As in Ruth Rendell’s books as Barbara Vine, readers are invited to watch helplessly as things go from bad to much, much...
Inspector Konrad Sejer’s latest quarry is a prankster whose pranks are callous, cruel and ultimately lethal.
Lily Sundelin feels magically connected to her baby Margrete, but that doesn’t prevent someone from pouring blood over the little girl as she sleeps in her pram just outside Lily’s kitchen. In short order, some trickster—the same person?—places a premature obituary for Gunilla Mørk, dyes one of Sverre Skarning’s sheep orange, calls the Memento funeral home to come pick up the body of Helge Landmark, ravaged by ALS but very much alive, and summons Evelyn Mold to Central Hospital, where her teenage daughter Frances has not been brought after an accident on her bike. Nor is Sejer himself left out. A note slipped under his door announces: “Hell begins now.” Fossum (Bad Intentions, 2011, etc.), who has little interest in playing whodunit, hints early and often that the jokester is delinquent Johnny Beskow, seething with resentment over his alcoholic mother’s neglect of him, hungry for the love of his grandfather Henry, and determined to harm Henry’s neighbor Else Meiner, who turns out to be one resourceful girl. Instead, the focus is on the frustrated Johnny and the widening circle of calamity he spreads (two of his victims are hospitalized as collateral damage).
As in Ruth Rendell’s books as Barbara Vine, readers are invited to watch helplessly as things go from bad to much, much worse for an unlucky group of basically nice people. If that’s your pleasure, you could hardly do better.Pub Date: Aug. 14, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-547-57752-4
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Review Posted Online: June 16, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2012
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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