Lightweight but no-nonsense and genuinely brainy, like Anthony Horowitz without all the meta.
The creator of the Death in Paradise series (Murder in the Caribbean, 2018, etc.) crafts a triple-decker puzzle in a Thames-side English village.
When crossword compiler Judith Potts hears a shout and a bang from the yard of neighboring art gallery owner Stefan Dunwoody, she’s convinced he’s been shot. But DS Tanika Malik, of the Maidenhead Police Station, brushes off her report as a likely car backfire. Next morning, when Judith finds her neighbor shot in the head, Malik naturally says his death was probably an accident or suicide. So Judith, struck by the Faith medallion adorning Stefan’s body, decides to investigate on her own—or rather, with the help of Becks Starling, wife of the vicar of All Saints Church, and dogwalker Suzie Harris. Briefly discouraged when the obvious suspect, auction house owner Elliot Howard, with whom Stefan had publicly quarreled, proves to have an ironclad alibi, they redouble their efforts when cabdriver Iqbal Kassam is found shot to death in his home wearing a Hope medallion. Now even Malik is persuaded that the two men have been killed by someone who’s presumably targeting a third victim, and over the objections of her own staff, she deputizes the amateur sleuths to work with her. Since Andy Bishop, the solicitor who seems to have robbed Iqbal of a hefty legacy from the late Ezra Harrington, also produces an alibi for his murder, the four women have their work cut out for them. Are the deaths linked by a common school background, a fondness for rowing, or a Mark Rothko painting Elliot sold to Stefan more than 30 years ago?
Lightweight but no-nonsense and genuinely brainy, like Anthony Horowitz without all the meta.Pub Date: May 3, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-72825-051-9
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Poisoned Pen
Review Posted Online: Jan. 25, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2022
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
It's hard to read but hard to look away from.
When two women who share a birthday meet, a journalist becomes the subject of her own true-crime mystery.
On their 45th birthdays, Josie Fair and Alix Summer meet at a pub and discover they were born not only on the same day, but in the same hospital. Alix is a successful journalist, and Josie convinces Alix that her story is worth telling: Josie met her husband when she was 13 and he was 40. “I can see that maybe I was being used, that maybe I was even being groomed?” she confesses to Alix. “But that feeling of being powerful, right at the start, when I was still in control. I miss that sometimes. I really do. And what I’d like, more than anything, is to get it back.” From this premise Alix creates a Netflix series, Hi! I’m Your Birthday Twin! which investigates Josie’s life as she reconciles what happened to her as a teen and seeks a new path. With the story unfinished, the narrative unfolds in the present tense, with prose that jingles like song lyrics: “He turns to see if the girl is behind him, and sees her wishy-washy, wavy-wavy, in double vision through the glass windows of the hotel.” Alix is both intrigued and repulsed by Josie, but she initially gives her the benefit of the doubt. After all, Alix’s husband, Nathan, has a drinking problem, and Alix knows what it’s like to be reluctant to leave a bad situation. But Josie seems more interested in being part of Alix’s seemingly glamorous life than she is in fixing her own, and when three people end up dead and Alix’s life is turned upside down, the evidence points to Josie—and turns the TV series into a murder mystery. Transcripts from Alix’s interviews alternate with the narrative, offering increasingly varied perspectives on Josie’s story as told by her neighbors, friends, and family members. With so many versions of events, the ending shatters, leaving readers to decide whose is the truth.
It's hard to read but hard to look away from.Pub Date: Aug. 8, 2023
ISBN: 9781982179007
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: May 24, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2023
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