You’ll meet some odd characters reading crime fiction. As we look ahead to the week of Shakespeare’s birthday on 23 April – when a stupendous amount of books are being released – we’ve found a cast the bard would be proud of. A couple of ex-cops, two dogs, a prostitute, some hitmen, a couple of teenagers and an AI system that could take over the world. If they all got together, what would they talk about? Or, who would survive?
Read on and discover your next crime read.
A Deadly Episode by Anthony Horowitz
British Anthony Horowitz fans will be raising three cheers on 23 April, but the celebrations for the arrival of A Deadly Episode must wait until 28 April in the US. Either way, the latest in the series featuring ex-Met detective Daniel Hawthorne and Horowitz himself finds the pair on a set where The Word is Murder, is being made into a major feature film. It soon becomes clear that tensions are running high between cast and crew. Things can only get worse when the actor playing Hawthorne is stabbed to death. It’s a case of fact meets fiction, meets metafiction, as Hawthorne sets about finding the killer
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Pork Pie Pandemonium by Steve Higgs
Steve Higgs is about to serve up a tasty slice of culinary crime with the arrival of Pork Pie Pandemonium in print from Vinci Books on 23 April. Retired Detective Superintendent Albert Smith and his faithful mutt, former police dog Rex Harrison, are on a culinary tour of Britain, beginning with the pie-making capital, Melton Mowbray. But something doesn’t taste quite right, and soon Albert and Rex find themselves in the middle of an operation that’s worth lots of money – the kind of cash that people will kill to keep. Can the ex-copper and his trusty hound use their skills to catch the culprits and save the day?
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Holy F*ck by Joseph Incardona
Stella is a saint in the making. She lives in Georgia, in America’s South, and has made a name for herself by healing the sick, the dying and the paralysed. Which is why Stella’s miracles come to the attention of the Vatican – at last, a poster girl for the modern age! But Stella’s good deeds, come at a cost the Church may find hard to swallow because she heals the people she sleeps with. In her motorhome. For money. How to spin this? The Vatican’s answer is to send the Bronski twins, its most discreet killers – because it might be better this particular saint is a martyr. Holy F*ck by Joseph Incardona is out on 23 April.
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Paw & Order by Blake Mara
It appears that the Bard’s birthday is a big day for dog lovers this year as Blake Mara’s Paw & Order arrives on 23 April hot on the heels of Pork Pie Pandemonium, above. When a group of friends who meet regularly to walk their dogs together find a young homeless man dead in the park they visit regularly, The Pack, as they call themselves, sit up and pay attention. Another death, this time by the canal, has the group on the hunt for the killer. However, when one of The Pack is targeted they must search for new leads and collar the culprit before he or she strikes again.
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Little Sins by Clifford Beal
It’s 1968, and two teenage boy are about to have their perfect summer ruined in Clifford Beal’s Little Sins, out now. Best friends Billy and Paulie have plans for a clandestine night of camping on private property that’s used only for their Boy Braves troop. But their night under the stars goes all dark when the pair find a dead body – and it’s someone they know. The place is only known to a few people, including both of their fathers, and when Billy finds evidence that could put his dad in the frame, he decides to conceal what he knows and conduct his own investigation into the murder.
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Seconds to Midnight by David Orson Newton
Swinging from the past into the future in Seconds to Midnight by David Orson Newton, arriving on 23 April, we have Omnia, a hugely advanced AI that no longer answers to its creators. It’s 2029, the Doomsday Clock is about to run its course and Europe is on the brink of collapse. As a cyberwar wages, conscription is launched in the UK. Is Omnia the answer? With time running out, it seems we’re going to find out. But as humanity rises again from the ashes, the lines blur between human ambition and machine intent in this fast-paced techno thriller.
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