A debut that’s a model of finely tuned suspense. First, inevitably, of the Nina Borg trilogy.
Of all the recent Scandinavian thrillers that have been rushed into translation for fans of Stieg Larsson, here’s one whose pair of strong heroines taking on a monstrous conspiracy of men behaving badly is actually reminiscent of the Millennium Trilogy.
As if the demands of her family and her job caring for women who’ve run away from abusive partners aren’t stressful enough, Nina Borg has a new problem, and it’s a doozy. For reasons she doesn’t explain, Karin Kongsted, an old friend from nursing school, has begged her to pick up a piece of luggage from a locker at Copenhagen’s Central Station. When Nina opens the suitcase, she instantly sees why Karin was so closemouthed about her errand. Inside is a naked little boy, drugged and deeply asleep but still alive. A chance encounter at the police station where she goes to report her shocking discovery instantly persuades Nina that her best move is to go into hiding, as Karin seems to have done herself. By the time she catches up with her friend to demand an explanation, however, Karin’s been murdered after using her dying breath to identify Nina to the man who beat her to death. Nina will have to look elsewhere for answers—just as Sigita Ramoskiene, the Lithuanian mother whose 3-year-old son Mikas has just vanished from a playground near their house in Vilnius, will have to look further for answers than the Department of Missing Persons, whose investigator, Evaldas Guzas, doesn’t believe her wild story of abduction. It’s clear that Mikas is the boy in the suitcase, and it’s only a matter of time before the two women hunting for the truth find each other. But the reason Mikas has been kidnapped, when it’s finally revealed, packs quite a wallop. So does the continued threat of Karin’s killer, who’s on the hunt himself.
A debut that’s a model of finely tuned suspense. First, inevitably, of the Nina Borg trilogy.Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-1-56947-981-0
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Soho Crime
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2011
A treat for aficionados of shopkeeper-sleuth cozies.
Notch another corpse for Jacobia “Jake” Tiptree (Death by Chocolate Malted Milkshake, 2019, etc.).
After slowly working its way out of the red, Jake’s sweet shop is now one of the linchpins of the revitalized business district of Eastport, Maine. But she and her partner, Ellie White, are less than thrilled when Henry Hadlyme, star of the food tourism show Eat This! offers to include The Chocolate Moose on his podcast Eating on the Edge! which highlights off-the-beaten-track purveyors of New England fare. Hadlyme seems a little slimy to Jake and Ellie, and his interest in their treats seems less than sincere. But when he calls Jake “missy,” that’s it; the two chocolateers boot him out of their shop. He comes back with a vengeance—or at least, his corpse does. It turns up in the basement of the Moose with a stuffed parrot pinned to its shoulder and a cutlass jabbed through its chest in a gruesome nod to the ongoing Eastport Pirate Festival. Jake would love to present police chief Bob Arnold with a convenient alternative to charging her with Hadlyme’s murder. And there’s no dearth of suspects: A surreptitious trip to the Eat This! production trailer lets Jake know that pretty much everyone involved with the show hated Hadlyme. But finding out exactly who croaked the curmudgeon—and offering the chief some proof—proves to be a challenge to Jake’s and Ellie’s ingenuity, health, and welfare.
A treat for aficionados of shopkeeper-sleuth cozies.Pub Date: Feb. 25, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-4967-1134-2
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Kensington
Review Posted Online: Nov. 23, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An expert juggling act that ends with not one but two intercut trials. More, please.
His Clifton Chronicles (This Was a Man, 2017, etc.) complete, the indefatigable Archer launches a new series that follows a well-born police officer from his first assignment to (spoiler alert) his appointment as commissioner of the Metropolitan Police some volumes down the road.
William Warwick may have been born with a silver spoon in his mouth, but he’s done everything he can to declare his independence from his father, Sir Julian Warwick QC. When William, fresh out of King’s College with a degree in art history, announces his intention to enroll in Hendon Police College, his father realizes that he’ll have to count on William’s older sister, Grace, to carry on the family’s tradition in Her Majesty’s courts. Instead, guileless William patrols the streets of Lambeth until a chance remark lands him on DCI Bruce Lamont’s Art and Antiques unit under the watchful eye of Cmdr. Jack Hawksby. No fewer than four cases await his attention: the forger who signs first editions with the names of their famous authors; a series of even more accomplished forgeries of old masters paintings; a well-organized series of thefts of artworks by a gang whose leader prefers selling them back to the companies who’ve insured them and often don’t even report the thefts to the police; and a mysterious series of purchases of century-old silver by one Kevin Carter. His investigations take William across the path, and then into the bed, of Beth Rainsford, a research assistant at the Fitzmolean gallery, still reeling seven years after a priceless Rembrandt was stolen from its collection, most likely by landowner and self-styled farmer Miles Faulkner. As if to prevent William from getting even a moment’s sleep in between rounds of detection and decorous coupling, Beth unwillingly drags William into a fifth case, a 2-year-old murder whose verdict she has every reason to doubt. One of these cases will bring William up against Grace, whose withering cross-examination of him on the witness stand is a special highlight.
An expert juggling act that ends with not one but two intercut trials. More, please.Pub Date: Sept. 3, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-250-20076-1
Page Count: 336
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: June 16, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2019
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