The Coffee Trader is an “historical financial thriller” which sounds impossibly dull, but isn’t. The novel takes place in 1659 Amsterdam, a bustling international center of business and home to the first commodities exchange. Miguel Lienzo is a clever trader who recently lost everything on sugar ... [Continue Reading]
The Case of the Reincarnated Client by Tarquin Hall
One of my favorite private detectives Vish Puri, also known as “Chubby,” is back in The Case of the Reincarnated Client, the fifth novel in the series. If you aren’t familiar with India’s “Most Private Investigator” check out these lighthearted novels which take place contemporary Delhi. ... [Continue Reading]
The Weight of Ink by Rachel Kadish
I love it when a novel inspires me to conduct extra research, and in The Weight of Ink there was plenty of material which demanded further investigation, like The Great Plague of London, Spinoza, and Shakespeare’s Dark Lady. Now you may prefer to read a book that requires no additional effort on ... [Continue Reading]
The Eyes of the Queen and The Queen’s Men by Oliver Clements
The historical thrillers by Oliver Clements are set in the early, shaky years of Queen Elizabeth I’s reign, where the old religion is not completely dead, and Elizabeth’s Catholic cousin Queen Mary makes mischief from her prison in Scotland. The Agents of the Crown series features the ... [Continue Reading]
The Maid by Nita Prose
Molly is the maid every hotel wishes they had on their payroll. Obsessively tidy, punctual, and methodical, Molly cleans each room at the Regency Grand Hotel as if it is a surgical theater. “Your room has been returned to a state of perfection,” she cheerfully exclaims as she finishes her ... [Continue Reading]
Penny & Connelly & Osman
Louise Penny the Madness of Crowds As soon as I finished the seventeenth Chief Inspector Gamache novel, I complained to anyone who would listen! For those of you who missed my rants----The Madness of Crowds is terrible. If you haven’t read the Gamache novels, the earlier ones are wonderful and ... [Continue Reading]
The Best of Everything by Rona Jaffe
How Rona Jaffe came to write her bestseller The Best of Everything (published 1958) is almost as dramatic as the book itself. The young Jaffe had recently quit her first job at Fawcett Publications to write full time. She had a few stories published in national publications but was still living ... [Continue Reading]
An Extravagant Death by Charles Finch
In 1878, the aristocratic private detective Charles Lenox travels to America on a mission for Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli in An Extravagant Death by Charles Finch. Not long after his arrival, a debutant dies under mysterious circumstances, and Lenox is abruptly summoned from New York City to ... [Continue Reading]
Snowdrift by Helene Tursten
In Snowdrift by Helene Tursten, Embla Nyström, a Detective Inspector with the Gothenburg, Sweden, police force, investigates the deaths of two well-known criminals and a cold case involving a childhood friend. Her colleague is a handsome detective and his police dog. Although I still miss Irene ... [Continue Reading]
The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman
The Thursday Murder Club kept appearing on various “recommended for you” lists, but I initially resisted buying it as it sounded rather insipid, like those mystery novels where the amateur sleuth’s cat is a major character. In Richard Osman’s novel, four residents of a posh British retirement ... [Continue Reading]