McPherson’s newest stand-alone (Come to Harm, 2015, etc.) is a stunning combination of creepy thriller and classic mystery...
A divorced woman with a severely disabled teenage son gets sucked into a mystery that will change her forever.
Gloria lives in a farmhouse on the remnants of a large Scottish estate. For the owner, who lives in the nursing home created out of the main house, her most important job is rocking the ancient stone in the garden 12 times a day to prevent the devil trapped inside from escaping. In addition, she takes care of the house and its dog and cats. In return, she can afford to keep her son, Nicky, in the same home. Stephen “Stig” Tarrant, a grade school pal, turns up on her doorstep saying he's being stalked by April Cowan, one of his fellow students from Eden, an alternative high school once based on the estate, and asks Gloria to go with him to a meeting April demanded. When they find April dead in a small stone hut on the estate, Stig slowly reveals a terrible story about the death of a boy at the school. He was found floating in the nearby river the night of Beltane, when the students had a cookout and slept outside—all but Stig, who claims he was sick after eating undercooked sausages and knows only parts of the story. Although the death was ruled an accident, the school was closed, the headmistress’s reputation ruined, and the students scattered. April’s body vanishes before they decide to tell the police, and Stig becomes a person of interest, hiding in Gloria’s house and cooking gourmet meals while Gloria sleuths. Believing Stig’s story of being set up, Gloria, whose job as a registrar gives her access to private information, starts to search for the other students and soon learns that most of them were apparent suicides. She’s horrified to realize that her ex-husband was one of them, one of the few still left alive.
McPherson’s newest stand-alone (Come to Harm, 2015, etc.) is a stunning combination of creepy thriller and classic mystery with a startling denouement.Pub Date: Sept. 8, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-7387-4549-7
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Midnight Ink/Llewellyn
Review Posted Online: June 16, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2015
An anodyne visit with Tricia and her friends and enemies hung on a thin mystery.
Too much free time leads a New Hampshire bookseller into yet another case of murder.
Now that Tricia Miles has Pixie Poe and Mr. Everett practically running her bookstore, Haven’t Got a Clue, she finds herself at loose ends. Her wealthy sister, Angelica, who in the guise of Nigela Ricita has invested heavily in making Stoneham a bookish tourist attraction, is entering the amateur competition for the Great Booktown Bake-Off. So Tricia, who’s recently taken up baking as a hobby, decides to join her and spends a lot of time looking for the perfect cupcake recipe. A visit to another bookstore leaves Tricia witnessing a nasty argument between owner Joyce Widman and next-door neighbor Vera Olson over the trimming of tree branches that hang over Joyce’s yard—also overheard by new town police officer Cindy Pearson. After Tricia accepts Joyce’s offer of some produce from her garden, they find Vera skewered by a pitchfork, and when Police Chief Grant Baker arrives, Joyce is his obvious suspect. Ever since Tricia moved to Stoneham, the homicide rate has skyrocketed (Poisoned Pages, 2018, etc.), and her history with Baker is fraught. She’s also become suspicious about the activities at Pets-A-Plenty, the animal shelter where Vera was a dedicated volunteer. Tricia’s offered her expertise to the board, but president Toby Kingston has been less than welcoming. With nothing but baking on her calendar, Tricia has plenty of time to investigate both the murder and her vague suspicions about the shelter. Plenty of small-town friendships and rivalries emerge in her quest for the truth.
An anodyne visit with Tricia and her friends and enemies hung on a thin mystery.Pub Date: Aug. 13, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-9848-0272-9
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Berkley
Review Posted Online: May 26, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2019
A murder is committed in a stalled transcontinental train in the Balkans, and every passenger has a watertight alibi. But Hercule Poirot finds a way.
**Note: This classic Agatha Christie mystery was originally published in England as Murder on the Orient Express, but in the United States as Murder in the Calais Coach. Kirkus reviewed the book in 1934 under the original US title, but we changed the title in our database to the now recognizable title Murder on the Orient Express. This is the only name now known for the book. The reason the US publisher, Dodd Mead, did not use the UK title in 1934 was to avoid confusion with the 1932 Graham Greene novel, Orient Express.
Pub Date: Feb. 28, 1934
ISBN: 978-0062073495
Page Count: -
Publisher: Dodd, Mead
Review Posted Online: Sept. 20, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1934
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