Archive for the ‘Mystery/Suspense’ Category

THE LAST ESTATE by Conor Bowman

This is a short but pungent tale about crime, betrayal, passion, love, and a scar–both real and psychic. How juicy is that? Especially when you blend in the Côtes du Rhône-Villages wine made from the dark-skinned Syrah, Mourvèdre, and Cisault grapes. Throw in a pivotal love affair, a chateau, a virulent father, and an odious priest, and you have the crushing, pressing, and fermenting ingredients of a serious page-turner. The title refers to the legacy of the protagonist–the chateau, estate, and wine cellar he is set to inherit.

August 27, 2010  Tags: , ,   Posted in: Betrayal, France, Mystery/Suspense  2 Comments

I’D KNOW YOU ANYWHERE by Laura Lippman

Laura Lippman knows how to write about terror, both the subtle, covert, shadow type and the more acute, stomach-wrenching, in-your-face type. This is a book about acts of terror, specifically kidnapping and rape. It is primarily about the kidnapping and rape of 13 year-old Elizabeth Lerner in 1985 and the 39 days she spent at the hands of her kidnapper and rapist, William Bowman, a serial killer.

August 17, 2010  Tags: ,   Posted in: Award Winning Author, Horror, Mystery/Suspense, US Mid-Atlantic  No Comments

CITY OF VEILS by Zoe Ferraris

There have been many literary mysteries written and many books about the plight of women in repressive Saudi Arabia, but I have never read an author who is able to so seamlessly weave these threads together to create a potboiler thriller that sizzles with knowledge, like CITY OF VEILS.

August 9, 2010  Tags: , ,   Posted in: Middle East, Mystery/Suspense, World Literature  No Comments

THE LEAVENWORTH CASE by Anna Katherine Green

In 1917, the august and eccentric Sherlock Holmes was sent a letter by his American precursor detective, Ebenezer Gryce, warmly extending sympathy for a shared suffering of rheumatism, and winkingly offering hope that Conan Doyle would give to Sherlock as clever an assistant as Anna Katharine Green had to Ebenezer, casting gentle aspersions on Dr. Watson! Naturally, it was really Green who was tweaking Doyle in good fun. She and Doyle had met in Buffalo, New York in 1894 when Sherlock’s creator toured the U.S, delivering lectures. He couldn’t pass up the opportunity to see the lady who debuted her series sleuth nearly a decade before the Holmes stories began.

August 6, 2010  Tags: , ,   Posted in: Classic, Courtoom Drama, Mystery/Suspense, Sleuths Series  No Comments

BEAUTIFUL MALICE by Rebecca James

It is important to set the parameters, or the standards, of a Young Adult novel right up front when reviewing one in a public forum. The Young Adult novel is a genre that allows authors to explore edgy content within the typical bathos of teen self-consciousness. If a novel is to be successful in this market, it must ambitiously try to underscore topics such as murder, sickness, abuse, heroin addiction, suicide, sexuality – pretty much any topic with an “edge” – and have a central character that is either surrounded by the subject, or is going to potentially be lost to the subject. Take Romeo & Juliet, minus out the words of William Shakespeare, put it in first person narrative form – let’s let Romeo be the narrator – and you will be soundly situated in a Young Adult novel.

July 30, 2010  Tags: , ,   Posted in: Australia, Coming-of-Age, Mystery/Suspense, Psychological Suspense  No Comments

STASH by David Matthew Klein

Debut novelist Klein has written a smart and nervy domestic drama/thriller. The pages fly, and the prose is crisp and economical. He tackles difficult, dicey, and controversial subject matter without handing out platitudes or falling into blunt party line agendas. I am tempted to call it a non-puff beach read. It is lively, energetic, and easily accessible, but it is also thought provoking and ultimately bold.

July 28, 2010  Tags: , ,   Posted in: Book Club Choice, Debut Novel, Job, Mystery/Suspense  No Comments


Google Search

Custom Search