On the Radar — An exciting week for fans of Stieg Larsson’s ultimate crime fiction heroine, Lisbeth Salander. Just a week to go and you’ll be able to get the latest Millennium novel, The Girl in the Spider’s Web. It’s not written by Stieg Larsson, though, so will it measure up? There are more big names too – Louise Penny, Lee Child, Jeff Lindsay and Andrea Camilleri. Read on and discover what’s on our radar…
The Girl in the Spider’s Web by David Lagercrantz
Stieg Larsson’s Lisbeth Salander and Mikael Blomkvist spring back into action. As Larsson passed away in 2004, the storytelling is taken over by another Swedish author, whose previous best-known work is a biography of the footballer Zlatan Ibrahimović. Salander and Blomkvist face the challenge of confronting international cyber gangsters who threaten to bring blood and chaos to the cobbled streets of Stockholm. Published on 27 August.
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The Nature of The Beast by Louise Penny
Louise Penny takes us back to the isolated township of Three Pines in Eastern Quebec with its celebrity retiree, Armand, formerly of La sûreté du Quebec. The distinguished former cop has to investigate the disappearance of a nine-year-old boy known for crying wolf. His stories are so wild and strange nobody can believe him, but was he telling the truth after all because now Laurent Lepage has disappeared. Available from 25 August.
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The Bad Things by Mary Jane Riley
This debut novel by journalist Mary Jane Riley takes us into a world of kidnapping, family secrets and murder. The neice and nephew of Alex Devlin were snatched 15 years earlier. The boy was found dead, but no trace was found of the little girl. When a woman found guilty of assisting in the crime is released from prison, Devlin is determined to meet her and find the truth. What she discovers will turn her world upside down. Out on 27 August.
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The Mistake I Made by Paula Daly
This psychological thriller tells the tale of a woman whose life is in a spiral of despair. She is deeply in debt, her business has gone to the wall and all she has left is her nine-year-old son and a home from which she is threatened with eviction. Then she meets a rich and powerful friend of her sister. He offers her complete redemption from her debt, and a chance to put her life back together. But his offer comes at a price. Available on 27 August.
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Blade of Light by Andrea Camilleri
The idiosyncratic Inspector Montalbano returns in a new episode of life and crime in the Italian town of Vigàta. A bizarre armed robbery, a suspected mafia hit, and the strange case of a door that has gone missing from a garden shed all conspire to make life the detective’s life difficult. Top crime critic Barry Forshaw chose Camilleri’s August Heat in his Grand Tour of Euro Noir, and Blade of Light will be on the shelves from 27 August.
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The Pale House by Luke McCallin
We first met the WWI veteran Gregor Reinhardt in The Man From Berlin. Now he returns in a second grim novel about the German army but this time it’s WWII. Reinhardt has a new job which forces him to cultivate new allies within German military intelligence. With Sarajevo in turmoil as the partisan forces close in he investigates the massacre of a group of civilians and finds that he has as much to fear from his own former colleagues as he does from the brutal Croatian Ustase. Published on 27 August.
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Headline Murder by Peter Bartram
This whodunnit is set in the newspaper world of the 1960s. Colin Crampton is the crime reporter for the Brighton Evening Chronicle, and, as ever, he’s desparate for a front page story that will boost circulation and keep him in a job. The apparently comical disappearance of a seafront amusement boss soon leads to something much more sinister, and Crampton and his Aussie girlfriend are up to their necks in trouble. Published on 28 August.
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Tropical Depression by Jeff Lindsay
Ever wondered what Jeff Lindsay wrote prior to Dexter? Now you can find out with Tropical Depression, which first came out in 1994 but is being republished. Former cop Billy Knight has lost his job and his family. In disgust, he moves to Florida to live a simple life at one end of a fishing rod. Despite his best intentions, a series of murders sucks him back into a dark world of police corruption on the streets of Los Angeles. Out on 25 August.
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Small Wars by Lee Child
Here’s a chance to find out more about Jack Reacher’s backstory. It’s 1989, and this story involves Reacher, his older brother, an attractive female lieutenant colonel, and some of the Pentagon’s darker dealings. Our review of Personal, a full length Reacher novel, is here, and our hero also teamed up with Joseph Finder’s Nick Heller in a one-off short story featured in the anthology Face Off. Small Wars is out for Kindle now.
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Deceptions by Kelley Armstrong
Cainsville, Illinois, is a quiet town. But quiet towns have dark secrets. Olivia Taylor Jones has settled there after discovering that her real parents were serial killers. But were they? This is the third in the Cainsville series, and Livi has some supernatural gifts that might help her find the truth about her bloodline. A former fiancé is stalking her, she has disturbing visions of a small girl, and a mysterious book is sending her ominous threats. Out now.
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The Girl Who Broke the Rules by Marnie Riches
We reviewed Marnie Riches’ debut, The Girl Who Wouldn’t Die, earlier this summer. In her second book, criminologist Georgina McKenzie must build a relationship with serial killer Dr Silas Holm. Across the water in Amsterdam, Chief Inspector van den Bergen is desperately trying to solve a series of horrific murders in the red light district and his only clue lies in the interchange between McKenzie and Holm. Out now.
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