by Nick Oldham ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 3, 2021
An episodic, felony-strewn stroll down Memory Lane.
Now that he’s retired, DI Henry Christie finally gets a chance to close one of his very first cases.
It’s 1985, and PC Christie is at the point of taking in Thomas Benemy, who's clearly shoplifting perfumes to order on a grand scale even though he’s only 13, when he’s coshed from behind and wakes up to find Tommy and his unidentified accomplice gone. Shortly after Henry pays a call on Trish Benemy, Tommy’s hard-used mother, her son disappears, never to be seen again. The following year, Henry, now a newly minted Detective Constable, is called on the carpet as the likeliest person to have passed a pair of suspects in the abduction and murder of two children the tools they used to end their lives in the nick. It’s not until 2020, when he signs a six-month contract to serve as a Civilian Investigator with the Blackpool CID’s Cold Case Unit, that the threads begin to come together. First Henry gets to hear the scarifying source of the scars that disfigure the body of his sergeant, Debbie Blackstone. Then he learns of the suicide of Trish Benemy, which turns out to be murder. He and Blackstone close in on Ellis Clanfield, a serial rape suspect who has the same unusual tattoo that Henry remembers Tommy sporting, only to see him snatched from custody by sexy solicitor Hortense Thorogood. Incredible as it seems, things rapidly get even worse before all the loose ends (and there are many) are tied up.
An episodic, felony-strewn stroll down Memory Lane.Pub Date: Aug. 3, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-7278-5014-0
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Severn House
Review Posted Online: May 18, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2021
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by Laura Bradford ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 5, 2022
A novel hook introduces an otherwise standard cozy.
The risks mount as the oddball business venture Emma Westlake launched in A Plus One for Murder (2021) picks up steam.
It took a lot of guts, some ingenuity, and a little bit of prodding from her octogenarian pal, Dottie Adler, but it looks like A Friend for Hire, Emma’s service for folks who need someone to offer unconditional support in their hour of need, is going to be a decent earner after all. In addition to Dottie, who still pays Emma for having tea with her once a week, there are three other clients and a fourth in the works. But Kim Felder, Emma’s newest paying friend, comes with a lot of baggage. She’s sad and lonely because now that her kids are grown, she has no one who needs her. But she’s also really, really angry because her husband dumped her for his thin, blond secretary. Emma encourages Kim to vent her frustrations on paper, writing down all the things she’d like to do to her ex. Which might be good psychology but turns out to be terrible advice from a legal standpoint, since once someone actually does strangle that old cheat Roger, the list provides Deputy Jack Riordan ample evidence to arrest Kim. Now Emma has two problems: First, her client is in the hoosegow, and second, she’s fighting with Jack just as their relationship is moving from the “friends” to the “dating” column. There’s only one way to fix this mess, and it doesn’t take Sherlock Holmes to figure out who has to crack this case.
A novel hook introduces an otherwise standard cozy.Pub Date: July 5, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-59333-478-2
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Berkley
Review Posted Online: April 12, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2022
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by Tamara Berry ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 30, 2023
A little humor, a little romance, a little detection, but no solid takeaway.
Murder disrupts a bookstore’s grand opening in Winthrop, Washington.
Tess Harrow is going all out for the launch of Paper Trail, the painstakingly renovated bookshop on the site of her father’s old hardware store. Not only has she scheduled her latest novel, Fury Under the Floorboards, for release the night of the store’s launch party, but she’s allowed her daughter, 15-year-old Gertie, to plan a menu of tasty treats, including sushi-grade tuna flown in fresh that morning from Seattle. So she’s less than thrilled when her mother, mega-diva Bernadette Springer, shows up even earlier than the fish with her boyfriend, Levi Parker, in tow. Parker is famous all over Instagram, accused of murdering two women in New York and one in Detroit, although no one’s been able to make the charges stick. But this time, he’s the one who ends up in the morgue. Relieved as Tess is that her mother won’t be Parker’s next victim, his death derails the plans for her gala reopening big-time. First, journalist Mumford Umberto ditches his plans for an extended interview with Tess in favor of covering the crime. Next, podcaster Neptune Jones sets up shop down the street, drawing away the huge crowds that Tess expected at Paper Trail. Worst of all, Sheriff Boyd, who Tess keeps hoping will declare his feelings for her, invites Neptune to stay at his house and help him crack the case. Tess spends so much energy grieving the injustice of it all that she barely has time to solve the mystery, even when it looks as if her mom is a prime suspect. Although Berry’s dialogue is crisp and funny, her scattershot plotting may leave some readers wishing for a bit less.
A little humor, a little romance, a little detection, but no solid takeaway.Pub Date: May 30, 2023
ISBN: 9781728248660
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Poisoned Pen
Review Posted Online: April 24, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2023
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