Series or standalone? Standalone or series? Which do you prefer?
The reason we ask is that the winner of our Best Author Editor’s Choice Award 2022, Steve Cavanagh, has announced that his next book is a standalone. Will lovers of his Eddie Flynn series be excited, or will they be wishing for Eddie? Here on at Crime Fiction Lover we love it when authors try something new – it keeps things fresh. So that’s where we’re starting our report this week, with something new from one of Northern Ireland’s finest. But there’s plenty more to discover including a Golden Age-style mystery by Martin Edwards, an LGBTQ+ detective novel from David E Feldman, some rural noir with Reavis Z Wortham (best name in the business) plus Gillian McAllister’s latest psychological thriller.
Kill For Me Kill For You by Steve Cavanagh
There are echoes of Strangers on a Train and Peter Swanson’s The Kind Worth Killing as Steve Cavanagh leaves his hotshot lawyer Eddie Flynn behind for a standalone thriller. Kill for Me Kill For You is out on 3 August and is set in New York City, where two women meet by chance, share a drink or two and reveal that they both desperately want revenge against the two men who destroyed their families. Bonded by loneliness and desperation, Amanda and Wendy come up with a foolproof plan – if you kill for me, I’ll kill for you – but is an off-the-wall idea dreamed up after a few too many cocktails really going to solve all of their problems?
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A Divisive Storm by David E Feldman
Dora Ellison and Missy Winters of Geller Investigations are back in A Divisive Storm – the sixth book in David E Feldman‘s popular indie crime fiction series. After Ray Drucker is shot in the face while sitting in his car in the parking lot of a drug store, his wife Katie hires Dora and Missy to find his killer. Soon, another murder occurs, and these are linked to a third murder, five years earlier – all of the victims were members of a club with a barely hidden racist agenda and a white supremacist past. Has our dynamic duo of doughty detectives finally bitten off more than they can chew? Find out when the book is published on 1 August!
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The Puzzle of Blackstone Lodge by Martin Edwards
Martin Edwards steps back into the Golden Age of crime with The Puzzle of Blackstone Lodge. It’s 1930 and in northern England Nell Fagan is looking for a second chance at a career in investigative journalism. It looks like Blackstone Fell’s sanatorium could be the answer to her prayers; in 1606, a man vanished from a locked gatehouse in a remote Yorkshire village and 300 years later it has happened again. Nell confides in the best sleuth she knows, Rachel Savernake – who is soon hot-footing it to Yorkshire in search of the truth. But what part does a fraudulent clairvoyant have to play in all this? All becomes clear on 1 August.
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Hard Country by Reavis Z Wortham
Tucker Snow has been hardened by decades working as an undercover narcotics agent for the Texas Department of Public Safety. Thanks to a special dispensation from the governor, he and his brother Harley cut a wide swath through the criminal element of Northeast Texas. But when Tucker’s wife and toddler are killed in a horrific traffic accident caused by a drug addled felon, he hands in his badge and moves with his surviving teenage daughter to a small town where they can mourn in peace. But when new form of meth with the street name of gravel gets too close to home, it’s time for Tucker to put his badge back on and call Harley for help… Hard Country by Reavis Z Wortham is out on 1 August.
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Just Another Missing Person by Gillian McAllister
A missing person case unravels deeper, darker secrets in Gillian McAllister’s latest psychological thriller. One night, Olivia walked into a dead-end alley and disappeared. As the clock ticks, detective Julia knows what to expect – a distraught family and long hours away from her husband and daughter. But there’s a man out there who knows a secret that Julia is desperate to hide, and he tells her that her family’s safety depends on one thing: she must NOT find out what happened to Olivia and must frame somebody else for her murder. Just Another Missing Person is out on 3 August.
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