The Lying-Down Room by Anna Jaquiery
The Lying Down Room introduces us to the charismatic and dedicated Chief Inspector Serge Morel. The story opens in Paris in the stifling August heat, and Morel is called to examine a disturbing crime scene. An elderly woman has been brutally murdered to the soundtrack…
The Accident by CL Taylor
Most of us know someone with an apparently perfect life. They’re happily married, with a lovely home and clever, well behaved offspring. But, as we crime fiction fans know all too well, appearances can be deceptive. Sue Taylor has a life that many would envy….
Sorrow Bound
We interviewed former journalist David Mark after his previous novel Original Skin won universal praise in crime fiction circles. The intriguingly named lynchpins of that book, Aector McAvoy and Trish Pharoah are back. Their stamping grounds remain the unlovely Humberside port of Hull. In an…
This Dark Road to Mercy
Cash’s first novel, A Land More Kind Than Home was widely admired. Here he tells a tale which is equally gripping and endearing. Easter Quillby is a girl on the verge of womanhood, and she and her younger sister are in care. Their mother is…
Long Way Home
It’s all good when one of our writers lays down her critic’s pen and writes her own novel. There can hardly have been a more stunning debut than this, by Eva Dolan. Scene – the teeming but unglamorous East Anglian city of Peterborough, on the…
A Pleasure and a Calling
The local estate agent working in Home County villages. He’s polite, he smiles, he’ll sell your house, make you a profit and collect his commission. But William Heming is not quite what he seems. While selling dream homes, Mr H also makes sure that he…