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]
Nordic Noir
At the end of July, The New York Times Book Review featured a guide to Nordic noir. Categorized by country (Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, Sweden), I was familiar with a few of the authors, but happily there were many unfamiliar names as well. Keeping in mind that dark is the hallmark of the ... [Continue Reading]
Ordeal by Jorn Lier Horst
Modern day Norway Taxi driver Jens Hummel has been missing for six months, and Chief Inspector William Wisting and his colleagues in the Larvik Criminal Investigation Unit are no closer to finding him. Just as they are about to give up, a promising lead materializes, which suggests a link to ... [Continue Reading]
Fractured and Undone by Karin Slaughter [Will Trent Books #2 ]
Will Trent is a 6’ 3” GBI (Georgia Bureau of Investigation) agent with extraordinary investigative skills and limited social skills, both of which can be traced back to his childhood in a state-run orphanage. (His orphan nickname was Trash, because he was abandoned in a trash can.) His terrifying ... [Continue Reading]
The Body in the Castle Well (Book 12) and The Shooting at Château Rock (Book 15) by Martin Walker
Must Read for Francophiles Reading Martin Walker’s novels set in the Périgord region of France IS almost as good as being there. Although nominally murder mysteries, the protagonist, Bruno Courrèges, Chief of Police of the fictional village of St. Denis, spends more time cooking mouthwatering ... [Continue Reading]
Hunting Game by Helene Tursten
It’s moose hunting season in Sweden, and twenty-eight-year-old Embla Nyström, a Detective Inspector in the Västra Götaland County Bureau of Investigation’s mobile unit (VGM) is looking forward to the annual hunt with family and friends. Because the hunting rights have been in the same families for ... [Continue Reading]
Mysteries: Bad, Better, Best
Why do I keep reading Linda Fairstein? I say this every time, yet every time a new Alexander Cooper crime novel is released, I get sucked in. Maybe it is the history buff in me that appreciates the NYC landmarks and historical trivia that Fairstein peppers throughout her stories. But this time, ... [Continue Reading]
Mysteries from Paretsky, Clark and Black
Sara Paretsky, Marcia Clark, Benjamin Black In Fallout, Sara Paretsky relocates her Chicago based detective, V.I. Warshawski, to Kansas, where the fish out of water V.I. gets caught up in a convoluted and not entirely plausible plot involving old nukes. I raced through Moral Defense, another in ... [Continue Reading]
The Keeper of Lost Causes by Jussi Adler-Olsen
The Keeper of Lost Causes by Jussi Adler-Olsen I’m always on the lookout for a new mystery series, so I was thrilled when my cousin Harriet suggested the Department Q series by Jussi Adler-Olsen. The first novel in the series, The Keeper of Lost Causes, introduces veteran Homicide Detective ... [Continue Reading]
International Crime Fiction
Books by Nina Borg, Helene Tursten and the writing team of Lene Kaaberbol and Agnete Friis When in Boston last month, I attended the Boston Book Festival where I happily discovered the booth of SOHO Crime, a twenty-year-old publisher that specializes in international crime fiction. I ... [Continue Reading]