The Darkest Secret by Alex Harwood
Alex Marwood’s latest domestic noir novel is one of those ones where you’ll definitely feel like screaming, “He’s behind you!” like an overexcited child at a pantomime. There were also times when I wanted to grab a character by the arm and ask, “Can’t you…
In the Cold Dark Ground by Stuart MacBride
Logan McRae is one of the more endearing Scottish coppers who has risen to fictional fame over the last two decades. Formerly a detective sergeant, he is now in uniform again and has been banished to the bleak north coast of Aberdeenshire, away from his…
Highbridge by Phil Redmond
His name is synonymous with hard-hitting TV dramas like Grange Hill, Brookside and Hollyoaks, but can Phil Redmond cut the mustard as a crime fiction writer? On this showing, the answer is an unhesitating ‘yes’. I suppose it’s not surprising that the man behind the…
Bred to Kill by Frank Thilliez
Translated by Mark Polizzotti — Almost a year to the day since the events chronicled in Thilliez’s earlier book Syndrome E, a terrible tragedy has driven a wedge between Franck Sharko and Lucie Henebelle’s fledgling romance. The two police detectives, both damaged in some way, began a…
Coffin Road by Peter May
A brand-new standalone from the pen of Peter May is always going to be near the top of a crime fiction reader’s wish list, and in many ways Coffin Road doesn’t disappoint. It certainly begins dramatically enough, as a man washes up on a beach….
Cut Me In by Ed McBain
Originally written in 1954 and released under the pseudonym Hunt Collins, this book has been rediscovered and reprinted by Hard Case Crime. The publisher has even roped in the excellent illustrator Robert McGinnis, who painted many a James Bond poster in the 1960s, and who…