Tag: crime fiction

In this timeless, mythical tale of unforgiving justice and elusive grace, rural Mississippi townsfolk shoulder the pain of generations as something dangerous lurks in the enigmatic kudzu of the woods.

The town of Red Bluff, Mississippi, has seen better days, though those who’ve held on have little memory of when that was. Myer, the county’s aged, sardonic lawman, still thinks it can prove itself — when confronted by a strange family of drifters, the sheriff believes that the people of Red Bluff can be accepting, rational, even good.

The opposite is true: this is a landscape of fear and ghosts — of regret and violence — transformed by the kudzu vines that have enveloped the hills around it, swallowing homes, cars, rivers, and hiding a terrible secret deeper still.

Colburn, a junkyard sculptor who’s returned to Red Bluff, knows this pain all too well, though he too is willing to hope for more when he meets and falls in love with Celia, the local bar owner. The Deep South gives these noble, broken, and driven folks the gift of human connection while bestowing upon them the crippling weight of generations. With broken histories and vagabond hearts, the townsfolk wrestle with the evil in the woods — and the wickedness that lurks in each and every one of us.

Michael Farris Smith is the author of The Fighter, Desperation Road, Rivers, and The Hands of Strangers. His novels have appeared on Best of the Year lists with Esquire, Southern Living, Book Riot, and numerous others, and have been named Indie Next List, Barnes & Noble Discover, and Amazon Best of the Month selections. He has been a finalist for the Southern Book Prize, the Gold Dagger Award in the UK, and the Grand Prix des Lectrices in France, and his essays have appeared with the New York Times, Bitter Southerner, Writer’s Bone, and more. He lives in Oxford, Mississippi, with his wife and two daughters.

My thoughts:

This was a strange book, in a good way. The blurb implies a straightforward crime thriller but it isn’t quite that.

Colburn has returned to the town his father died in, still dealing with his feelings about his parents.

Three strange drifters also arrive in town, never named, they live in their car till they, and three local residents, go missing.

It’s like a weird, anti fairy tale, with the creeping vines gradually eating up the town and its inhabitants. A town that’s slowly dying, with its empty store fronts and dwindling population.

The writing is lyrical, drawing you into the Mississippi haze.

*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour but all opinions remain my own.

Days after a young pageant queen named Jenny is found murdered, her small town grieves the loss alongside her picture-perfect parents. At first glance, Jenny’s tragic death appears clear-cut for investigators. The most obvious suspect is one of her fans, an older man who may have gotten too close for comfort. But Jenny’s half-sister, Virginia—the sarcastic black sheep of the family—isn’t so sure of his guilt and takes matters into her own hands to find the killer.
But for Jenny’s case and Virginia’s investigation, there’s more to the story. Virginia, still living in town and haunted by her own troubled teenage years, suspects that a similar darkness lay beneath the sparkling veneer of Jenny’s life. Alternating between Jenny’s final days and Virginia’s determined search for the truth, the sisters’ dual narratives follow a harrowing trail of suspects, with surprising turns that race toward a shocking finale.
Infused with dark humor and driven by two captivating young women, The Prized Girl tells a heartbreaking story of missed connections, a complicated family, and a town’s disturbing secrets.My thoughts:This covers some dark terrain, and I don’t just mean murder. Both Jenny and Virginia live with secrets, and while Virginia is trying to find Jenny’s killer, she’s also unravelling her own past.The plot twists and turns, keeping you guessing right till the very end.For a small town there’s a lot of terrible people doing terrible things, reminding me of some recent Netflix binges, and that’s no bad thing.*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour but all opinions remain my own.

Chaos reigns in the sleepy village of Aramoana on the New Zealand coast, when a series of shipping containers wash up on the beach and looting begins. Detective Constable Sam Shephard experiences the desperation of the scavengers first-hand, and ends up in an ambulance, nursing her wounds and puzzling over an assault that left her assailant for dead. What appears to be a clear-cut case of a cargo ship running aground soon takes a more sinister turn when a skull is found in the sand, and the body of a diver is pulled from the sea…

a diver who didn’t die of drowning…

As first officer at the scene, Sam is handed the case, much to the displeasure of her superiors, and she must put together an increasingly confusing series of clues to get to the bottom of a mystery that may still have more victims…

About the author

Vanda Symon is a crime writer, TV presenter and radio host from Dunedin, New Zealand, and the chair of the Otago Southland branch of the New Zealand Society of Authors. The Sam Shephard series has climbed to number one on the New Zealand bestseller list, and also been shortlisted for the Ngaio Marsh Award for best crime novel. She currently lives in Dunedin, with her husband and two sons.

My thoughts:

This was very twisty and turny with plenty of red herrings. Well written and gripping, showing the dark underbelly of the sunny New Zealand coastal towns.

I really enjoyed the way the author conjured up the landscape, even though I’ve never been to New Zealand, I could picture the ocean and the various buildings the characters enter. I could even imagine the differing officers and persons of interest quite vividly.

The plot is clever and the characters have nuance and shade, Sam’s a cop but not unwilling to colour outside the lines, making her feel more realistic and I liked her partner Smithy.

*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour but all opinions remain my own.

Do you listen to your mother? Even after she’s dead?

Anna Hardaker is following you …

This seemingly innocent Tweet fills Jamie Hardaker with confusion and fear. After all, his mother Anna has been dead for nearly three weeks.

What follows is an orchestrated Twitter campaign to lead those Anna loved, and didn’t love so much, to the truth behind her “accidental” death.

Amazon

Maria Frankland’s life began at 40 when she escaped an unhappy marriage and began making a living from her own writing and becoming a teacher of creative writing.

The rich tapestry of life with all its turbulent times has enabled her to pour experience, angst and lessons learned into the writing of her novels and poetry.

She recognises that the darkest places can exist within family relationships and this is reflected in the domestic thrillers she writes.

She is a ‘born ‘n’ bred’ Yorkshirewoman, a mother of two and has recently found her own ‘happy ever after’ after marrying again.

Still in her forties, she is now going to dedicate the rest of her working life to writing books and inspiring other writers to also achieve their dreams too!
Twitter Website

My thoughts:

This was an interesting thriller, written with Jamie as our unreliable narrator – the reader only ever sees what he sees, and is he telling the truth?

Family is often the most complicated thing of all and the relationships within a family can be messy and toxic.

Jamie and his stepsister to be hate each other, Claudia hates her soon to be stepmother, Anna is tired of the bickering and Iain won’t tell his ex-wife to butt out.

After Anna’s death, someone is tweeting as her and the tangled family mess gets worse, rather than better as the ghostly tweeter starts to make claims that Anna’s death was no accident.

It was good to see modern technology integrated into the plot, a lot of novels seem to try to act as though social media either doesn’t exist or that characters just don’t use it. Which is weird and when so many people see it as essential, deeply unrealistic.

For a first novel, this reads as though the author has been writing for a while, it’s confident and assured, dangling red herrings and making the reader ask questions of the protagonist.

*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour but all opinions remain my own.

Oslo, 2018. Former long-distance runner Sonja Nordstrøm never shows at the launch of her controversial autobiography, Always Number One. When celebrity blogger Emma Ramm visits Nordstrøm’s home later that day, she finds the door unlocked and signs of a struggle inside. A bib with the number ‘one’ has been pinned to the TV. Police officer Alexander Blix is appointed to head up the missing persons investigation, but he still bears the emotional scars of a hostage situation nineteen years earlier, when he killed the father of a five-year-old girl. Traces of Nordstrøm soon show up at different locations, but the appearance of the clues appear to be carefully calculated … evidence of a bigger picture that he’s just not seeing… Blix and Ramm soon join forces, determined to find and stop a merciless killer with a flair for the dramatic, and thirst for attention. Trouble is, he’s just got his first taste of it…

Jørn Lier Horst and Thomas Enger are the internationally bestselling Norwegian authors of the William Wisting and Henning Juul series respectively. Jørn Lier Horst first rose to literary fame with his No. 1 internationally bestselling William Wisting series. A former investigator in the Norwegian police, Horst imbues all his works with an unparalleled realism and suspense. Thomas Enger is the journalist-turned-author behind the internationally acclaimed and bestselling Henning Juul series. Enger’s trademark has become a darkly gritty voice paired with key social messages and tight plotting. Besides writing fiction for both adults and young adults, Enger also works as a music composer. Death Deserved is Jørn Lier Horst & Thomas Enger’s first co-written thriller.

My thoughts:

This was very clever, both authors are at the top of their game and it shows in this twisty, fast paced novel.

I liked the contrast between Emma and Blix, she the hot shot young reporter, he the dogged career detective.

As they attempt to track down the mysterious counting killer and unravel his obsession with celebrities, their own secrets are revealed.

I could definitely see a series of cases investigated by the combined skills of the protagonists and even see it as the latest Scandi Noir TV must see. That’s how good the plot and writing are.

*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour but all opinions remain my own.