There’s been a big, big buzz around our lead book this week – Missing White Woman by Kellye Garrett – and both John Connolly and Abir Mukherjee are favourites here at Crime Fiction Lover. We’ve also got a fascinating mystery visit to Guatemala (first time, I think) with Andromeda Romano-Lax, and GT Karber is here with more of his Murdle puzzles. Time for you to dig into our report…
Missing White Woman by Kellye Garrett
Former Cold Case series writer Kellye Garrett has turned to writing dark thrillers in recent years, and her latest, Missing White Woman, is published on 9 May and was earmarked as one of CFL’s Most Wanted releases of 2024. Breanna’s romantic break in New York with her boyfriend Ty turns sour when she finds recently missing dog-walker Janelle Beckett dead in the foyer, and Ty gone. Janelle was white and beautiful; Bree is a black woman alone in a strange city and out of her depth. She turns to her ex-best friend – a lawyer – for help, but it’s complicated. Targeted by the media and an online campaign, Bree is desperate. If she is to stay out of prison, she needs to find Janelle’s killer and fast.
Order now on Amazon or Bookshop.org
The Instruments of Darkness by John Connolly
Step once more into the world of former NYPD cop-turned-private eye Charlie Parker when The Instrument of Darkness by Irish author John Connolly arrives on 7 May. This is the 21st book in John Connolly’s award-winning series that melds hard-hitting crime with a soupçon of the supernatural. Colleen Clark is making headlines in Maine and far beyond. She’s accused of abducting and possibly killing her child and everyone is convinced of her guilt. Everyone, that is, except lawyer Moxie Castin and his private investigator Charlie Parker, who has the feeling that there’s more to the case that meets the eye – and an old, twisted house deep in the woods of Maine could hold the answers…
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Hunted by Abir Mukherjee
Abir Mukherjee puts his Wyndham and Bannerjee series of historical crime novels aside for a standalone thriller set in modern-day America and Britain, which is published on 9 May. A bomb in a Los Angeles shopping mall just a week before the Presidential election sends shockwaves across the globe – and in London, armed police storm Heathrow Airport and arrest Sajid Khan. His daughter, Aliyah entered the US with the suicide bomber, and now she’s vanished. Then Sajid gets a visit from a stranger. Carrie claims that Aliyah is with her son and she has an idea where they might be. It’s a race against time as the two parents search desperately to find their children before the authorities.
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The Deepest Lake by Andromeda Romano-Lax
The prize for this week’s most exotic author name must this week go to Andromeda Romano-Lax, whose novel The Deepest Lake is out on 7 May. The body of water in question is Lake Atitlán, Guatemala, where a group of would-be memoirists gather for a writing workshop. Among them is Rose, a mother grieving the death of her daughter Jules, who drowned in the lake while supposedly taking a swim in the middle of a previous course. Rose is here to find out what actually happened and to find closure but as she begins to piece together details of Jules’ final days, something just doesn’t add up. What do the course organisers have to hide?
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Murdle: Even More Killer Puzzles by GT Karber
It’s time to give those little grey cells another workout with the arrival on 9 May of Murdle: Even More Killer Puzzles by GT Karber, the third of its kind. It’s a very tempting invitation to once again join Deductive Logico in a series of baffling deductions. He will set out to solve the riddles of the suspiciously disorderly Investigation Institute, wander the eerie corridors of a tech billionaire’s desert retreat and engage with AI supercomputer MORIARTY in a bid to uncover the secrets of TekTopia. Are you up to the taks of examining the clues, interviewing the witnesses and completing the deduction grids to catch the villains?
Order now on Amazon or Bookshop.org