Charging into 2014, Books in Hand

To be totally honest, I’m not yet done with all of the crime and mystery fiction, published in 2013, that I have on my reading pile. Robert Littell’s A Nasty Piece of Work, Adrian Magson’s Death at the Clos du Lac, and David Gordon’s Mystery Girl still demand more of my attention. And it seems that no matter how many chapters I read of Eleanor Catton’s The Luminaries (which stretches out to more than 800 pages!), there are always more ahead.

The reviewer’s job being what it is, however, I am now having to divide my concentration between such previously released volumes and a crop of new, 2014 novels already in my hands or awaiting delivery. The first quarter of this freshly minted year promises to grace bookstores with the latest efforts from old genre hands such as Charles Todd, Barbara Nadel, Gerald Seymour, Laura Lippman, Ann Cleeves, Robert J. Randisi, Paul Doherty, Anne Perry, Louis Bayard, Yrsa Sigurdardottir, and Rory Clements. Together with them, expect to find less-experienced but nonetheless promising writers--Wiley Cash, Eva Dolan, Malcolm Mackay, and others--sharing shelf space with wordsmiths who are not customarily associated with crime and thriller fiction: Valerie Martin and Isabel Allende, for instance. In addition, we will have the chance to welcome back a few authors--including Rex Burns and John Straley--who seemed to have been elbowed out of the novel-writing game by shifting commercial demands.

With help from publishers’ catalogues, as well as online resources such as The Bloodstained Bookshelf and Euro Crime, I recently compiled a list of more than 225 interesting-sounding crime, mystery, and thriller novels due out--in English, on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean--between now and the closing days of March. From that list, I highlighted eight titles in my latest Kirkus Reviews column, works I think ought to be on every crime-fiction lover’s radar. I know, though, that everyone doesn’t share my reading tastes; so below, I am posting my full rundown of potential genre hits for the coming season.

JANUARY (U.S.):

• Alice Close Your Eyes,
by Averil Dean (Mira)

• Apple Tree Yard, by Louise Doughty
(Sarah Crichton)

• The Ascendant, by Drew Chapman
(Simon & Schuster)

• Bad Wolf, by Nele Neuhaus (Minotaur)

• The Blood Promise, by Mark Pryor (Seventh Street)

• Carthage, by Joyce Carol Oates (Ecco)

• Cell, by Robin Cook (Putnam)

• Cross of Vengeance, by Cora Harrison (Severn House)

• Cursed in the Act, by Raymond Buckland (Berkley)

• The Dead in Their Vaulted Arches, by Alan Bradley (Delacorte Press)

• Dead Man’s Fancy, by Keith McCafferty (Viking)

• Dead to Me, by Cath Staincliffe (Minotaur)

• Delivering Death, by Julie Kramer (Atria/Emily Bestler)

• Dominion, by C.J. Sansom (Mulholland)

• The Execution, by Dick Wolf (Morrow)

• Fear Nothing, by Lisa Gardner (Dutton)

• Finders, Keepers, Losers, Weepers, by Robert S. Levinson (Five Star)

• The Fire Dance, by Helene Tursten (Soho Crime)

• From the Dead, by Mark Billingham (Atlantic Monthly Press)

• The Ghost of the Mary Celeste, by Valerie Martin (Nan A. Talese)

• Greed, by Dan O’Shea (Exhibit A)

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

• The House on the Cliff, by Charlotte Williams (Bourbon Street)

• Hunting Shadows, by Charles Todd (Morrow)

• In the Blood, by Lisa Unger (Touchstone)

• The Kept, by James Scott (Harper)

• Kilos in the Keys, by Dave Klein (Forge)

• Lake of Tears, by Mary Logue (Tyrus)

• The Last Dead Girl, by Harry Dolan (Amy Einhorn/Putnam)

• The Last Death of Jack Harbin, by Terry Shames (Seventh Street)

• The Last Time I Died, by Joe Nelms (Tyrus)

• The Man Who Loved Dogs, by Leonardo Padura
(Farrar, Straus and Giroux)

• The Master of Knots, by Massimo Carlotto (Europa Editions)

• Mayhem, by Sarah Pinborough (Jo Fletcher)

• A Measure of Blood, by Kathleen George (Mysterious Press/
Open Road)

• Mercy Snow, by Tiffany Baker (Grand Central)

• Mr. Monk Gets on Board, by Hy Conrad (NAL)

• Moriarty Returns a Letter, by Michael Robertson (Minotaur)

• The Moses Virus, by Jack Hyland (Taylor)

• The Murder House, by Simon Beaufort (Severn House)

• Murder in the Ball Park, by Robert Goldsborough (Mysterious Press/Open Road)

• North of Boston, by Elisabeth Elo (Pamela Dorman)

• NYPD Puzzle, by Parnell Hall (Minotaur)

• An Officer and a Spy, by Robert Harris (Knopf)

• That Old Black Magic, by Mary Jane Clark (Morrow)

• The Orphan Choir, by Sophie Hannah (Picador)

• Pandemic, by Scott Sigler (Crown)

• The Pawnbroker, by Aimée Thurlo (Minotaur)

• Phantoms of Breslau, by Marek Krajewski (Melville International Crime)

• Red Cell Seven, by Stephen Frey
(Thomas & Mercer)

• Red 1-2-3, by John Katzenbach
(Mysterious Press)

• The Rented Mule, by Bobby Cole
(Thomas & Mercer)

• Resurrection, by Wolf Haas (Melville International Crime)

• Return to Tradd Street, by Karen White (NAL)

• Ripper, by Isabel Allende (Harper)

• The Rome Prophecy, by Sam Christer (Overlook)

• Saints of the Shadow Bible, by Ian Rankin (Little, Brown)

• The Secret History of Las Vegas, by Chris Abani (Penguin)

• Shovel Ready, by Adam Sternbergh (Crown)

• This Dark Road to Mercy, by Wiley Cash (Morrow)

• Tiger Shrimp Tango, by Tim Dorsey (Morrow)

• The Vanishing, by Wendy Webb (Hyperion)

• Watching Over You, by Mel Sherratt (Thomas & Mercer)

• The Ways of Evil Men, by Leighton Gage (Soho Crime)

• The Way You Die Tonight, by Robert J. Randisi (Severn House)

• What We’ve Lost Is Nothing, by Rachel Louise Snyder (Scribner)

• Whispers of Vivaldi, by Beverle Graves Myers (Poisoned Pen Press)

• The Wrong Quarry, by Max Allan Collins (Hard Case Crime)

JANUARY (UK):

• The Beast in the Red Forest, by Sam Eastland (Faber & Faber Crime)

• Blind Alley, by Danielle Ramsay (Mulholland)

• Body Count, by Barbara Nadel (Headline)

• A Burnable Book, by Bruce Holsinger (HarperCollins)

• A Cry in the Night, by Tom Grieves (Quercus)

• The Dark Palace, by R.N. Morris (Creme de la Crime)

• The Dead Can Wait, by Robert Ryan (Simon & Schuster)

• Dead Gone, by Luca Veste (Avon)

• Death of an Elgin Marble, by David Dickinson (Constable Crime)

• Entry Island, by Peter May (Quercus)

• Harbour Street, by Ann Cleeves (Macmillan)

• Hearts of Darkness, by Paul Lawrence (Allison & Busby)

• The Lawless Kind, by Matt Hilton (Hodder & Stoughton)

• Long Way Home, by Eva Dolan (Harvill Secker)

• The Mammoth Book of the Lost Chronicles of Sherlock Holmes, by Denis O. Smith (C&R Crime)

• Murder on High Holborn, by Susanna Gregory (Sphere)

• The Pershore Poisoners, by Kerry Tombs (Robert Hale)

• Reckless Endangerment, by Graham Ison (Severn House)

• Respect, by Mandasue Heller (Hodder & Stoughton)

• The Second Deadly Sin, by Åsa Larsson (MacLehose Press)

• The Shroud Maker, by Kate Ellis (Piatkus)

• A Song for the Dying, by Stuart MacBride (HarperCollins)

• Stay Alive, by Simon Kernick (Century)

• Stone Bruises, by Simon Beckett (Bantam Press)

• The Sudden Arrival of Violence, by Malcolm Mackay (Mantle)

• The Tournament, by Matthew Reilly (Orion)

• The Verdict, by Nick Stone (Sphere)

• The Watchman, by Adrian Magson
(Severn House)

• You’re Mine Now, by Hans Koppel (Sphere)

FEBRUARY (U.S.):

• After I’m Gone, by Laura Lippman (Morrow)

• An Air of Treason, by P.F. Chisholm (Poisoned Pen Press)

• The Amazing Harvey, by Don Passman (Minotaur)

• Baptism, by Max Kinnings (Quercus)

• Body Slam, by Rex Burns (Mysterious Press/Open Road)

• Chance, by Kem Nunn (Scribner)

• The Chase, by Janet Evanovich and Lee Goldberg (Bantam)

• The Chinese Beverly Hills, by John Shannon (MP Publishing)

• Cockroaches, by Jo Nesbø (Vintage Crime/Black Lizard)

• Cold Storage, Alaska, by John Straley (Soho Crime)

• Concealed in Death, by J.D. Robb (Putnam)

• The Contractors, by Harry Hunsicker (Thomas & Mercer)

• The Counterfeit Agent, by Alex Berenson (Putnam)

• Dark Side, by Margaret Duffy (Severn House)

• Dead Water, by Ann Cleeves (Minotaur)

• The Dealer and the Dead, by Gerald Seymour (Thomas Dunne)

• The Deepest Secret, by Carla Buckley (Bantam)

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

• Doing Harm, by Kelly Parsons (St. Martin’s Press)

• Double Fault, by Judith Cutler (Severn House)

• Drowning Barbie, by Frederick Ramsay (Poisoned Pen Press)

• The Girl with a Clock for a Heart, by Peter Swanson (Morrow)

• Graveyard of Memories, by Barry Eisler (Thomas & Mercer)

• Half World, by Scott O’Connor (Simon & Schuster)

• The Innocent Sleep, by Karen Perry (Henry Holt)

• The Kept Girl, by Kim Cooper (Esotouric Ink)

• Killer, by Jonathan Kellerman (Ballantine)

• A Killing of Angels, by Kate Rhodes (Minotaur)

• Lion Plays Rough, by Lachlan Smith (Mysterious Press)

• Love Story, With Murders, by Harry Bingham (Delacorte Press)

• The Mangle Street Murders, by M.R.C. Kasasian (Pegasus)

• Moving Target, by J.A. Jance (Touchstone)

• Nazis in the Metro, by Didier Daeninckx (Melville International Crime)

• The Poisoned Pawn, by Peggy Blair (Pintail)

• Raiders of the Nile, by Steven Saylor (Minotaur)

• The Red Road, by Denise Mina (Little, Brown)

• The Resistance Man, by Martin Walker (Knopf)

• Seven Grams of Lead, by Keith Thomson (Anchor)

• She’s Leaving Home, by William Shaw (Mulholland)

• The Stolen Ones, by Richard Montanari (Mulholland)

• To Dwell in Darkness, by Deborah Crombie (Morrow)

• We Are Here, by Michael Marshall (Mulholland)

• Wendell Black, MD, by Gerald Imber (Bourbon Street)

• Where Monsters Dwell, by Jørgen Brekke (Minotaur)

• Who Thinks Evil,
by Michael Kurland (Minotaur)

• The Winter People,
by Jennifer McMahon (Doubleday)

• Without Warning,
by David Rosenfelt (Minotaur)

FEBRUARY (UK):

• Don’t Stand So Close, by Luana Lewis (Bantam Press)

• The Farm, by Tom Rob Smith
(Simon & Schuster)

• Free Falling, As If in a Dream, by Leif G.W. Persson (Pantheon)

• The Ghost Runner, by Parker Bilal (Bloomsbury)

• Guilt, by Jussi Adler-Olsen (Penguin)

• The Hangman’s Song, by James Oswald (Penguin)

• The Madness of July, by James Naughtie (Head of Zeus)

• A Man of Sorrows, by James Craig (C&R Crime)

• The New Mammoth Book of Pulp Fiction, edited by Maxim Jakubowski (C&R Crime)

• A Pleasure and a Calling, by Phil Hogan (Doubleday)

• The Queen’s Man, by Rory Clements (Hodder & Stoughton)

• The Silence of the Sea, by Yrsa Sigurdardottir (Hodder & Stoughton)

• The Stone Boy, by Sophie Loubiere (Trapdoor)

• The Toy Taker, by Luke Delaney (HarperCollins)

• Treachery, by S.J. Parris (HarperCollins)

• Water Music, by Margie Orford (Head of Zeus)

• What She Saw, by Mark Roberts (Atlantic)

• You Will Never Find Me, by Robert Wilson (Orion)

MARCH (U.S.):

• The Accident, by Chris Pavone (Crown)

• The Black-Eyed Blonde, by Benjamin Black (Henry Holt)

• Black Horizon, by James Grippando (Harper)

• Bone Deep, by Randy Wayne White (Putnam)

• The Boy Who Stole from the Dead, by Orest Stelmach
(Thomas & Mercer)

• The Cairo Affair, by Olen Steinhauer (Minotaur)

• Children of the Revolution, by Peter Robinson (Morrow)

• A Circle of Wives, by Alice LaPlante (Atlantic Monthly Press)

• Citadel, by Kate Mosse (Morrow)

• City of Darkness and Light, by Rhys Bowen (Minotaur)

• The Coal Black Asphalt Tomb, by David Handler (Minotaur)

• Dakota, by Gwen Florio (Permanent Press)

• Day of the Dead: The Autumn of Comissario Ricciardi, by Maurizio de Giovanni (Europa Editions)

• The Dead Don’t Dance, by John Enright (Thomas & Mercer)

• The Deal: About Face, by Adam Gittlin (Oceanview)

• Death on Blackheath, by Anne Perry (Ballantine)

• The Detective, by James Patrick Hunt (Five Star)

• The Disappeared, by Kristina Ohlsson (Atria/Emily Bestler)

• Don’t Look for Me, by Loren D. Estleman (Forge)

• Eat What You Kill, by Ted Scofield (St. Martin’s Press)

• Hyde, by Daniel Levine (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)

• In the Morning I’ll Be Gone, by Adrian McKinty (Seventh Street)

• Kill Fee, by Owen Laukkanen (Putnam)

• Mind of Winter, by Laura Kasischke (Harper)

• Missing You, by Harlan Coben (Dutton)

• The Moon Sisters, by Therese Walsh (Crown)

• Murder at Cape Three Points, by Kwei Quartey (Soho Crime)

• Murder in Pigalle, by Cara Black (Soho Crime)

• Notorious, by Allison Brennan (Minotaur)

• Nude on Thin Ice/Memory of Passion, by Gil Brewer (Stark House)

• The Outcast Dead, by Elly Griffiths (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)

• The Player, by Brad Parks (Minotaur)

• Precious Thing, by Colette McBeth (Minotaur)

• Providence Rag, by Bruce DeSilva (Forge)

• The Revenant of Thraxton Hall, by Vaughn Entwistle (Minotaur)

• Roosevelt’s Beast, by Louis Bayard (Henry Holt)

• The Seeker, by R.B. Chesterton (Pegasus)

• The Setup Man, by T.T. Monday (Doubleday)

• Spirits Revived, by Alice Duncan (Five Star)

• Stone Cold, by C.J. Box (Putnam)

• Strongwood, by Larry Millett (University of Minnesota Press)

• Ten for Dying, by Mary Reed and Eric Mayer (Poisoned Pen Press)

• Trouble in Mind: The Collected Stories, Volume 3,
by Jeffery Deaver (Grand Central)

• Watching You, by Michael Robotham (Mulholland)

• The Weight of Blood, by Laura McHugh (Spiegel & Grau)

• Wrecked, by Tricia Fields (Minotaur)

MARCH (UK):

• The Bird That Did Not Sing, by Alex Gray (Sphere)

• Blue Is the Night, by Eoin McNamee
(Faber & Faber)

• The Boy That Never Was, by Karen Perry (Michael Joseph)

• Bryant & May: The Bleeding Heart, by Christopher Fowler (Doubleday)

• Candle Flame, by Paul Doherty (Creme de la Crime)

• The Convictions of John Delahunt, by Andrew Hughes
(Doubleday Ireland)

• Crime Always Pays, by Declan Burke (Severn House)

• The Dangerous Game, by Mari Jungstedt (Doubleday)

• Deep Shelter, by Oliver Harris (Jonathan Cape)

• The Devil in the Marshalsea, by Antonia Hodgson
(Hodder & Stoughton)

• The Exile, by Mark Oldfield (Head of Zeus)

• Exit the Thief, by Danny Miller (C&R Crime)

• The Facts of Life and Death, by Belinda Bauer (Bantam Press)

• Falling, by Emma Kavanagh (Century)

• Galveston, by Nic Pizzolatto (Sphere)

• Hotel Brasil: The Mystery of the Severed Heads, by Frei Betto
(Bitter Lemon Press)

• Irène, by Pierre Lemaitre (MacLehose Press)

• The Man with the Golden Mind, by Tom Vater (Osprey)

• Margery Allingham’s Mr. Campion’s Farewell: The Return of Albert Campion, completed by Mike Ripley (Severn House)

• A Matter of Breeding, by J. Sydney Jones (Severn House)

• Panic, by Lauren Oliver (Hodder & Stoughton)

• Parade, by Shuichi Yoshida (Harvill Secker)

• The Pattern of Fear, by Drew Chapman (Penguin)

• The Strange Death of Fiona Griffiths, by Harry Bingham (Orion)
• Trouble in the Cotswolds, by Rebecca Tope (Allison & Busby)

• Writers’ Block, by Judith Flanders (Allison & Busby)

OK, so what did I miss? What coming crime or thriller novels should I have included here, but didn’t? Please feel free to suggest other promising genre works in the Comments section below.

READ MORE: “2014 Australian Crime Fiction Releases -- January Update,” by Bernadette Bean (Fair Dinkum Crime); “Most Anticipated: The Great 2014 Book Preview” (The Millions).