‘The reading public enjoys murders.’ So reflects a detective assigned to investigate a particular murder. Harriet Hall’s murder is certainly one the local press enjoy when the inquest reveals a rather sensational fact about the victim. But who is Harriet? And why should we care that she’s been murdered? What’s it about? Miss Amy Steer […]
‘I think I might have killed her…’ These are not the words Frank Philips expect to hear when he attends his local AA meeting, but they are the words that will haunt him when he learns that a woman was murdered that night – and that the killer may now be targeting other members of […]
Obviously, it was the title that intrigued me. For her debut novel starring a serial killer who decides to murder her entire biological family, Mackie chooses Lady MacBeth’s demands to the witches as an epigraph: ‘Unsex me here, And fill me from the crown to the toe top-full of direst cruelty. Make thick my blood.’ […]
‘Resnick had despised estate agents ever since one of them ran off with his wife.’ So begins chapter two of ‘Rough Treatment’, a tale of dreadful TV executives, mismatched burglars, a menacing drug dealer and a reclusive detective. What’s it about? ‘Rough Treatment’ is the second Charlie Resnick novel, in which a house burglary somehow […]
Did you know that you may legally access only 3% of England’s rivers? The remaining 97% are privately owned. How did that come about? Should England’s citizens be restricted in this way? What is the history behind our segregation from our own land and what are the consequences? Nick Hayes’ explores these issues – and […]
Jim had lured the Watcher out on the seas. Jim had shaken the shadows. If the sentences above intrigue you, this book may be for you. If they leave you shrugging and wondering where the plot is, then you may be best advised to read something else. What’s it about? Sam is seven when she […]
‘Kneeling in the fragrant moist grass of the village green Clara Morrow carefully hid the Easter egg and thought about raising the dead, which she planned to do right after supper.’ Welcome back to Three Pines, a village in Quebec only discovered by those who need it. In this, the third book in the series, […]
What a killer premise! An injured man stumbles into a remote Australian police station. He has fought his way through the wilderness after being drugged and kidnapped, somehow managing to escape from a cabin in the mountains where he was chained. His name is Gabriel and he is fleeing a man called Heath, who threatened […]
As a parent / guardian, you want your children to be happy. More than that, you want them to be able to create their own secure, inner happiness that isn’t dependent upon treats and toys – lovely though a well-timed ice cream can be! How can we do this? The authors believe they have some […]
‘We are more alike than different.’ This is the essence of Dr Adshead’s argument: that while it is easier to write off certain criminals as monsters, it is essential to admit their humanity and recognise the value of rehabilitation over our instinctive desire for vengeance. Of course, this is easier said than done, but Dr […]