Apart from recurring characters, this entry is less interested in live people than in dead animals.
Dr. Temperance Brennan tackles the case of a serial killer of animals who’s been ascending the food chain over a period of years.
The unnerving vision that causes an elderly woman to drive off a rainy road in Mecklenburg County, North Carolina, turns out to be a painted head nailed to a tree. Even more disquieting than this discovery is Tempe’s realization that it’s only the latest of a series of heads similarly disfigured, decorated, and displayed as death’s heads. The only thing that prevents the perp, whoever it is, from being threatened with life imprisonment is that none of the remains are human: They’re all skulls of rats, squirrels, rabbits, skunks, and dogs, the earliest of them three years old. Tempe and Erskine “Skinny” Slidell, the surly retired police investigator who partners with her, suspect that the killer, whose latest display does contain some human bones, is working up to killing people, and they turn out to be all too correct. Just in case Tempe is looking for relief from this stressful case at home, her willful 17-year-old grandniece, Ruthie, has overcome her resistance to setting foot on the campus of UNC Charlotte and made contact with Lester Meloy, a grad student who’s supplied her with weed, and Danielle Hall, his fellow member in a secretive group called “Live.” Ruthie inevitably goes missing and Tempe is kidnapped herself before all the promising complications of the case are waved aside in favor of a solution that comes out of left field and answers almost none of the sharpest questions the mystery has raised.
Apart from recurring characters, this entry is less interested in live people than in dead animals.Pub Date: Nov. 18, 2025
ISBN: 9781668051474
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Scribner
Review Posted Online: Aug. 29, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2025
A fresh and clever whodunit with an engaging twist.
A 16-year-old savant uses his Groundhog Day gift to solve his grandfather’s murder.
Nishizawa’s compulsively readable puzzle opens with the discovery of the victim, patriarch Reijiro Fuchigami, sprawled on a futon in the attic of his elegant mansion, where his family has gathered for a consequential announcement about his estate. The weapon seems to be a copper vase lying nearby. Given this setup, the novel might have proceeded as a traditional whodunit but for two delightful features. The first is the ebullient narration of Fuchigami’s youngest grandson, Hisataro, thrust into the role of an investigator with more dedication than finesse. The second is Nishizawa’s clever premise: The 16-year-old Hisataro has lived ever since birth with a condition that occasionally has him falling into a time loop that he calls "the Trap," replaying the same 24 hours of his life exactly nine times before moving on. And, of course, the murder takes place on the first day of one of these loops. Can he solve the murder before the cycle is played out? His initial strategies—never leaving his grandfather’s side, focusing on specific suspects, hiding in order to observe them all—fall frustratingly short. Hisataro’s comical anxiety rises with every failed attempt to identify the culprit. It’s only when he steps back and examines all the evidence that he discovers the solution. First published in 1995, this is the first of Nishizawa’s novels to be translated into English. As for Hisataro, he ultimately concludes that his condition is not a burden but a gift: “Time’s spiral never ends.”
A fresh and clever whodunit with an engaging twist.Pub Date: July 29, 2025
ISBN: 9781805335436
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Pushkin Vertigo
Review Posted Online: July 4, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2025
A top-class cozy infused with dry wit and charming characters who draw you in and leave you wanting more, please.
Four residents of Coopers Chase, a British retirement village, compete with the police to solve a murder in this debut novel.
The Thursday Murder Club started out with a group of septuagenarians working on old murder cases culled from the files of club founder Elizabeth Best’s friend Penny Gray, a former police officer who's now comatose in the village's nursing home. Elizabeth used to have an unspecified job, possibly as a spy, that has left her with a large network of helpful sources. Joyce Meadowcroft is a former nurse who chronicles their deeds. Psychiatrist Ibrahim Arif and well-known political firebrand Ron Ritchie complete the group. They charm Police Constable Donna De Freitas, who, visiting to give a talk on safety at Coopers Chase, finds the residents sharp as tacks. Built with drug money on the grounds of a convent, Coopers Chase is a high-end development conceived by loathsome Ian Ventham and maintained by dangerous crook Tony Curran, who’s about to be fired and replaced with wary but willing Bogdan Jankowski. Ventham has big plans for the future—as soon as he’s removed the nuns' bodies from the cemetery. When Curran is murdered, DCI Chris Hudson gets the case, but Elizabeth uses her influence to get the ambitious De Freitas included, giving the Thursday Club a police source. What follows is a fascinating primer in detection as British TV personality Osman allows the members to use their diverse skills to solve a series of interconnected crimes.
A top-class cozy infused with dry wit and charming characters who draw you in and leave you wanting more, please.Pub Date: Sept. 22, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-98-488096-3
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Pamela Dorman/Viking
Review Posted Online: June 30, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2020
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