Sharon Bolton: Dead Woman Walking Tuesday, Sep 5 2017 

Award winning novelist and complex mystery and great read and mystery to die for Auntie M Writes Crime 12:39 am


Sharon Bolton’s new stand-alone, Dead Woman Walking, shows once again the creativity of this author, and her adept way of handling psychological suspense.

What starts off a seemingly idyllic hot air balloon ride over Northumberland Park near the Scottish border soon turns horrific. Drifting low near ancient ruins, the various passengers from all walks of life witness a young woman being brutally murdered.

One of the passengers manages to capture the murderer’s photo–only he’s seen her face just as she’s seen his.

It sets off a chain reaction when the killer retaliates and the balloon crashes. Now that young woman is fleeing not only the accident scene, but she’s on the run from a killer who can recognize her. Dazed and hurt, does she have the presence of mind to evade a murderer?

It’s a complicated maze that includes two sisters who are close but whom have chosen different paths in their lives and the secrets they hide. There is a cloister of nuns, and a policeman trying to salvage his life. There will be a Romani family seemingly bent on destruction. And there will be suspense and tension as all of these threads come together to create a resoundingly good read.

Bolton’s astute view into her characters makes this psycholically complex and a compulsive page-turning read. Highly recommended.

 

Connie Hambley: The Wake Sunday, Sep 3 2017 

Award winning novelist and complex mystery and Continued series winner and great read and mystery to die for Auntie M Writes Crime 12:41 am

Please welcome guest author Connie Hambley, who has the third book out in her Jessica Trilogy, The Wake:

When we talked last year on your blog, I was deep into the polishing touches of my third book, The Wake, and completing The Jessica Trilogy. It never fails that the journey to publication is also a journey of personal growth. What is it about the process of writing that changes a person?

Authors are often changed by what we learn to write our lies. I became less ignorant of the struggles of Northern Ireland to rid itself of British rule and how the Troubles affected my family. I took the threads of those facts and wove them into my books. But, our goal is not to change ourselves. We want to somehow reach our readers and alter something about them.

When a reader begins a conversation with “I had no idea that. . . ” and proceeds to tell me how my story prompted them to look further into a topic, I know I scored! I’m gratified when readers tell me they learned about Irish history or became aware of how American involvement – both legal and illegal – supported unification efforts. I love it when readers tell me of their search for ancestral roots and how learning the truth of blood ties changed them.

So, for my new book? I’m hearing, “I had no idea horses could play such a huge role in therapy.”

Huh?

A new thread in my book builds upon the main character’s backstory of being a world-class equestrienne. No spoilers here, but hippotherapy – physical or behavioral therapy with licensed practitioners that utilizes the unique attributes of the horse – plays a large role in a character’s life after a catastrophic event at the Atlanta Olympics. (Could the injury be related to the Centennial Park bombing? A horrific fall on the devilish cross-country course? Like I said, no spoilers!)

I knew I had my research and writing right when my book received an endorsement from the CEO of the Professional Association of Therapeutic Horsemanship, International. My inspiration to write about hippotherapy sparked from volunteering at a therapeutic riding center. I’ve been around horses all my life, but my focus was able-bodied.

I’m satisfied by my readers’ surprise because it mirrors my own learning curve. I was changed by real life “research.” My readers are changed through reading about my newfound knowledge via my story.

I consider that a win/win.


CONNIE JOHNSON HAMBLEY grew up on a dairy farm in New York and had plenty of space to ride one of her six horses. All would have been idyllic if an arsonist hadn’t torched her family’s barn. Bucolic bubble burst, she began to steadfastly plot her revenge against all bad guys, real and imagined. After receiving her law degree, she moved to Boston and wrote for Bloomberg BusinessWeek, Nature and other wonky outlets as she honed her skills of reaching readers at a deep emotional level. Her high-concept thrillers feature remarkable women entangled in modern-day crimes. Connie delights in creating worlds where the good guys win–eventually. Her short story, Giving Voice, won acceptance in New England’s Best Crime Stories: Windward, published by Level Best Books. The third book in The Jessica Trilogy, The Wake, joins The Charity and The Troubles, the 2016 Best Fiction winner at the EQUUS Film Festival in New York City. She keeps horses in her life by volunteering as a horse handler at a therapeutic riding center. Connie is a board member and Featured Speaker of Sisters in Crime.

THE WAKE: A shattered heiress’ family secret is exploited by her spurned lover to blackmail her into engaging in international terrorism.
World-class equestrian, Jessica Wyeth, is thrust into the middle of a game of geopolitical warfare. Reeling from revelations of her connection to the violent struggles to expunge Britain from Northern Ireland, she’s blocked by unseen forces from returning to the United States.
The facts of Jessica’s birth become her deepest secret. Her late mother was considered by Northern Ireland to be a terrorist and her father is a key negotiator between violent Irish Republican Army (IRA) factions in Belfast and the British Government.
Jessica vows to keep her father’s identity hidden at all costs.
Only one man knows Jessica’s truth. Michael Connaught, heir to an international crime family who profits from political uprisings, struggles with his own legacy. He is torn between protecting the woman he loves or using her secrets as a catalyst for inciting global unrest.
When a catastrophic event happens at the Atlanta-based Summer Olympic Games, Jessica is forced to fight for her life in ways she never dreamed.
SOCIAL LINKS:
WEBSITE: http://www.conniejohnsonhambley.com
FACEBOOK: http://bit.ly/facebookcjhambley
BLOG: http://bit.ly/outofthefog
TWITTER: https://twitter.com/ConnieHambley
PINTEREST: https://www.pinterest.com/cjhambley/
LINKEDIN: https://www.linkedin.com/in/conniejhambley/

BUY LINKS:
THE CHARITY: http://www.amazon.com/Charity-Connie-Johnson-Hambley-ebook/dp/B009E7TUYM/
THE TROUBLES: http://www.amazon.com/The-Troubles-Jessica-Trilogy-Book-ebook/dp/B00VYV8X08/
THE WAKE: https://www.amazon.com/Wake-Jessica-Trilogy-Book-ebook/dp/B073NQ1HK5/

 

New in Paperback: Weaver, Gross, Hart, Thomas, Dorion, Harris and Mayor Friday, Sep 1 2017 

Award winning novelist and complex mystery and Continued series winner and great read and mystery to die for Auntie M Writes Crime 12:32 am

One of the highlights of summer is a ton of great reads from last season are now available in paperback, and here’s a roundup of some of the best ones, varied types for different reading tastes:

the 1930s come alive in Weavers’ series featuring amateur sleuth Amory Ames and her husband, Milo. In A Most Novel Revenge, the couple are summoned by her cousin Laurel to the estsate of Reginald Lyons. The assorted company includes the author of a fictionalized account of a murder that took place on the estate years ago, and now plans a sequel tell-all about what really happened that night.

Andrew Gross’ The One Man takes the thriller writer into a historical place, as a US intelligence officer must infiltrate the Nazi concentration camp at Auschwitz to find Professor Alfred Mendl. Not only must Nathan Blum sneak in, he must find the professor and sneak back out with him. Facing evil is heaert-pounding and makes this absorbing.


Elsa Hart’s The White Mirror takes readers to 18th-century China, where a traveling librarian and a storyteller team up to solve the murder of a Tibetan monk. Culturally and historically intriguing.

Hell Bay is Will Thomas’ Barker and Llwewllyn tale, where the Victorian-era private detectives undergo an assignment for the government to provide security for a top-secret meeting taking place on a remote island off the coast of Cornwall. What could possibly go wrong? Everything, including a sniper murder and a stabbing. A classic closed-environment mystery.


Paul Doiron’s Widowmaker continues his Maine series with game warden Mike Bowditch. It’s a complicated tale of family dysfunction with a beautiful woman at its heart, and raises the ghosts Bowditch was trying to tamp down. His search for the truth takes him to an unlikely fortress hidden in the wilderness where he find more than the answers he’d hoped for. A multiple award-nominated author, Doiron won the Barry and the Strand awards for Best First Novel with the The Poacher’s Son and the series continues at a fine pace.


Prolific author Charlaine Harris has five series in print. She returns to her earlier Aurora Teagarden series with All the Little Liars. Aurora has married crime writer Robin Crusoe, and the newly pregnant Aurora is infanticipating when four children disappear from the school soccer field–and Aurora’s 15 yr-old brother is among the missing. With a dead body complicating matters at the last place the youths were known to have gathered, the newlyweds run their own investigation to find Phillip and his friends. A bit darker than the earlier series but just as entertaining.


Archer Mayor’s Presumption of Guilt brings Vermont Investigator Joe Gunther a cold case when a 40 yr-old skeleton is found encased in concrete. Things heat up quickly for a cold case, with a fresh murder and a kidnapping, and Gunther and his team are stretched thin with tension. Well-plotted and compelling.

 

Donna Andrews: Gone Gull Thursday, Aug 31 2017 

Award winning novelist and Continued series winner and great read and mystery to die for Auntie M Writes Crime 12:34 am

With it’s clever twist on the title, Donna Andrews’ newest Meg Langslow cozy, Gone Gull, keeps up the promise of this long-running series with her trademark delightful humor. Meg has the honor of being a blacksmith; her Michael runs the children’s drama class, and their twin sons are along for the ride.

Classes are off to a good start, until vandals interrupt what should be a summer idyll. Grandmother Cordelia worries the students will demand their money back.

Meg worries there are almost too many suspects for her to follow: a rival craft center could be the culprit; so could the resort developers who want to push Cordelia into selling so they can keep to their plans for Biscuit Mountain?

And then there’s Meg’s grandfather, who is convinced the non-greenies have it in for him. Dr. Blake’s ornithology background has him searching for a rare gull.

Meg keeps watch on the studios to be certain they are locked against intruders, and its on one her rounds that she finds the body of the most difficult artist she’s encountered, Edward Prine.
Prine has insisted he has seen a species of gull thought to be extinct. What’s the truth of the situation? While staff and students alike might agree the womanizing artist wasn’t everyone’s favorite, it’s hardly grounds for murder.

And then a second body is found. . .

Meg’s eccentric family are front and center in this charming outing, which has a light, breezy pacing and interesting story.

 

Jane Casey: Let the Dead Speak Wednesday, Aug 30 2017 

complex mystery and Continued series winner and great read and mystery to die for Auntie M Writes Crime 12:21 am

Jane Casey’s newest Maeve Kerrigan mystery, Let the Dead Speak, brings the homicide detective her strangest case yet.

Maeve is saddled with a new detective constable who rubs her wrong, whilst trying to navigate things between the DC and her unpredictable DI, Josh Derwent, and as always, trying to appease her prickly DCI, Una Burt. On a quiet residential street in Putney, a horrific crime scene–blood splatters walls and stairs and is dotted on the ceiling–is missing one key component: the victim.

Chloe Emery is the 18-yr-old daughter of the owner, Kate Emery, who hasn’t been seen in a few days. With Chloe off visitng her father and his new family, she’s returned early from this visit to find the grissly scene.

Chloe is bundled off to a friend’s house to stay. Chloe staunchly refuses to return to her father’s house, with stories of abuse at the hands of her stepbrother.The religious Norris family act suspiciously to Maeve, but Chloe is being taken care of by them and her friend, Bethany.

In the neighborhood lives a charismatic youth, who is believed to have gotten away with stabbing a schoolfriend, and attracts and befriends both of the girls. There is the cleric of the Norris’ church, who sets off warning bells in Maeve’s intuition, too.

It’s a complicated situation as Maeve and her team investigate Kate Emory’s life. It’s obvious that people are lying to them, but who and why? The complex plot unspools gradually through dedicated police work and Maeve’s keen insights. And always, she is trying to balance juggling Derwent who remains exasperating and yet Maeve’s biggest supporter knows her all too well.

Auntie M is a huge fan of this character-driven series, with just the right amount of eccentricity mixing with reality. Casey has done a grand job of giving readers a story they will have to figure out as she does–there’s plenty of twists and surprises. The strong development of the players will leave readers flipping pages as the suspense builds to the surprising ending. Highly recommended.

 

Louise Penny: Glass Houses Tuesday, Aug 29 2017 

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


Louise Penny’s 13th Inspector Gamache novel takes readers back to Three Pines in a most creative way.

Readers are introduced to a trial in process with Gamache as a prime witness. But who the defendant and the victim are is parsed out in a way that heightens the suspense in the first part of the book.

But that’s not the only challenge that Penny has up her sleeve. By going back to the beginning of this crime, Gamache and the other Three Pines residents tell the story of a dark figure who suddenly appears on the village’s green. Cloaked in black and with its face hidden behind a mask, the figure causes a disruption in the town, but since it has done nothing illegal, Gamache is powerless to do anything.

Readers learn the unusual history behind this kind of figure, and not long after it disappears is when the victim’s body is found.

Gamache almost appears on trial, as the animosity between him and the prosecutor on the case is quite evident. His every move and action is questioned. It’s a tense standoff, and there’s more at the bottom of this than meets the eye.

It’s difficult to explain more without giving away the plot, but it involves old friends in a reunion, the bounding drug culture, drugs being transferred, and the feel that Quebec is losing its footing against the drug barons. How these disparate things tie in to Three Pines is once again the genuis that is Penny’s, and the difficult decisions she visits on Gamache.

There will be real threat and pain to those he loves before it’s over, and even then the outcome will be devastating on several levels. Absorbing and complex, the richly layered plot is highlighted by Penny’s trademark details and the wry humor that creeps in, despite the enormity of the situation.

It’s a fine balance that tackles a real life issue with an insprired and controversial solution. Highly recommended.

 

Bruce Coffin: Beneath the Depths Sunday, Aug 27 2017 

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

Beneath the Depths is Bruce Coffin’s sequel to Among the Shadows, his debut featuring Portland detective John Byron, and it’s a solid sophmore offering.

Juggling his sobriety along with his romance with Detective Diane Joyner that must be kept hidden, Byron doesn’t hide his feelings when a lawyer he dislikes is found dead by a lobsterman in a stretch called Floater Alley. A possible suicide or accidental drowning is ruled out once a slug is removed from the victim’s head.

Paul Ramsey’s recent loss of a huge case is one point that interests Bryon, but there soon seem to be no shortage of suspects in the growing list of people who would want the obnoxious lawyer dead. This is a man whose vanity plate reads: I WIN.

There are past clients, a drug connections, mistresses and a grieving widow, and that’s just the start. Complicating their investigation is a reporter who seems to have inside information on the case. And it doesn’t help when Diane is offered a position that might solve their problem with keeping their relationshop under the table but keeps the offer to herself.

With the Portland PD having its own issues, Byron is often caught between a rock and a hard place, which intensifies when the Chief makes it clear that Ramsey’s law office makes huge donations to his pet projects.

Coffin draws on his own experience and knowledge as a former homicide detective to make this a solid police procedural. The Portland setting is well drawn and provides a strong backdrop to the action. This is a great read with a tight plot and believeable characters.

 

Mandy Morton: The Michaelmas Murders Friday, Aug 25 2017 

Continued series winner and great read and mystery to die for Auntie M Writes Crime 12:07 am

Mandy Morton’s highly original No. 2 Feline Detective Agency is back with The Michaelmas Murders, with the detecting team of Hettie Bagshot and her assistant Tilly Jenkins being handed their strangest case yet.

Back from their late summer holiday, the cats are in need of funds, so when Fluff Wither-Fork of Wither-Fork Hall asks them to come around immediately, they are hopeful of adding to their coffers.

The new case is that of a bludgeoned cat found on the allotments that Fluff owns, across the road from Wither-Fork Hall. A stranger to the area, the male cat’s coat and fine clothing are drenched from the overnight rain and his body found right on Bonny Grubb’s onion patch.

None of the other cats on the allotments can identify the body, and are soon busy as preparations gear up for the Michaelmas Festival, and the Flower and Vegetable Show on the following day, as Hettie and Tilly try to interview the various cats.

This is where the real fun comes in. Morton’s world of cats is divine and the felines who people the allotments stand out as distinct personalities, with different families, appearances, backgrounds, and eccentricites. Many have heartaches in their pasts, too–could any of those incidents have triggered this murder?

Then a second cat is found dead in her bed, savagely stabbed, and Hettie and Tilly ramp up their efforts and their investigation to find the culprit.

This charming series, set in a world without humans, nevertheless examines foibles that affect us all. There are sly references to human deeds and fun names for the cats residing alongside this irresistible world where happiness can often be a warm bed and full, purring belly.

Not just for cat fanciers, Morton delivers a fine cozy mystery readers everywhere will enjoy.

 

Jorn Lier Horst: Ordeal Thursday, Aug 24 2017 

Award winning novelist and complex mystery and Continued series winner and great read and mystery to die for Auntie M Writes Crime 12:11 am


Chief Inspector William Wisting heads this solid Norwegian police procedural, one of a series being translated into English. Ordeal begins with a thoughtful two-page summary of Wisting’s life up to this stage, as this book is fifth in a series of ten.

Once a senior investigating officer himself, Horst gets those details just right, but it’s the interplay of the man’s detective nose with his sensibilities and his own emotions that make this a great read.

Wisting’s daughter, Line, has moved near him to await the birth of the child that will make him a grandfather and his daughter a single mother. She becomes friends with a young mother nearby, living in an inherited house with her little girl.

It’s a good fit for the two women, one pregnant and the other alone and new to the area. The house Sofie Lund has inherited belonged to her grandfather, a man who thwarted police efforts to tie him to several criminal activities.

There is also a missing mand, a taxi driver, whose case appears to have grown cold with leads. Then a locked safe in the basement of her grandfather’s house reveals secrets that put everyone connected in danger.

It’s a dance Wisting must make with his bosses as he fights the bureaucracy and the media while trying to protect his daughter.

Horst writes fully realized characters and well-plotted book that doesn’t race along but rather meanders in a totally realistic way as most police investigations do. Readers will be looking for the next translation to appear, even as the series is developed for Danish television.

 

J. D. Tafford: Little Boy Lost Wednesday, Aug 23 2017 

Award winning novelist and complex mystery and great read and mystery to die for and Uncategorized Auntie M Writes Crime 12:29 am

J. D. Tafford departs from his Michael Collins series to introduce Justin Glass, a mixed-race lawyer trying to get out from the depression that has plagues him since his young wife’s death. Raising his daughter alone, he’s also under the shadow of his political family. His black senator father, a civil rights proponet, and state congressman brother are pressuring him to run for office. His law practice suffered greatly after his wife’s death, and Justin is squeaking by as a public defender, while he and his daughter live in the carriage house of his white mother’s family home with her judge father.

Into his sweltering St. Louise office on a hot summer day comes an 8 yr-old girl with a jar full of change. Tanisha Walker wants to hire him to find her missing brother. With racial tensions high in the area between the African-American and the mostly white police department, Glass reluctantly takes her case and soon finds himself on the receiving end of police mistreatment. It’s a rude awakening, but doesn’t prepare him for when the brother’s body is found buried in the woods, along with over a dozen other teens.

Soon Justin finds many missing teens’ families lined up outside his offic asking for help for locating the “Lost Boys,” the media’s name for the missing boys. The common thread at first is that all had been troubled youths. As he juggles issues with his daughter at school and tries to make decisions about his future, he hires an assistant who smartens his office and gets him organized. And then his searching turns up another commonality that will leave Justin in jeopardy, and all bets are off.

Tafford covers topical issues without over-preaching. His own legal background makes the court system echo with reality. St. Louis simmers in the hot summer and readers will feel they are immersed in the city and in a great mystery.

 

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