A gentle charmer of an SF mystery that surprises as it satisfies.
A detective aboard an interstellar ship where all childbearing is on indefinite hold gets drawn into a case involving an infant mysteriously left at her nephew’s door.
The last thing Dorothy Gentleman expected is involvement in a child abandonment case. Before departing Earth, all 10,000 passengers aboard the spaceship Fairweather underwent a procedure to pause their reproductive abilities. Now, centuries later, Dorothy’s gay nephew, Ruthie, and his husband, John, inexplicably find a baby outside their cabin. They all want answers, but Dorothy in particular wants to protect the child from her starchy rules-and-regulations colleague, Leloup, who sees the infant as “a disaster for civil disorder and general calm.” If Leloup has his way, the baby will be unable to download memories into a memory-book before death and then upload them into a new body. This second installment of Waite’s Dorothy Gentleman cozy mystery-in-space series will delight readers with quirky characters, wry dialogue, and a puzzle-like plot reminiscent of Agatha Christie’s Miss Marple books. Dorothy eventually locates the mother, who’s been newly incarnated and who, oddly enough, has no memory of giving birth. It quickly becomes clear that the child’s right to preserve his memories for future incarnations isn’t the only issue at stake. Someone with motives Dorothy is determined to discover wanted the old incarnation of the baby’s mother dead. Waite’s imaginative merging of futuristic settings and technologies with elements of the classic whodunit is only part of what makes this novel so successful. Her handling of themes like memory, love, and the bonds that create a family add a level of quiet poignancy that makes Waite’s book both entertaining and meaningful.
A gentle charmer of an SF mystery that surprises as it satisfies.Pub Date: March 10, 2026
ISBN: 9781250342263
Page Count: 144
Publisher: Tordotcom
Review Posted Online: Jan. 19, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2026
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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
The lavish food descriptions and appended recipes are the best parts of this anemic mystery.
Christmas is coming, but so is trouble for South Lick, Indiana.
Robbie Jordan, owner and chief cook at Pans ’N Pancakes, returns from solving a murder in California just in time for the holiday rush, which is complicated more than most Christmastimes by a number of surprises that disrupt her circle of friends. First, her assistant, Danna Beedle, gets a visit from Marcus Vandemere, a young biracial man claiming to be her half brother, an assertion that thrills Danna despite the doubts of some friends and relatives. Next comes a fire that nearly destroys the home of anesthesiologist Dr. William Geller, a racist whose wife, Tina, reportedly left him years ago. When a skeleton turns up in the attic, the not-so-esteemed doctor has some explaining to do. Robbie’s nemesis, Detective Octavia Slade, who recently married Robbie’s former boyfriend, is more willing than usual to accept help from Robbie, who has a knack for finding things out. The next to die is Tina’s twin, Toni, who knew Marcus from karate classes. Toni’s husband is the prime suspect, but Robbie’s convinced the fatalities are connected. With help from her boyfriend and her network of friends, she attempts to clear things up before the killer spoils her holiday by adding her to his list.
The lavish food descriptions and appended recipes are the best parts of this anemic mystery.Pub Date: Sept. 29, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-4967-2317-8
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Kensington
Review Posted Online: June 30, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2020
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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