iBookKindlePrintReviews

The Silent Companions

By
Written by Laura Purcell — Just in time for Halloween comes The Silent Companions, a Gothic ghost story or mild horror tale that attempts to follow in the wake of Shirley Jackson and Susan Hill. Told in three timelines, we first meet Elsie Bainbridge in 1866…
Read more
Features

CIS: We Have Always Lived in the Castle

By
Shirley Jackson: A Rather Haunted Life by Ruth Franklin came out last year, and since this biography the American crime author seems to be enjoying a bit of a revival. For the first time in many years, all of Jackson’s novels and story collections are…
Read more
iBookKindlePrintReviews

Final Girls

By
Written by Riley Sager — The concept of the final girl is well known to fans of slasher horror flicks. Halloween, Scream, Alien – in each the protagonists are killed one by one down to a final girl. In 2015, a comedy pastiche was released…
Read more
iBookKindlePrintReviews

Stillhouse Lake

By
Written by Rachel Caine — A drunk driver loses control of his vehicle and hits a house in Wichita, Kansas, shattering the lives of Gina Royal and her two children forever – and not in the way you might imagine. There’s not a scratch on…
Read more
iBookKindlePrintReviews

Sherlock Holmes and the Shadwell Shadows

By
Written by James Lovegrove — Sherlock Holmes remains an enduring literary phenomenon. He is an iconic character that continues to capture the imagination of readers, writers and TV viewers alike. This undying popularity seems to make Holmes’ original creator, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, unique. However, crime fiction…
Read more
KindleReviews

The Quiet Ones by Betsy Really

By
As Mark Billingham pointed out in an insightful essay a few years ago, the key to genuine suspense is to be found in character rather than relying on twists and cliffhangers. That ability to make readers empathise with a protagonist is part of the craft…
Read more