For a woman who wrote a book titled This is Not a Book about Benedict Cumberbatch, Tabitha Carvan sure knows a lot about the actor Benedict Cumberbatch. A lot. As in, she has a top ten list of Benedict Cumberbatch characters ranked by hairstyle. Also, she knows what movie Benedict Cumberbatch was watching when he…
With high-tech suspense and intricate plotting – it’s time for enigmalogist Jeremy Logan to save the day and prevent a thousand people from dying in Chrysalis by Lincoln Child. Logan is not an expert in virtual reality, but when he is called to help find the extortionist who has already killed one board member and…
The driving character of the novel Horse is Lexington, the most famous American racehorse of the 19th century. But this story is so much more than about a great stallion who sired champions. Geraldine Brooks uses Lexington as a backdrop to write about the consequences of one of this country's greatest sins, slavery. The sweeping novel effortlessly weaves back and forth from before the…
Jaq Walker is an aspiring filmmaker whose subject is her hometown of Savannah, Georgia, a “town out of a fable.” Many of Savannah’s denizens agree – the city does resemble a fairy tale, with its lush beauty, storied history, and high society trappings. But Jaq knows that fairy tales and fables are two very different…
I'm fascinated by Australian mysteries. Something about the Australian landscape lends itself well to crime fiction: the bleak, drought-ridden outback serves as the perfect setting for murder. Dirt Creek fits right into this, as the book is named for the town in which it's set (also called "Dirt Town" by its residents). This small, rural place is slowly dying,…
A couple of months ago, at my son’s baseball game, I was asked to help settle an argument between some good friends of mine. Because we were at a sporting event, you might assume that the dispute in question was about a rule of the game or a play that had just occurred. You would…
Her red torso, decorated with tattoos, is attached to a large powerful tail covered with shimmering black and silver scales. Her head is covered in black dreadlocks infested with various types of sea creatures. When Black fisherman David sees her peeking from the waves near the rocks off Murder Bay, he has no idea of…
Young Mungo begins with a camping trip from Hell, launching a gripping story of the dysfunctional, fascinating Hamilton family. Author Douglas Stuart, who won the 2020 Booker Prize for his literary debut, Shuggie Bain, returns with another coming-of-age story set in the 1990s among the working poor of Glasgow, Scotland. The matriarch of the family, Maureen, gives birth to Hamish as an…
At first glance, The Return of Faraz Ali reads like noir fiction: A police inspector in 1960s Pakistan is sent to the Mohalla, Lahore’s red light district, to cover up the murder of a child prostitute, but his conscience urges him to investigate instead. That is the central mystery of Aamina Ahmad's novel: who killed…
This pulse-pounding thriller grabbed me from the first page and did not let go! Ariel Pryce, middle-aged wife and mother from New York, wakes up in her Lisbon hotel room one morning to find her husband, John Wright, unexpectedly missing. Almost immediately, she goes to the police and to the American embassy, but neither takes her…
