Fallout
Written by Sara Paretsky — Some crime series stretch themselves too thinly, eventually petering out, plots so transparent you can see the joins a mile away. That’s not the case here. In Fallout, Sara Paretsky and VI Warshawsky have reached book 18 and there’s no sign that the…
Freefall
Written by Brian Lutterman — Pen Wilkinson has appeared in two previous books in this contemporary amateur sleuth series, and author Brian Lutterman gets points for creating a protagonist who uses a wheelchair. Pen works in the US Attorney’s office in Los Angeles, so does…
The Lighthearted Quest
Written by Ann Bridge — Things have certainly changed since the 1950s. With the rise of cheap air travel and global terrorism, along with the internet and Hollywood movies, North Africa is no longer a place of mystery for most English speakers. It sometimes feels like…
Let the Dead Speak
Written by Jane Casey — Detective Constable Maeve Kerrigan last made an appearance on this site more than two years ago, in a two-star review of The Kill, which I was surprised to discover was written by me! Oddly, in Let The Dead Speak, I felt like…
The Follower
Written by Koethi Zan — The ‘will they, won’t they?’ storyline is standard issue in romantic tales for page, stage and screen. So why mention it in the context of this book? In truth, there’s precious little romance within the pages of The Follower, though it does feature a twisted…
Cursed
Written by Thomas Enger, translated by Kari Dickson — Henning Juul is a fearless investigative journalist based in Oslo who has garnered a fair number of enemies in the course of his job. He yokes himself to his work, but nothing can distract him from an uphill personal battle….
Stasi Wolf by David Young
David Young’s novel Stasi Child was a memorable debut and a breath of fresh air in crime fiction. It focused on East Germany in the 1970s, a country and period that are less known to readers in Western Europe. By fortuitous coincidence, it arrived at the…