Newest Crime Reviews
Crime
Human Remains by Elizabeth Haynes
Annabel lived on her own, with a life filled by her job as a police intelligence analyst, her aging mother and her cat. It was the cat that began the story, as she led Annabel to the house next door, where there was a body which had obviously been there a long time. Decomposition was advanced but Annabel hadn't known that there was anyone living there and it seemed that no one else cared. Back at work curiosity took hold and it seemed that there had been rather a lot of bodies which had lain undiscovered over the last few months - and definitely more than in previous years. There was, though, no suggestion that death was other than through natural causes so it was difficult to get her police colleagues interested. Full review...
The Carrier by Sophie Hannah
Due to a delayed flight home, Gaby has to stay overnight in a German hotel with fellow passenger Lauren. During the night Lauren tells Gaby about a man charged with the murder of his paralysed wife. At this point two things strike Gaby: 1. Lauren believes him to be innocent. 2. He's Tim Breary, Gaby's former lover with whom she has unfinished business. Once home Gaby is determined to prove his innocence but that's easier said than done. Full review...
Dead Scared by S J Bolton
A few minutes before midnight on 22nd January, DC Lacey Flint is standing on top of the tallest tower in Cambridge, contemplating flying. It's a beautiful sight out there. Just one step.
Mark Joesbury is entering the chapel and pounding up the stairs… not knowing what he'll do, or what he'll find, when he gets to the top.
We'll have to wait to the end of the book to find out. Full review...
The Circus: An Inspector Carlyle Novel by James Craig
Journalist Duncan Brown was found dead in the back of a rubbish truck. It was a prosaic introduction to a major scandal for Inspector John Carlyle and before long his slim resources were stretched even further when a teenager had a bomb attached to his neck and the neighbour who was about to complain about the loud music was shot dead on the doorstep. It might have seemed that it couldn't get much worse, but before long Carlyle found himself up against Trevor Miller, a former police officer who had become security officer to the Prime Minister. He and Carlyle went back a long way and none of the memories were good. Full review...
White Bones by Graham Masterton
Finding a dead body isn't an unusual occurrence for Detective Superintendent Katie Maguire of the Cork Gardai. But finding the bones of eleven bodies in a mass grave, each with marks that suggest the flesh was stripped from them and with evidence that they were used in a voodoo-like ritual is beyond the pale even by her usual standards. There is some respite when it appears that these bones have been dead bodies for more than 80 years, until another fresh set appear in roughly the same spot. Full review...
Money Never Sleeps by Stella Whitelaw
Fancy Jones is a crime writer. Actually, it’s Francine Double-Barrelled name but her brother never got further than being able to pronounce ‘Fancy’ and the name stuck. Her Pink Pen Detective stories are one of the main reasons that she was invited to attend a writers’ conference in Derbyshire. But Fancy has other reasons for going: in London someone is trying to kill her. It was difficult to think otherwise when you only just avoid being pushed in front of a tube train and have a rucksack hurled at you as you get on a bus. The bubble-wrapped piece of concrete hurled through the bedroom window as she slept convinced her - if she still had any lingering doubts. There was just one problem: the attacks continued when she got to Derbyshire and it soon became clear that she wasn’t to be the only victim. Full review...
Harbour Nocturne by Joseph Wambaugh
The Hollywood Station series is set (no prizes for guessing) in Hollywood. Hollywood is, almost by definition, a bit weird. A full moon is known as a Hollywood moon, because that's when all the weirdoes come out to play. But it's a district that needs to be policed like any other. It has its fair share of RTAs and domestics and sad and lonely people. Not for nothing has the night shift sergeant instituted pizza-rewarded awards for best 'True Hollywood Romance' or 'Quiet Desperation' reports from a given shift. You need a black sense of humour to work the mean streets. Full review...
Dead in the Water (A Kate Shugak Investigation) by Dana Stabenow
Kate Shugak is a native Aleut living in an Alaskan National Park and she's currently an investigator for hire. I hesitate to call her a private investigator as so far she's been hired by a government agency, but at just over five feet tall and just over thirty she's the best man when it comes to sorting out what's been going on. This time it's the case of two crew members lost from a ship off the coast of Alaska some months before. Their families want to know what happened to them. That's how Kate came to be signed on as a deckhand on the Avilda. They're crabbing in some of the nastiest and most dangerous conditions you can imagine. And it's not just the weather that's the problem. Full review...
Seven Ways to Kill a Cat by Matias Nespolo
The Argentinian economy is in meltdown and the streets of Buenos Aires are awash with protestors, but this means little to those struggling to survive in the shanty towns clinging to the city's edge. In the barrio every day is hard and the choices you make really do mean the difference between life and death. Gringo, a youth on the verge of becoming a man and Chueco, his unreliable friend, both short on options, are drawn to the local gang culture and the seemingly easy money it offers. But, with a turf war brewing, can either of them survive the coming storm? Full review...
The Three Day Affair by Michael Kardos
How well do you know your best friends? Will thought he knew Jeffrey, Nolan and Evan particularly well. Heck, they'd known each other since college at Princeton, before the advent of wives and partners. However, Will's assurance becomes less certain during a golfing weekend. Just blokes together with the WaGs out the way; what could go wrong? Nothing till Jeffrey stops the car to pop into a convenience store and emerges with nothing except the till's contents and the shop assistant he's kidnapped. What do they do? A simple enough question but as the hours tick by it becomes more complicated. Full review...
Vengeance by Lee Child (Editor)
I like short story collections. They're useful reading material when you're a mum of young children as you can usually manage to squeeze in a six page story at nap time, but you're guaranteed if you try to start that 500 page novel you've been meaning to read that just as it starts to get interesting your baby will wake up! This collection of crime stories is brought together under the title of Vengeance so, as you'd imagine, they are all to do with revenge and people getting or trying to get their own back. Full review...
A Fatal Thaw (A Kate Shugak Investigation) by Dana Stabenow
Roger McAniff bought a new Winchester rifle and went out to test it - and nine people were dead by the end of the day. But - only eight of them had been shot by McAniff and one - Lisa Getty was shot by someone else. McAniff wouldn't have it - he was almost insulted by the thought that he might have missed someone - but ballistic tests proved that in this instance he wasn't the killer. Kate Shugak was given the job of tracking down the unknown killer. It wasn't going to be easy, not least because she apprehended McAniff and every conversation began with a statement that she could have saved time and money if she'd killed him. That's not Kate's way though. Full review...
Up Close by Henriette Gyland
Dr Lia Thompson is an E.R. specialist. She patches people up for a living. Her fiancé is some hot-shot lawyer (specialism unspecified) with an all-American-apple-pie family and a mom pressing for a wedding date. When Lia's grandmother dies and her mother eschews any right to the inheritance or obligation for dealing with the estate, it falls to Lia to come up and tidy up. That's exactly what she intends to do. Sign the papers, clear the house, get it on the market and go home. Full review...
