Mysteries Recent Picks

November 2009

The underlined titles will take you directly to our catalogue.
Some featured items are linked via a book cover to enable you to read more reviews.

New tricks, David Rosenfelt. (2009)
Starred Review. In Rosenfelt's excellent seventh legal thriller to feature Paterson, N.J., defense attorney Andy Carpenter (after Play Dead), Andy takes on another canine client—Waggy, a Bernese mountain puppy, who's somehow connected to the murder of Walter Timmerman, a semi-titan in the pharmaceutical industry. Andy represents the dog in a custody battle between Diana, Walter's widow, and her stepson, Steven, who's a suspect in his father's shooting. Shortly after Andy picks up Waggy from Diana, she dies in a bomb explosion at her house. When Steven's arrested for Diana's murder, Andy agrees to represent him. After Andy's police chief girlfriend, Laurie Collins, who's visiting from Wisconsin, is shot and wounded while playing with Waggy and Tara, Andy's golden retriever, Andy realizes Waggy was the real target. Rosenfelt injects this clever installment with courtroom twists, a peek into some scary DNA research and a romantic surprise. (Publishers Weekly)

Evil at heart, Chelsea Cain. (2009)
Since serial killer Gretchen Lowell went on the run, following Detective Archie Sheridan’s latest near-fatal encounter with her, the city of Portland has descended into Beauty Killer hysteria. Even fan sites have sprung up online, where admirers of Gretchen can congregate to discuss their heroine. When a spleen is discovered at a local rest stop, Detective Henry Sobol is at first sceptical it is Gretchen’s work. It is only when he sees the rest stop’s wall –covered in hundreds of tiny red hearts that Henry realises its time to contact Archie . . . Archie Sheridan has spent the last few month’s in the city’s psychiatric hospital, battling with his addiction to painkillers and his strange obsession with the woman who tortured him. But soon he, along with the Beauty Killer taskforce and journalist Susan Ward, find themselves investigating a new spate of killings –when bodies start to turn up at local beauty spots, their eye-balls removed. Could this be the work of a copy-cat? Or has Gretchen really returned? One thing is certain, whoever is behind these brutal murders, they will do whatever it takes to get to Archie . .(Amazon.co.uk)

Halfhead, Stuart B. MacBride. (2009)
Terrifying serial killer thriller set in the gritty Glasgow of the near future, from the bestselling author of the Logan McRae series. Glasgow, not too far in the future. A new punishment has been devised for the perpetrators of serious crimes -- one that not only reduces the prison population but also benefits society at large. The process is known as halfheading: the offender's lower jaw is removed and they are lobotomized. They are then put to work as cleaners in municipal areas like hospitals, where they serve as a warning to all that crime doesn't pay. But for one halfhead, it seems the lobotomy hasn't quite succeeded. Six years after her surgery, Dr Fiona Westfield 'wakes up' surrounded by the butchered remains of a man she has just brutally killed. As her mind slowly begins to return, she sets out on a quest for vengeance. William Hunter, Assistant Section Director of the 'Network' -- a military wing of the police -- attends the crime scene left behind by the newly awakened halfhead. Sherman House is a run-down concrete housing development full of undesirables and Hunter and his team quickly find themselves in a firefight with the locals. With the help of old comrades and a new friend in the form of prickly but attractive Detective Sergeant Josephine Cameron, Will gets on the trail of the killer. But before long the investigation leads back to a terrible tragedy in his own past, as well as to a terrifying conspiracy to sow violence and misery among Glasgow's most vulnerable citizens. (Amazon.co.uk)

The monster in the box , Ruth Rendell. (2009)
'He had never told anyone. The strange relationship, if it could be called that, had gone on for years, decades, and he had never breathed a word about it. He had kept silent because he knew no one would believe him. None of it could be proved, not the stalking, not the stares or the conspiratorial smiles, not the killings, not any of the signs Targo had made because he knew Wexford knew and could do nothing about it'. Wexford had almost made up his mind that he would never again set eyes on Eric Targo's short, muscular figure. And yet there he was, back in Kingsmarkham, still with that cocky, strutting walk. Years earlier, when Wexford was a young police officer, a woman called Elsie Carroll had been found strangled in her bedroom. Although many still had their suspicions that her husband was guilty, no one was convicted. Another woman was strangled shortly afterwards, and every personal and professional instinct told Wexford that the killer was still at large. And it was Eric Targo. A psychopath who would kill again...As the Chief Inspector investigates a new case, Ruth Rendell looks back to the beginning of Wexford's career, even to his courtship of the woman who would become his wife. The past is a haunted place, with clues and passions that leave an indelible imprint on the here and now. (Amazon.co.uk)

The silent hour , Michael Koryta. (2009)
Starred Review. Edgar-finalist Koryta spins a dark tale of broken dreams and second chances in his stunning fourth mystery to feature Cleveland, Ohio, PI Lincoln Perry (after 2008's A Welcome Grave). When Perry starts receiving letters from convicted murder Parker Harrison, he ignores them until the man shows up in his office. Twelve years earlier, the then recently paroled Harrison worked for Alexandra and Joshua Cantrell, a couple who ran a rehabilitation program for violent offenders. Then they disappeared, and Harrison wants Perry's help in tracking down Alexandra. Suspicious why Harrison waited so long, Perry discovers that Joshua's bones were recently unearthed in Pennsylvania. Ken Merriman, a Pittsburgh PI, soon arrives in Cleveland, asking Perry for help finding out who killed Joshua. That Alexandria's brother heads one of Cleveland's most notorious mob families complicates matters. Perry has to reconsider everything he thought he knew about right, wrong and everything in between. (Publishers Weekly)

Blood work , by Mark Pearson. (2009)
The first victim is a young woman found on Hampstead Heath. Her throat has been slashed and her body mutilated. This horrifying discovery marks the beginning of Detective Inspector Jack Delaney's toughest ever case. When the expertly dissected body of a second young woman is discovered in a north London flat with a brightly coloured scarf tied around her neck, it suddenly becomes clear that a psychopath is on the loose. There is no apparent connection between the two victims and there are no clear motives - but the crime scenes tell a terrifying story. Delaney, together with forensic pathologist Kate Walker, needs to act quickly and piece together the evidence in order to uncover the deadly pattern behind the murders. However, violent events from Delaney's past are threatening to catch up with him, and he must stay one step ahead of his enemies if he is to stop the killer from striking again. (Amazon.co.uk)

Self's murder , by Bernhard Schlink ; translated by Peter Constantine. (2009)
The successful film adaptation of Schlink's The Reader should give a boost to his third mystery to feature aging German PI Gerhard Self (after 2007's Self's Deception). On his way home to Mannheim during a snow storm, Schlink helps a stranded driver, Bertram Welker, who on learning Self's profession offers him a job. A partner in the region's oldest private bank, Welker is writing its history and asks Self to identify a silent partner in the bank. What appears to be a straightforward assignment becomes a double murder inquiry once Self comes to doubt Welker's account of how his wife perished in a hiking accident the year before and the bank's unofficial archivist dies in a suspicious car crash after handing Self a briefcase full of money. Crisp prose and some well-handled plot complications, which include the emergence of a man claiming to be Self's son, will keep readers turning the pages. (Publishers Weekly)

Little bird of heaven : a novel , Joyce Carol Oates. (2009)
'A writer of extraordinary strengths' Guardian Set in the mythical small city of Sparta, New York, this searing, vividly rendered exploration of the mysterious conjunction of erotic romance and tragic violence in late 20th-century America. When a young wife and mother named Zoe Kruller is found brutally murdered, the Sparta police target two primary suspects: her estranged husband Delray and her longtime lover Eddy Diehl. In turn, the Krullers's son Aaron and Eddy's daughter Krista become obsessed with one another, each believing the other's father is guilty. Told in halves in the very different voices of Krista and Aaron, Little Bird of Heaven is classic Joyce Carol Oates, in which the lyricism of intense sexual love is intertwined with the anguish of loss, and tenderness is barely distinguishable from cruelty. By the novel's end, the fated lovers, meeting again as adults, are at last ready to exorcise the ghosts of the past and come to terms with their legacy of guilt, misplaced love and redemptive yearning. With Little Bird of Heaven, Joyce Carol Oates once again confirms her place as one of the most outstanding writers at work today. (Amazon.co.uk)

Blood atonement, Dan Waddell. (2009)
Waddell's sequel to 2008's The Blood Detective, which introduced Nigel Barnes, a genealogist employed by Scotland Yard, offers an overly similar plot. Once again, the police suspect a serial killer is at work, this time targeting members of a family with possible connections to the Mormon church whose ancestors may have some sins to atone for. Det. Chief Insp. Grant Foster and his team look into the murder of Katie Drake, a 37-year-old actress and single mother who lived in Queen's Park, a middle-class London neighborhood, as well as the disappearance of Drake's daughter on her 14th birthday. The police discover that a distant female relative of the Drakes also vanished just before turning 14. Barnes's skill at tracking obscure records to identify suspects and potential victims proves vital to the investigation. Unfortunately, too many coincidences and a far-fetched motive for the crimes make this a less successful effort than its predecessor. (Publishers Weekly)

Grave Stones , Priscilla Masters. (2009)
Jakob Grimshaw has eked out a precarious living as a Staffordshire moorland farmer by selling off some of his land to Gabriel Frank, a local businessman, who seized the opportunity to build a select development of nine houses, the Prospect Farm Estate. But having been sold a rural idyll, the residents of the estate quickly realise that they do not like Grimshaw's old farm building - surely such an eyesore will mean their properties will depreciate in value? And so the war begins - complaints, petty obstruction, each inhabitant with his or her own reason for wanting Grimshaw to move away. What none of the residents realise is that the old farmer is neither simple nor honest. He has a cunning and devious nature and likes to play malicious tricks, including double-crossing the landowners around him. When Grimshaw's body is discovered at the foot of his boundary wall, his head crushed by one of the copestones, it is up to DI Joanna Piercy to unravel the events leading up to his death. But Joanna has worries of her own in her personal life and the last thing she needs on her desk is a gruesome murder investigation. (Amazon.co.uk)

Previous Mysteries picks