How do you make a witch? Sharon Bolton has some ideas, and her latest novel is a wonderfully chilling tale of conspiracy and murder in a small northern town at the foot of Pendle Forest. What’s it about? ‘I imagine that Patsy regained consciousness slowly, and that her first lucid thought was that she was […]
I’d not heard of Lisa Jackson before, but her books dominated a whole shelf on the library’s crime section, so I thought her books would be worth a read. Unfortunately, by the time I had finished reading the prologue, I was already feeling reservations… What’s it about? Dr Kacey Lambert was once targeted by a […]
‘Perfect People’ is a stand-alone story by popular crime writer, Peter James, in which the political is made, and remains, intensely personal. What’s it about? Having lost their four year old son to a rare genetic disease, John and Naomi Klaesson seek out controversial geneticist Leo Dettore in an attempt to ensure their next child […]
Snap decisions can be dangerous. We never meet Eileen Bright. Instead, we begin with a hot, airless car and her three small children: Jack, Joy and Merry. They fuss and bicker exactly as you would expect, but underneath their casual cruelties there is a deep fog of unease: their mother went to get help, but […]
‘An elk emerges from the overgrown pines and it is monstrous.’ Tuva Moodyson, isolated Gavrik’s newest reporter, is less than keen on being surrounded by overgrown forest and occasionally charged at by an elk, but Gavrik is home and home is near where her terminally ill mother lives, so she’s learned to live with her […]
One crossed wire. Three dead bodies. Six bottles of bleach. What a strapline! I was sold, but if you want more… What’s it about? Where to begin? Insomniac Seth, who is married to borderline-alcoholic Maeve, gets to know suicidal Hadley as a result of a crossed phone wire and a weird late night hobby. Hadley […]
It must be quite frustrating at times for a police officer reading crime fiction and thinking, ‘but that would never happen that way!’ Debut novelist Desmond P. Ryan is here to address this problem: a former Canadian detective with 30 years experience on the force behind him, he’s penned the first in a planned series […]
As the autumn chill deepens and Christmas approaches, it’s lovely to snuggle up with a hot drink and read books with a chilly setting. This is the first Anne Perry book I’ve tried, but I understand that ‘A Christmas Promise’ is the seventh in a series of Christmas themed novellas penned by the author, all […]
When a blurb promises a huge twist, I’m wary. If I’m on the lookout for a twist, I might be disappointed when I find it. I might guess it before it arrives. I might not trust anything I read because, well, why should I? I’ve been told my assumptions will be wrong. But. When there […]
‘Again! Again!’ The men bind her again…This time they carry her into the water. This is the much anticipated follow-up to ‘The Girl on the Train’, so of course all the publicity focuses on comparing the two and declaring this book to be “even better”. If by “better” the blurb writers mean “completely different”, then […]