose curiously hypnotic allure is called the beautiful mystery )? Yes, indeed, and in the hands of the masterful Penny, the topic proves every bit as able to transfix readers as the chants do their listeners. It begins when the choir director of a monastery in a remote corner of Quebec is murdered, his skull bashed in with a rock. Outsiders are not allowed inside the monastery’s walls, where 24 cloistered monks pray, make chocolate, and sing though a few years earlier, a homemade recording of their chants was released and created a sensation, helped along by the inaccessibility of the artists. Now, with the murder, the doors of the monastery are opened to Chief Inspector Armand Gamache and Inspector Jean-Guy Beauvoir, charged with finding a killer among a group of largely silent monks, who, it quickly becomes apparent, are engaged in a civil war over their music, The deepest passions could appear dispassionate, the face a smooth plain while something mammoth roiled away underneath…there is always something mammoth roiling away beneath the surface of Penny’s novels but this time the roiling is set against the serenity of the chanting, producing a melody of uncommon complexity and beauty…’ (Adapted from Syndetics summary)

Hot blooded / Lisa Jackson.
“New Orleans is beginning to be afraid . . . A prostitute lies strangled in a seedy French Quarter hotel room. Miles away, in a rambling plantation house on the sultry shores of Lake Ponchartrain, popular late-night radio host Dr. Samantha Leeds receives a threatening phone call. All in a day’s work for a celebrity. Who would think to link the two? A second hooker’s corpse turns up. Samantha’s ominous caller persists, along with a mysterious female claiming to be a woman from her past – a woman who’s been dead for years. With Detective Rick Bentz convinced that the serial killer prowling the shadowy streets of New Orleans is somebody close to Samantha, she doesn’t dare trust anyone. Especially not Ty Wheeler, her seductive new neighbour who seems to know more about her than a stranger should. Somebody has discovered Samantha’s darkest secret. Somebody is convinced that lives must be sacrificed to pay for her sins. So far, the victims have been strangers. But as a cunning, cold-blooded killer grows bolder, Samantha wonders in dread if she will be the next to die . . .” (Description from Amazon.com)

The Abbey / Chris Culver.
“Ash Rashid is a former homicide detective who can’t stand the thought of handling another death investigation. In a year’s time, he’ll be out of the department completely. That’s the plan, at least, until his niece’s body is found in the property of one of the city’s wealthiest citizens. The coroner calls it an overdose, but the case doesn’t add up. Against orders, Ash launches an investigation to find his niece’s murder. But the longer he searches, the darker the case gets – and if he doesn’t solve it fast, his niece won’t be the only family member he has to bury…” (Syndetics summary)

First Frost : a DS Jack Frost investigation / James Henry.
“Denton, 1981. Britain is in recession, the IRA is becoming increasingly active and the country’s on alert for an outbreak of rabies. Detective Sergeant Jack Frost is working under his mentor and inspiration DI Bert Williams, and coping badly with his increasingly strained marriage. Probably not helped by the fact that he never goes home…” (Syndetics summary)

This month the new mystery picks focus more on the grittier, darker and bloodier side of the genre. Grisly murders are solved in locales as diverse as Glasgow, Chicago, Sweden and Florida.

Rush of blood / Mark Billingham.
“Three couples meet around the pool on their Florida holiday and become fast friends. But on their last night, their perfect holiday takes a tragic twist: the teenage daughter of another holidaymaker goes missing, and her body is later found floating in the mangroves. When the shocked couples return home, they remain in contact, and over the course of three increasingly fraught dinner parties they come to know one another better. But they don’t always like what they find: buried beneath these apparently normal exteriors are some dark secrets, hidden kinks, ugly vices…Then, a second girl goes missing. Could it be that one of these six has a secret far darker than anybody can imagine? A brilliantly plotted, utterly gripping thriller about the danger of making friends on holiday, Rush of Blood is Mark Billingham’s most ambitious and accomplished work to date…” (Description from Amazon.co.uk)

Vengeance / Benjamin Black.
“Why would suicide need a witness? On the east coast of Ireland, Victor Delahaye, one of the country’s most prominent citizens, takes his business partner’s son out sailing. But once at sea, Davy Clancy is horrified to witness Delahaye take out a gun and shoot himself dead. This strange event captures the attention of Detective Inspector Hackett and his friend Pathologist Doctor Quirke. The Delahayes and Clancys have been rivals for generations and the suicide lays bare the perplexing characters at the heart of the mystery, from Mona, Delahaye’s toxic young widow, to Jonas and James, his strange, enigmatic twin sons; and Jack Clancy, his down-trodden, womanizing partner. And when a second death occurs, one even more shocking than the first, Quirke begins to realise that terrible secrets lie buried within these entangled families; and that in this world of jealousy, ruthless ambition and pride – nothing is quite as it seems…” (Description from Amazon.co.uk)

The last victim : a novel / Karen Robards.
“Charlie Stone, thirtysomething, single, and attractive, is the only known survivor of the infamous Boardwalk Killer. Fifteen years later, as a psychiatrist researching serial killers on death row, she encounters murderers in the safety of a cinder-block room with plenty of chains and a guard. That is, until the Boardwalk Killer returns, and she is called upon by the FBI to assist in the investigation. But there’s more! The ever-popular and tireless Robards grants Charlie psychic abilities: she can see and talk to the ghosts of the recently, violently departed. Inconveniently for Charlie, she is also doggedly, comically haunted by the ghost of the devilishly handsome Garland, one of her research subjects. Robards successfully infuses the thrilling murder investigation with the unlikely, even otherworldly, but definitely steamy romance between specter and woman…( Adapted from Syndetics summary)

Summertime death / Mons Kallentoft ; translated from the Swedish by Neil Smith.
“As the temperature in Sweden reaches a record-breaking 45 degrees, forest fires break out. However, when a teenage girl is discovered naked and bleeding in the local park, it is clear that the raging heat is not the only plague affecting the town. Then a second girl is found dead. Alarmed by the fact that the victims are the same age as her daughter, detective Malin Fors must work round the clock to capture the perpetrator. But as every lead comes to nothing, it is as if the opressive heat is clogging up the wheels of her investigation…” (Syndetics summary)

The nightmare / Lars Kepler ; translated from the Swedish by Laura A. Wideburg.
“Lars Kepler returns with a piercing, bestselling sequel to The Hypnotist. After spellbinding audiences in The Hypnotist, Detective Inspector Joona Linna is back in The Nightmare, an internationally bestselling Swedish thriller published to critical acclaim in dozens of countries. As the Swedish newspaper Arbetarbladet put it, “The reader is ready to sell his own soul for the opportunity to read this book without interruption, in one sitting.” On a summer night, police recover the body of a young woman from an abandoned pleasure boat drifting around the Stockholm archipelago. Her lungs are filled with brackish water, and the forensics team is sure that she drowned. Why, then, is the pleasure boat still afloat, and why are there no traces of water on her clothes or body? The next day, a man turns up dead in his state apartment in Stockholm, hanging from a lamp hook. All signs point to suicide, but the room has a high ceiling, and there’s not a single piece of furniture around—nothing to climb on. Joona Linna begins to piece together the two mysteries, but the logistics are a mere prelude to a dizzying and dangerous course of events. At its core, the most frightening aspect of The Nightmare isn’t its gruesome crimes—it’s the dark psychology of its characters, who show us how blind we are to our own motives…(Description from Amazon.com)

Judgment call / J. A. Jance.
“When high-school principal Debra Highsmith disappears, and her body is later found by Cochise County Sheriff Joanna Brady’s daughter, Jenny, Joanna investigates. Matters are muddied when Jenny sends a friend a crime scene photo that quickly becomes widely disseminated on the Internet, even before the victim’s family has been notified. Joanna soon learns that Highsmith had been using the identity of a long-deceased child. Is her murder connected to her past or to a more recent student suspension that angered the student and his father? With little to go on, Joanna and her team conduct their investigation and are finally able to learn more about Highsmith from her best friend and her grandmother. After a further murder, the chase is on in earnest, and Joanna finds she must deal with a killer who doesn’t seem to care whether he lives or dies…” (Adapted from syndetics summary)

Gods and beasts / Denise Mina.
“A Glasgow post office one week before Christmas. Martin Pavel cowers on the floor, his eyes locked on those of a terrified child. Above them a masked gunman wields an AK47 while the boy’s grandfather calmly volunteers to help the robber gather the money. Then the old man stands passively, hands by his sides, while the gunman raises the barrel and shoots him to shreds. Recently returned to work after the birth of her twins, DS Alex Morrow is called in to head the investigation. Why did the grandfather offer his help? Was it a moment of madness, a noble act of self-sacrifice, or did the old man and his killer share a dark past? Morrow’s enquiries lead her to the door of Kenny Gallagher, a politician fighting for his political life – and his marriage – after he’s publicly accused of having an affair with a young employee. And unknown to Morrow a temptation too great to resist leads two of her colleagues, DCs Leonard and Wilder, to make a rash decision and leaves them at the mercy of a ruthless blackmailer. The complicity of an old man in his own death, a promiscuous politician and a bag of untraceable money – one city, three crimes and a powerful connection that runs from Glasgow’s dark criminal underworld to the international spheres of the super rich…(Description from Amazon.co.uk)

Complication / Isaac Adamson.
“A mysterious missive propels Lee Holloway on a bizarre journey from Chicago to Prague in Adamson’s atmospheric and satisfyingly twisted tale. Following his father’s death, Lee finds a letter from a woman named Vera who doubts the circumstances of Lee’s younger brother Paul’s death five years earlier. She promises in writing to reveal the mystery at a Prague cafe. On impulse, Lee flies to Prague and meets the shady Vera at a dark place called the Black Rabbit. Vera believes that Paul was murdered for helping steal a magical centuries-old watch known as the Rudolf Complication. Made by an alchemist, the watch ran both forwards and backwards and supposedly granted its wearer eternal life. Not long after, Lee is approached by a crusty ex-detective, Zdenek Soros, a man convinced that Paul’s murder is connected to a notorious serial killer known as the Right Hand of God. Woven into Lee’s attempts to discover the truth about his brother’s death-and life-are interconnected stories that form the history of the Rudolf Complication itself, as much a character as any person in the book. The plot could easily have collapsed under the weight of its own complexity, but Adamson (Tokyo Suckerpunch) pulls it off with style and a whopper of a twist…” (Syndetics summary)

The short list for the Ngaio Marsh Award for Best Crime Novel, established in 2010, has been announced. The four novels are:

• Collecting Cooper by Paul Cleave
• Luther: The calling by Neil Cross
• By Any Means by Ben Sanders
• Bound by Vanda Symon

The winner selected by the judging panel will receive a handcraft Trophy, a set of Ngaio Marsh novels and $1000, with the announcement and presentation on 1st September. Exciting!

Love a good mystery? Here’s a selection of the newest to land on our shelves …

Very bad men / Harry Dolan.
“Anthony Lark has a list of names—Terry Dawtrey, Sutton Bell, Henry Kormoran. To his eyes, the names glow red on the page. They move. They breathe. The men on the list were once involved in a notorious robbery. And now Lark is hunting them, and he won’t stop until every one of them is dead. David Loogan—editor of the mystery magazine Gray Streets—is living a quiet life in Ann Arbor, Michigan, with Detective Elizabeth Waishkey and her daughter. But soon David and Elizabeth are drawn into Lark’s violent world. As Elizabeth works to track Lark down, David befriends Lucy Navarro, a reporter with a crazy theory about the case that threatens to implicate some very powerful people. And when Lucy disappears, David decides her theory may not be so crazy after all…” – (adapted from Amazon.com summary)

Flowering Judas : a Gregor Demarkian novel / Jane Haddam.
“Twelve years ago, Chester Morton disappeared from his hometown in Mattuck, New York, leaving no trace and never to be heard from again. For the past twelve years, his mother has kept the search for her son alive—paying for a billboard overlooking the local community college, putting up new flyers every week, hounding every law enforcement agency she can get to listen. Her determination has made his disappearance very high profile but it’s also been damaging to her family, her children and to herself. Now, Chester’s body is finally found—hanging from the very billboard that has been advertising his disappearance. Chester’s corpse, however, is recent—meaning that Chester had been alive, somewhere, until very recently. Under pressure and with limited resources, the local police turn to Gregor Demarkian—a former FBI agent and a frequent consultant on such cases—to try and unravel the truth buried within this very complex and tragic case and find out once and for all what really happened all those years ago…” – (adapted from Amazon.com summary)

Winter of the lions / Jan Costin Wagner ; translated from the German by Anthea Bell.
“Every year since the tragic death of his wife, Detective Kimmo Joentaa has prepared for the isolation of Christmas with a glass of milk and a bottle of vodka to arm himself against the harsh Finnish winter. However, this year events take an unexpected turn when a young woman turns up on his doorstep. Not long afterwards two men are found murdered, one of whom is Joentaa’s colleague, a forensic pathologist. When it becomes clear that both victims had recently been guests on Finland’s most famous talk show, Kimmo is called upon to use all his powers of intuition and instinct to solve the case. Meanwhile the killer is lying in wait, ready to strike again. In Kimmo Joentaa, prizewinning author Jan Costin Wagner has created a lonely hero in the Philip Marlowe mould, who uses his unusual gifts for psychological insight to delve deep inside the minds of the criminals he pursues.” – (adapted from Syndetics summary)

Fallen angels / Connie Dial.
“Two ex-cops are currently turning out mysteries centering on the LAPD’s Hollywood Division: Joe Wambaugh, who left the job fairly early after establishing the genre of gutsy, raucous police procedurals, and Connie Dial, who retired as commanding officer of the Hollywood Division after 27 years, including patrol, undercover, and narcotics work. Wambaugh gives readers a totally wild ride, often veering off into tangentially related war stories and cop humor, careening back into plot limits just in time. Dial’s ride (this is her third novel) is much more controlled when it comes to obeying conventional limits with plot and characters. Captain Josie Corsino, beset at home with an absentee husband and a troubled adolescent son, almost finds working in the byzantine politics of the L.A. police a relief. The plot focuses on how Corsino oversees the investigation into the murder of a 17-year-old Hollywood starlet at a notorious “party house” in the Hollywood Hills. The investigation quickly uncovers a netherworld of connections that can destroy careers. As with Wambaugh, the great thing about Dial is that readers know her take on the LAPD and the craziness of Hollywood crime is based on long reflection…” – (adapted from Booklist summary)

Bonefire of the vanities / Carolyn Haines.
“Despite the wishes of her overprotective fiancé, Sarah Booth Delaney can’t give up her detective work, no matter how dangerous it becomes. It’s too much a part of her. On this case, avoiding danger might be impossible—she’s on the trail of a porn-star-turned-psychic operating from a haunted estate on the edge of town. Medium Sherry Cameron promises to reunite grieving family members with their dearly departed, but it seems vaguely suspicious that Sherry will only accept emotionally vulnerable and tremendously wealthy clients. Aging billionaire Marjorie Littlefield fits the profile perfectly—her daughter died in a tragic accident as a young girl, she’s been estranged from her son for decades, and she’s planning to leave her considerable inheritance to her cat. Convinced she’s uncovered a scheme to separate a lonely woman from her fortune, Sarah Booth talks her way onto the estate as a maid, where she finds Marjorie and several other wealthy eccentrics ready to commune with the dead. Between chores, Sarah Booth explores the estate, mingles with the other staff…and finds a few dead bodies. But which guest or staff member might be the killer? Even Jitty, Sarah Booth’s personal haint, won’t tell until Sarah Booth has uncovered all of Sherry’s well-kept secrets…” – (adapted from Amazon.com summary)

Wicked business : a Lizzy and Diesel novel / Janet Evanovich.
“Lizzy Tucker’s once normal life as a pastry chef in Salem, Massachusetts, turns upside down as she battles both sinister forces and an inconvenient attraction to her unnaturally talented but off-limits partner, Diesel. When Harvard University English professor and dyed-in-the wool romantic Gilbert Reedy is mysteriously murdered and thrown off his fourth-floor balcony, Lizzy and Diesel take up his twenty-year quest for the Luxuria Stone, an ancient relic believed by some to be infused with the power of lust. Following clues contained in a cryptic nineteenth-century book of sonnets, Lizzy and Diesel tear through Boston catacombs, government buildings, and multimillion-dollar residences. On their way they’ll leave behind a trail of robbed graves, public disturbances, and general mayhem. Diesel’s black sheep cousin, Gerwulf Grimoire, also wants the Stone. His motives are far from pure, and what he plans on doing with the treasure, no one knows . . . but Lizzy Tucker fears she’s in his crosshairs… Treasures will be sought, and the power of lust will be unmistakable as Lizzy and Diesel attempt to stay ahead of Anarchy, Grimoire, and his medieval minion, Hatchet, in this ancient game of twisted riddles and high-stakes hide-and-seek…” – (adapted from from Amazon.co.uk summary)

A deeper darkness / J.T. Ellison.
“As a medical examiner, Samantha Owens knows her job is to make a certain sense of death with crisp methodology and precision instruments. But the day the Tennessee floods took her husband and children, the light vanished from Sam’s life. She has been pulled into a suffocating grief no amount of workaholic ardor can penetrate—until she receives a peculiar call from Washington, D.C. On the other end of the line is an old boyfriend’s mother, asking Sam to do a second autopsy on her son. Eddie Donovan is officially the victim of a vicious carjacking, but under Sam’s sharp eye the forensics tell a darker story. The ex-Ranger was murdered, though not for his car. Forced to confront the burning memories and feelings about yet another loved one killed brutally, Sam loses herself in the mystery contained within Donovan’s old notes. It leads her to the untouchable Xander, a soldier off-grid since his return from Afghanistan, and then to a series of brutal crimes stretching from that harsh mountainous war zone to this nation’s capital. The tale told between the lines makes it clear that nobody’s hands are clean, and that making sense of murder sometimes means putting yourself in the crosshairs of death…” – (adapted from Amazon.com summary)

The cold room / Robert Knightly.
“NYPD detective Harry Corbin hasn’t been allowed to work on a homicide case for almost a year following his unearthing of corruption amongst his colleagues and superiors. So when a young woman’s body is found dumped and mutilated on a sweltering New York morning, Corbin jumps at the chance to redeem his career and solve the case. Identification of the Jane Doe proves to be difficult until Corbin stumbles upon a link to a Queens Catholic church that provides sanctuary to Eastern European immigrants. What then follows is a journey into the dark and secretive world of illegal immigrants, where humans are exploited and life is cheap…” – (adapted from Syndetics summary)

Dead men and broken hearts / Craig Russell.
“November 1956. The world is in turmoil. While the Suez Crisis and the Hungarian Uprising boil away in the background, Lennox has more immediate concerns, like getting his personal life, and his business, back on track. So, when a woman comes into Lennox’s office and hires him to follow her husband, whom she suspects of leading a double life, it seems the perfect case. Straightforward, typical – if a little sordid – and most of all, legal. But as he begins to dig deeper, Lennox realizes that this is no ordinary case of marital infidelity. He finds himself caught by the police in a room with a dead body; pursued by shadowy members of the intelligence community; and once more a target of the Three Kings, the crime bosses who between them run Glasgow’s underworld. Lennox must again draw on the violent, war-damaged part of his personality that he has tried to keep buried, in order to survive…” – (adapted from Amazon.co.uk summary)

New mysteries for June include David Hewson’s novel length adaptation of the popular Danish crime series ‘The Killing’; a new Swedish mystery from Ake Edwardson; R.J. Ellory’s latest thriller; Charles Todd’s new Bess Crawford mystery; and two new début authors…

The killing / David Hewson.
“This adaption of ‘The Killing’ is a huge success…So how does it survive this possibly awkward transmutation? The answer, in short, is extremely well. David Hewson – the author of more than a dozen detective novels set in Italy and with no need to stoop to anything too hurriedly commercial – has taken what was television gold and turned it into literary gold. Indeed he has done it so well that his book is now being translated and readied for publication in Danish….The publisher makes much of the fact that instead of sitting in front of his telly with one finger on the pause button and the other on his keyboard, Hewson went to Copenhagen and ‘constructed with’ Soren Sveistrupp, the series script writer. What has emerged from their meetings is really very interesting…His (Hewson’s) take is as valid as yours or mine. It creates an odd dynamic between author and reader which I rather liked…This is one of the most engrossing detective novels I’ve read in a long time’ –The Daily Telegraph, 5-Star Review…” (Description from Amazon.co.uk)

Sail of stone / êAke Edwardson ; translated by Rachel Willson-Broyles.
“In his sixth outing (after The Shadow Woman), Erik Winter investigates two missing-person cases in Gothenburg, Sweden. One involves the disappearance of an old girlfriend’s father, who traveled to Scotland to search for his own father, presumed to have died during World War II. When the missing man is found dead, Winter goes to Scotland to determine whether wartime smuggling activities played a part in this case. In an unrelated story line, Winter’s colleague Anetja Djanali investigates a case of possible domestic abuse. The more she tries to contact the possible victim, the more she is stonewalled by the woman’s family….Fans of Scandinavian mysteries, especially those who like Camilla Lackberg, Kjell Eriksson, and HAkan Nesser, will enjoy adding this award-winning author to their reading list…” (Adapted from Syndetics summary)

A dark and broken heart / R.J. Ellory.
“It should have all been so easy for Vincent Madigan. Take four hundred grand from the thieves who stole it in the first place and who could they turn to for help? Madigan is charming, resourceful, and knows how to look after himself. The only problem is that he’s up to his neck in debt to Sandia – the drug king of East Harlem. This one heist will free Madigan from Sandia’s control and give him the chance he needs to get his life back on track. But things go wrong when Madigan is forced to kill his co-conspirators and a child is shot in the crossfire. Now both Sandia and the collected might of the NYPD are hunting him down, and the one cop assigned to lead the case is the very last person he could have expected. Employing every deception and ruse he can think of, Madigan must stay one step ahead in a battle of wits that will test him to his limits. Can he evade justice for his crimes, or will his own conscience be his final undoing?…” (From Syndetics summary)

The priest : a novel / Gerard O’Donovan.
“From the most riveting writer to come out of Ireland since John Connolly, the first in a series of Dublin-based thrillers introducing Inspector Mike Mulcahy, who is pitched into a deadly battle with a religion-obsessed serial killer..Struggling to find his feet back in Ireland after a lengthy posting with Europol in Spain, drugs specialist Mike Mulcahy is plunged into unfamiliar territory when the daughter of a politician suffers a horrific sex attack. Dragged into the case against his will, Mulcahy becomes convinced there is more to it than a random frenzied sexual assault, especially when he discovers that the weapon used by the attacker to torture the victim was a crucifix…Sidelined and overruled, Mulcahy sets about his own investigation, but frustrations abound at every turn—until reporter Siobhan Fallon turns up asking awkward questions. As more young women are attacked and assault turns to murder, Mulcahy and Fallon are drawn into an uneasy alliance, and each step they take hurtles them ever closer to the monstrous killer known only as The Priest and a final showdown that is as explosive as it is unforgettable…” (Description adapted from Amazon.com)

Monkey wrench : a quilting mystery / Terri Thayer.
“Dewey Pellicano continues to transform her late mother’s quilt shop, making her own mark with contemporary trends. She’s worried about her employees, college student Vangie and part-time instructor Pearl, who is newly widowed and floundering with old age. When Vangie’s shady boyfriend ends up dead of an overdose, Vangie calls Dewey for help. At the same time, Pearl hires a part-time caretaker through a campus-advertised service that sounds too good to be true. It is, because the students are using their senior clientele as a front for a prescription pill mill. When another death occurs, Dewey senses a pattern, and she’s not about to let it go any further. VERDICT This engaging and thought-provoking fourth entry (after Ocean Waves) in Thayer’s excellent quilting series is an easy-to-recommend cozy with its likeable characters, loyal cop boyfriend, and community of quilters…” (Adapted from Syndetics summary)

In her blood / Annie Hauxwell.
“It’s not that easy to kick the money habit. After the world meltdown forces London’s bankers to go cold turkey, people look elsewhere for a quick quid: the old fashioned East End. So when investigator Catherine Berlin gets an anonymous tip-off about a local loan shark, the case seems straightforward – until her informant is found floating in the Limehouse Basin. In another part of town, a notorious doctor is murdered in his surgery, and his entire stock of pharmaceutical heroin stolen. An unorthodox copper is assigned to the case, and Berlin finds herself a reluctant collaborator in a murder investigation. Now Berlin has seven days to find out who killed her informant, why the police are hounding her and, most urgently of all, where to find a new – and legal – supply of the drug she can’t survive without. Smart, stylish and fast-paced, In Her Blood heralds the arrival of a remarkable new talent in crime fiction…” (Syndetics summary)

Freezing / Clea Koff.
“Forensic anthropologists and best friends Steelie Lander and Jayne Hall operate Agency 32/1, a Los Angeles nonprofit that creates forensic profiles of missing persons. Their work is difficult but rewarding. When body parts are found on the side of a freeway, FBI agent Scott Houston asks Jayne and Steelie for help in identifying the victim, or victims. The women soon become entangled in Houston’s pursuit of a serial killer. Koff, a forensic anthropologist who identified bodies in Rwanda and the Balkans (as recounted in her gripping memoir The Bone Woman), fills her debut thriller with fascinating true-to-life forensic details. She also steadily builds the suspense to the climactic twist. Verdict Koff has written a procedural with emotional depth. Readers who enjoy Patricia Cornwell and Kathy Reichs won’t want to miss this…” (Adapted from Syndetics summary)

An unmarked grave / Charles Todd.
“Set in the spring of 1918, bestseller Todd’s outstanding fourth Bess Crawford mystery (after 2011’s A Bitter Truth) finds the British nurse and her co-workers in France contending with the Spanish influenza epidemic as well as battlefield carnage. When the number of flu victims kept in a shed before burial is one more than the official count, Bess is shocked to discover the corpse of Maj. Vincent Carson, who once served in her father’s old regiment, in the shed. That the major’s neck is broken suggests that his body was dumped amid the flu victims to conceal his murder. Before Bess can act on her suspicions, she catches the dread disease herself, leaving the trail to the truth even fainter on her recovery. Caroline and Charles Todd, the mother-son team who write as Charles Todd, remain unmatched in their ability to convey the horrors of trench warfare and the effect on its participants…”(Adapted from Syndetics summary)

Including new titles from Donna Leon and James Patterson. Also featuring hardened and haunted homicide cops, a killer with a penchant for blowfish toxin, investigating crime writers, and intrigue and conspiracy aplenty.

The drowning / Camilla Lackberg ; translated from the Swedish by Tiina Nunnally.
“Christian Thydell has been receiving anonymous threats since he began writing his novel THE MERMAID. When one message, secreted within a bouquet of flowers, causes Christian to collapse at the launch party, crime writer Erica Falck is compelled to investigate. Erica’s husband detective Patrik Hedstrom, meanwhile, is puzzled by the disappearance of Christian’s friend Magnus Kjellner four months previously. When a body is found frozen in the sea near Fjallbacka, he finds he has a murder enquiry on his hands…Clues in Christian’s debut novel THE MERMAID point to a horrific secret buried deep in his past…(Adapted from Syndetics summary)

Beastly things / Donna Leon.
“When a body is found floating in a canal, strangely disfigured and with multiple stab wounds, Commissario Brunetti is called to investigate and is convinced he recognises the man from somewhere. However, with no identification except for the distinctive shoes the man was wearing, and no reports of people missing from the Venice area, the case cannot progress. Brunetti soon realises why he remembers the dead man, and asks Signorina Elettra if she can help him find footage of a farmers’ protest the previous autumn. But what was his involvement with the protest, and what does it have to do with his murder? …Both a gripping case and a harrowing exploration of the dark side of Italy’s meat industry, Donna Leon’s latest novel is a compelling addition to the Brunetti series.” (Adapted from Syndetics summary)

The cold room / Robert Knightly.
“The new mystery from the author of Bodies in Winter – NYPD detective Harry Corbin hasn’t been allowed to work on a homicide case for almost a year following his unearthing of corruption amongst his colleagues and superiors. So when a young woman’s body is found dumped and mutilated on a sweltering New York morning, Corbin jumps at the chance to redeem his career and solve the case — and finds himself on a journey into the dark and secretive world of illegal immigrants, where humans are exploited and life is cheap . . .” (Syndetics summary)

The prodigal son : a Carmine Delmonico novel / Colleen McCullough.
“Holloman, Connecticut, 1969. A very rare and lethal toxin, extracted from the blowfish, is stolen from a laboratory at Chubb University. It kills within minutes and leaves no trace behind — unless a doctor knows what to look for — and worried biochemist Dr. Millie Hunter reports the theft at once to her father, Medical Examiner Dr. Patrick O’Donnell. Patrick’s cousin Captain Carmine Delmonico is therefore quick off the mark when the bodies start to mount up. A sudden death at a dinner party followed by another at a gala black-tie event seem at first to be linked only by the poison and Dr. Jim Hunter, a scientist on the brink of greatness and husband to Millie…Is he being framed for murder — and if so, by whom?…” (Adapted from Syndetics summary)

11th hour / James Patterson and Maxine Paetro.
“Millionaire Chaz Smith is mercilessly gunned down and Detective Lindsay Boxer discovers that the murder weapon is linked to the deaths of four of San Francisco’s most untouchable criminals. And it was taken from an SFPD evidence locker. Anyone could be the killer – even her closest friends on the force. Lindsay is then called to the most bizarre crime scene she’s ever seen: two bodiless heads elaborately displayed in the garden of a world-famous actor. Another head is unearthed in the garden, and Lindsay realises that the ground could hide hundreds of victims… 11th Hour is the most shocking, most emotional, and most thrilling Women’s Murder Club novel ever.” (Adapted from Syndetics summary)

Ready, scrap, shoot : A Kiki Lowenstein scrap-n-craft mystery / Joanna Campbell Slan.Ready, Scrap, Shoot
“With bills piling up and a brassy new partner at her scrapbooking shop, the last thing Kiki Lowenstein needs is a surprise visit from her browbeating mother. But when shots fired into the crowd narrowly miss Kiki at her daughter’s May Day pageant, it’s another mother — St. Louis’s wealthiest matriarch-who winds up dead. While creating a memorial album for the murdered beer heiress, Kiki becomes bait in a dangerous trap as threats from her old foe mount against her. With help from friends in high and low places, including hunky beau Chad Detweiler, Kiki finds herself facing a grave ultimatum: catch the killer or be cropped out of her own family album.” (Syndetics summary)

Night rounds : A Detective Inspector Irene Huss Investigation / Helene Tursten ; translation by Laura A. Wideburg.
“In the fourth instalment of the Detective Inspector Irene Huss series, one nurse lies dead and another vanishes after their hospital is hit by a blackout. The only witness claims to have seen Nurse Tekla doing her rounds, but Nurse Tekla died sixty years ago. Detective Inspector Irene Huss of the Violent Crimes Unit has the challenge of disentangling wandering ghosts and complex human relationships to get to the bottom of this intriguing case.” (Syndetics summary)

Promise : for every promise, there is a price to pay– / Tony Cavanaugh.
“Top Homicide cop Darian Richards has been seeking out monsters for too long. He has promised one too many victim’s families he will find the answers they need and it’s taken its toll. After surviving a gunshot wound to the head he calls it quits and retires to the Sunshine Coast in an attempt to leave the demons behind. But he should have realised, there are demons everywhere and no place is safe. A serial killer is prowling the Sunshine Coast area and Darian tries to ignore the fact his experience could make a difference hunting him down. All he wants is to sit at the end of his jetty on the Noosa River and ignore the fact that girls from the area have vanished over the past fourteen months. All blonde and pretty. Youngest: 13. Oldest: 16…Darian can’t sit idly by and he decides he is going to find the killer and deal with him … his way.” (Syndetics summary)

Stolen prey / John Sandford.
“Lucas Davenport has seen many terrible murder scenes. This is one of the worst. In the small Minnesota town of Deephaven, an entire family has been killed-husband, wife, two daughters, dogs. There’s something about the scene that pokes at Lucas’s cop instincts-it looks an awful lot like the kind of scorched-earth retribution he’s seen in drug killings sometimes. But this is a seriously upscale town, and the husband was an executive vice president at a big bank. It just doesn’t seem to fit. Until it does. And where it leads Lucas will take him into the darkest nightmare of his life.” (Syndetics summary)

Afraid to die / Lisa Jackson.
“Others may dread the bone-numbing cold of winter, but the killer relishes it. The way the frigid water preserves his victims, the feel of their icy skin beneath his fingers. Before long, the world will see their beauty – and his vengeance. The Bitterroot Mountains are in the grip of a hard winter when the detectives first see the two bodies: each frozen solid, yet deliberately displayed. Both victims are women known to Detective Selena Alvarez. Each of them is wearing a piece of her jewellery. Selena’s partner Regan Pescoli and the entire department are working on this case, and so is P.I. Dylan O’Keefe, a man Selena got too close to once before. But this killer already knows too much about the mistakes Selena has tried to outrun. The secrets of her past are coming to the surface, one by one. And soon a madman bent on revenge will show her just how much she has to lose . . . (Description from Amazon.co.uk)

New mysteries for April include the return of Harry Hole to Oslo in Jo Nesbo’s ‘Phantom’; a new Leonid McGill mystery from Walter Mosley; Nate Romanowki taking centre stage in the new C. J Box ‘Joe Pickett’ series; as well as some new ‘cozy’ entries from Carolyn Hart, G.A. McKevett, & Lois Winston.

Death comes silently / Carolyn Hart.
“In her 22nd adventure set in Broward’s Rock, SC, Annie Darling, owner of the Death on Demand bookstore, and her husband, Max, become involved in the murder investigation of a local charity shop worker. The victim tried to call Annie right before she was killed, so Annie feels compelled to find her killer. When a second murder occurs, Annie and Max begin to think that another recent death, which was ruled accidental, may be connected. In addition, Annie’s longtime customer Henny Brawley is trying her best to keep an innocent man from being tried for the murders. VERDICT Fans of this popular cozy series will not be disappointed with Hart’s latest entry (after Dead by Midnight). Recommended for all cozy mystery fans, especially for those who like to read Joan Hess, Leslie Meier, and Jill Churchill…” – (adapted from Syndetics summary)

Death by killer mop doll / Lois Winston.
“An overworked, underpaid crafts editor at a women’s magazine, Anastasia Pollock has no peace at home, either…Her mother is recently engaged to an executive of the magazine’s corporate owner, jubilant that he is pursuing her idea for a new reality TV show involving the magazine’s editors. More work, no more pay for Anatasia, whose assignment for the pilot is to build a program around making mop dolls, a craft from an earlier decade. When the rag doll samples are trashed, a Christmas angel mop doll, left at the scene, suggests an inside job. A few days later, the Valentine mop doll is found at the scene of a murder. Anastasia is a crafting Stephanie Plum, surrounded by characters sure to bring chuckles as she careens through the narrative, crossing paths with the detectives assigned to the case and snooping around to solve it…” – (adapted from Syndetics summary)

Cage of bones / by Tania Carver.
“Into the house. Down the stairs. Through the dripping dark of the cellar. Someone is there. Someone that shouldn’t be there. As a building awaits demolition, a horrifying discovery is made inside the basement: a cage made of human bones – with a terrified, feral child lurking within. Unbeknownst to DI Phil Brennan and psychologist Marina Esposito, they have disturbed a killer who has been operating undetected for thirty years. A killer who wants that boy back. But the cage of bones is also a box of secrets – secrets linking Brennan to the madman in their midst. With the death toll rising and the city reeling in terror, Brennan and Marina race to expose a predator more soullessly evil than any they’ve ever faced.” – (adapted from Amazon.co.uk summary)

Buried in buttercream : a Savannah Reid mystery / G.A. McKevett.
“If the crazies would take a break, Savannah Reid could finally tie the knot with her former police partner, Det. Sgt. Dirk Coulter, in McKevett’s entertaining 17th mystery featuring the San Carmelita, Calif., PI. But between the torching of their original wedding venue and the murder of their wedding planner, it’s clear the only way this duo will get hitched is by first catching the bad guys. Savannah is recovering from near-fatal gunshot wounds received in the previous entry, 2011’s A Decadent Way to Die, a detail overly focused on without any clear explanation for those who missed it. Meanwhile, Tammy Hart, Savannah’s associate in Moonlight Magnolia Detective Agency, and Savannah’s brother, Waycross, begin a mutual attraction as Waycross lends a hand with some sleuthing. Readers will relish the author’s trademark wit…” – (adapted from Syndetics summary)

Force of nature / C.J. Box.
“*Starred Review* Some sidekicks provide comic relief, while others serve a darker purpose. Think Easy Rawlins and Mouse or Elvis Cole and Joe Pike the ego and the id. In Box’s Joe Pickett novels, off-the-grid free-agent Nate Romanowki plays a similar role: Joe is a family man, while Nate is a loner; Joe is a poor shot, but Nate is deadly accurate; Joe is rational, while Nate is a force of nature. In some ways, the blood on Nate’s hands allows Joe to remain the sympathetic hero. In the twelfth series installment, Nate takes center stage. His mysterious past has caught up with him, and the black-ops military unit to which he used to belong wants him dead. They’re going after Nate through the people he cares about, including Joe’s family. This is a very different Pickett novel, more a pure thriller and much more violent. Fans who love the books for their thoughtfulness may find this one a bit bloody, but those who love Box’s stunning set pieces will be in heaven…” – (adapted from Syndetics summary)

A pound of flesh / Alex Gray.
“Detective Superintendent Lorimer’s worst nightmare is a serial killer loose in his city. But two serial killers operating at once on the streets of Glasgow is a nightmare come to life. Is there a link between the brutal slaying of prostitutes in the backstreets of the city and the methodical killing of several unconnected businessmen? Lorimer is never one to jump to conclusions but something about these cases just doesn’t add up. Each killer has a different MO, but their obsession with murder is equally chilling. When the latest death is that of a prominent government minister, Lorimer finds the media’s relentless scrutiny turned on his investigation. Psychologist Solly Brightman is helping with both cases, but someone within Lormer’s team is sabotaging their efforts by leaking confidential police information… (adapted from Amazon.co.uk summary)

All I did was shoot my man / Walter Mosley.
“In Mosley’s fourth Leonid McGill mystery (after 2011’s When the Thrill Is Gone), the best in the series to date, the New York City PI tries to atone for a misdeed from his checkered past. Eight years earlier, McGill helped frame Zella Grisham for a part in the biggest Wall Street robbery in history-$58 million stolen from Rutgers Assurance Corp. Zella was guilty of shooting her man, Harry Tangelo, when she found him in bed with her best friend, Minnie Lesser, but the eight years she served were due to the frame, not the shooting. McGill manages to get Zella released, setting in motion a chain of deadly events. Meanwhile, his difficult family life reaches full boil with each of his three adult children, Twill, Dimitri, and Shelly, as well as with his hard-drinking wife, Katrina. Unraveling the truth behind the robbery and the unrecovered millions tests McGill’s skills to the utmost in this complex, satisfying entry…” – (adapted from Syndetics summary)

Phantom / Jo Nesbo ; translated from the Norwegian by Don Bartlett.
“Following from Jo Nesbø’s electrifying international best-sellers The Snowman and The Leopard, now comes Phantom, which plunges the brilliant, deeply troubled, now former police officer Harry Hole into a full-tilt investigation on which his own tenuous future will come to depend. When Harry left Oslo again for Hong Kong—fleeing the traumas of life as a cop—he thought he was there for good. But then the unthinkable happened. The son of the woman he loved, lost, and still loves is arrested for murder: Oleg, the boy Harry helped raise but couldn’t help deserting when he fled. Harry has come back to prove that Oleg is not a killer. Barred from rejoining the police force, he sets out on a solitary, increasingly dangerous investigation that takes him deep into the world of the most virulent drug to ever hit the streets of Oslo (and the careers of some of the city’s highest officials), and into the maze of his own past, where he will find the wrenching truth that finally matters to Oleg, and to himself.” – (adapted from Amazon.com summary)

Mysteries can take many surprising twists as they wind towards a conclusion, no other genre sets out to surprise in quite so many ways. However, amongst all the unpreditabilty is one element that can always be relied upon, an ominous sounding title. Well, that and murder I suppose…

Victims : an Alex Delaware novel / Jonathan Kellerman.
“Drawing from insights gained in his clinical work with mentally distressed children, Kellerman pulls the reader into a macabre case of ritualistic slaughter in his 27th Alex Delaware/Milo Sturgis title. After discovering two identically grisly murders, the investigative duo (Delaware is a psychologist, Sturgis an LAPD lieutenant) strive to connect the apparently unrelated victims. As the body count rises, names and experiences from Delaware’s clinical training begin to surface unexpectedly and the case becomes personal. Verdict Kellerman’s bizarre yet plausible thriller will be a treat for his many fans, who will recognize and appreciate the emphasis upon psychological detail and insight instead of more customary sleuthing terminology…” – (adapted from Library Journal summary)

Heart of a killer / David Rosenfelt.
“Edgar-finalist Rosenfelt’s fine stand-alone begins as a legal thriller that twists into a murder mystery before becoming a full-blown suspense chiller. The life of Karen Harrison, a 14-year-old girl with a congenital heart defect, can only be saved by a heart transplant from a matching donor. Karen’s mom, Sheryl, who shares Karen’s rare blood type, wishes to donate her heart. Two complications stand in Sheryl’s way. First, she must die to enable the transplant. Second, in order to commit suicide, she must get out of prison, where she’s serving 15 years to life for her abusive husband’s murder six years earlier. That’s where Sheryl’s underachieving lawyer, Jamie Wagner, comes in. Jamie hopes to file a lawsuit against the state of New Jersey on her behalf, but his plans change when he learns Sheryl may not be guilty…” – (adapted from Publisher Weekly summary)

Cut, crop & die : a Kiki Lowenstein scrap-n-craft mystery / Joanna Campbell Slan.
“Tainted icing triggers a rare allergy, and a hobbyist croaks at a scrapbooking crop sponsored by Time in a Bottle, the store where Kiki Lowenstein works. When it comes out that someone swiped the victim’s emergency medication, the scrappers realize they have a murder on their hands, and the entire community jumps to point the finger at Kiki and her coworkers. Suddenly, the one anchor in Kiki’s stormy life is on the verge of sinking beneath a ruined reputation. But who wouldn’t want to kill Yvonne Gaynor? The nasty woman had enough enemies to fill a memory album. Once again, Kiki gets sucked into a mystery that should be left to that dreamy detective, Chad Detweiller — who hasn’t tried to kiss her yet. With anti-Semitic threats coming in at the store, a quarrelsome teen daughter at home, and constant financial pressure, Kiki needs to keep her cool if she’s going to set things right.” – (adapted from Syndetics summary)

Left for dead : a novel / J.A. Jance.
“Bestseller Jance’s engaging seventh Ali Reynolds novel (after 2011’s Fatal Error) offers plenty of scope for the widowed former reporter, anchorwoman, and graduate of the Arizona Police Academy, who now heads a private charitable fund, to use her sleuthing talents. When 17-year-old Rose Ventana is found dead near the Mexican border, savagely beaten and tortured, the police assume she’s just another casualty of the drug wars. But Ali’s dear friend, Sister Anselm, thinks otherwise, and the two vigorous and persistent women discover links to other cases that suggest a serial killer at work. Meanwhile, the pair involve themselves in caring for the extended family of a local deputy, mysteriously wounded and suspected of dealing in drugs…” – (adapted from Publisher Weekly summary)

Catch me / Lisa Gardner.
“D.D. Warren has returned from maternity leave and is back on the job just in time to investigate a crime spree in which the victims are also child predators. She’s soon contacted by a young woman named Charlie Grant, who announces that she expects to be killed in several days and asks D.D. to investigate her murder. As D.D. copes with personal issues while working with her old team (plus a new face in Detective O) to piece together this crime puzzle, the two seemingly unconnected cases begin to show signs of overlapping. The clues all point in one direction, prompting D.D. to rethink and reevaluate the evidence in the race to put that final piece in place. Verdict New York Times best-selling author Gardner (Love You More; Live To Tell; Alone) always plays in the big leagues, but this scare-your-socks-off thriller is a grand slam, packed with enigmatic characters (some good, some crazily evil), expert procedural detail, and superb storytelling…” – (adapted from Library Journal summary)

Vigilante / Stephen J. Cannell.
“In the last novel by acclaimed producer and New York Times bestselling author Stephen J. Cannell, LAPD detective Shane Scully and his partner Sumner Hitchens investigate a crime with ties to the sometimes violent world of reality TV. Lita Mendez was a thorn in the LAPD’s side. An aggressive police critic and gang activist, she’d filed countless complaints against the department. So when she’s found dead in her home, Detective Scully and his partner Hitchens fear the worst: that there’s a killer in their ranks. Outside the crime scene, Nixon Nash and his television crew have set up shop. Nash is the charismatic host of a hit reality show called “Vigilante TV,” dedicated to beating the cops at their own game: solving murders before they can. Now he has the murder of Lita Mendez in his sights. He presents the detectives with a choice: either join his team, or prepare for a public takedown. But Scully knows that Nash isn’t the folk-hero he seems. He will do anything in the name of self-promotion. If a detective got in his way, would he be prepared to kill? In this new novel, Scully will have to risk everything save himself and the job he loves…” – (description from Amazon.com summary)

Unwanted / Kristina Ohlsson ; [translated by Sarah Death].
“Swedish federal investigator Frederika Bergman is an academic whose intellect assists her in formulating unique theories during her investigations. Unfortunately, her mostly male colleagues show contempt at her lack of previous police experience and push aside her findings and opinions. But before Frederika can quit and work in a profession more appropriate for her talent, a simple custodial interference case quickly turns into a serial kidnapping and murder spree. VERDICT This award-winning first volume in an acclaimed Swedish crime series spends a significant amount of time introducing and setting up Frederika’s investigative team. While this makes for a slightly lengthy thriller, it does not take away from the compelling story line. Ohlsson’s U.S. debut is a complicated novel that delves into every parent’s nightmare. Fans of detective or thriller fiction will delight in discovering this excellent addition to the Scandinavian mystery genre…” – (adapted from Library Journal summary)

The bloody meadow / William Ryan.
“Following his investigations in The Holy Thief, which implicated those at the very top of authority in Soviet Russia, Captain Alexei Korolev finds himself decorated and hailed as an example to all Soviet workers. But Korolev lives in an uneasy peace – his new-found knowledge is dangerous, and if it is discovered what his real actions were during the case, he will face deportation to the frozen camps of the far north. But when the knock on the door comes, in the dead of night, it is not Siberia Korolev is destined for. Instead, Colonel Rodinov of the NKVD security service asks the detective to look into the suspected suicide of a young woman: Maria Alexandovna Lenskaya, a model citizen. Korolev is unnerved to learn that Lenskaya had been of interest to Ezhov, the feared Commissar for State Security. Ezhov himself wants to matter looked into. And when the detective arrives on the set for Bloody Meadow, in the bleak, battle-scarred Ukraine, he soon discovers that there is more to Lenskaya’s death than meets the eye…” – (description from Amazon.com summary)

Here are our picks of the new mysteries for February — including the new V. I. Warshawski novel from Sarah Paretsky, John Lescroart’s new Wyatt Hunt novel, Charles Todd’s new 1920s mystery featuring Inspector Ian Rutledge, and the latest needlecraft mystery from author Monica Ferris. Enjoy!

Breakdown / Sara Paretsky.
“Both Paretsky and her sharp-tongued justice-seeker, V. I. Warshawski, remain formidable in the masterfully suspenseful fifteenth novel in this superb and adored Chicago-set series… called away by Petra, her young cousin, now a regular in the series, to look for the teenage girls Petra works with in a program that brings together daughters of penniless immigrants with daughters of privilege, V. I. finds them in a cemetery, performing a ritual inspired by their ardor for a series of vampire novels. She also finds a dead man with a metal rod driven through his heart. The ensuing morally reprehensible case, which V. I. compares to a Rubik’s Cube, involves class divides, a state mental hospital, warped brother-sister relationships, a tricked-out Camaro, a Holocaust survivor’s tale, a wrongful murder conviction, and the politics of hate…” (Adapted from Syndetics Summary)

The chalk girl / Carol O’Connell.
“Kathy Mallory of the NYPD’s Special Crimes Unit may be the Lord Byron of police detectives. Like Byron, the gorgeous and beyond-eccentric Mallory is mad, bad, and dangerous to know. In this remarkable series, Mallory, wounded by a horrific childhood, concentrates her entire being on the vengeful pursuit of bad guys, using some well-developed criminal skills to flush them out of hiding. Mallory is pulled out of leave (brought on by the department psychiatrist’s labeling her as dangerously unstable) by a case her superiors think that only she, rocky as she is, can solve. The case turns on one witness, an eight-year-old girl with a rare genetic disorder that leaves her physically and emotionally vulnerable, who knew a serial killer’s first victim, found hanging from a tree in Central Park…” (Adapted from Syndetics Summary)

The hunter : a novel / John Lescroart.
“Raised by loving adoptive parents, San Francisco private investigator Wyatt Hunt never had an interest in finding his birth family – until he gets a chilling text message from an unknown number: “How did ur mother die?” The answer is murder, and urged on by curiosity and the mysterious texter, Hunt takes on a case he never knew existed, one that has lain unsolved for decades. His family’s dark past unfurls in dead ends. Child Protective Services, who suspected but could never prove that Hunt was being neglected, is uninformed; his birth father, twice tried but never convicted of the murder, is in hiding; Evie, his mother’s drug-addicted religious fanatic of a friend, is untraceable. And who is the texter, and how are they connected to Hunt?… The cat-and-mouse game leads Hunt across the country and eventually to places far more exotic-and far more dangerous…” (Adapted from Amazon description)

Threadbare / Monica Ferris.
In this needlecraft novel from author Monica Ferris, Betsy Devonshire gets embroiled in an embroidery mystery. When an elderly homeless woman is found dead on the shore of Lake Minnetonka, she’s wearing something that holds the key to her identity but also opens up a mystery. Embroidered on her blouse is her will, in which she bequeaths everything she owns to her niece Emily Hame, a member of the Monday Bunch at Betsy’s Crewel World needlework shop! Emily’s aunt turns out to be the second homeless woman to be found dead under mysterious circumstances. It’s up to Betsy to discover the common thread between the deaths, and to determine if a murderer may strike again. (Syndetics Summary)

The broken blue line / Connie Dial.
“LAPD internal affairs detective Mike Turner and a few colleagues risk lives and careers to follow the spirit, if not the letter, of the law in Dial’s competent follow-up to Internal Affairs (2009). Turner is an important cog in a squad that takes down cops who break the laws they’re intended to enforce. Unfortunately, his boss, Lieutenant Metcalfe, is primarily concerned with career advancement, and squad leader Tom Weaver is careful to play by the book and won’t buck Metcalfe. Turner is willing to protect rasher comrades as they try to catch crooked cop Ian Conner, who’s faked a back injury and is stealing guns and committing felonies with a gang of white boys and Mexicans in the Valley. On the personal side, Turner must deal with an elderly retired cop he takes in as well as his flighty on-again/off-again girlfriend. Dial, a 27-year veteran of the LAPD, paints a dispiriting picture of a force riven by incompetence and ambition…” (Description from Publishers Weekly)

For richer, for danger : a broken vows mystery / Lisa Bork.
“(A Broken Vows mystery.) Jolene Parker and her police-deputy husband Ray have found new love in their life together. They’re foster parents for Noelle, an adorable baby whose fugitive birth parents hightailed it out of their touristy Finger Lakes-area town. Jolene and Ray want to make their parenthood official, but the adoption hits a mysterious roadblock when the given name of Noelle’s mother traces back to a dead girl. As Jolene races to find the true identity of the secretive birth mother, she discovers an unsolved murder . . . and learns that her family may be in extreme danger.” (Syndetics summary)

Vulture peak / John Burdett.
“Burdett’s fifth Bangkok novel (after 2010’s The Godfather of Kathmandu) opens with a memorable tableau-three corpses, laid neatly on a bed in a Phuket mansion and missing all commercially viable body parts, including their faces. It’s clearly a case for the quirky, pot-smoking police detective, Sonchai Jitpleecheep, whose investigations are often stymied by the double whammy of his country’s corruption and his own personal problems. When Jitpleecheep is on task, he’s doggedly pursuing traffickers in human organs, led by a beautiful but ruthless set of twins, Lilly and Polly Yip. The criminal ring uses as its source material executed Chinese prisoners, while its customers are wealthy Westerners whose internal organs have worn out…” (Adapted from Syndetics Summary)

Physical education / Maggie Barbieri.
“Barbieri adroitly mixes campus politics, mob wars, and religious scandals in her sixth mystery featuring English professor Alison Bergeron (after 2010’s Third Degree). When Paul, the new mail carrier at St. Thomas, the small Catholic university in New York City where Alison teaches, turns up dead in the trunk of Alison’s car, her new husband, Det. Robert Crawford, warns her off the case. Paul, it turns out, is really Vito Passella, a member of a local crime family. Meanwhile, Alison is deeply involved in temporarily coaching the school’s basketball team – a true test of her tact in dealing with incompetent players as well as their pushy parents. What little remains of her time is spent trying to exonerate her friend Fr. Kevin McManus, forced to take leave as school chaplain after anonymous accusations of impropriety. That Crawford becomes evasive and reclusive adds to her stress, but Alison remains irreverent, cynical, and totally engaging throughout…” (Adapted from Syndetics Summary)

The confession / Charles Todd.
“Set in 1920, Todd’s excellent 14th mystery featuring Insp. Ian Rutledge (after 2011’s A Lonely Death) offers an intriguing setup. When Wyatt Russell shows up at Scotland Yard and confesses to murdering a cousin, Justin Fowler, five year earlier, Rutledge is unwilling to accept the story at face value, especially since Russell refuses to explain why he killed Fowler. Russell, who’s dying of cancer, agrees to lunch with the inspector in London, but divulges little more. Rutledge travels to a remote corner of Essex to pursue the few leads Russell provides, but receives an extremely hostile reception from the locals. The cold case takes an even stranger turn after Russell suffers a fatal gunshot wound to the back of his head. The plot convolutions compel, but the book’s main strength is its remarkable lead, who has survived the trench warfare of WWI and remains haunted by what the exigencies of the battlefield forced him to do…” (Adapted from Syndetics Summary)

This selection of new Murder Mysteries includes updates for Patricia Cornwell’s Kay Scarpetta, Sue Grafton’s Kinsey Millhone and Janet Evanovich’s Stephanie Plum. Plus, three new Scandinavian mysteries, and a new instalment in Martin Walker’s Captain Bruno Courrèges mysteries (set in South-West France). Enjoy!

Red mist / Patricia Cornwell.
“Kay Scarpetta has arranged to meet an inmate at the high-security Georgia Prison for Women. The prisoner is a convicted sex offender and the mother of a vicious and diabolically brilliant killer. Against advice, Scarpetta is determined to hear this woman out – she believes she may hold some answers to the murder of her former deputy. But soon she finds connections to a string of grisly killings, including the slaughter of a Savannah family years earlier. She can see a pattern to these killings, but who is behind them and why?” (adapted from Amazon.co.uk)

Slash and burn / Colin Cotterill.
“Dr Siri, off on what he calls a ‘therapeutic holiday’ in the mountains with his wife and friends and with the help of a little blackmail they are accompanying an American MIA team. Their mission is to discover what happened to a stoned airman downed ten years earlier. Could he have survived? Who is eliminating the last people to have seen him alive? And who, we ask, is lighting the fires that are shrouding the Friendship Hotel in smog? In the remote Plain of Jars, surrounded by a thousand tons of unexploded bombs, Siri and the morgue team have to discover who is the killer in their midst before they too become victims.” (adapted from Amazon.co.uk)

Burned / Thomas Enger ; translated from the Norwegian by Charlotte Barslund.
“A solitary tent is found to contain the body of a half-buried woman. She’s been stoned to death. There are lash marks across her back. One of her hands has been cut off. Two years earlier internet reporter Henning Juul lost his son, Jonas, in a domestic fire. As he returns to work, physically and emotionally scarred, Henning struggles to escape this past and to be taken seriously again as a reporter, by his colleagues, his ex-wife and the police. Told to cover the story of the woman in the tent, he finds an increasingly dangerous trail and, despite an early arrest, he is convinced that the story is more complex than the police think. “(adapted from Amazon.co.uk)

Explosive eighteen / Janet Evanovich (Book on CD).
“Before Stephanie can even step foot off Flight 127 from Hawaii to Newark, she’s knee deep in trouble. Her dream vacation turned into a nightmare, she’s flying back to New Jersey solo, and someone who sounds like Sasquatch is snoring in row 22. Worse still, her seatmate never returned to the plane after the L.A. layover. Now he’s dead, in a garbage can, waiting for curbside pickup. His killer could be anyone. The FBI, the fake FBI, and guns-for-hire are all looking for a photograph the dead man was supposed to be carrying. Only one other person has seen the missing photograph, Stephanie Plum. Now she’s the target, and she doesn’t intend to end up in a garbage can” (adapted from Syndetics summary).

The territory / Tricia Fields.
“At the end of State Road 170 and just past a ghost town lies Artemis, population 2500. The townspeople had sought out this remote corner of western Texas in hopes of living lives of solitude and independence. None of them realized that their small town would become a hot spot for Mexican drug runners, whose turf battles have turned both sides of the Rio Grande into a war zone. Still, many of the locals would rather take the law into their hands than get help from police chief Josie Gray, even when they’re up against a cartel’s private army. After arresting one of the cartel’s hit men and killing another, Josie finds her own life at risk for doing a job which many people would rather see her quit.” (adapted from Amazon.co.uk)

“V” is for vengeance / Sue Grafton.
“Las Vegas, 1986. A young college graduate is murdered when he is unable to pay back a loan funded by notorious criminal Lorenzo Dante. Two years later private investigator Kinsey Millhone finds her-self assisting to apprehend a shoplifter, Audrey Vance, in a shopping centre. Events take a much darker turn when Audrey’s body is discovered beneath the Cold Spring Bridge, a local suicide spot. Unable to believe she took her own life, Audrey’s fiancé Marvin Striker hires Kinsey to investigate. It soon emerges that the shoplifter had become caught up in a much larger operation. Meanwhile Lorenzo Dante has begun to grow weary of his life in organised crime and frustrated with his violent and impulsive younger brother Cappi. As Kinsey’s enquiries reach a dramatic head, it becomes clear that she and Dante have one thing in common, they must be careful who they trust.” (adapted from Amazon.co.uk)

Vacuum / Bill James.
“After his son and wife were shot, Mansel Shale turned to God, leaving DCS Colin Harpur with a potential problem. Instead of keeping a grip on his profitable drugs empire, Shale, ravaged by sorrow and regret, has abandoned that business, leaving it in the hands of an assistant who is reputed to hallucinate about the Spanish Civil War.” (adapted from Syndetics summary)

The hidden child / Camilla Läckberg ; translated by Tiina Nunnally.
“Crime writer Erica Falck is shocked to discover a Nazi medal among her late mother’s possessions. Haunted by a childhood of neglect, she resolves to dig deep into her family’s past and finally uncover the reasons why. Her enquiries lead her to the home of a retired history teacher. He was among her mother’s circle of friends during the Second World War but her questions are met with bizarre and evasive answers. Two days later he meets a violent death. Detective Patrik Hedström, Erica’s husband, is on paternity leave but soon becomes embroiled in the murder investigation. Who would kill so ruthlessly to bury secrets so old? Reluctantly Erica must read her mother’s wartime diaries. But within the pages is a painful revelation about Erica’s past. Could what little knowledge she has be enough to endanger her husband and newborn baby?” (adapted from Amazon.co.uk)

Until thy wrath be past / Asa Larsson ; translated from the Swedish by Laurie Thompson.
“It is the first thaw of spring and the body of a young woman surfaces in the River Thorne in the far north of Sweden. Rebecka Martinsson is working as a prosecutor in nearby Karuna. Her sleep has been disturbed by haunting visions of a shadowy, accusing figure. Could the body belong to the ghost in her dreams? And where is the dead girl’s boyfriend, also reported as missing the previous winter? Joining forces once again with Police Inspectors Anna-Maria Mella and Sven-Erik Stalnacke, Rebecka is drawn into an investigation that centers on old rumors about a plane carrying supplies for German troops in 1943 that never arrived.” (adapted from Syndetics summary)

The crowded grave : an investigation by Bruno, Chief of Police / Martin Walker.
“Life in south-west rural France is not the sleepy idyll you might suppose. Local duck and goose farms are being attacked by animal rights protestors attempting to halt the production of foie gras. A senior policeman has been shot by terrorists believed to be the Basque Separatists of ETA. And if that weren’t enough, a group of students have just unearthed a ‘modern’ skeleton during a dig at one of the ancient sites of this famous region and home to pre-historic man, a dig that has brought an influx of foreigners to the Dordogne. It is up to Chief of Police Bruno Courrèges to get to the bottom of these seemingly unrelated events.” (adapted from Amazon.co.uk)