November 2024 New Mystery Releases!

 

I've really been enjoying my reduced blogging time. It's been better for my persnickety legs, and I've had more reading time. I am going to continue with this, although I'll have to come up with a way to keep you abreast of what I've been reading (shorter format, less time sitting at the computer). We'll see what I come up with.

 

In the meantime, you know that I've been keeping track of new crime fiction to read. I've grouped my choices according to their release dates, and I've included links to author websites where available as well as the books' entries on Amazon US. Book covers and synopses are also courtesy of Amazon.

 

Let's see if I can tempt you with any of these titles!

 

 

=== November 5 ===

 

 

Title: The Gardener's Plot

Author: Deborah J. Benoit

Series: #1 in the Maggie Walker cozy series set in western Massachusetts

336 pages

 

*Upcoming review on Kittling: Books

 

Synopsis: "After life threw Maggie Walker a few curveballs, she’s happy to be back in the small, Berkshires town where she spent so much time as a child. Marlowe holds many memories for her, and now it also offers a fresh start. Maggie has always loved gardening, so it’s only natural to sign on to help Violet Bloom set up a community garden.

When opening day arrives, Violet is nowhere to be found, and the gardeners are restless. Things go from bad to worse when Maggie finds a boot buried in one of the plots… and there’s a body attached to it. Suddenly, the police are looking for a killer and they keep asking questions about Violet. Maggie doesn’t believe her friend could do this, and she’s going to dig up the dirt needed to prove it.

The Gardener’s Plot takes readers to the heart of the Berkshires and introduces amateur sleuth Maggie Walker in Deborah J. Benoit’s Minotaur Books/Mystery Writers of America First Crime Novel Award-winning debut." 

Title: Death and the Old Master

Author: G.M. Malliet

Series: #6 in the DCI Arthur St. Just series set in England

240 pages

Synopsis: "Something is bothering Sir Flyte Rascallian, renowned art expert and Master of Hardwick College at the University of Cambridge. Are the grimy paintings he recently inherited from his aunt as worthless as he claims?

Curator Ambrose Nussknacker believes one of the paintings could be a genuine Rembrandt. Why is Sir Flyte so reluctant to get it authenticated, and so determined to avoid the tributes due to the discovery of one of the world’s great lost treasures?

When Sir Flyte is found murdered in the Master’s Lodge, Detective Chief Inspector Arthur St. Just must unravel his unusual actions to solve the death of the old master. College fellows, staff, and students all agree something was amiss. But as St. Just investigates, he quickly becomes entangled in a web of deception following the trail of priceless artwork people would kill to possess."

 

 

Title: Misery Hates Company

Author: Elizabeth Hobbs

Series: #1 in the Marigold Manners historical mystery series set in New England.

320 pages

 

Synopsis: "Miss Marigold Manners may be steeped in the etiquette of her old-money Boston family, but she is also an accomplished, modern woman and an avid student of archaeology who can handle any situation with poise. When the death of her parents leaves her too destitute to pursue her academic career and she receives a letter from a distant relative on Great Misery Island, Marigold decides she must do what any person of superior sense and greater-than-average curiosity would: she mounts her trusty bicycle and heads up the craggy, fog-shrouded coast of New England for a date with fate.

Marigold arrives at Hatchet Farm, a moldering, gothic pile of a house inhabited by relatives so mired in the sins of the past, they have no future. She sets out to modernize the recluses with a brisk, ruthless efficiency, but her well-intentioned plans to manage their lives lead to malice—and murder. Marigold spies a body floating in the stormy waters surrounding the island, and her suspicions immediately turn to her hostile, weapon-wielding relatives when one of the local girls turns up missing. And she might not be the only one.

When another dead body is found in the garden of the estate, Marigold finds herself accused. She must enlist the help of an eccentric, colorful cast of friends and found family to save herself—and everything she holds dear. As secrets are uncovered and lies exposed, the question of “who done it?” turns into “who didn’t do it?” and Marigold must face a truth that shatters her steely poise and shakes her very sense of self." 

 

 

=== November 7 ===

 

 

Title: The Neighbour's Secret

Author: Sharon Bolton

Standalone Thriller set in the UK.

352 pages

*UK Release

Synopsis: "A new job. A new home. A new start.

It's all Anna wants.

But in a closed rural community, strange traditions and a suspicion of outsiders mean everything is not as it seems.

Three teenage girls have vanished at the annual Gathering as they reach their sixteenth birthday.
No one seems to be investigating.
And a fourth girl begs Anna for help, fearing that she will be next to disappear.

Everyone has secrets.
Anna is watching everyone.
But who is watching Anna?

An unpredictable and wild page-turner, with shocks, surprises and a killer twist for a finale."

=== November 12 ===

Title: Those Opulent Days

Author: Jacquie Pham

Standalone historical mystery set in 1920s colonial Vietnam.

304 pages

Synopsis: "Duy, Phong, Minh, and Edmond have been best friends since childhood. Now, as young men running their families’ formidable businesses, they make up Saigon’s most powerful group of friends in 1928 Vietnam’s elite society.

Until one of them is murdered.

In a lavish mansion on a hill in Dalat, all four men have gathered for an evening of indulgence, but one of them won’t survive the night. Toggling between this fatal night and the six days leading up to it, told from the perspectives of the four men, their mothers, their servants, and their lovers, an intricate web of terror, loyalty, and well-kept secrets begins to unravel.

As the story creeps closer to the murder, and as each character becomes a suspect, the true villain begins to emerge: colonialism, the French occupation of Vietnam, and the massive economic differences that catapult the wealthy into the stratosphere while the poor starve on the streets."

 

 

=== November 19 ===

 

 

Title: Tooth and Claw

Author: Craig Johnson

Series: A Walt Longmire prequel

208 pages

 

Synopsis: "Tooth and Claw follows Walt and Henry up to Alaska as they look for work after they both returned from serving in Vietnam. While working for an oil company in the bitter cold of winter, they soon encounter a ferocious polar bear who seems hell-bent on their destruction. But it’s not too long until they realize the danger does not lurk outside in the frozen Alaskan tundra, but with their co-workers who are after priceless treasure and will stop at nothing to get it.

Fans of Longmire will thrill to this pulse-pounding and bone-chilling novel of extreme adventure that adds another indelible chapter to the great story of Walt Longmire." 

Title: The Bones of Bascom Hall

Authors: Betsy Draine and Michael Hinden

Series: #5 in the Nora Barnes and Toby Sandler series set in Wisconsin

224 pages

 

Synopsis: "Campus police at the University of Wisconsin–Madison are baffled by the discovery of human remains in the attic of the administration building. Drawn into the investigation, visiting professor Nora Barnes connects the bones to the Vietnam-era bombing of Sterling Hall. But someone doesn’t want her probing the past. She’s side-swiped by a car while riding a bicycle and almost crushed in the art library’s motorized book stacks. Meanwhile, her high-spirited husband, Toby Sandler, is hot on the trail of lost architectural plans drafted by Frank Lloyd Wright.

Inspired by an event that traumatized Madison and shocked the nation, this absorbing novel blends fact and fiction and is sure to delight both mystery enthusiasts and UW alumni." 

Title: Silent Are the Dead

Author: D.M. Rowell

Series: #2 in the Mud Sawpole amateur sleuth series set on ancestral Kiowa tribal land. 

320 pages

 

Synopsis: "While back on tribal land, Mud Sawpole uncovers an illegal fracking operation underway that threatens the Kiowas’ ancestral homeland. But there’s an even greater threat: a local businessman involved in artifact thefts is murdered, and a respected tribe elder faces accusation of the crime. After being roped in by her cousin, Denny, they begin to investigate the death while also pursuing evidence to permanently stop frackers from destroying Kiowa land, water, and livelihoods.

When answers evade her, Mud heeds her grandfather's and great-aunt’s words of wisdom and embraces Kiowa tribal customs to find the answers that she seeks. But her ceremonial sweat leads to a vision with answers wrapped in more questions.


Mud and Denny race against the clock to uncover the real killer and must face the knowledge that there may be a traitor—and a murderer—in their midst. It’s already too late for one victim—and Mud may be next." 

Title: Murder in the Ranks

Author: Kristi Jones

World War II historical mystery featuring Women's Army Auxiliary Corps member Dottie Lincoln. Set in Algiers.

304 pages

 

Synopsis: "Algiers, North Africa, 1943. After her abusive German husband left her for dead and took their daughter with him behind enemy lines, Dottie Lincoln learned that it’s better to be a trained soldier rather than a victim. As a newly minted squad leader in the Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps, she spends her days moving men and materials to the front and her nights attending mandatory dances to boost the morale of the men. Despite the grueling nature of her job, she has found a sanctuary amongst the women in the Army. When Ruth, a member of her squad, is murdered, she’s devastated and determined to get to the bottom of the murder.

Dottie’s company is the first group of American women assigned to a combat theater, and with Ruth’s death, the entire operation is being questioned. Determined to do everything she can to help win the war, bring justice to her friend, and hopefully reunite with her daughter, Dottie must rise to the occasion before the killer strikes again.

But when her past comes back to haunt her, Dottie must prove she’s not a German spy and put a stop to a deadly conspiracy that threatens the entire American war effort." 

Title: Ghosts of Waikiki

Author: Jennifer K. Morita

Amateur sleuth mystery set in Hawaii

288 pages

 

Synopsis: "After the newspaper she works for folds and the freelance assignments no longer pay the bills, Maya Wong reluctantly returns to her native Hawaiʻi to ghostwrite controversial land developer Parker Hamilton's biography. But when the Hamilton patriarch is found dead under suspicious circumstances, Maya is unwittingly drawn into the investigation.

Maya’s family and friends aren't happy about her work for Hamilton. And now, with her ex, Detective Koa Yamada, on the case, she’s forced to contend with the very person she was determined to avoid.

All too soon, Maya is dodging assailants and digging for clues while juggling girls’ nights out with her old BFFs and weekly family dinners. Convinced the police are after the wrong man, Maya is determined to stop the killer before it’s too late.

Exploring timely issues in Hawaiʻi, including locals getting priced out of paradise, Ghosts of Waikīkī is an engrossing mystery in the vein of The Verifiers." 

=== November 21 ===

Title: Deadfall

Author: Aline Templeton

Series: #6 in the DCI Kelso Strang series set in Scotland.

384 pages

Synopsis: "There's something sinister about Drumdalloch Woods in the Black Isle near Inverness. It is a place of tangled growth and shadowy darkness, it has business opportunists, biological scientists and conflicted family members all competing for a say in its future. Then a body is found, and everything starts to look suspicious. 

As DCI Kelso Strang's investigation grows more complex, he unearths layers of hatred, greed and revenge that cast doubt even on the local police force. Having only just found happiness with his new girlfriend, Cat Fleming, Strang faces an existential threat not only to his career but to his very life."

=== November 28 ===

Title: City of Destruction

Author: Vaseem Khan

Series: #5 in the Malabar House historical series set in India.

352 pages 

*UK release

Synopsis: "Bombay, 1951. A political rally ends in tragedy when India's first female police detective, Persis Wadia, kills a lone gunman as he attempts to assassinate the divisive new defence minister, a man calling for war with India's new post-Independence neighbours.

With the Malabar House team tasked to hunt down the assassin's co-conspirators - aided by agents from Britain's MI6 security service - Persis is quickly relegated to the sidelines. But then she is given a second case, the burned body of an unidentified white man found on a Bombay beach. As she pursues both investigations - with and without official sanction - she soon finds herself headed to the country's capital, New Delhi, a city where ancient and modern India openly clash.

Meanwhile, Persis's colleague, Scotland Yard criminalist Archie Blackfinch, lies in a hospital fighting for his life as all around him the country tears itself apart in the prelude to war..."

There are quite a few intriguing new mysteries coming out in November, aren't there? Did I manage to tempt you with any of them? Or... had you already been tempted? Which books? Inquiring minds would love to know!