Is The Montford Maniac on the loose again after a ten-year absence? Lady Violet, author and amateur detective, is on the case. With the help of her fictional characters, can she solve the crime? Hmmm, I so wanted to like this book. While I found the fictional characters in LadyContinue Reading
An intern from a gossip magazine is sent to interview a reclusive author. The author recounts a harrowing story of his life and his connection to a cult called The Eleven represented by the symbol XIIX. This is no ordinary cult. The Eleven is a great example of why IContinue Reading
American ex-pat and Scottish bookseller Delaney has done it again. The amateur sleuth has become entangled in a murder, a hoarder’s life, a pushy attorney, and a possibly stolen national artifact. Can Delaney solve the crime and determine the proper answers to the other questions? You will spend a delightfulContinue Reading
Picture an alternate world where vampires are not only integrated into society, but protected as a racial minority. However, just because they are protected doesn’t mean that everyone has accepted them. In The Gathering, a young man has been killed in a manner implicating the local vampire colony. But areContinue Reading
My Review It’s always a delight to spend time with Jessica, Seth and Mort. In Murder Backstage, Jessica’s identical British cousin, Emma, invites them all to vacation with her in Edmonton, Canada. Emma is rehearsing a new musical revue with a retiring fellow thespian when one of the crew isContinue Reading
Poor ten-year-old Lili Gray! In Lili Gray and the World’s Most Embarrassing Superpower, Lili’s mother is dead. Her stepmother, Bella, is pregnant and constantly plotting against her. Now, Lili’s Dad has disappeared without even saying goodbye. Oh, and she keeps blowing holes in her pants, chairs, and even her closetContinue Reading
The Classified Dossier – Sherlock Holmes and Dorian Gray is not from the oeuvre of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. No, in this world Dr. Watson is a vampire and the Island of Doctor Moreau is a real location. Despite these, and more, changes, it still feels somehow like it belongsContinue Reading
Imagine that the January sixth incident was run by a former Army General with a force of thousands using a military command structure. Would the U.S. government have fallen? That is essentially the plot of Leave No Trace. Someone is targeting national parks. Michael, who has a prosthetic foot fromContinue Reading
Under the Storm is a rural Swedish police procedural. A woman is killed and her house burned to the ground. A bloody man is found wandering in a nearby forest. The man is arrested for the woman’s death. But a local policeman doubts his guilt. As the years pass, theContinue Reading
I call foul, and not in the cute parakeet or tasty fried chicken kind of way, on Crime and Cherry Pits! The characters are engaging and the romantic triangle is cute in this new cozy farming mystery. But the mystery! There is an underlying truth to all mysteries. They shouldContinue Reading
The Guest is the latest novel by the author of Behind Closed Doors and a slew of other domestic suspense stories. This one is about a married couple, Iris and Gabriel, who have two challenges in their life. The husband recently found a boy dying after an accident whose lastContinue Reading
In The Lantern’s Dance, Mary Russell and her husband Sherlock Holmes are back to unravel another mystery. This time it involves Sherlock’s son and their genealogy, which makes fascinating reading. Mary and Sherlock visit his recently discovered adult son, Damien. It seems Damien and his family have been scared offContinue Reading
The Tainted Cup combines a beautifully designed fantasy world (from the creator of the Foundryside series) and the sensibilities of a classic mystery duo like Holmes and Watson or Poirot and Captain Hastings. Luckily, fans of either genre will enjoy the book as the two genres are seamlessly entwined. “AContinue Reading
Another year, another great buddy police/psychologist procedural for Milo and Alex. I look forward to reading this series and The Ghost Orchid is another great entry. Two naked bodies are found murdered in a middle-class backyard in the LA adjacent and mega-wealthy Bel Air enclave. Which one was the intendedContinue Reading
An unnamed female ghostwriter is tapped to write a failed third-party Presidential candidate’s memoir. The candidate is a witty elder stateswoman who is soon investigating a murder with the ghostwriter’s help in this homage to golden age mysteries, The Busy Body. I love golden age mysteries. I still hope thatContinue Reading
The Sherlock Holmes Bookshop at 222 Baker Street, New London, Massachusetts is once again open for business in The Sign of Four Spirits, the ninth book in the series. Gemma, the co-owner, is wrangled into attending a seance, where someone is killed in plain sight when all the lights areContinue Reading