Fresh from the scandal at Hampstead County PD, Detective Sergeant Casey Wray works a complex double-homicide that points to a killer on a murderous rampage and a shattering series of discoveries that could end her career … The shocking sequel to the addictive, twisty, bestselling Black Reed Bay…
Hampstead County Police Department is embroiled in scandal after corruption at the top of the force was exposed. Cleared of involvement and returned to active duty, Detective Sergeant Casey Wray nonetheless finds herself at a crossroads when it becomes clear not everyone believes she’s innocent.
Partnered with rookie Billy Drocker, Casey works a shocking daytime double-homicide in downtown Rockport with the two victims seemingly unknown to one another. And when a third victim is gunned down on her doorstep shortly after, it appears an abusive ex-boyfriend holds the key to the killings.
With powerful figures demanding answers, Casey and Billy search for the suspect, fearing he’s on a murderous rampage. But when a key witness goes missing, and new evidence just won’t fit, the case begins to unravel. With her career in jeopardy, Casey makes a shattering discovery that threatens to expose the true darkness at the heart of the murders… with a killer still on the loose…
The Kitchen – Simone Buchholz, translated by Rachel Ward out 11th April Link
Hamburg State Prosecutor Chastity Riley and her colleagues investigate the murders of men with a history of abuse towards women … as a startling, horrifying series of revelations emerge.
When neatly packed male body parts wash up by the River Elbe, Hamburg State Prosecutor Chastity Riley and her colleagues begin a perplexing investigation.
As the murdered men are identified, it becomes clear that they all had a history of abuse towards women, leading Riley to wonder if it would actually be in society’s best interests to catch the killers.
But when her best friend Carla is attacked, and the police show little interest in tracking down the offender, Chastity takes matters into her own hands and as a link between the two cases emerges, horrifying revelations threaten Chastity’s own moral compass … and put everything at risk.
The award-winning, critically acclaimed Chastity Riley series returns with a slick, hard-boiled, darkly funny thriller that tackles issues of violence and the difference between law and justice with devastating insight, and an ending you will never see coming…
Art expert Emma Lindahl is anxious when she’s asked to appraise the antiques and artefacts in the infamous manor house of one of Sweden’s wealthiest families, on the island of Storholmen, where a young woman was murdered nine years earlier, her killer never found.
Emma must work alone, and with the Gussman family apparently avoiding her, she sees virtually no one in the house. Do they have something to hide? As she goes about her painstaking work and one shocking discovery yields clues that lead to another, Emma becomes determined to uncover the secrets of the house and its occupants.
When the lifeless body of another young woman is found in the icy waters surrounding the island, Detective Karl Rosén arrives to investigate, and memories of his failure to solve the first case come rushing back. Could this young woman’s tragic death somehow hold the key?
Battling her own demons, Emma joins forces with Karl to embark upon a chilling investigation, plunging them into horrifying secrets from the past – Viking rites and tainted love – and Scandinavia’s deepest, darkest winter…
Born in Marseille, France, and with a degree in Political Science, Johana Gustawsson has worked as a journalist for the French and Spanish press and television. Her critically acclaimed Roy & Castells series, including Block 46, Keeper and Blood Song, has won the Plume d’Argent, Balai de la découverte, Balai d’Or and Prix Marseillais du Polar awards, and is now published in nineteen countries. A TV adaptation is currently under way in a French, Swedish and UK co-production. The Bleeding was a number-one bestseller in France and received immense critical acclaim across the globe. Johana lives in Sweden with her Swedish husband and their three sons.
My thoughts: this is not a Christmas book, despite the title, it’s a creepy, dark read about obsession, murder, and how twisted some minds can get.
And it is also so, so good. Totally compelling, very enjoyable as I like dark, weird stuff, and peopled with very normal individuals, and some very disturbed ones passing as normal. Which of course makes it worse.
There are several narratives that once you realise what’s happening and how they interconnect, build to reveal the total horror that has taken place in the Gussman family’s manor house.
This is the second book I’ve read from this author, and it is deeply chilling but incredibly interesting and her writing (and the excellent work of the translator) just sucks you into the world Johana has created on this island. It’s that good. If you prefer your winter reading to be dark and full of horrors, monsters hidden in plain sight, then this is absolutely for you.
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in the blog tour but all opinions remain my own.
When a celebrated government official is found dead after his surprise birthday party, a young police officer uncovers a terrifying world of financial crime, sinister cults and disturbing secret lives. Icelandic politician KatrÍn JÚlÍusdÓttir’s award-winning, breathtaking debut, and first in a chilling series.
When Óttar Karlsson, a wealthy and respected government official and businessman, is found murdered, after failing to turn up at his own surprise birthday party, the police are at a loss. It isn’t until young police officer SigurdÍs finds a well-hidden safe in his impersonal luxury apartment that clues start emerging.
As Óttar’s shady business dealings become clear, a second, unexpected line of enquiry emerges, when SigurdÍs finds a US phone number in the safe, along with papers showing regular money transfers to an American account. Following the trail to Minnesota, trauma rooted in SigurdÍs’s own childhood threatens to resurface and the investigation strikes chillingly close to home…
Atmospheric, deeply unsettling and full of breakneck twists and turns, Dead Sweet is a startling debut thriller that uncovers a terrifying world of financial crime, sinister cults and disturbing secret lives, and kicks off an addictive, mind-blowing new series.
KatrÍn received the Blackbird Award, an Icelandic crime-writing prize, for her first novel, Dead Sweet. Her debut novel was reviewed well by critics and hit the best-selling lists in the first weeks after publication. KatrÍn has a political background and was a member of Parliament from 2003 until 2016. Before she was elected to Parliament, KatrÍn was an advisor and project manager at a tech company and a senior buyer and CEO in the retail sector, as well as the Managing Director of a student union during her uni years.
Translator – Quentin Bates escaped English suburbia as a teenager, jumping at the chance of a gap year working in Iceland. He is the author of a series of crime novels set in present-day Iceland (Frozen Out, Cold Steal, Chilled to the Bone, Winterlude, Cold Comfort and Thin Ice which have been published worldwide. He has translated all of Ragnar JÓnasson’s Dark Iceland series.
My thoughts: this was really good, but also really awful because when the truth comes out about the victim, Óttar, he turns out to have been one bad man and I didn’t really want the cops to find his killer, because weirdly I felt bad for them – not him!
SigurdÍs is a really good investigator, even if she does go off on her own – she just wants to prove to her bosses that she’s a great cop and not keep getting left out of investigations or given paperwork to shuffle.
I really hope this grows into a series as I was completely hooked, the writing (and Quentin’s brilliant translation work) was so gripping and compelling, even as I realised, oh no, he’s guilty of really gross and horrible things, I wanted to keep reading.
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in the blog tour but all opinions remain my own.
Hotel Beresford is a grand, old building, just outside the city. And any soul is welcome.
Danielle Ortega works nights, singing at whatever dive bar will offer her a gig. She gets by, keeping to herself. Sam Walker gambles and drinks, and can’t keep his hands to himself. Now he’s tied up in a shoe closet with a dent in his head that matches Danielle’s broken ashtray.
The man in 731 has been dead for two days and his dog has not stopped barking. Two doors down, the couple who always smokes on the window ledge will mysteriously fall.
Upstairs, in the penthouse, Mr Balliol sees it all. He can peer into every crevice of every floor of the hotel from his screen-filled suite. He witnesses humanity and inhumanity in all its forms: loneliness, passion and desperation in equal measure.
All the ingredients he needs to make a deal. When Danielle returns home one night to find Sam gone, a series of sinister events begins to unfold. But strange things often occur at Hotel Beresford, and many are only a distraction to hide something much darker…
Will Carver is the international bestselling author of the January David series and the critically acclaimed, mind-blowingly original Detective Pace series, which includes Good Samaritans (2018), Nothing Important Happened Today (2019) and Hinton Hollow Death Trip (2020), all of which were ebook bestsellers and selected as books of the year in the mainstream international press.
Nothing Important Happened Today was longlisted for both the Goldsboro Books Glass Bell Award 2020 and the Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year Award. Hinton Hollow Death Trip was longlisted for Guardian’s Not the Booker Prize, and was followed by four standalone literary thrillers, The Beresford, Psychopaths Anonymous, The Daves Next Door and Suicide Thursday.
Will spent his early years in Germany, but returned to the UK at age eleven, when his sporting career took off. He currently runs his own fitness and nutrition company, and lives in Reading with his children. children.
My thoughts: it won’t be a surprise to anyone else in the cult of Carver that this is very, very good. Set before The Beresford, this takes place in the hotel next door, where Mr Balliol watches everyone and everything that goes on.
Carol, the best manager of a hotel ever, ensures the smooth running of the building, making certain that nothing interrupts the guests day. Including a dead body or two.
There’s a conference taking place in the hotel and everything must be perfect, Mr Balliol expects nothing less. But an old friend of his has checked in, and he wonders why now.
Obviously nothing important happened today and the Beresford has its own unique way of ensuring that nothing ever will. The detective asking about the dead man in 731 gets distracted by a long term guest, so doesn’t notice anything else going on, which is probably a good thing.
It’s a brilliant, twisted and utterly engaging read, defying an easily defined genre – is it a crime novel, a thriller, something fantastical? I don’t know. I just know I was totally hooked.
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in the blog tour but all opinions remain my own.
Acacia Pines, USA. Sheriff Cohen’s life is falling apart – his father accidently burned down the retirement home, his wife has moved out, and his son is bullying other kids at school.
When high-school student, Lucas Connor, is abducted, Cohen sees a chance to get his life back on track – to win back his wife and scoop the reward money offered for Lucas’ safe return.
But as the body count rises, it becomes clear that Cohen’s going to have to make the kind of decision from which there’s no coming back … a decision with deadly consequences…
A furiously paced, edge-of-your-seat thriller exposing the dark underbelly of small-town life, His Favourite Graves is also a twisted and twisty story of father and son relationships, and the one last gamble of a desperate man to save everything…
Paul is an award-winning author who often divides his time between his home city of Christchurch, New Zealand, where most of his novels are set, and Europe. He’s won the New Zealand Ngaio Marsh Award three times, the Saint-Maur book festival’s crime novel of the year award in France, and has been shortlisted for the Edgar and the Barry in the US and the Ned Kelly in Australia. His books have been translated into more than twenty languages. He’s thrown his Frisbee in more than forty countries, plays tennis badly, golf even worse, and has two cats – which is often two too many. The critically acclaimed The Quiet People was published in 2021 and was followed in 2022 by The Pain Tourist – a number-one bestseller in three countries.
My thoughts: this was so good, all of the characters are morally compromised, not just the obvious ones. There’s a lot of terrible crimes that have gone unsolved so far, and if Lucas Connor hadn’t been kidnapped, a lot of them would still be a mystery.
Sheriff Cohen has a lot of secrets and is prepared to go to some extreme lengths to try to fix some of his problems, missing issues with his son, who’s not a very nice person and who might be about to get his comeuppance.
Lucas might be a victim, but he’s just as complicated and quite disturbed as well. As the true, horrific extent of how and what his dad has done to protect him is incredible, and not in a good way.
Dark, twisted, disturbing and set in a town I never want to visit.
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in the blog tour but all opinions remain my own.
Henri Koskinen, intrepid insurance mathematician and adventurepark entrepreneur, firmly believes in the power of common sense and order. That is until he moves in with painter Laura Helanto and her daughter…
As Henri realises he has inadvertently become part of a group of local dads, a competing adventure park is seeking to expand their operations, not always sticking to the law in the process…
Is it possible to combine the increasingly dangerous world of the adventure-park business with the unpredictability of life in a blended family? At first glance, the two appear to have only one thing in common: neither deals particularly well with a mounting body count. In order to solve this seemingly impossible conundrum, Henri is forced to step far beyond the mathematical precision of his comfort zone … and the stakes have never been higher…
Finnish Antti Tuomainen was an award-winning copywriter when he made his literary debut in 2007 as a suspense author. In 2011, his third novel, The Healer, was awarded the Clue Award for Best Finnish Crime Novel and shortlisted for the Glass Key Award. With a piercing and evocative style, Tuomainen was one of the first to challenge the Scandinavian crime-genre formula, and his poignant, dark and hilarious The Man Who Died became an international bestseller, shortlisting for the Petrona and Last Laugh Awards and now a Finnish TV series. Palm Beach, Finland (2018) and Little Siberia (2019) were shortlisted for the Capital Crime/Amazon Publishing Readers Awards, the Last Laugh Award and the CWA International Dagger, and won the Petrona Award for Best Scandinavian Crime Novel. The Rabbit Factor, the first book in the trilogy will soon be a major motion picture starring Steve Carell for Amazon Studios, and the first two books were international bestsellers. Antti lives in Helsinki with his wife.
My thoughts: we return, for the final time, to the crazy world of adventure theme parks and Henri, the actuary who often seems to wind up solving crimes, instead of his actual job at YouMeFun.
Now living with girlfriend Laura and her daughter, you might think joining the dads club at the school and settling into domesticity, would mean less crime solving and fewer murders. But no, Henri’s ne rivals are a bunch of gangsters, who are attracting all the customers with free entry and free food, but Henri can’t see them lasting long in business. And then the owner is murdered. Which brings the cops to his door, again.
So, in between reassuring his staff and baking cakes to fundraise for the school trip to Paris, Henri sets out to solve a murder, or several, find out what the two dodgy cops are up to, and what this all has to do with horses, before he gets arrested or killed.
Written (and translated) with great wit, this delightfully funny black comedy of theme park shenanigans and espionage, is a wonderful high note for the highly entertaining trilogy to end up. Henri’s life is settled and happy, his crack team at the park are more committed than ever and things just might, finally, be ok.
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in the blog tour but all opinions remain my own.
On a snowy winter morning, an abandoned shipping container is discovered near Reykjavík. Inside are the bodies of five young women – one of them barely alive.
As Icelandic Police detective Daníel struggles to investigate the most brutal crime of his career, Áróra looks into the background of a suspicious man, who turns out to be engaged to Daníel’s former wife, and the connections don’t stop there…
Daníel and Áróra’s cases pit them both against ruthless criminals with horrifying agendas, while Áróra persists with her search for her missing sister, Ísafold, whose devastating disappearance continues to haunt her.
As the temperature drops and the 24-hour darkness and freezing snow hamper their efforts, their investigations become increasingly dangerous … for everyone.
Bestselling crime-writer Lilja Sigurðardóttir was born in the town of Akranes in 1972 and raised in Mexico, Sweden, Spain and Iceland. An award-winning playwright, Lilja has written ten crime novels, including Snare, Trap and Cage, making up the Reykjavík Noir trilogy, and her standalone thriller Betrayal, all of which have hit bestseller lists worldwide and been long- and shortlisted for multiple awards. The film rights for the Reykjavík Noir trilogy have been bought by Palomar Pictures in California. Cold as Hell, the first book in the An Áróra Investigation series, was published in the UK in 2021 and reprinted twice, and was followed by Red as Blood, a number-one digital bestseller. Lilja lives outside of Reykjavík with her partner and a brood of chickens.
My thoughts: a terrible crime scene inside a shipping container, the bodies of several young women, buried underneath them, a survivor. After surviving a harrowing journey, she could provide the key evidence to stop a human trafficking ring run by Russian gangsters in Iceland.
Is there a connection between this awful case and Daniel’s ex-wife’s new boyfriend? Àróra is looking into him, as she turns out to be related to the woman in question too – is Iceland really that small?
This is an incredibly awful crime – Bola has been through a horrific experience but maybe now, with Helena’s help she might be able to start to recover and find a safe place to begin her life again.
Written with great sensitivity and detail, this might be Daniel’s hardest case yet, and his children are staying too. Luckily he has a marvellous helper in the drag queen who lives in his garden.
It also means Àróra has to put the search for her sister on hold – there’s just not enough evidence and the trail grows colder. This case could bring her and Daniel closer together, as there’s nothing specifically personal about it.
Another masterful and compelling addition to the series, once again tackling complex themes and injustices.
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in the blog tour but all opinions remain my own.
The Skelf women are recovering from the cataclysmic events that nearly claimed their lives. Their funeral-director and privateinvestigation businesses are back on track, and their cases are as perplexing as ever.
Matriarch Dorothy looks into a suspicious fire at a travellers’ site, and takes a grieving, homeless man under her wing. Daughter Jenny is searching for her missing sister-in-law, who disappeared in tragic circumstances, while grand-daughter Hannah is asked to investigate increasingly dangerous conspiracy theorists, who are targeting a retired female astronaut … putting her own life at risk.
With a body lost at sea, funerals for those with no one to mourn them, reports of strange happenings in outer space, a funeral crasher with a painful secret, and a violent attack on one of the family, The Skelfs face their most personal – and perilous – cases yet. Doing things their way may cost them everything…
Doug Johnstone is the author of sixteen novels, many of which have been bestsellers. The Space Between Us was chosen for BBC Two’s Between the Covers, while Black Hearts and The Big Chill were longlisted for the Theakston Crime Novel of the Year. Three of his books – A Dark Matter, Breakers and The Jump – have been shortlisted for the McIlvanney Prize. Doug has taught creative writing or been writer in residence at universities, schools, writing retreats, festivals, prisons and a funeral home. He’s also been an arts journalist for 25 years. He is a songwriter and musician with six albums and three EPs released, and he plays drums for the Fun Lovin’ Crime Writers, a band of crime writers. He’s also co-founder of the Scotland Writers Football Club and lives in Edinburgh with his family.
My thoughts: Skelfs, Skelfs, Skelfs, they’re back!!
OK, so this is one of my favourite series and I get super excited to read each installment. And this one is excellent.
Each Skelf is on a case of their own, and still running the funeral home, which is going green under Indy’s lead. Buying a plot of land for green burials and using a water based process to break down remains.
Dorothy is looking into the arson attack on a local travelling community, is it simply a local who hates them or is there something more sinister going on?
Jenny is still dealing with her ex-husband Craig’s trail of chaos and looking for his sister, who was last seen making off with Craig’s body. Her former mother-in-law is dying and wants to say her farewells.
Finally Hannah has come up against the old adage about never meeting your heroes, when she gets drawn into the lives of a female astronaut and her wife. Indy is a bit worried, and not without reason.
There’s also a potential new employee at the funeral home, some fab gigs for Dorothy’s band, Jenny and Archie’s friend dates, while Schrodinger the cat gets plenty of love from everyone.
It’s another brilliant, funny, clever book about these incredible women and their work. The ghost phone in the garden is proving popular, helping the grieving to deal with their feelings and share what they need to say to their loved ones.
Can’t wait to see what happens to them next, have they finally reached a good place as a family and as a business?
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in the blog tour but all opinions remain my own.
On the first morning of her new job at Heartfield House, a care home for the elderly, Annie Jackson wakens from a terrifying dream. And when she arrives at the home, she knows that the first old man she meets is going to die.
How she knows this is a terrifying mystery, but it is the start of horrifying premonitions … a rekindling of the curse that has trickled through generations of women in her family – a wicked gift known only as ‘the murmurs’…
With its reappearance comes an old, forgotten fear that is about to grip Annie Jackson.
And this time, it will never let go…
Michael Malone is a prize-winning poet and author who was born and brought up in the heart of Burns’ country. He has published over 200 poems in literary magazines throughout the UK, including New Writing Scotland, Poetry Scotland and Markings. Blood Tears, his bestselling debut novel won the Pitlochry Prize from the Scottish Association of Writers. His dark psychological thriller, A Suitable Lie, was a number-one bestseller, and is currently in production for the screen, and five powerful standalone thrillers followed suit. A former Regional Sales Manager (Faber & Faber) he has also worked as an IFA and a bookseller. Michael lives in Ayr, where he also works as a hypnotherapist.
My thoughts: this was so good, creepy and weird and at times incredibly sad. Annie seems to have inherited the family curse, last seen in her aunt Bridget, a woman she never met. When she meets certain people, their faces become skulls and a voice whispers in her ear, telling how they’re going to die.
Annie was in a terrible accident as a child, in which her mum died, and lost all her memories of life before that point. With her twin brother Lewis, she sets out to find out what happened, to her, to the aunts they never knew and solve the family curse, before it drives her mad, as it supposedly did her aunt and great-grandmother.
Interspersed with diary extracts of a 17th century ancestor, to explain the curse’s origins, Annie and Lewis carefully unwind the past – with the few reminders their parents left behind, including some photos.
This journey into the past reconnects them with the town they lived in as children, and their old neighbours. But it also puts Annie in terrible danger, can Lewis, and a convicted murderer, save her or will Annie be able to save herself?
I was completely hooked by Annie’s story, and Bridget’s too, sad and lonely, but utterly loved, both women struggled with their strange gift, and not always to the happiest of ends, but Annie’s might just be freedom and joy thanks to her other mysterious aunt, Sheila.
Family secrets cast long shadows in this book, if only Annie and Lewis hadn’t had to wait till adulthood, and become orphans, before learning the truth about their family and the women they come from. Religion and the persecution of witches, Scottish history and murder all meet in this beguiling and inventive book.
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in the blog tour but all opinions remain my own.
ramblingmads 