Elly Griffiths: The Vanishing Box Tuesday, Nov 13 2018 

Award winning novelist and complex mystery and Continued series winner and great read and historical saga and mystery to die for Auntie M Writes Crime 12:55 am

Elly Grifftiths delightful period series, The Magic Men Mysteries, returns with The Vanishing Box, and it’s Auntie M’s favorite yet in a compelling series.

It’s almost Christmas in Brighton, and magician Max Mephisto is headlining a special act at the Hippodrome with his daughter, Ruby. With a television show in the offing, the Vanshing Box trick wows the audience. Things are changing for the magician duo in more ways than one.

An act gaining a lot of interest and controversy in the same show is the “living statues” act, where near-naked women freeze in a strange tableau of historic moments. While some appreciate the stillness of the women and others their strategic feathers and leaves, there are cries of obscenity in the town that pale in comparison when one of the young women is murdered.

Max’s good friend, DI Edgar Stephens, who happens to be Ruby’s fiance, leads the investigation into the death of the lovely young woman. He also must deal with his conflicted feelings for a colleague, with surprising results.

There will be secrets from the past woven into the fabric of the mystery Edgar must solve as the deaths mount up. And when the danger hits close to home, Edgar will realize this is his most important case yet.

A fine entry in the series, with the period details spot on. And don’t miss Griffiths’ new stand-alone Gothic thriller, The Stranger Diaries.

 

Catriona McPherson: Go To My Grave Sunday, Nov 11 2018 

Award winning novelist and complex mystery and great read and mystery to die for Auntie M Writes Crime 12:36 am

Catriona McPherson’s newest standalone, Go To My Grave,
with a gothic thriller that’s eerie even as it’s a study in characterization.

For Donna Weaver and her mother, restoring Galloway beach house The Breakers and turning it into a posh inn has been the stuff of their dreams. Redecorated, filled with fresh flowers, Donna awaits the arrival of their first guests for a long weekend where she will cook and wait on them.

She’s juggling this alone as her Mum is at a wedding venue getting new clients when the gang of relations arrive for one couple’s tenth anniversary. It’s not long before most of them realize they’ve been at this very house decades before, for a sixteenth birthday party that didn’t end well.

Things soon start to happen that catch them off balance, playing games with their memories and the events of that party. Until the unthinkable happens and a body is found.

At once atmospheric, the tangle of people at this party confound Donna with their interwoven histories that are slowly revealed to her, as are the details of exactly what happpened at the party, when the participants swore to keep the details secret in a vow of silence they would take to their graves.

For some of them, this might just come true.

Disturbing and twisted, this is a deliberately devious mystery with a shocking and unexpected ending.

 

Andrew Michael Hurley: Devil’s Day Sunday, Nov 4 2018 

Award winning novelist and great read and mystery to die for and thriller Auntie M Writes Crime 12:02 am


Andrew Michael Hurley’s mines the Lancashire landscape when he brings John Pentecost an his young wife back to the Endlands in Devil’s Day.

Unsettling from the outset, John brings his newly pregnant wife, Katherine, home for the funeral of his grandfather, known as the Gaffer.

Dadda, John’s father, has his own agenda, and the funeral is the backdrop to the local legends and tales that are told and retold as preparations for the ritual to keep the Devil away from the sheep begin. Everything has a superstition behind it, and everyone on the moors is affected. But it’s all just tales and nonsense, isn’t it?

The unsettled landscape comes alive under Hurley’s talented pen, as the gripping tale shows Nature at her finest and her cruelest. The eerie feel to the entire tale had the Daily Mail note: “This impeccably written novel tightens like a clammy hand around your throat.”

With Katherine’s growing apprehension, is John merely failing to see the menace she sees, or does he know something more?

An accomplished followup to Hurley’s award-winning first novel, The Loney.

 

Michael J McCann: The March and Walker Crime Novels Wednesday, Oct 24 2018 

Award winning novelist and complex mystery and Continued series winner and great read and mystery to die for Auntie M Writes Crime 12:06 am

Please welcome Hammett Prize Finalist Michael McCann, to talk to readers about his March and Walker Crime Novel series:

Is setting important to readers when it comes to crime fiction?

For most of us, it can be more or less transparent, particularly in Scandinavian noir by Henning Mankell, for example, where our familiarity with rural and small-city Sweden is limited. For readers of William Kent Krueger or Anne Hillerman, on the other hand, a sense of place is more important for an appreciation of the story, even if we’ve never been to Minnesota or New Mexico.

As far as my novels are concerned, a Canadian setting might be equally unfamiliar to crime fiction fans, but it offers a different perspective to homicide investigation that will appeal to readers looking for an international flavour to their mysteries.

During 15 years with the Canada Border Services Agency, I had an opportunity to learn about law enforcement procedures common to all professionals, including interviewing and interrogation techniques, search procedures, firearms handling, and evidence processing.

I also worked alongside experienced officers from other agencies and was exposed to a wide range of Canadian legal requirements for policing in our country.

This time spent in public service provided an ideal training ground for writing crime fiction in a Canadian setting. As a result, my March and Walker novels reflect how the Ontario Provincial Police actually investigates homicides in their jurisdiction.

Given that the OPP is one of the largest law enforcement agencies in North America, a strong sense of verisimilitude is very important to my work.

It was a great honour when the first novel in the series, Sorrow Lake, was named a finalist for the prestigious Hammett Prize for excellence in crime fiction in North America. I hope that the next two in the series, Burn Country and Persistent Guilt, come close to matching that high standard.

I hope you’ll consider trying crime fiction set in Canada!

Find the March and Walker Crime Novel series on Amazon, in paperback or eBook, at my author page here: https://www.amazon.com/Michael-J.-McCann/e/B0031LPGCC/ref=dp_byline_cont_ebooks_1.

Electronic versions in epub format are also available from Kobo for any epub reader here: https://www.kobo.com/ca/en/search?query=The%20March%20and%20Walker%20Crime%20Novel%20Series&fcsearchfield=Series&seriesId=8a03a5f5-a99d-537e-9aae-3f2f93609102.


Michael J. McCann

Michael J. McCann lives and writes in Oxford Station, Ontario, Canada. He was born and raised in Peterborough. A former production editor with Carswell Legal Publications (Western), he holds a Bachelor of Arts (Honours) from Trent University with a major in English Literature and a Master of Arts in English from Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario.

He worked for fifteen years with Canada Customs (Canada Border Services Agency) as a training specialist, project officer, and national program manager (duty free shop program, complaints investigation, commercial compliance management) before leaving the public service to write on a full-time basis.

In addition to writing crime fiction, Michael J. McCann also reviews mysteries and thrillers for the New York Journal of Books.

 

Peter Blauner: Sunrise Highway Sunday, Oct 14 2018 

Award winning novelist and complex mystery and great read and mystery to die for Auntie M Writes Crime 12:36 am

As a native Long Islander, Auntie M has long been intrigued with the string of unsolved murders from the place where she grew up and lived until her mid-40s. Now Peter Blauner delivers a possible solution with the story of one man who manages to hide his pyschopathy enough to cover his tracks for years in the very compelling Sunrise Highway.

Told in advancing years, readers figure out soon enough who the culprit is, watching Joey Tolliver rise from a teen on the cusp of a criminal career to becoming a decorated policeman.

Along the way he gathers supporters and people who owe him and look the other way, which allows his outrageous and horrific behavior to continue.

Then in 2017, when Tolliver is Chief of Police, a Latina NYPD detective, Lourdes Robles, finds that her investigation into the body of a young woman washed up on her patch leads her to similarities of a multitude of other female victims, a trail along Sunrise Highway in Long Island all the way to Brooklyn.

She’s tenacious and relentless, despite career and personal threats, in following the evidence, as she must fight against the political powerhouses in of the justice system itself. And just as it seems she’s making headway, she finds herself on the opposite site of the law.

The chapters alternate between Tolliver’s rise and Robles’ investigation, heightening the tension to a terrific pitch.

This read so plausibly it made Auntie M’s hair rise on her arms. It’s too believeable to see one person make a life’s work of extreme misogyny while supposedly upholding law and order.

The setting rings true with its familiarity, but the main attraction here are the strong characters, easily pictured and believed, along with the grunt police work and the thrill of escalating twists that will keep readers glued to the book. Highly recommended.

 

Paul Doiron: Stay Hidden Thursday, Sep 27 2018 

Award winning novelist and complex mystery and Continued series winner and great read and mystery to die for Auntie M Writes Crime 12:36 am

Paul Doiron’s Mike Bowditch series reflects the beauty and hardiness of Maine. He returns in a new mode for Bowditch in Stay Hidden, when the newly promoted Warden Investigator receives his first case.

Maquoit Island is isolated, and at first Bowditch isn’t surprised that a flash of white clothing has caused a deer hunter to mistake that for a deer, fatally shooting a woman.

But the hunter in question denies the shooting, and when the ballistics don’t match his rifle, he’s cleared.

Suddenly the accidental death appears far much more, especially when Bowditch learns Ariel Evans was an investigative journalist. She was supposed to interview and research the islan’ds hermit with a view to writing about his past life.

Bowditch confronts his most secretive community yet, and his efforts are thwarted.

And then the dead woman alights from a ferry, unharmed. It’s a case of mistaken identity, but it soon becomes clear the murderer thought he was killing Ariel.

The two will team up to find who wanted her dead, and why.

With taut action against the backdrop of the rugged terrain and sometimes walls of fog, this is a strong entry in the Bowditch series.

 

Allison Brennan: Abandoned Monday, Sep 24 2018 

Award winning novelist and complex mystery and Continued series winner and great read and mystery to die for Auntie M Writes Crime 12:52 am

Allison Brennan’s newest thriller, Abandoned, revolves around her investigative reporter Max Revere, about to tackle her most important case yet: finding out who murdered her mother.

Martha Revere will never win awards for Mother of the Year, and indeed she leaves Max with her grandparents after dragging the young girl around the world without formal schooling.

Postcards sent from Martha’s travels erratically are the only clue the young woman has when she decides to put her cable show on hold to find out why those cards stopped coming seven years ago.

With her only clue her mother’s disappearance from a small Chesapeake Bay town sixteen years ago, Max heads there, renting a cottage and determined to find the truth.

She will find that Martha was with a true con man before her disappearance, and they lived off Martha’s trust fund income and what they swindled from others they’d duped.

And when the FBI indicates they have an active investigation into the con man, Max knows she’s on the right track.

Where her probing leads her is straight into the heart of long-held secrets, from her family and others, with surprsing twists in store. Along the way, Max learns about creating a family.

A strong entry in Brennan’s cannon, with interesting characters, an idyllic setting, and a twist of romance to sweeten the plot.

 

Aline Templeton: Human Face Thursday, Sep 20 2018 

Award winning novelist and complex mystery and debut and great read and mystery to die for Auntie M Writes Crime 12:42 am


Aline Templeton’s DI Marjory Fleming series is one of Auntie M’s favorites, so it was with great anticipation that she dove into the first of Templeton’s new series, Human Face.

Featuring DI Kelso Strang, dealing with the after effects of a life-changing accidnet, he’s sent to unravel the case of a missing woman on the Isle of Skye.

The isolated landscape in the shadow of the Black Cuillin range proves threatening to Strang and matches his bleak mood. He’s been sent to followup on the disappearance of a housekeeper, Eva, at Balnasheil, the isolated manor that houses the charity Human Face, which helps bring food and medical care to Third World children.

The charity’s founder and biggest donor, Beatrice Lacey, is a woman with her own secrets; enigmatic co-founder Adam Carnegie has charmed her with the promise of a life for them together. They live together but separately at Balnasheil, across the bay from the small town.

When Strang finds out Eva is actually the second housekeeper to disappear, the case becomes a probable murder investigation–until a confirmed murder happens on the premises, throwing Strang and his cobbled-together team into a whirlwind case.

Strang’s a believeable protagonist, needing the responsibility of the case and decisive position to blot out his memories. But he also becomes an unwilling mentor to a young PC determined to prove her chops as a budding detective.

A nicely twisted plot, weather that turns on a dime, landscape that functions as more than a setting, and complex characters hiding secrets all add up to grand mystery.

This debut promises the new series will bring all of these hallmarks that make Templeton’s books ones that have won a legion of faithful readers.

 

Wendy Corsi Staub: Little Girl Lost Sunday, Sep 16 2018 

Award winning novelist and complex mystery and great read and mystery to die for Auntie M Writes Crime 12:57 am

Award-winning thriller author Wendy Corsi Staub debuts the first in a new Foundling series with Little Girl Lost.
Staub’s latest, Little Girl Lost, is the first book in her new Foundlings trilogy, where lives become intertwined and secrets are kept.

It’s the pre-dawn hours of May 12, 1968, a Mother’s Day Calvin Crenshaw won’t soon forget. As janitor at Harlem’s Park Baptist Church, his work is interrupted by a whimpering sound coming from the choir stall.

He finds a baby there, wrapped in a small bundle. Having been unable to conceive a child with his wife, he makes the fateful decision to claim the infant girl as their own.

Elsewhere in New York City, an elusive serial killer known as the Brooklyn Butcher has been slaughtering families in their beds, leaving one young female survivor at each scene.

These seemingly disparate events are anything but that, under Staub’s skilled thriller writing.

Flash-forward to March 7, 1987 when college student Amelia Crenshaw makes the shocking discovery that she is a “foundling”—somebody that was abandoned by his or her birth parents to be discovered and cared for by another—as her mother lays dying of cancer in a hospital bed.

Both shocked and griefstricken, she vows to unlock the secrets of a past she never suspected she had—despite her father’s refusal to discuss the details of her supposed adoption.

NYPD Detective Stockton Barnes is grieving, too. He’s shown up in earlier novels, but now as his mentor and surrogate father wastes away, he receives a legal notice that a one-night stand he had is now pregnant with his child.

Barnes uses a new case to distract him: the disappearance of millionaire Perry Archibald Wayland III, whose supposed suicide may have been staged.

How Amelia and Barnes search for individual answers intersect bring them to a killing spree that harkens back to the Brooklyn Butcher.

Staub’s characterizations are vivid, with Amelia and Barnes providing the counter views of a youn girl who’s the product of an unwanted pregnancy, contrasted with Barnes being the cause of one. This emotional weight resonates with the reader.

Staub uses the backdrop of 1980s New York City to life through her depiction of landmarks and locales, as well as references to pop culture and politics. It’s a subtle thing but one that hints at the depth of her research—and that elevates the story.

Filled with twists and turns, Little Girl Lost is a suspense story that will leave readers looking for the next installment.

 

Michael Robotham: The Other Wife Friday, Sep 14 2018 

Award winning novelist and complex mystery and Continued series winner and great read and mystery to die for Auntie M Writes Crime 12:27 am

Micahel Robotham’s Professor Joe O’Loughlin is one of Auntie M’s favorite characters, ever. The psychologist struggling with Parkinson’s and grief, trying to parent his two growing daughters, has his shaking hands full again in The Other Wife.

When the call comes that his well-known and respected surgeon father, retired but still admired, has suffered an horrific attack and had to have brain surgery, Joe rushes to the ICU to find a strange woman, covered in his father’s blood, at his bedside.

This is the woman who found William O’Loughlin lying in a pool of blood at the bottom of the stairs of the home she claims they share when William is in London, away from the home he shares in Wales with his wife of sixty years and Joe’s mother.

Olivia Blackstone is William’s other wife, married in a Buddhist ceremony, and bringing her own baggage along.

If it’s a shock to readers, we can only imagine the shock Joe must feel as he absorbs this radical new view of his father–the distant, cool man who raised him contrasts sharply with photos Olivia shares to prove their relationship.

This other man is smiling, brighter, happier than Joe has ever seen him. But regardless of the painful reality of his father having led two lives for over twenty years, comes the stark realization that someone wanted him dead, and the suspects start to mount up. It doesn’t help that the lead detective on the case doesn’t like Joe, which adds to the complications.

Counting on his good friend, retired police detective Vincent Ruiz, Joe will try to keep his daughters safe even as the younger, Emma, has her own struggles with the loss the previous year of her mother. With older sister Charlie now studying psychology at Oxford, Joe will lean on her to help Emma as he turns to tracing his father’s movements and the behavior that led to this attack.

There are even more surprises as the plot twists and take unexpected turns, but one thing readers can count on is Robotham’s ability to make them care about Joe and his family. There is even a small sense of triumph with the resolution of his father’s situation, one readers will smile at as it reveals Joe’s own human side.

This writing is exceptional. There is a huge sense of the author understanding human emotions and frailties, and being able to translate that to the page in such a subtle way that readers will wish, somehow, that Joe O’Loughlin was their friend. It’s why Vince sticks around, and Charlie and Emma love him. You will, too.

Auntie M is always moved by Robotham’s last chapters. Always.

Highly recommended.

 

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