January has flown by-- but then it usually does. It seems as though I just finished packing away all the Christmas decorations, but I do know that I've had a house guest and spent a week down in Bisbee since then!
February has some gems in store for all of us: old favorites like Lorraine Bartlett, Colin Cotterill, Deborah Crombie, Leighton Gage, and Andrea Camilleri all have books coming out this month, and then there are new-to-me authors like Sheila Connolly, Stephen Gallagher, and Peggy Blair that I want to try.
Hopefully I've got a title or two here that tickles your fancy. I've included all the information you need to find them at your favorite book spots, and they're also grouped according to their release dates. Enough yakking-- let's get to my picks of the month!
=== February 5 ===
Title: One Hot Murder
Series: #3 in the Victoria Square series set in upstate New York
ISBN: 9780425251904
Publisher: Berkley Prime Crime
Mass market Paperback, 304 pages
Synopsis: "Katie Bonner, the reluctant manager of Artisans Alley in the quaint
shopping district of Victoria Square, is no stranger to ambivalence.
Things have been going hot and heavy with pizza maker Andy Rust—so much
so that Katie has moved in over his pizza parlor. But now that summer’s
ushered in a heat wave, an apartment above pizza ovens without an air
conditioner is making Katie hot and bothered.
At the height of
the heat wave, a tragic fire strikes Victoria Square. Wood U, a small
store selling wooden gifts and small furniture, is destroyed. But the
fire may just be a smoke screen—for murder. A body is found among the
charred wreckage, and the victim didn’t die from smoke inhalation. He
was shot. Now—despite making Detective Ray Davenport hot under the
collar—Katie is determined to smoke out a coldhearted killer…."
Title: Chance of a Ghost
Series: #4 in the Haunted Guesthouse series set on the Jersey Shore
ISBN: 9780425251683
Publisher: Berkley Prime Crime
Mass Market Paperback, 304 pages
Synopsis: "Even with a blizzard bearing down on New Jersey, Alison can count on at
least two guests—Paul and Maxie, the stubborn ghosts who share her shore
town inn. Then there’s her widowed mother, who hasn’t just been seeing
ghosts, she’s been secretly dating one: Alison’s father. But when he
stands her up three times in a row, something’s wrong. Is he a lost
soul…or a missing apparition?
Their only lead is an overdramatic
spirit—stage name Lawrence Laurentz—who doesn’t take direction well and
won’t talk until they find his killer. Alison will reluctantly play the
part of PI, but when the clues take a sinister turn, the writing is on
the wall: If Alison can’t keep a level head, this will be her father’s
final act—and maybe her own."
Title: Every Trick in the Book
Series: #2 in the Novel Idea series set in North Carolina
ISBN: 9780425251676
Publisher: Berkley Prime Crime
Mass Market Paperback, 304 pages
Synopsis: "Lila Wilkins has it all: the home of her dreams in the charming town of
Inspiration Valley, North Carolina; a perfect police officer boyfriend;
and a new job she absolutely loves. At the Book and Author Festival,
which is sponsored by the Novel Idea Literary Agency, Lila expects to
discover some talented new authors, but what she finds instead is the
body of an editor to whom she bears an eerie resemblance.
Trouble is, the editor’s death isn’t the only literary murder taking
place. Soon a blossoming author is also killed, and Lila has a gut
feeling that the two murders are linked. Now she must hunt down the dark
figure who killed these women—and to her surprise, she just might find
the clues hidden in a manuscript…."
Title: Buried in a Bog
Series: #1 in the County Cork series set in Ireland
ISBN: 9780425251898
Publisher: Berkley Prime Crime
Mass Market Paperback, 304 pages
Synopsis: "Honoring the wish of her late grandmother, Maura Donovan visits the
small Irish village where her Gran was born—though she never expected to
get bogged down in a murder mystery. Nor had she planned to take a job
in one of the local pubs, but she finds herself excited to get to know
the people who knew her Gran.
In the pub, she’s swamped with
drink orders as everyone in town gathers to talk about the recent
discovery of a nearly one-hundred-year-old body in a nearby bog. When
Maura realizes she may know something about the dead man—and that the
body’s connected to another, more recent, death—she fears she’s about to
become mired in a homicide investigation. After she discovers the death
is connected to another from almost a century earlier, Maura has a
sinking feeling she may really be getting in over her head...."
Title: Brooklyn Bones
Author: Triss Stein
Series: #1 in the Erica Donato series set in Brooklyn, New York
ISBN: 9781464201202
Publisher: Poisoned Pen Press
Hardcover, 250 pages
*Upcoming review on Kittling: Books
Synopsis: "
In Brooklyn Bones, a crime of the past
comes much too close to home when Erica Donato’s teenage daughter
Chris finds a skeleton behind a wall in their crumbling Park Slope home.
Erica – young widow, over-age history Ph.D candidate, mother of a teen,
product of blue-collar Brooklyn – is drawn into the mystery when she
learns this was an unknown teenage girl, hidden there within living
memory. She and her daughter are both touched and disturbed by the
mysterious tragedy in their own home.
Chris’s dangerous curiosity
and Erica’s work at a local history museum lead her right back to her
neighborhood in its edgy, pre-gentrification days, the period when the
age of Aquarius was turning dark. A cranky retired reporter shares old
files with her. The charming widow of a slumlord has some surprises for
her. The crazy old lady who hangs around her street keeps trying to tell
her something. And there are people, including some she is close to,
who know the whole story and will stop at nothing to make sure it stays
buried forever."
Title:
The Golden Calf
Author: Helene Tursten
Series: #6 in the Detective Inspector Irene Huss series set in Sweden
ISBN: 9781616950088
Publisher: Soho Crime
Hardcover, 346 pages
*Upcoming review on Kittling: Books
Synopsis: "
Three men have been shot in one of Göteborg's most fashionable
neighborhoods, sending Detective Inspector Irene Huss and her colleagues
on a goose chase through a tony world of expensive cars and fancy
homes. All three victims seem to be tied to one person, the glamorous
dot-com darling Sanna Kaegler-Ceder, but no matter which strategy Irene
adopts—good cop or bad cop—Sanna is not speaking, even when her own life
seems to be at stake.
Meanwhile, Irene’s partner and long-time
friend, Tommy, is acting strange. Could he be having an affair with
someone in the force? And what does Sanna have to gain by remaining
silent anyway? Irene is desperate for answers . . . before more bodies
hit the floor."
=== February 7 ===
Title: The Bedlam Detective
Standalone set in turn-of-the-twentieth-century England and America
ISBN: 9780307406644
Publisher: Crown
Hardcover, 320 pages
Synopsis: "From a basement office in London’s notorious Bethlehem
Hospital, Sebastian Becker investigates wealthy eccentrics whose dubious
mental health may render them unable to manage their own affairs. His
interview with rich landowner Sir Owain Lancaster, whose sanity has been
in question since a disastrous scientific adventure in the Amazon
killed his family and colleagues, coincides with the disappearance of
two young local girls. When the children are found slain, Lancaster
claims that the same dark forces that devastated his family have
followed him home. It is not the first time that children have come to
harm in his rural countryside town, though few are willing to speak of
incidents from the past. Becker must determine whether this mad nobleman
is insane and a murderer, or if some even more sinister agency is at
work.
Struggling on his small salary, and with unexpected help
from a son who needs special care, Becker and his wife make sacrifices
so Becker can stay on the case after an innocent man is convicted of the
crime. The answers he seeks may be found with the assistance of the
local investigator and a young suffragette who fled Arnmouth, but
couldn’t flee the horrors she encountered there.
From dank
asylums to the lush and treacherous Amazon, through the makeshift
studios of the early film industry and a traveling fair of freaks and
illusions, Sebastian Becker’s search for answers brings him face to face
with madmen and monsters, both imagined and real. Confronting immense
danger in his hunt for the truth, he will explore murder, tragedy, and
the tempestuous depths of his own mind."
=== February 19 ===
Title: Dead Suite
Series:#4 in the Ghost Duster series set in Seattle, Washington
ASIN: B007P7HT9G
Publisher: InterMix
eBook, 248 pages
Synopsis: "
Crime scene cleaner Sadie Novak has been blessed with the gift of
second sight. But with ghosts of murder victims always popping up when
she’s trying to work, her blessing sometimes seems more like a curse…
With
business slow, her mortgage payment looming, and her relationship with
on-again off-again boyfriend Zack somewhere in limbo, Sadie could use a
drink and a little rejuvenating R&R. But when women start getting
killed in fancy hotels, Sadie suddenly finds herself back to work and
her business back in the black.
Posh hotels are much nicer
accommodations than her usual crime scenes, but soon perks turn to peril
and Sadie gets caught in the killer’s web. Now, Sadie has to figure out
the identity of the Seattle Slasher, before he comes for her next…."
Title:
The Woman Who Wouldn't Die
Author:
Colin Cotterill
Series: #9 in the Dr. Siri Paiboun series set in 1970s Laos
ISBN: 9781616952068
Publisher: Soho Crime
Hardcover, 320 pages
Synopsis: "
In a small Lao village, a very strange thing has happened. A woman was
shot and killed in her bed during a burglary; she was given a funeral
and everyone in the village saw her body burned. Then, three days later,
she was back in her house as if she'd never been dead at all. But now
she's clairvoyant, and can speak to the dead. That's why the long-dead
brother of a Lao general has enlisted her to help his brother uncover
his remains, which have been lost at the bottom of a river for many
years.
Lao national coroner Dr. Siri Paiboun and his wife,
Madame Daeng, are sent along to supervise the excavation. It could be a
kind of relaxing vacation for them, maybe, except Siri is obsessed with
the pretty undead medium's special abilities, and Madame Daeng might be a
little jealous. She doesn't trust the woman for some reason─is her
hunch right? What is the group really digging for at the bottom of this
remote river on the Thai border? What war secrets are being covered up?"
Title:
The Sound of Broken Glass
Author:
Deborah Crombie
Series: #15 in the Duncan Kincaid and Gemma James series set in England
ISBN: 9780061990632
Publisher: William Morrow
Hardcover, 368 pages
*Upcoming review on Kittling: Books
Synopsis: "
In the past . . .
On a blisteringly hot
August afternoon in Crystal Palace, once home to the tragically
destroyed Great Exhibition, a solitary thirteen-year-old boy meets his
next-door neighbor, a recently widowed young teacher hoping to make a
new start in the tight-knit South London community. Drawn together by
loneliness, the unlikely pair forms a deep connection that ends in a
shattering act of betrayal.
In the present . . .
On a
cold January morning in London, Detective Inspector Gemma James is back
on the job now that her husband, Detective Superintendent Duncan
Kincaid, is at home to care for their three-year-old foster daughter.
Assigned to lead a Murder Investigation Team in South London, she's
assisted by her trusted colleague, newly promoted Detective Sergeant
Melody Talbot. Their first case: a crime scene at a seedy hotel in
Crystal Palace. The victim: a well-respected barrister, found naked,
trussed, and apparently strangled. Is it an unsavory accident or murder?
In either case, he was not alone, and Gemma's team must find his
companion—a search that takes them into unexpected corners and forces
them to contemplate unsettling truths about the weaknesses and passions
that lead to murder. Ultimately, they will begin to question everything
they think they know about their world and those they trust most."
Title:
Perfect Hatred
Author:
Leighton Gage
Series: #6 in the Inspector Mario Silva series set in Brazil
ISBN: 9781616951764
Publisher: Soho Crime
Hardcover, 320 pages
*Upcoming review on Kittling: Books
Synopsis: "
Chief Inspector Mario Silva and his team have a heavy work load with
several high-profile cases. First, a suicide bombing that was apparently
the work of a militant Islamist group. Then, a gubernatorial candidate
is assassinated in broad daylight at a campaign rally. Could the cases
be related? To complicate Silva's investigation, a criminal with a very
bad grudge against the Chief Inspector has been released from prison and
is plotting ugly revenge."
=== February 26 ===
Title: The Dance of the Seagull
Series: #15 in the Inspector Salvo Montalbano series set in Sicily
ISBN: 9780143122616
Publisher: Penguin Books
Paperback, 288 pages
Synopsis: "With Inspector Montalbano's most recent outings hitting the New York Times
bestseller list, Andrea Camilleri's darkly refined Italian mysteries
have become favorites of American crime novel fans. This latest
installment finds Montalbano in search of his missing right-hand man.
Before leaving for vacation with Livia, Montalbano witnesses a seagull
doing an odd dance on the beach outside his home, when the bird suddenly
drops dead. Stopping in at his office for a quick check before heading
off, he notices that Fazio is nowhere to be found and soon learns that
he was last seen on the docks, secretly working on a case. Montalbano
sets out to find him and discovers that the seagull's dance of death may
provide the key to understanding a macabre world of sadism, extortion,
and murder."
Title: The Beggar's Opera
Series: #1 in the Inspector Ramirez series set in Cuba
ISBN: 9780143186427
Publisher: Pintail
Paperback, 352 pages
*Upcoming review on Kittling: Books
Synopsis: "In beautiful, crumbling old Havana, detective Mike Ellis hopes
the sun and sand will save his troubled marriage. He doesn’t yet know
that it’s dead in the water, much like the little Cuban boy last seen
begging the couple for a few pesos on the world famous Malecón.
For Inspector Ricardo Ramirez, head of the Havana Major Crimes Unit,
arresting Ellis isn’t the problem—the law is. He has only seventy-two
hours to secure an indictment and prevent a vicious killer from leaving
the island. And Ramirez has his own troubles. He’s dying of the same
dementia that killed his grandmother, an incurable disease that makes
him see the ghosts of victims of his unsolved cases. As he races against
time, the dead haunt his every step. . . ."
What a wonderful month for new books! I hope you've added a few of these titles to your own wish lists, just like I have mine. Which ones appeal to you most? Inquiring minds need to know!
