Their Lives All Mattered

In the past, I have found time at each year’s end to write about the people from the broader crime-fiction community who died during the previous 12 months. No such flexibility presents itself this week. Therefore, I am glad that Mystery Fanfare’s Janet Rudolph put together this record of contributors to the genre who passed away in 2023. It includes authors as diverse as Carol Higgins Clark, Tim Dorsey, Patricia Holt, Tom Savage, and Anne Perry. Mentioned, as well, is Jim Napier, a longtime Rap Sheet contributor from Canada, who apparently died on December 23 at age 81—though this is the first I’ve heard of it.

Born in 1942 and reared in California, James E. Napier later moved to Ontario to study philosophy at the University of Waterloo. He went on to pursue a teaching career, but retired in 2004 to take up crime-fiction reviewing and writing. “Author of the Colin McDermott series in Legacy (2017) and Ridley’s War (2020), Jim was writing his third novel and looking forward to publishing it in 2024,” according to this obituary. In addition to critiquing books for the Montreal Review of Books, the Ottawa Review of Books, and January Magazine, and maintaining an award-winning crime-fiction site called Deadly Diversions, Jim composed occasional reviews for The Rap Sheet. Since 2014, he had also participated in this blog’s annual “favorite crime fiction of the year” features. However, he never responded to my requests this last fall that he submit a favorites list for 2023; I might have recognized that as being significant, but did not.

I knew Jim had suffered vision problems in his right eye for a long while, which limited his print-reading opportunities to a mere 20-30 minutes at a stretch. I didn’t think, though, that he was on the verge of leaving us. I’m only glad to read in his obituary that he “died peacefully surrounded by loved ones.” I offer my condolences to Jim’s family. Thank you for sharing him with the rest of us.

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In addition to the late authors Mystery Fanfare recognizes, let us remember several people who, before they breathed their last in 2023, lent their abundant talents to crime and mystery films or television shows: Peter S. Fischer, who, among other things, co-created the CBS-TV series Murder, She Wrote; Richard Roundtree, who played super-cool, super-tough New York City private eye John Shaft on both the large and small screens; Man From U.N.C.L.E. co-star David McCallum; actress Sharon Farrell, who appeared with James Garner in Marlowe (1969) and later featured in series such as The Name of the Game and Harry O; Canadian-born Sharon Acker, who was seen regularly on Hec Ramsey and The New Perry Mason; Barry Newman, who led the 1974-1976 NBC-TV legal drama Petrocelli; Rupert Heath, the founder and publisher of Dean Street Press; Robert Blake, who went from headlining ABC-TV’s Baretta to defending himself from charges that he murdered his wife in 2001; Barbara Bosson, a frequent fixture in her husband, Steven Bochco’s shows, from Hill Street Blues to Hooperman; and two familiar faces from Homicide: Life on the Street—Andre Braugher and Richard Belzer.

READ MORE: “Notable Deaths of 2023” (The Washington Post).

Favorite Crime Fiction of 2022, Part III: Jim Napier

Jim Napier is a crime-fiction critic based in Canada. Since 2005, more than 600 of his reviews and interviews have appeared in newspapers and on various crime-fiction and literary Web sites, including on his own award-winning review site, Deadly Diversions. Legacy, the first entry in his Colin McDermott mystery series, was published in 2017; a sequel, Ridley’s War, came out in 2020 from FriesenPress.

• A Heart Full of Headstones, by Ian Rankin (Little, Brown):

A new book from Ian Rankin is always a source of joy. Over the past three and a half decades that Scottish author has dominated the international crime-writing scene, perfecting a subgenre that has come to be known as Tartan noir. His protagonist John Rebus personifies the independent yet dedicated copper who always seems to be squeezed between the corrupt and the corrupted, as he struggles to achieve a tiny bit of justice in the gloomy streets of Edinburgh.

To the consternation of everyone around him, Rebus is his own man, and plays by his own rules (the term “loose cannon” comes to mind). Colleagues and senior offices alike are left to cope with the consequences, and he’s never far away from a reprimand, or suspension, or worse.

In A Heart Full of Headstones (the first book in a two-novel deal with UK publisher Orion), things are very much worse. Now retired and suffering from poor health, but still working, Rebus finds himself in the dock, accused of murder. His prospects are bleak.

The ex-detective inspector had earlier been drawn into an investigation going back to his days as a young detective assigned to Tynecastle, a local nick infamous for its misconduct and misfeasance. A detective there, one Frances Haggard, is facing charges of spousal abuse, and in a bid to avoid the consequences of his actions, is threatening to go public with some of the dirty laundry at Tynecastle Station—unless his mates can find a way to make the charges go away. There are a lot of skeletons in Tynecastle’s closet, so it comes as no surprise when Haggard is soon after found stabbed to death. That only serves to intensify the investigation into the corrupted station house.

Having previously been assigned to Tynecastle, Rebus becomes a person of interest, and his own past actions are placed under the microscope. It’s not giving too much away to say that before this novel is over, more people will die—and Rebus will face the possibility of spending the remainder of his days in lock-up.

John Rebus is one of the most fascinating and complex characters in modern crime fiction, carving out a tortured path between legal justice and cosmic justice, often annoying his friends and enraging his enemies. Yet he somehow emerges from the tumult victorious in the end. This time, though, even Rebus’s own doggedness may not be enough to keep him on the streets.

• Not Your Child, by Lis Angus (Wild Rose Press):

Susan Koss is enjoying a rewarding life as a consulting family psychologist and single parent, rearing her 12-year old daughter, Maddy, in Ottawa, Ontario's upscale Glebe district, when her comfortable world is suddenly turned upside down. An elderly man named Daniel Kazan has spotted Maddy on the street. Convinced that she is his long-lost granddaughter, who vanished after her parents were killed in a vehicle accident more than a decade earlier, Daniel follows Maddy home and tries to get closer to the family. He is clearly obsessive, and Susan fears for her child’s safety.

Susan is also made personally uncomfortable by these developments. After all, she is Maddy’s birth mother, and they have been together for her daughter’s entire life. But when Susan suggests DNA tests to resolve the issue, she receives not one surprise, but two: the results indicate that Susan is not Maddy’s mother, and even more ominously, they don’t rule out the possibility that Daniel might be Maddy’s grandfather after all. This is all bad enough, to be sure, but things get a whole lot worse when Maddy suddenly disappears from the family home, and despite a thorough police search, there is no sign of her. It seems Susan’s comfortable world has finally come crushing down.

Not Your Child is among the strongest debut novels I’ve read. It is original and polished, with believable dialogue and an impressive sense of atmosphere. The characters are engaging and nuanced; the author is particularly effective in portraying the obsessed grandfather in a partly sympathetic light. With a crisp pace that keeps readers engaged until the very end, this tale is highly recommended.

• Going to Beautiful, by Anthony Bidulka (Stonehouse):

Toronto, Ontario: celebrity chef, author, and restaurateur Jake Hardy, together with his husband, successful fashion designer Eddie Kravets, are living a dream life. Comfortably ensconced in spacious digs on the top floor of a fashionable apartment building, they go from success to success, pausing only to realize just how fortunate they are.

But even dreams aren’t perfect. In one morning’s early hours, Jake is awakened abruptly by the police, who break the news that his partner’s body has been found on the ground just below their balcony. Eddie Kravets is dead.

Over the weeks that follow, Jake and the closest of those around him wrestle with a toxic mix of well-meaning sympathizers, nosy gawkers, and online gossip-mongers, all of them having the effect of ripping a bandage off the fresh wound that is now Jake’s daily reality. He finds only a tiny measure of solace in sifting through Eddie’s left-behind things. Ever the planner, Eddie had made a list of places he wanted his ashes spread. They include, enigmatically, the single word Beautiful. Further searching reveals that the word in not simply a placeholder, but an actual place in rural Saskatchewan.

Determined to honor Eddie’s final wishes, Jake begins his odyssey. He will discover along the way that, far from living up to its name, the small prairie town of Beautiful harbors more than its fair share of dark secrets—and more than one murderer.

With its richly textured and layered plot, nuanced characters, and sometimes brooding environment, Going to Beautiful moves between being a lyrical celebration of life and an unflinching exploration of the dark recesses of twisted souls. It offers an inventive and evocative journey that will keep you enthralled throughout. If you’ve never before encountered the work of Anthony Bidulka, creator of the Russell Quant private-eye series and a multiple winner of both the Arthur Ellis and Lambda Literary awards, you’re in for a real treat.

• Blind Date, by Brenda Chapman (‎Ivy Bay Press):

Successful Canadian crime writer Brenda Chapman (Shallow End, Closing Time) recently launched a new series, this one featuring an engaging amateur sleuth named Ella Tate.

Blind Date finds Ella attempting to mark out a new career for herself. Formerly a journalist working the crime beat for an Ottawa newspaper, she’s now gone online with a true-crime podcast. She’s already amassed quite a following, when an intriguing case falls into her lap. A young teacher, Josie Wheatly, has been assaulted. After leaving the hospital prematurely, she’s found in her apartment, murdered by hanging. It just so happens that the apartment where this tragedy took place used to belong to Ella, and the deceased looks remarkably similar to her. Josie even appropriated Ella’s name for online dating purposes. The implications are impossible to miss: Could Josie’s killer have mistaken that other woman for Ella herself? When two other people close to the podcaster are also victimized by violent crime, the answer seems all too clear.

Ella strives to connect the dots here, but is frustrated at every turn. Then she begins to receive ominous messages, some on her podcast, then, more ominously, on her cell phone: “You’re next, bitch.” Does the solution to all of this lie somewhere in the podcasts she’s been airing, which expose peoples’ wrongdoing? Or should she be looking closer to home? Like Angus’ Not Your Child, this yarn is set largely in Ottawa’s Glebe area, and the city has seldom looked so threatening.

Never at a loss when it comes to creating a spellbinding thriller, author Chapman draws on her considerable skills to weave a credible, well-crafted plot that will leave readers hungering for more.

• L.A. Burning, by D.C. Taylor (Crooked Lane):

From former movie and TV screenwriter David C. Taylor, L.A. Burning is a gripping read that draws upon events rooted in the real world of Hollywood in order to paint a picture altogether less glamorous, and a great deal more disturbing, than that imagined by fans of the silver screen.

Ex-street kid Cody Bonner has just been released from a five-year stretch in prison for bank robbery, and she’s a gal on a mission. While she was locked up, her twin sister, Julie, had been brutally murdered, her body washed up on a beach in Malibu. The two had been especially close. Now Cody is committed to finding out how Julie died, and why. The trail will lead her into the dark recesses of Tinseltown, a world of sleazy agents and even sleazier movie moguls. Throughout her investigation, Cody will also have to navigate the Byzantine world of her mother, a fading film star who seems less concerned about her daughter’s death than her own tenuous position in the ephemeral heights of the Hollywood firmament. Cody, though, has two things going for her: the skills she picked up while behind bars, and her own dogged determination to solve her sibling’s slaying.

L.A. Burning is a riveting tale that turns on the seamy underside of an industry built on image, power, and to some extent, perversion. Seamlessly plotted, and with compelling characters and crackling dialogue, this novel is guaranteed to satisfy.

• Fenian Street, by Anne Emery (ECW Press):

This immersive tale—set in Dublin, Ireland, during the turbulent years between 1969 and 1975, and ripe with both historical detail and real-life characters—introduces us to Seamus “Shay“ Rynne. He’s the son of Thomas “Talkie” Rynne, a former Irish Republican Army supporter who’d been interned during the Emergency—known elsewhere as the Second World War. Shay was born shortly after that war ended. Now a young man, he has come under the wing of Colm Griffith, a detective sergeant in the Garda Síochána, the Irish police force. With his support, Shay joins the Garda as a police constable.

In the impoverished neighborhood where he grew up, one filled with public housing and bent toward animosity against government officials, to be a cop is viewed as only one small step above being an informer. Shay must therefore work extra hard to earn his friends’ respect. So when Rosie McGinn, a young woman he knew from his schooling, turns up dead at the hotel where she worked, her neck bruised with fingermarks, Shay resolves to bring her killer to justice, even though it means going up against some intimidating local figures.

On the strength of that success, Shay is promoted to detective, and thereafter joins DS Griffith in tackling the case of Darragh McLogan, a member of the Irish parliament, who was found brutally murdered in his back yard following a party held there the night before. Shay’s inquiry will plumb the depths of the local power structure and even lead him to Hell’s Kitchen in New York City. This is a knotty case, made still more complicated by the fact that Shay’s own father emerges as a prime suspect in the politician’s demise.

Readers benefit from the research Emery did before penning Fenian Street. She integrates Shay Rynne’s story expertly into the larger drama of 1970s Irish politics, and delivers both with prose that fairly leaps off the pages. A propulsive and gripping mystery, to be sure.

Other 2022 Favorites: Like a Sister, by Kellye Garrett (Mulholland); When It Was Cold, by Howard Shrier (e-book, short stories); and Call Me a Cab, by Donald E. Westlake (Hard Case Crime).

Favorite Crime Fiction of 2021, Part VI: Jim Napier

Jim Napier is a crime-fiction critic based in Canada. Since 2005, more than 600 of his reviews and interviews have appeared in newspapers and on various crime-fiction and literary Web sites, including on his own award-winning review site, Deadly Diversions. Legacy, the first entry in his Colin McDermott mystery series, was published in 2017; a sequel, Ridley’s War, came out last year from FriesenPress.

• Find You First, by Linwood Barclay (Morrow):

Forty-four-year-old Miles Cookson has had a life-changing day. Told by his doctor that he has a non-treatable and fatal genetic disease, he is advised to use part of the time he has left to put his affairs in order. Miles resolves to do just that, and before long he receives some equally dramatic news: sperm donations he made in his youth have resulted in nine offspring. Miles has done well in life. A tech-savvy billionaire, he decides to track down his children and leave them a sizable portion of his wealth. As he begins to do so, though, he learns that several of them are either dead or disappearing. It seems someone else is trying to track down those same people … but for a very different purpose. For the ill-fated benefactor, what ensues is a race against time. Think Bill Gates meets Jeffrey Epstein. In Find You First, author Linwood Barclay has fashioned an original and gripping tale of good versus evil. But it is not a classic story in which readers can expect that in the end, good will prevail. For evil, in this case, has the face of a wildly affluent sociopath with virtually unlimited means at his disposal—and no shortage of enablers to do his bidding. Find You First is a dark and compelling story, exquisitely told, and frighteningly apropos for our twisted times.

• Five Decembers, by James Kestrel (Hard Case Crime):

Honolulu, Hawaii, December 1941: Police detective Joe McGrady is assigned to solve a gruesome double homicide on the eve of the United States’ long-awaited entry into World War II. A young man has been found hanging upside-down in a remote dairy shed, naked, his body split open by a knife, and dead for a day or more. After reporting his find by phone, McGrady returns to the shed to find a gunman lying in wait. A firefight ensues, and when the dust has cleared McGrady is alive; the other man isn’t. Entering the shed, the detective investigates the murder scene more closely. A nearby cot attracts his attention, and he discovers underneath some clothing the body of a second victim, a young Asian woman, bound with her throat slit. Back in Honolulu, the male is identified as Henry K. Willard, the nephew of Admiral Kimmel, the ranking naval officer at Pearl Harbor. He’d been in Honolulu preparing to study at the university there. Kimmel is anxious to solve his nephew’s death, and McGrady is given a free hand to go wherever the evidence leads him. Ultimately, McGrady will follow the trail across the Pacific Ocean to Hong Kong and on to the Empire of Japan, where the detective finds himself caught up in the global conflict and struggling to survive. After the war ends, the dogged cop returns to finish his investigation, ultimately tying up some very personal loose ends in Japan. An evocative hard-boiled tale that is part Dashiell Hammett, part James Michener, Five Decembers is a sweeping saga of love, hate, innocence, and evil, consummately told.

• Diamond and the Eye, by Peter Lovesey (Soho Crime):

In Bath, England, Detective Superintendent Peter Diamond focuses on a break-in at a local antiques shop. The owner, one Septimus Hubbard, has gone missing, and a week later his daughter, Ruby, is growing increasingly concerned. Diamond is bemused to find that Ruby has hired a private invesrigator to help locate her father. And not just any private detective, but an especially brash—and to Diamond’s mind, offensive—gumshoe in the classic American mold. His name is Johnny Getz. The motto on his business card reads “Getz Results.” Not the sort of thing to impress the stolid and methodical Diamond. Following the break-in, the shop was taped off by police. A week later, Getz, Ruby, and Diamond enter it to determine whether there is any clue to Septimus Hubbard’s disappearance. Before long they discover a body concealed in an Egyptian coffin and overlooked in the earlier (and cursory) search of the premises. However, the body is not that of the vanished shop-owner. To his chagrin, Diamond soon finds himself saddled not only with the insufferable P.I., but also with Lady Bede, a local member of the nobility who also sits on the police ethics committee. It grows increasingly unclear as to whether Lady Bede, a woman with an overactive libido, is interested primarily in the conduct of this case or in the widowed Diamond himself. In Diamond and the Eye, prolific British fictionist Peter Lovesey has great fun juxtaposing the very different styles of Diamond and his shamus nemesis, assigning them alternating chapters marked by dissimilar narrative voices, and creating a comic send-up of the private-eye genre. Readers will enjoy the duel between the brash P.I. and his more prosaic alter ego, Detective Superintendent Diamond, as well as a cracking plot that has its own version of the much-sought-after Maltese Falcon.

• Slough House, by Mick Herron (Soho Crime):

Mick Herron occupies a unique niche among spy thriller writers: he eschews the sensationalistic (and formulaic) chronicles of authors such as Ian Fleming in favor of the darker and more prosaic portrayals of the craft offered by writers on the order of the late John le Carré. But while le Carré’s writing is spare and largely humorless, Herron’s is packed with an uncompromisingly dark humor more characteristic of Irish writers: barbed and with a cynical message firmly embedded in the narrative. In this outing the denizens of Slough House, a marginalized purgatory to which apparently underperforming spooks are relegated, find themselves under attack— not metaphorically, but literally. Someone seems to have them in his or her crosshairs. Soon it emerges that this is payback for the killing of two Russian agents on their own soil, itself retaliation for the (real-life) effort to kill a dissident Russian and his daughter on British soil, using a highly toxic nerve agent known to be the product of Russian research. The attack had failed, but it left the targets fighting for their lives. The rules of spycraft are amorphous at the best of times, but one of them is fixed in stone: one nation doesn’t kill another nation’s spooks on their home ground. So when Russian agents start dying, the Russkis seek to even the score, and events threaten to spiral out of hand. The latest in a growing series of Herron novels currently being adapted for television, Slough House casts a caustic (and dare I say brilliant?) light on the dark world of spies.

• Seven Down, by David Whitton
(Rare Machines):

Canadian crime writer David Whitton draws on several literary efforts (not least Dorothy Sayers’ The Documents in the Case) to create his debut novel, Seven Down, and comes up with an original tale lampooning the world of spies and black ops. The setting is the aftermath of a clandestine operation gone awry. Decades earlier, seven sleeper agents had been inserted into the ranks of the employees at a single upscale hotel in downtown Toronto, Ontario. None of them are aware of the identity of the others, or even that they exist. Their brief is to remain in place and go about their normal duties until such time as they are activated by their controls with a special phrase. Just so is Operation Fear and Trembling conceived. Yet as any parent knows, there is a world of difference between the most elegant of plans and everyday reality. In the wake of what becomes an unmitigated disaster, a senior analyst is assigned to discover just what went wrong with the operation, and how. He reviews the written debriefings of each of the clandestine agents; this slender novel consists entirely of those debriefings, together with the analyst’s own observations. Little by little the curtain is drawn aside, and the reader is given snippets of information, which only confirm Murphy’s Law: what can go wrong will go wrong. Thus, Seven Down thumbs its nose at the spy trade, and at novels which attempt to take it seriously. It’s a commentary on the tendency of Those in Power to assume that grandiose plans can be made which will change the course of history. A highly amusing and a much-needed antidote to the writings of too many spy novelists.

All the Witty Horses

By Jim Napier
To say that Mick Herron is a dark writer is a little like saying Attila the Hun had difficulty getting along with others. One doesn’t read his novels for the plot, nor even primarily for the characters, but for the bleak and jaundiced narrative style that is as much social commentary as it is drama.

Herron’s caustic prose is peppered with witticisms. When—in his new novel, Slough House (Soho Crime)—someone enters a room and finds a varied group of inhabitants, one of his characters exclaims, “It’s like the United Nations in here,” to which another responds, “What, a dosshouse for the weird and lonely?” And when a relatively young man tries to wedge his way into the ranks of his disgraced intelligence agents, Herron observes that “When they went on about sixty being the new forty they forgot to add that that made thirty-something the new twelve.”

Slough House is an outlier in the organizational structure of the British Secret Service, whose home base is located in London’s very elegant Regent’s Park district. By contrast, Slough House lies in the decidedly tatty borough of Finsbury, and is a haven for—what else?—the so-called Slow Horses, viewed by the Park as expendable assets in the world of spycraft. It is zealously presided over by Jackson Lamb. Supremely arrogant, and the living embodiment of political incorrectness, Lamb alternates his burps, farts, and various other offensive bodily functions with off-hand insults directed at gays, the mentally challenged, the vertically challenged, and pretty well anyone else who wanders into his purview. The denizens of Slough House include a coke-head, a gay dwarf, a man framed for being a pedophile, and a woman thought to be dead, but who turns out to be very much alive, though the degree to which she has retained her former skills is as yet worryingly unclear. All of these unfortunates (and others) have managed to alienate the affections of those in command at the Park, who have consigned them to a surrealistic limbo that would give even Hieronymus Bosch pause.

In their latest outing, the members of Slough House find themselves under attack, this time not metaphorically, but literally: someone seems to have them in his or her crosshairs, shadowing them for purposes unknown but clearly concerning.

Jackson Lamb at first speculates that the suits at Regent’s Park are simply using his staff as training fodder to develop their surveillance skills. But it soon appears that something more ominous is going on: payback for the killing of two Russian agents on their home turf in retaliation for an attempt to take out a swapped Russian spy on British soil. The rules of spycraft are elusive at the best of times, but one of them is that home ground is off-limits: one simply doesn’t kill another nation’s assets in their own back yard. So when this happens, events threaten to spiral out of hand.

Herron’s writing is packed with an uncompromisingly dark humor, barbed and cynical, often dripping with sarcasm, a bleak message firmly embedded in his ominous narrative. Students of recent real-world events will find much that is familiar in Herron’s tale, and to be fair, the bellicose visages of Nigel Farage and Boris Johnson and Donald Trump do arise from time to time, as do the more unruly populist movements found lately in Europe and America. For some, this will be simply an aggravating reminder of unpleasant memes gleaned from the media; others will read the author’s references as elements of a cautionary tale that comes uncomfortably close to reality.

Herron’s veteran followers know better than to expect a quick read: the text here is dense, and its narrative passages often prolonged. But to skip over those in search of action would be to miss much of the flavor—and the merit—of Herron’s writing. Slough House could easily have been titled Bleak House, but lamentably, that latter title had already been taken. This is a book to be highly recommended. And the best news of all? Herron’s Slough House tales are soon to be released as a series on television. Truly, life is sweet—or should I say, sour?

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Jim Napier is a novelist and crime-fiction reviewer based in Canada. Since 2005 his book reviews and author interviews have been featured in several Canadian newspapers and on various crime-fiction and literary Web sites, including his own award-winning review site, Deadly Diversions. His crime novel Legacy was published in April 2017, and the second installment in that series, Ridley’s War, came out in November 2020. Napier can be reached at jnapier@deadlydiversions.com

Favorite Crime Fiction of 2020, Part II: Jim Napier

Jim Napier is a crime-fiction critic based in Canada. Since 2005, more than 600 of his reviews and interviews have appeared in newspapers and on various crime-fiction and literary Web sites, including on his own award-winning review site, Deadly Diversions. Napier’s debut crime novel, Legacy, was published in 2017, with a sequel, Ridley’s War, released in November 2020 by FriesenPress.

• The Law of Innocence, by Michael Connelly (Little, Brown):

Los Angeles defense lawyer Mickey Haller is having a good day. He’s just helped his client walk out of a courtroom, after turning a felony battery charge into a winning case of justified self-defense. Not the sort of outcome that endears Haller to cops, judges, and prosecutors, yet it goes with the job when you’re a defense lawyer.

But after leaving a nearby bar, where he’s been celebrating his win, Haller turns his car onto a street and notices blue flashing lights in his rear-view mirror. His day is about to get a whole lot worse.

Within hours Haller finds himself under arrest and lodged in one of L.A.’s jails. Its seems a search of his car has turned up a bullet-riddled body in the trunk. It belongs to a former client of Haller’s, and now the lawyer is the cops’ prime suspect. An unsympathetic judge sets Haller’s bail at $5 million. Even covering the 10 percent bond would wipe out Haller’s nest egg, which he’s set aside to cover his daughter’s college costs, so Haller decides to remain in jail and conduct his defense from there. What do they say about a person who acts as his own lawyer? Right. Haller, though, is undaunted, and promptly sets about preparing his case. It won’t be easy: forensic evidence shows that the victim was killed in Haller’s own garage the night before the attorney’s apprehension, and Haller says he was at home the entire time—alone.

So begins The Law of Innocence, Michael Connelly’s sixth novel in his Lincoln Lawyer series. It focuses on a cat-and-mouse game played between Haller and cutthroat prosecutor Dana Berg, with Haller’s freedom, livelihood, and reputation all hanging in the balance. For it’s not enough that Haller should walk out of the courtroom with a Not Guilty verdict on his record; instead, he must prove himself innocent, or he knows that the public, and his clients, will simply conclude that he somehow beat the system. This is Mickey Haller’s most important case, and one he must win.

To say that The Law of Innocence is deftly written doesn’t begin to do it justice. It is superbly plotted, the writing taut and utterly convincing, and Connelly once again displays his encyclopedic knowledge of both Los Angeles and the labyrinth world of the law, keeping readers firmly in his grip. The latest in what was already an outstanding series, The Law of Innocence cements Michael Connelly’s standing as simply America’s finest crime-fiction author.

• Postmark Berlin, by Anne Emery (ECW Press):

Halifax, Nova Scotia, 1996: After a night out on the town, Father Brennan Burke is sleeping off a hangover of mammoth proportions. When he awakens, he learns that Meika Keller, a parishioner and active member of his Catholic diocese, has been found dead, a possible suicide. Father Burke is devastated. He’d missed an appointment they had scheduled for the previous evening, in the hours prior to her death. If only he had avoided the siren’s lure of drink, he would have remembered their appointment—and she might still be alive. He cannot escape the conclusion that, in a very real sense, her blood is on his hands.

Now haunted by Meika’s passing, Burke struggles to make sense of her life. He learns that many years earlier, Meika had changed her name after fleeing East Germany. Why had she taken a new identity? Was there some lingering threat having to do with her former life? Brennan soon discovers that shortly before her demise, Meika had received a postcard from Berlin. Did that somehow play a role in her tragedy? He decides to travel to Germany to see for himself.

Postmark Berlin is an excellent addition to an already very strong series of novels (begun with 2006’s Sign of the Cross) by multiple award-winning author Anne Emery. Its gripping plot is supported by nuanced and believable characters, and informed by the author’s firm knowledge of history. Slowly unfurling the multifaceted tale of a complex woman and her equally convoluted past, the author carries the reader along effortlessly to a satisfying conclusion. Coming on the heels of Though the Heavens Fall (2018), Postmark Berlin firmly cements Emery’s position among the top half-dozen crime writers in Canada.

• Find Them Dead, by Peter James (Macmillan UK):

A young woman traveling through South America during her gap year is in mortal danger. Unbeknownst to her, her every action is being monitored by killers, and it is clear that only one thing will save her: her widowed mother, Sarah Hope, sitting on a jury back in England, must hold out for a full acquittal of the defendant being tried. Anything short of that, including bringing in the police, will result in the death of her daughter. Drawing on the resources of the Internet and other high-tech means of surveillance, the criminals make it clear that they are in total control of Sarah’s life: they are monitoring her calls, and know where she goes and who she sees. They can enter her house at any time, leaving clear signs that they have been on the premises. And as the jury moves to determine the accused’s fate, Sarah is reminded that if she fails to convince a majority of her fellow jurors to vote for acquittal, her daughter will die.

Find Them Dead, Peter James’ 16 novel featuring Brighton-based Detective Superintendent Roy Grace, is an absolute corker of a thriller. The author deftly navigates the stark terror faced by Sarah Hope, and her increasingly desperate attempts to protect her daughter, as the trial moves inexorably toward its conclusion and Grace remains—at least initially—oblivious to the whole dire situation. Meticulously plotted and superbly written, Find Them Dead marks another high point in James’ series. It’s as good as anything else this genre can offer. Well done!

• A Song for the Dark Times, by Ian Rankin (Little, Brown):

Just squeaking under the wire in the waning days of 2020, Ian Rankin delivers his 23rd John Rebus yarn, which finds the retired Edinburgh police detective struggling against the ravages of age. He and his dog Brillo have moved into a ground-floor flat in the building they already occupied, the better to cope with Rebus’ ever-worsening COPD. Yet they’re hardly settled there when Rebus receives a troubling phone call from his daughter, Samantha, who has been living in northern Scotland with her partner Keith and their own child, Carrie.

Rebus hasn’t heard from Sam in some time, and for all practical purposes they are estranged. But when he learns that Keith has suddenly gone missing and that Sam is a prime suspect in his disappearance, Rebus hurries north to do what he can. It’s a struggle the whole way, trying to solve the case and protect his daughter’s future. And things can only get worse when Rebus himself discovers Keith’s corpse.

Dark as that description of the novel’s storyline is, this wouldn’t be a Rankin story if it wasn’t dexterously layered. While Rebus carries on his investigation, his former partner, Siobhan Clarke, has her hands full dealing with a high-profile murder, while her colleague Malcolm Fox finds himself becoming increasingly involved in the machinations of none other than Rebus’ familiar antagonist, “Big Ger” Cafferty, who wants to use Fox’s connections for his own less-than-legal ends. In this book, Rankin also explores the nooks and crannies of Rebus’ troubled relationship with his daughter, who harbors an abundance of long-standing hostility toward her father. This is yet another battle for the old warrior to fight.

All in all, A Song for the Dark Times is vintage Rankin, an estimable read. And let’s face it, it just wouldn’t be Christmas without a fresh Rebus outing to savor, would it? Thanks for the present, Ian.

• Mr. Campion’s Séance, by Mike Ripley (Severn House):

London, toward the end of World War II: Best-selling crime writer Evadne Childe has just published a novel in which the rather disreputable owner of one of the city’s speakeasies (“bottle clubs” in London parlance) is robbed and slain. The extraordinary parallels between the plot of that yarn and a recent, real-life homicide at the Grafton Club in Soho raise eyebrows at Scotland Yard. Yet no one is arrested for the crimes.

A full six years later, yet another killing takes place. This one too shares eerie similarities with another Evadne Childe novel. The police are again baffled, but can make no headway in the case.

Now fast-forward several more years, and a daring robbery is committed in the heart of London. A postal van is stopped in broad daylight, breeched, and its contents taken away by thieves in front of startled passers-by. Incredibly, the heist had been previously described in one of Evadne Childe’s novels—a work that is still in the hand of her publishers, and has not yet been released! Again, police look into the matter, but they are unable to establish any link between the author and the crime itself.

Aristocratic amateur sleuth Albert Campion—the creation originally of Margery Allingham—takes up the formidable task of solving these daunting puzzles, assisted by a colorful cast of supporting players. This is an ambitious and far-reaching tale, but Ripley carries it off with his characteristic panache. Undaunted by the complexity of his project, he seamlessly transports the reader between times and places that would challenge a lesser author. Mr. Campion’s Séance is Mike Ripley’s sixth Campion continuation novel, and throughout, his affection for Allingham and her characters is apparent. He never fails to do her work justice. This novel is a distinctive achievement of 2020.

Rendering Judgment Under Duress

By Jim Napier
Full disclosure: I am an unabashed fan of British thriller writer Peter James. His 2005 debut novel in the Roy Grace series, Dead Simple, is a contemporary classic, outshining even Edgar Allan Poe with its masterful plot and ever-building suspense, and it served as a launching pad for his record of more than 20 million books sold to date. Yet I must confess, I was somewhat dismayed by the plot of his 16th Brighton, England-set Grace novel, Find Them Dead (Macmillan UK): a villain is arrested for a major crime, of which he is guilty. The evidence against him is overwhelming. If convicted, he faces serious prison time. So he seeks to nobble the jury by making one member an offer he or she cannot refuse: not money, but the life of a loved one.

Of course, that plot had been done several (many?) times before. What could even a gifted writer such as James possibly add that was fresh? Was I in for a major disappointment?

I needn’t have worried. Find Them Dead is an absolute corker of a thriller, in which a young woman traveling through South America during her gap year is in mortal danger. Unknown to her, her every action is being monitored by the villain’s henchmen, and it is clear that only one thing will save her: her widowed mother, Sarah Hope, sitting on that jury, must hold out for a full acquittal of the defendant on trial. Anything short of that, including bringing in the police, will result in the death of her daughter. Drawing on the resources of the Internet and other high-tech means of surveillance, the criminals make it clear that they are in total control of Sarah’s life: they are monitoring her calls, and know where she goes and who she sees. They can enter her house at any time, leaving clear signs that they have been on the premises. And as the jury moves to determine the villain’s fate, Sarah is reminded that if she fails to convince a majority of the jury to vote for acquittal, her daughter will die.

Peter James deftly navigates the terror faced by this woman, and her increasingly desperate attempts to protect her daughter, as the trial moves inexorably toward its conclusion, while Detective Superintendent Roy Grace remains—at least initially—oblivious to the whole situation.

Readers familiar with these books will encounter the latest developments in the myriad subplots that define Roy Grace’s life. A serial killer and former nemesis who almost killed Grace, Dr. Edward Crisp, is coming up for trial, and the DS is concerned that he may well be planning yet another escape attempt from custody. Grace’s wife, Clio, is expecting their child, and Grace cannot put aside the complex relationship they have with his son, Bruno, by a former marriage. He also finds himself locked once again in combat with his superior officer, Assistant Chief Constable Cassien Pewe, who seems perversely determined to make Grace’s existence a misery, despite the fact that the detective recently saved his life.

All in all then, Find Them Dead is a finely plotted, atmospheric, and superbly written addition to the Grace canon, and I was rash to consider, even for the moment, that its author was not fully up to the job. It marks a new high point in what is already an impressive series of stories, as good as anything out there. Well done!

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Jim Napier is a novelist and crime-fiction reviewer based in Canada. Since 2005 his book reviews and author interviews have been featured in several Canadian newspapers and on multiple Web sites. His crime novel Legacy was published in April 2017, and the second installment in that series, Ridley’s War, is scheduled for release in November 2020. Napier can be reached at jnapier@deadlydiversions.com

How Much Stress Can One Man Take?

By Jim Napier
Canadian private investigator Sam Jones has had a difficult life, and recently it’s only gotten worse. A 42-year-old veteran of the war in Iraq, Sam had lost an arm in that conflict. Returned from the fighting and now a civilian again, he is in a Toronto coffee bar trying to come to terms with what he just saw, and what he just did. Noticing spots of blood on his sleeve, he goes to the washroom to get rid of them. The blood isn’t his, but he knows police will soon be searching for him, and wanting an explanation for the two dead people—one a mere boy—who are lying in the basement of a house Sam vacated not long ago.

As we learn in Mike Knowles’ latest novel, Running from the Dead (ECW Press), Sam is bothered as well by thoughts of what he will tell the dead boy’s mother. Six years earlier he’d set out to find that youngster, hoping to bring him back to her alive. Today, though, he realizes he’s failed. That, more than anything else, concerns him greatly.

While he is scrubbing the blood from his shirt, Sam notices a bit of graffiti containing a cryptic message near a hinge on the bathroom door: I know you are, but what am I? A belligerent challenge, or a cry for help? Sheena, a 20-something tattooed barista with an attitude, is tending the coffee bar counter. She is unable to help Sam identify the author of those words, so the task falls to him. Remorseful over the fact that he failed to find the boy alive and restore him to his mother, Sam is driven to try at least to identify the obviously troubled graffiti writer and maybe lend that person some help.

Thus begins the odyssey of a good man caught up in an evil world. Before it ends, Sam will enlist the improbable aid of an aging ex-bank robber as he navigates the dark streets of Toronto, where vulnerable young women are easy prey for men who cannot see beyond their own twisted lives; and he’ll do his best to remain on the run from cops wanting to question him about those bodies in the basement.

As if all that weren’t enough weight upon his already burdened shoulders, while Sam grapples with a distressed young woman who might not want to be found—and might not want to be helped—he’s also anxious about his looming meeting with the dead boy’s mother. And he’s having to care for his own 80-year-old father, who is in a residential care home, unable to speak following a stroke.

Running from the Dead is the layered and nuanced eighth novel by Hamilton, Ontario, writer Knowles. It is a highly charged tale, marked by crackling dialogue and leavened only by brooding narration and a deft use of metaphor, as in this passage, which finds Sam comparing his race to evade the police with the behavior of sharks:

Sharks needed to remain in a constant state of motion in order to breathe. It didn’t matter how much water was around—if the shark stopped swimming it would suffocate in the middle of the ocean … [F]or the same reason he was driving across the city on a Monday—it kept him from stopping. If he stopped, if he lost momentum, it would mean confronting the inevitable, and ... Jones had a week before the inevitable became unavoidable. Seven days—his own Shark Week—unless he stopped moving.

There are also moments of dark humor scattered about this yarn, as when Sam is asked how he happened to lose his arm and he replies, “I didn’t lose it. I know exactly where it is.”

Readers in search of an uncompromising chronicle of our troubled times, exquisitely told, will find much to admire in Knowles’ new book, and will, I suspect, be drawn afterward to his earlier writing.

Highly recommended.

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Since 2005 Jim Napier’s book reviews and author interviews have appeared in several Canadian newspapers and on various crime-fiction and literary Web sites, including his own award-winning review site, Deadly Diversions. His debut crime novel, Legacy, was published in the spring of 2017, and its sequel, Ridley’s War, is scheduled for release in the late summer of 2020. He can be reached at jnapier@deadlydiversions.com

Big Troubles in a Small Town

By Jim Napier
With 32 novels contained in eight series, plus another 11 standalones and two collections of short stories, David Baldacci can reasonably lay claim to being one of the most prolific—and successful—crime writers alive today. His books have sold more than 130 million copies, and many have been adapted for film or television. Looking at his work, one cannot fail to be impressed by the prodigious breadth of it all.

One Good Deed (Grand Central), released earlier this year in paperback, falls (so far) into the standalone category. Set in 1949, it follows the travails of Aloysius Archer, a veteran of the wartime conflict in Italy who later served time for a crime he didn’t commit. Now he finds himself in a threadbare suit and fraying shirt, and with little in the way of money, hoping to rebuild his life. His destination is someplace—a nowhere place—called Poca City. It had been picked by someone in the Department of Prisons; seven hours away by bus from where he had served time, yet not quite offering the promise of the more glamorous cities further on, on America’s West Coast. Archer doesn’t much care. Bent by his war experiences and life behind bars, the lofty visions of Archer’s youth have given way to the more practical goal of just getting by.

But luck, it seems, is on his side. Soon after arriving in Poca City Archer meets a local high-flyer named Hank Pittleman, who sizes Archer up and offers him a hundred dollars—big money for the day, and for an ex-con—to recover a car that Pittleman says is owed to him as collateral for a loan that had gone unpaid. He shows Archer a promissory note signed by one Lucas Tuttle, a local farmer; it identifies the car and lists its license plate. Archer asks a few questions and then accepts the job.

The next day, Archer meets with his probation officer, the person who will largely determine his fate for the next three years. Ernestine Crabtree is very businesslike, and Archer notes, not unattractive either. She has misgivings about his new job, but says she’ll go along with it so long as Archer adheres to all the rules governing his probation. It’s only later that Archer learns Ernestine Crabtree’s father had killed three people in Texas a dozen years earlier.

After spending the night in his hotel room, Archer sets out on foot to find Lucas Tuttle and earn his money. When he arrives, he knocks on the farmhouse door and is greeted by the barrels of a Remington 12-gauge shotgun. At this point the reader begins to more fully appreciate the subtle nuances that govern small-town life. Archer will have to work harder than he’d imagined just to survive.

One Good Deed is the engrossing account of a basically decent man who finds himself in troubles not of his own making, and who strives to do the right thing, realizing all the while that accomplishing that goal may come at great risk, and even greater cost. Baldacci’s tale is credible, and his writing convincing, steeped in the language of its era. In the end, the author spins a layered story of a time and way of life that mercifully has passed us by, wrapped up in the saga of a man with a talent for getting into things over his head. If this were a classic yarn lifted from the Greeks, no doubt there would be an over-arching theme or moral at the end; but being thoroughly American, it merely offers hope of a better day.

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Since 2005 Jim Napier’s book reviews and author interviews have appeared in several Canadian newspapers and on various crime-fiction and literary Web sites, including his own award-winning review site, Deadly Diversions. His debut crime novel, Legacy, was published in the spring of 2017, and the second entry in that series, Ridley’s War, is scheduled for release in the fall of 2020.

A Convergence of Coincidences

By Jim Napier
British crime writer Mike Ripley continues to add arrows to his already impressive quiver with his latest addition to the Albert Campion canon. To the delight of the members of the Margery Allingham Society, he has now published his sixth Campion novel. Mr. Campion’s Séance (Severn House) follows Mr. Campion’s War (2018), Mr. Campion’s Abdication (2017), Mr. Campion’s Fault (2016), Mr. Campion’s Fox (2015), and Mr. Campion’s Farewell (2014), all of which have earned this author high praise from both Allingham devotees and the wider reading public. Mr. Campion’s Séance will likely add to that renown.

London, toward the end of World War II: Best-selling crime writer Evadne Childe (born Evadne Walker-Pyne) has published a novel in which the rather disreputable owner of one of the city’s speakeasies (known as “bottle clubs” in London) is robbed and slain. The extraordinary parallels between the plot of that yarn, The Bottle Party Murder, and a recent, real-life homicide at the Grafton Club in Soho raise eyebrows at Scotland Yard. Yet no one is arrested for the bottle club crime.

A full six years later, yet another killing takes place. This one too shares eerie similarities with another novel written by Evadne Childs. The police are again baffled, but can make no headway in the case.

Now fast-forward several more years, and a daring robbery is committed in the heart of London. A postal van is stopped in broad daylight, breeched, and its contents taken away by thieves in front of startled passers-by. The heist had been previously described in one of Evadne Childe’s novels—a work that is still in the hand of her publishers, and has not yet been released! Once again the police look into the matter, but they are unable to establish any link between the author and the crime itself.

Aristocratic amateur sleuth Albert Campion takes up the formidable task of solving these puzzles, assisted by a colorful cast of characters including his manservant (a former burglar), Magersfontein Lugg, his wife, Lady Amanda Fitton, and their precocious 4-year-old son, Rupert. Victims and suspects include Tony Valetta (the late nightclub owner), the intriguingly-named “Rags” Donovan (a former cigarette girl who has taken over the running of the club), two mysterious Belgians, and a spiritualist or medium named Miss Kitto. Campion is further aided in his investigation by the familiar-to-Allingham-readers Superintendent Stanislaus Oates, Detective Superintendent Yeo, and Charles Luke, all of Scotland Yard. This is an ambitious and far-reaching tale, but Ripley carries it off with his characteristic panache.

In the original Campion canon, humor and social commentary were very much a part of Allingham’s style, and Ripley lends it his own special flavor. There are improbably named characters such as Thaddeus P. Honeycutt, and of course, Magersfontein Lugg. And there is no shortage of wit of the nudge-nudge-wink-wink variety, as when author Childe signs into a seedy nightclub as “Mrs. Agatha Leigh Sayers,” or when she is described as “a neighbor of D. Sayers and M. Allingham.” When Lugg expresses his dislike for Belgium—acquired, it seems, during the First World War—Campion inquires why this is so, and Lugg acerbically replies, “I only went once and they started shooting at me. No inclination to go back there.” Often the butt of Campion’s jests, when the sleuth apologizes for his manservant Lugg he says, “he can only read in short bursts because his lips get tired.”

In Mr.Campion’s Séance Mike Ripley undertakes a wide-ranging narrative. Undaunted by the complexity of his project, he seamlessly transports the reader between times and places that would challenge a lesser author. Throughout this novel, Ripley’s affection for Allingham and her characters is apparent, and he never fails to do her work justice. Mr. Campion’s Séance has a cracking good puzzle at its core, and has earned a rightful place on the shelf alongside Allingham’s original works. It will not disappoint Ripley’s readers, either.

(Editor’s note: Mr. Campion’s Seance will be released in the United States, again by Severn House, this coming August.)

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Since 2005 Jim Napier’s book reviews and author interviews have appeared in several Canadian newspapers and on various crime-fiction and literary Web sites, including his own award-winning review site, Deadly Diversions. His debut crime novel, Legacy, was published in the spring of 2017, and the second entry in that series, Ridley’s War, is scheduled for release in the fall of 2020.

Enjoyment Found in a “Lost” Thriller

By Jim Napier
Originally released as a hardcover work in 1990 in the UK, and now reissued in 2020, Ian Rankin’s Westwind offers a rare glimpse into the mind of a very talented, and ultimately world-class novelist who was struggling to understand and give direction to his craft in the nascent days of his career.

Rankin is candid about his state of mind at the time. Lamenting the fact that Westwind initially garnered but one scant review, he admits in an introduction to this new edition, that he was not “in a good place” in those days. His first novel starring Edinburgh police detective John Rebus, Knots & Crosses, had been published three years earlier. Rankin was living in London’s Tottenham district and working as an assistant at the National Folktale Centre, housed in a nearby polytechnic. He struggled to get to the point where he could quit his day job and devote all of his time and creative energy to his first love: becoming a novelist. It was against that background that Rankin decided, rather rashly, to try and compose a best-selling techno-thriller of the sort to be found on the shelves of airports and railway stations. It was not to be the emerging writer’s most felicitous idea.

The yarn captures Britain in the waning days of the Cold War, when Europeans are less than happy about hosting a formidable U.S. military presence in their own backyard, and the Americans are reluctantly withdrawing their troops to friendlier environs. Working at a small satellite tracking station in the UK, protagonist Martin Hepton is witness to a double disaster. First the ground station temporarily loses contact with a key British surveillance satellite code-named Zephyr. Then a space shuttle goes awry, plunging to earth with its crew of six astronauts, five Americans and a single Briton. Shortly thereafter, one of the ground technicians responsible for monitoring the satellite also disappears. The explanation—that he had become ill and been taken to hospital—is dismissed by Hepton: that these three events are unrelated seems to stretch the bounds of credulity.

Miraculously, one of the crew has survived the shuttle crash. It is the sole Brit, Major Michael Dreyfuss. He has been found unconscious, with the hands of a dead astronaut around his throat; but before he can be questioned he is whisked away to a hospital in America, where he faces hostile questioning by a high-ranking U.S. military officer.

And so begins the young Ian Rankin’s foray into the fast-moving world of techno-thrillers. Standing on the shoulders of his literary forebears (notably John le Carré and Ian Fleming), Rankin weaves a plausible tale of international tensions, conspiracy plots, larger-than-life villains, chase scenes, and attempted assassinations across the British landscape, with occasional side-trips to the continent and America.

Prior to its most recent incarnation, Westwind was given a light and sympathetic edit, but Rankin says it is essentially the same book he published three decades earlier. Not surprisingly, the characters in Westwind are less nuanced than those we have come to expect in Rankin’s later writing, for this novel is very much a child of its times. More seriously, the tale never quite manages to stand on its own; the reader is constantly aware of stories by other writers of the day that manage to carry readers to a higher level.

Yet, although it is not up to the standards of Rankin’s Rebus books (nor should we expect it to be), Westwind remains a revealing portrait of—dare I say it?) —The Artist as a Young Man, and offers a few glimpses of the master wordsmith he would become. Since 1990, of course, Rankin has gone on to become one of the finest writers of contemporary crime fiction, all but inventing the sub-genre known as Tartan Noir, and receiving an OBE and more honorary degrees than will fit in this review. Westwind is Rankin’s gift to aspiring writers everywhere, who hope someday to rise to his literary heights, and who can learn much from his early efforts. This novel remains an interesting read, and will undoubtedly be welcomed to the bookshelves of Rankin’s legion of fans.

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Since 2005 Jim Napier’s book reviews and author interviews have appeared in several Canadian newspapers and on various crime-fiction and literary Web sites, including his own award-winning review site, Deadly Diversions. His debut crime novel, Legacy, was published in the spring of 2017, and the second entry in that series, Ridley’s War, is scheduled for release in the fall of 2020.

Our Favorite Crime Fiction of 2019

There’s been no shortage of new books churned out this year. Over the last 12 months, in four separate seasonal reports (here, here, here, and here), we have highlighted more than 1,500 crime, mystery, and thriller works worth investigating. Some of those (even a few by prominent, best-selling authors) ultimately proved to be disappointing, and many others managed to be diverting and sufficiently satisfying without ever being memorable. However, a much smaller number of novels in this genre not only caught our attention, but held it—and we went on to recommend them to fellow readers.

Admittedly, we had neither the time nor manpower to tackle and judge every newly published title that drew our eyes. So we won’t maintain that our preferences represent the incontestable “best” of new crime, mystery, and thriller releases on offer in 2019. Yet we think they’re as valid as anyone else’s, and certainly worth sharing. So below, four regular Rap Sheet contributors present their favorite discoveries in this genre from the last twelvemonth. Each critic has briefly reviewed one novel of particular merit, and thereafter listed several additional choices they found to be outstanding. Almost all of the titles mentioned here first appeared in bookstores during 2019. And except where noted, the publishers mentioned are American.

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Kevin Burton Smith is the Montreal-born founder and editor of that essential 21-year-old resource, The (New) Thrilling Detective Web Site, as well as the Web Monkey for The Private Eye Writers of America and a contributing editor of Mystery Scene. He lives in Southern California’s High Desert region, where he’s still working on a non-fiction book about married detective couples with his wife, mystery author D.L. Browne (aka Diana Killian and Josh Lanyon).

• Save Me from Dangerous Men, by S.A. Lelchuk (Flatiron):

Is there anyone out there who’s actually for violence against women? If so, please leave the room. But how about violence by women?

It’s a hot-button topic these days, in some crime-fiction circles. I guess we can blame it all on Lisbeth Salander (star of the best-selling The Girl Who Tattooed “Rapist” on a Dude series), arguably the first modern-era heroine to lay a little hands-on justice on a man who just doesn’t get it. But author Stieg Larsson was a dude himself, so does that even count? Since then, though, there have been several female protagonists, all delivering their own versions of rough justice, utilizing everything from judo chops and brass knuckles to carving knives, on deserving male members of the species (and sometimes on the members of those members). A swift kick to the balls is also quite popular.

Which brings us to troubled private investigator/avenger Nikki Griffin, created by the gender-neutral (but revealed to be male) S.A. Lelchuk, cast by some as the perfect vigilante hero for the #MeToo age. Her powerful, if at times disturbing debut comes in Save Me from Dangerous Men, a ballsy mash-up of agitprop and vengeance porn; a cautionary tale (or cheap thrill read) full of sadistic, abusive men (Boo! Hiss!), with a violent, possibly unbalanced woman who often makes Ms. Salander (slyly name-checked several times) look like a pillar of mental stability (Hip-Hip-Hooray?).

“I’m not some psycho. There are people in this world who need help,” Nikki says, but her firm proclamation of sanity would go over better if it wasn’t in response to a question asked by her court-ordered therapist. Nonetheless, it’s moments like these, plus Nikki’s own self-doubts, that suggest both she and her creator may have many more depths yet to plumb.

So is this tale a socially sensitive call-to-arms, or opportunistic ca-ching? Or both? I’ve read plenty of books this year, and possibly better ones, but Save Me’s the one that really begs a sequel. And answers.

Other 2019 Favorites: Bellini and the Sphinx, by Tony Bellotto (Akashic); The Bitterest Pill, by Reed Farrel Coleman (Putnam); The Butterfly Girl, by Rene Denfield (Harper); Metropolis, by Philip Kerr (Putnam); A Time to Scatter Stones, by Lawrence Block (Subterranean); and Your House Will Pay, by Steph Cha (Ecco).

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Ali Karim is The Rap Sheet’s longtime British correspondent, a contributing editor of January Magazine, and the assistant editor of Shots. In addition, he writes for Deadly Pleasures Mystery Magazine, Crimespree, and Mystery Readers International.

• Cari Mora, by Thomas Harris (Grand Central):

Like his 1975 debut, Black Sunday, Harris’ sixth novel is a standalone, so does not feature his singular character, Dr. Hannibal Lecter. Instead, Cari Mora offers a furtive glance into something considerably worse: the very best, and the very worst of the people and monsters that surround us. And at both extremes, they wear our skin.

We are introduced here not only to tall, hairless, and sadistic criminal Hans-Peter Schneider (an ex-medical student, who’d been “asked to leave on ethical grounds”), but also to those clients he provides with unspeakable entertainment and horrific services—namely, the mysterious Mr. Gnis of Mauritania and Mr. Imran (both of whom remain mostly off-stage, or are mentioned only in dispatches). When we do see Mr. Imran, he’s accompanied by a burly bodyguard, one who keeps his distance and wears “archery armguards” under his tailored suits. (Schneider remarks at one point that “Mr. Imran was a biter.”)

Brought into this tale, too, is Jesus Villarreal, a dying man in Colombia who knows about some $25 million in gold bars—a secret legacy of the late drug lord Pablo Escobar—concealed in a Miami Beach residence. Villarreal needs to provide for his family, so in exchange for help, he tells the story of that gold to Schneider, but also to Don Ernesto, the head of a Colombian crime syndicate. And he warns both men that those riches are locked in a solid steel safe, booby-trapped with plastic explosives.

Now enter the eponymous Caridad “Cari” Mora, a young South American woman, clinging to her life in Miami by the thread of a precarious immigration status. A former kidnapped child-soldier, she managed to survive (and escape) the clutches of a ruthless militia, but not without “scars on her arms. Truly,” writes Harris, “they are only snaky lines on her clear brown-gold skin. The scars are more exotic than disfiguring. Like cave paintings of wavy snakes. Experience decorates us.”

Apart from the gold, Hans-Peter Schneider also wishes to capture the lovely Ms. Mora, for he has designs, unspeakable desires that are detailed on a sketch pad, and have been shared with Mr. Gnis and Mr. Imran. And there hangs this tale, a cat-and-mouse game between the Colombian criminals and the creepy Schneider.

Cari Mora lends credence to the axiom that “less is more” when a narrative is in the hands of a master. Judiciously edited, this extraordinary novel puts Harris’ ability to craft truly nightmarish villains on full and frightening display.

Other 2019 Favorites: Elevator Pitch, by Linwood Barclay (Morrow); My Sister, the Serial Killer, by Oyinkan Braithwaite (Atlantic UK); No Mercy, by Martina Cole (Headline UK); The Warehouse, by Rob Hart (Crown); and The Whisper Man, by Alex North (Celadon). Plus, from the non-fiction shelves—Crime Fiction: A Reader’s Guide, by Barry Forshaw (Oldcastle UK).

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Jim Napier is a crime-fiction critic based in Quebec, Canada. Since 2005, his reviews and interviews have appeared in several Canadian newspapers and on various crime-fiction and literary Web sites, including January Magazine and his own award-winning review site, Deadly Diversions. His debut crime novel, Legacy, was published in the spring of 2017, and the second book in that series, Ridley’s War, is scheduled for release in the spring of 2020.

• Night Watch, by David C. Taylor (Severn House):

On a September morning in 1956, Detective Michael Cassidy (NightLife, Night Work) is having his share of problems. He’s suffering from nightmares dating back to the Second World War, and to make matters worse, someone is trying to kill him—but not before tormenting him first. Cassidy discusses the threat with his police partner, Tony Orso, over breakfast, but they realize they have nothing to go on: it’s just a matter of wait and see.

So Cassidy continues doing the work for which he’s paid, and it’s not long before the cauldron that is New York City spits out a new case to capture his attention. On the southern fringes of Central Park, near Columbus Circle, a corpse has been discovered in the early morning mist. It’s the body of a middle-aged man, and he has been murdered. Although at first glance it seems like a simple mugging—the victim’s wallet is missing—the autopsy reveals that he’s been stabbed in the skull, an extremely thin, sharp blade having penetrated his brain not once, but several times. On the face of it, the victim is an unlikely target, an immigrant who takes tourists around Central Park in his carriage. Not a wealthy man, then. Cassidy is handed the case … and his investigation will lead him to a complex conspiracy involving people in the highest echelons of political power, endangering his own life and the lives of those around him.

David Taylor’s writing is simply superb, deftly capturing the noir atmosphere of postwar Manhattan, and sweeping the reader through the story line until the final page. And it’s not all plot—the atmosphere is gripping, too:

Cassidy hated the night watch. The worst of people seeped out during the night. They did things they would not do in daylight, as if darkness could hide their actions: children were thrown against the wall for not finishing dinner, women were beaten for changing the channel, rapists and muggers, stick-up artists, the perverted, and the weird, they all slid out of the shadows looking for prey. Cassidy remembered the magazine photographs of zebras and antelope gathered around a waterhole at night. The flash revealed the glowing eyes of predators waiting in the bushes—New York City after midnight.

Hammett and Chandler would have been well pleased. Readers seeking a compelling, finely honed series that is rooted in history and perfectly captures the immediacy of those deceptively placid times simply cannot do better than to grab this novel.

Other 2019 Favorites: Broken Ground, by Val McDermid (Atlantic Monthly Press); One False Move, by Robert Goddard (Bantam Press UK); Run Away, by Harlan Coben (Grand Central); and The Stranger Diaries, by Elly Griffiths (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt).

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J. Kingston Pierce wears more hats than his head can firmly hold. He is the editor of both The Rap Sheet and Killer Covers, the senior editor of January Magazine, a contributing editor of CrimeReads, and a columnist with Down & Out: The Magazine.

• Blood & Sugar, by Laura Shepherd-Robinson (Mantle UK):

It’s the summer of 1781, and a young man is found hanging cruelly from a hook at Deptford Dock, on the River Thames east of London, his body displaying signs of torture and the brand of an Atlantic slave trader. Not long afterward, a widow named Amelia Bradstreet calls at the townhouse of Captain Henry Corsham, an aspiring politician and hero of Britain’s unsuccessful wars to hold onto its American colonies. She is the disgraced sister of Thaddeus “Tad” Archer, a barrister and fervent anti-slavery campaigner who was once Corsham’s closest friend. It seems Tad disappeared after traveling recently to Deptford, a town notorious for its role in the highly remunerative commerce involving African bondservants, and Amelia wants Corsham to go in search of him. She’s particularly concerned, because her sibling had told her before heading off that he’d discovered a secret capable of finally destroy the slave trade.

Not surprisingly, that Deptford lynchee was Tad, and his slaying provokes Corsham to begin searching for the killers. In order to succeed, the captain must reconstruct his old chum’s investigation into an appalling incident on board a trans-Atlantic slave ship. This leads him, further, to clash with men—wealthy, powerful, ruthless—who will do anything, conspire in any way necessary to perpetuate the selling of human flesh. Assailed by threats and alarmed by the spread of death in his wake, Corsham pursues the truth in Tad’s stead, despite it endangering his life, his family’s stability, and his prospects as a future member of Parliament; and despite fears that it will force him to reckon with a secret from his own past that he’d prefer remain concealed.

Although this is Shepherd-Robinson’s first novel, Blood & Sugar is extraordinarily sophisticated in its plot construction and most confidently written. Her portrayal of Georgian England, both its wealthy and wanton extremes, is deftly and convincingly executed (I can only imagine how many history books she must have enlisted in this endeavor!). Her characters are provided with full, sometimes surprising, dimensions. And she hesitates not for a moment to display the moral depravities of the slave trade in all their rawness. Let’s hope Shepherd-Robinson has a sequel in the works.

Other 2019 Favorites: The Darwin Affair, by Tim Mason (Algonquin); Lady in the Lake, by Laura Lippman (Morrow); Metropolis, by Philip Kerr (Putnam); and The Wolf and the Watchman, by Niklas Natt och Dag (Atria). Plus, from the non-fiction shelves—The Five: The Untold Lives of the Women Killed by Jack the Ripper, by Hallie Rubenhold (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt).