Cool Reads Heat Up the Colder Months

If you’re like me, you are still wending your way through a precarious pile of crime, mystery, and thriller novels published in 2012. The idea that still more books worth reading are scheduled for release in 2013 is, well, daunting at the least. Yet they’re coming, whether you find time in your busy schedule to enjoy them, or not.

Below are more than 130 books in this genre due out--in English, on both sides of the Atlantic--between now and April Fools’ Day. And these are only the works that interested me most in a preliminary study of those destined to become available. (If you’re in need of more suggestions, click over to The Bloodstained Bookshelf or Euro Crime’s future releases page.) Personally, I haven’t a minuscule hope in hell of making it through all of these. What’s more, they don’t include volumes such as Mickey Spillane’s From the Files of ... Mike Hammer: The Complete Dailies and Sundays, which will likely appeal to crime-fiction enthusiasts as well.

Several vintage gems are also waiting to be reissued over the next three months. Continuing its earnest efforts to resuscitate the reputation of British author Sax Rohmer, publisher Titan will re-release 1932’s The Mask of Fu-Manchu in a handsome trade paperback in March, with more adventures of the evil mastermind Dr. Fu-Manchu to come. In addition, March will bring to UK readers Constable & Robinson’s newfangled editions of Jonathan Gash’s earliest four novels showcasing roguish antiques dealer Lovejoy, beginning with 1977’s The Judas Pair. British readers--damn their luck!--can expect, too, to see The Saint (aka Simon Templar), Leslie Charteris’ thief/detective/global adventurer, reappear in a succession of paperbacks from Mulholland Books. (Several titles in that long-running series are to be re-issued each month through July 2013.)

So buckle up, friends. Your reading joys have only just begun.

JANUARY (U.S.):

• Arsenic and Old Puzzles, by Parnell Hall (Minotaur)

• Back from the Dead, by Peter Leonard (The Story Plant)

• The Blood Gospel, by James Rollins and Rebecca Cantrell (Morrow)

• The Bughouse Affair, by Marcia Muller and Bill Pronzini (Forge)

• Burden of Truth, by Terri Nolan (Midnight Ink)

• Cover of Snow, by Jenny Milchman (Ballantine)

• December’s Thorn, by Phillip DePoy (Minotaur)

• The Disciple of Las Vegas, by Ian Hamilton (Picador)

• Good Bait, by John Harvey (Pegasus)

• Green Light for Murder, by Heywood Gould (Tyrus)

• Gun Machine, by Warren Ellis (Mulholland)

• The Hard Bounce, by Todd Robinson (Tyrus)

• Insane City, by Dave Barry (Putnam)

• Kinsey and Me: Stories, by Sue Grafton (Marian Wood/Putnam)

• Little Elvises, by Timothy Hallinan (Soho Crime)

• Little Wolves, by Thomas James Maltman (Soho Press)

• The Llama of Death, by Betty Webb (Poisoned Pen Press)

• The Midwife’s Tale, by Samuel Thomas (Minotaur)

• Moon Underfoot, by Bobby Cole (Thomas & Mercer)

• Mr. Monk Gets Even, by Lee Goldberg (New American Library)

• My Second Death, by Lydia Cooper (Tyrus)

• Proof of Guilt, by Charles Todd (Morrow)

• Ratlines, by Stuart Neville (Soho Crime)

• The Rat Machine, by Kent Harrington (Market Street)

• Reunion at Red Paint Bay, by George Harrar (Other Press)

• The Riptide Ultra-Glide, by Tim Dorsey (Morrow)

• Rough Men, by Aric Davis (Thomas & Mercer)

• The Russian Donation, by Christoph Spielberg (Amazon Crossing)

• Scratch Deeper, by Chris Simms (Creme de la Crime)

• Speaking from Among the Bones, by Alan Bradley (Delacorte Press)

• Stakeout, by Parnell Hall (Pegasus)

• Standing in Another Man’s Grave, by Ian Rankin (Reagan Arthur)

• The Start of Everything, by Emily Winslow (Delacorte)

• A Study in Revenge, by Kieran Shields (Crown)

• Suspect, by Robert Crais (Putnam)

• The Third Bullet, by Stephen Hunter (Simon & Schuster)

• Unnatural Habits, by Kerry Greenwood (Poisoned Pen Press)

• Watching the Dark, by Peter Robinson (Morrow)

• The Wrath of Angels, by John Connolly (Atria/Emily Bestler)

JANUARY (UK):

• The Burning Air, by Erin Kelly
(Hodder & Stoughton)

• Capital Punishment, by Robert Wilson (Orion)

• Chamber Music, by Tom Benn
(Jonathan Cape)

• The Chessmen, by Peter May (Quercus)

• The Chosen Dead, by M.R. Hall (Mantle)

• Close to the Bone, by Stuart MacBride (HarperCollins)

• Cold Killing, by Luke Delaney (HarperCollins)

• Deadline, by Barbara Nadel (Headline)

• Deadly Business, by Quintin Jardine (Headline)

• Dead Man’s Land, by Robert Ryan (Simon & Schuster)

• Dead Water, by Ann Cleeves (Macmillan)

• Death in St James’s Park, by Susanna Gregory (Sphere)

• I Hear the Sirens in the Street, by Adrian McKinty (Serpent’s Tail)

• Light Shining in the Forest, by Paul Torday (Weidenfeld & Nicolson)

• Murders Most Foul, by Alanna Knight (Allison & Busby)

• The Necessary Death of Lewis Winter, by Malcolm Mackay (Mantle)

• Rubbernecker, by Belinda Bauer (Bantam Press)

• Semper Fidelis, by Ruth Downie (Bloomsbury)

• The Tale of Raw Head and Bloody Bones, by Jack Wolf
(Chatto & Windus)

• Two Evils, by P.J. Tracy (Michael Joseph)

• Ultimatum, by Simon Kernick (Century)

• The Verdict, by Nick Stone (Sphere)

FEBRUARY (U.S.):

• Airtight, by David Rosenfelt (Minotaur)

• Bad Blood, by Dana Stabenow (Minotaur)

• Bear Is Broken, by Lachlan Smith (Mysterious Press)

• Black Irish, by Stephan Talty (Ballantine)

• Crossbones Yard, by Kate Rhodes (Minotaur)

• The Dance of the Seagull, by Andrea Camilleri (Penguin)

• Dancer in the Flames, by Stephen Solomita (Severn House)

• Ghostman, by Roger Hobbs (Knopf)

• Gods and Beasts, by Denise Mina (Reagan Arthur)

• The Golden Calf, by Helene Tursten (Soho Crime)

• A Good Death, by Christopher R. Cox (Minotaur)

• Guilt, by Jonathan Kellerman (Ballantine)

• Hit Me, by Lawrence Block (Mulholland)

• Holy Smoke, by Frederick Ramsay (Poisoned Pen Press)

• The Jackal’s Share, by Christopher Morgan Jones (Penguin Press)

• A Medal for Murder, by Frances Brody (Minotaur)

• The Missing Italian Girl, by Barbara Corrado Pope (Pegasus)

• The Night Ranger, by Alex Berenson (Putnam)

• Perfect Hatred, by Leighton Gage (Soho Crime)

• Phony Tinsel, by Robert S. Levinson (Five Star)

• Schroder, by Amity Gaige (Twelve)

• Seduction of the Innocent, by Max Allan Collins (Hard Case Crime)

• Touch & Go, by Lisa Gardner (Dutton)

• The Woman Who Wouldn’t Die, by Colin Cotterill (Soho Crime)

FEBRUARY (UK):

• Alex, by Pierre Lemaitre (MacLehose Press)

• The Beauty of Murder, by A.K. Benedict (Orion)

• Bedlam, by Christopher Brookmyre (Orbit)

• The Circus, by James Craig (Constable & Robinson)

• Dead People, by Ewart Hutton (Blue Door)

• A Dreadful Murder: The Mysterious Death of Caroline Luard,
by Minette Walters (Pan)

• The Heretics, by Rory Clements (John Murray)

• The Honey Guide, by Richard Crompton (Weidenfeld & Nicolson)

• Linda, As in the Linda Murder, by Leif G.W. Persson (Doubleday)

• Rage Against the Dying, by Becky Masterman (Orion)

• The Red Moth, by Sam Eastland (Faber and Faber)

• Rules of Honour, by Matt Hilton (Hodder & Stoughton)

• The Scent of Death, by Andrew Taylor (HarperCollins)

• The Shadow Collector, by Kate Ellis (Piatkus)

• The Sound of One Hand Killing, by Teresa Solana (Bitter Lemon Press)

• A Treacherous Likeness, by Lynn Shepherd (Corsair)

MARCH (U.S.):

• Bay of Fires, by Poppy Gee (Reagan Arthur)

• The Bone Man, by Wolf Haas (Melville International Crime)

• The Boyfriend, by Thomas Perry (Mysterious Press)

• Breaking Point, by C.J. Box (Putnam)

• The Cherry Pages, by Gary Ruffin (Overlook)

• Criminal Enterprise, by Owen Laukkanen (Putnam)

• Deadly Virtues, by Jo Bannister (Minotaur)

• The Demonologist, by Andrew Pyper (Simon & Schuster)

• A Dying Fall, by Elly Griffiths (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)

• Evil in All Its Disguises, by Hilary Davidson (Forge)

• The Family Way, by Rhys Bowen (Minotaur)

• Frozen Solid, by James M. Tabor (Ballantine)

• The Good Cop, by Brad Parks (Minotaur)

• Helsinki Blood, by James Thompson (Putnam)

• Ice Cold Kill, by Dana Haynes (Minotaur)

• The Leviathan Effect, by James Lilliefors (Soho Crime)

• Murder Below Montparnasse, by Cara Black (Soho Crime)

• Night Moves, by Randy Wayne White (Putnam)

• One Through the Heart, by Kirk Russell (Severn House)

• Ordinary Grace, by William Kent Krueger (Atria)

• Pandemonium, by Warren Fahy (Tor)

• The Romanov Cross, by Robert Masello (Bantam)

• Room No. 10, by Åke Edwardson
(Simon & Schuster)

• Scratchgravel Road, by Tricia Fields (Minotaur)

• Six Years, by Harlan Coben (Dutton)

• You, by Austin Grossman (Mulholland)

MARCH (UK):

• The Asylum, by Johan Theorin (Doubleday)

• Baksheesh, by Aykol Esmahan
(Bitter Lemon Press)

• The Catch, by Tom Bale (Preface)

• The Child’s Child, by Barbara Vine (Viking)

• The Deliverance of Evil, by Roberto Costantini (Quercus)

• The Devil’s Recruit, by S.G. MacLean (Quercus)

• We Are Here, by Michael Marshall (Orion)

• Garden of Burning Sand, by Corban Addison (Quercus)

• The Ghost Riders of Ordebec, by Fred Vargas (Harvill Secker)

• The Killing Pool, by Kevin Sampson (Jonathan Cape)

• The Lost Boy, by Camilla Lackberg (HarperCollins)

• Poppet, by Mo Hayder (Bantam Press)

• The Swedish Girl, by Alex Gray (Sphere)

Did I miss mentioning any works in the genre that you think also deserve attention from Rap Sheet readers? If so, please tell us about them in the Comments section of this post.

READ MORE: “Preliminary Investigation: 6 Crime-Fiction Leads for 2013,” by J. Kingston Pierce (Kirkus Reviews).