September, always my busiest month for all kinds of reasons, has this year expanded even further and cast its influence into November! I think I'm maybe catching up now ...
The Business at Blandyce is at last out for preorder, paperback to follow shortly.
Dr Robert Wilson is writing a cultural guide to Europe, and perhaps beyond. Gil Archibald needs to get to Paris. As Dr Wilson’s secretary, he thinks he can reach his goal, but Dr Wilson is not a straightforward employer, and neither of them can make much progress when a body is found in the mud and rain of the Pas de Calais. When neither of them is telling the other the whole truth, how will they ever work together to solve the mystery?
But anyway, to books by other people! It's been quite a selection over the last two months - you'll be sure to find something to enjoy.
Hania Allen, The Polish Detective: Though we don’t know too much about
our main character to start with – why she’s in Dundee, for example – she’s
sympathetic enough and the case is interesting, a dead lecturer hidden in a
scarecrow. The plot evolves to include the Dundee Druidic community – no idea
if they exist or not but this is a good portrayal of Dundee and the surrounding
countryside, with the additional interesting layer of Polish culture.
Andrea Carter, Death at Whitewater Church: Winter in Donegal,
atmospherically portrayed in this, the first in the series with lawyer Ben
O’Keefe as the main investigator. When she and the estate agent find a skeleton
arranged in a disused chapel that’s up for sale, it triggers an investigation
that draws her further into a local community where she has, till now, been an
outsider, risking her own secrets on the way. This has a proper small community
feel, with layers of dark memories underlying current problems, and a good
conclusion that works well.
Carmen Radtke, Genie and the Ghost: This is a lovely start to a new cosy
mystery series, where Genie, a young jewellery designer, chums up with her
long-dead flapper aunt to solve mysteries. The physical difficulties of living
with a ghost, particularly one who can communicate with animals, are
wonderfully imagined and touchingly amusing. Looking forward to the next one!
Blue Raven, Adam: I thought this a little
overpriced for a novella but was interested by the concept: a criminal discovers
time travel and goes back to the past to manipulate politics to cause a nuclear
war and start an alternative timeline. The story is told from the future in the
alternative timeline, where an AI being called Adam reveals what really
happened to cause it. This is perhaps more of a political thriller than a sci-fi
book, with shades of conspiracy theories. Sometimes it jumps a little and you wonder
if the author is trying to jam too much plot into a short form. I’ll make no
comment on anything here about the actual American politics referred to – not my
cup of tea. In the last third of the book, the science fiction comes back in
and I liked the ending, even if I wasn’t in complete agreement with the
character who made it there! Interesting book, but perhaps a novel would have
been a better format and less rushed.
J.D. Kirk, A Dead Man Walking: If I had any gripes with this they would
be 1/ how could he be so unkind to Logan as to send him to an island with
Tammi-Jo and Tyler and 2/ it would never occur to me to wipe my eyes on the
sleeve of my Barbour jacket. But perhaps he means the quilted ones, not the
proper waxed jobs. As usual, there’s humour and some deep emotion here, and
despite the slightly Hallowe’en theme we have a good plot and character
development.
Robert Galbraith, The Ink Black Heart: Others have complained about the
online conversations in parts of this book. I found them interesting, and laid
out very well – except that for some reason the e-book then laid
them out again in a
different pattern. This was an enjoyable though not always comfortable read
with plenty of interesting characters, a few nicely resolved problems, and some
horrible reflections on the use of social media today.
Cecilia Peartree, Two Steps to Murder: Hooray! Another Pitkirtly
mystery! A teenager is killed and Amaryllis is arrested in the midst of a folk
and pop festival which sits over Pitkirtly like a granny-square blanket on a comfy
armchair.
Anna Faversham, Hide in Time: Intriguing start here with a
dating agent finding she has more and more in common with one of her clients –
and we grow to wonder if perhaps one final thing they have in common is that
they were both born in a different time. Eventually the plot unfolds into a
kind of time-swap romantic adventure, cleverly imagined and ultimately
satisfying, with touches of humour that are very sweet.
Groovy Lee, Colors in the Dark: The first action scene snatches you in fast
to this charming romantic thriller set mostly in California, with an excursion
to Mississippi. Hailey, the narrator, is sweet and sensible and a loving
friend, and you just want everything to go right for her! This causes the
reader some considerable stress when Hailey heads off on her own to pick up a
vulnerable child from a hostile family – my heart was in my mouth for several
chapters. No spoilers, though. Just go along for the ride!
Carmen Radtke, Murder at the Races: It’s lovely to be back in 1930s
Melbourne – I’ve left this series too long! I’ve enjoyed contrasting this, too,
with the author’s new Genie series, which is much more cosy. This is also very
Australian, whilst Genie feels like small town America: very clever writing!
You can really feel the struggles in a society trying to keep things together
in a slump. Frances is trying to clear the name of her vet brother, Rob, caught
up in a horse-ringing scandal and murder. Satisfying plot, and great set-up for the sequel.
J.M. Dalgliesh, A Long Time Dead: Our police main character is sent back to his native Skye
to investigate when the body of a girl missing since his childhood is
discovered in a bog. Though the resolution was maybe a little overdone (I mean
I felt I’d read it a few times before), the characterisation was good, as was the
sense of place, and I’d happily read another one.
T. Kingfisher, Thornhedge: A charming ugly fairy creature is guarding
the thorn hedge around Sleeping Beauty’s ruined tower. She’s been doing it for
centuries, when at last a knight comes along to give it a closer look. This is
a brilliant twisting of the fairy tale, amusing and touching and ultimately
very satisfactory.
Ann Cleeves, The Long Call: Ann Cleeves is a terrific example to us all
of how much writing can improve even for published authors. It was coincidence
that I started reading both this and A Lesson in Dying around the same time,
and The Long Call was instantly more interesting, appealing, and intriguing. I
loved the main character, everything seemed to work to further the plot, and
the general sense of the author’s ease with writing was clear.
Ann Cleeves, A Lesson in Dying: I really struggled with the first few
chapters here. I could see that the different stories were going to link up,
but they seemed overly disjointed and unsympathetic – it might just have been
the mood I was in, but I was almost relieved when we had a dead body and
something definite to focus on. But as we reached the discovery of a second
murder, there is a very detailed, intimate portrait of how murder can affect
those around it, those not even that closely connected with it, that is
beautifully done.
David Gatward, Blood Trail: Another excellent episode in the series,
with Grimm really starting to settle down in Yorkshire and a fine mystery with
its feet in the past and some very emotional moments.
Rhys Dylan, Gravely Concerned: Some weirdly inconsistent apostrophe use
here, but we’re back with the team after Evan’s break for a funeral. There’s a
well-paced urgency to the hunt for an abducted boy and a couple of nice twists. On to the next one soon!
Gareth Williams, Needing Napoleon: A very interesting start, with a man
arriving at Waterloo the afternoon before the battle – but from the year 2018.
Desperate to get away from his life and help his hero Napoleon, he takes the
extreme step of accepting a one-way trip to Waterloo. I found it amusing that
the present day is written in the past tense, and the past is written in the
present tense – a clever way to show the period that matters more to the main
character. Let’s put aside my favouritism here: I’m a big fan of the sensible
Wellington, and not at all of the selfish Bonaparte, and Richard is a serious
Bonapartist. But the quality of the writing makes him very sympathetic, and
renders the time-travel element quite realistic, in an unexpected way.
Valerie Keogh, No Memory Lost: The discovery of a child’s body disrupts
West’s self-recrimination over the death of a neighbour, a guilt-trip that I
didn’t really find very convincing. But the rest of the case is more
interesting. Less convincing is the attack on Edel by an old acquaintance. The
book rounds itself up well and I found the ending satisfying.
