Monday, March 09, 2020

A Spring Shower of Reading Choices



I typically spend a great deal of time at the end of every year frantically trying to consume as many newly published crime, mystery, and thriller books as possible, in order to compile lists of my favorite annual reads. As some compensation, I then devote myself to older works—not all of them crime yarns—during the opening months of the succeeding year. And so I have done in 2020.

While stacks of fresh releases climb steadily about the perimeter of my office desk, I have attended primarily to books such as John O’Hara’s Butterfield 8 (1935), Robert Goddard’s The Corners of the Globe (2014) and The Ends of the Earth (2015), Robert Louis Stevenson’s The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1886), Charles Dickens’ Great Expectations (1861), and Give the Little Corpse a Great Big Hand (1955), by “George Bagby” (aka Aaron Marc Stein). Yes, there have been a few new books sprinkled among this lot, including Rennie Airth’s sixth John Madden mystery, The Decent Inn of Death, Walter Mosley’s shortest Leonid McGill tale, Trouble Is What I Do, Ralph Dennis’ final Jim Hardman outing, All Kinds of Ugly, and Erik Larson’s latest captivating work of historical non-fiction, The Splendid and the Vile: A Saga of Churchill, Family, and Defiance During the Blitz. But for the most part, I have been enjoying dustier reads of late.

However, with spring set to start on March 20, and most of the older books I had intended to tackle these last few months already finished, I can now rebalance my reading diet a bit. Just in time, too, considering how many never-before-seen yarns in this genre will be arriving in bookshops on both sides of the Atlantic between now and June 1.

Below I have listed more than 350 works—novels as well as a few non-fiction texts—that should be of considerable interest to crime, mystery, and thriller fans. They include releases from John Lawton (Hammer to Fall), Donna Leon (Trace Elements), Peter May (A Silent Death), Mari Hannah (Without a Trace), Don Winslow (Broken), Jennifer Hillier (Little Secrets), Martin Edwards (Mortmain Hall), Lee Goldberg (Fake Truth), Samantha Downing (He Started It), Andrew Taylor (The Last Protector), Jane Casey (The Cutting Place), Michael Connelly (Fair Warning), Ivy Pochoda (These Women), and five—count ’em, five—books bearing Max Allan Collins’ byline, including Do No Harm, his 17th case for Chicago private eye Nate Heller. I should not fail to mention here, either, The Abstainer, by Ian McGuire; Sara Paretsky’s Dead Land (her 22nd V.I. Warshawski story); Cara Black’s World War II-set standalone, Three Hours in Paris; Loren D. Estleman’s new Valentino mystery, Indigo; a collection of essays from Laura Lippman, My Life as a Villainess; and Grave’s End, the third entry in William Shaw’s series starring Detective Superintendent Alexandra Cupidi. Finally, let me highlight the April debut (in Great Britain) of Southern Cross Crime, Kiwi Craig Sisterson’s guide to the burgeoning world of Australian and New Zealand crime writing. (Sisterson’s book should reach the States in September.)

If, during this sunnier season—one that might normally invite us outside—we must instead retreat indoors this year to avoid contracting the coronavirus disease COVID-19, we can at least do so with plenty of fresh reading material to keep us entertained.

As usual, works marked below with an asterisk (*) are non-fiction; the rest are novels or collections of short stories.

MARCH (U.S.):
After Me Comes the Flood, by Sarah Perry (Custom House)
The Animals at Lockwood Manor, by Jane Healey
(Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)
Are Snakes Necessary? by Brian De Palma (Hard Case Crime)
Beheld, by TaraShea Nesbit (Bloomsbury)
The Big Squeeze, by Jim Cirni (Brash)
Blackwood, by Michael Farris Smith (Little, Brown)
Blame the Dead, by Ed Ruggero (Forge)
The Body Double, by Emily Beyda (Doubleday)
The Boy from the Woods, by Harlan Coben (Grand Central)
The Bramble and the Rose, by Tom Bouman (Norton)
Buried, by Lynda La Plante (Zaffre)
Champagne Cowboys, by Leo W. Banks (Brash)
City of Margins, by William Boyle (Pegasus)
Code Name Hélène, by Ariel Lawhon (Doubleday)
Columbus Noir, edited by Andrew Welsh-Huggins (Akashic)
The Come On, by Jim Cirni (Brash)
A Conspiracy of Bones, by Kathy Reichs (Scribner)
A Criminal Justice, by William L. Myers Jr. (Thomas & Mercer)
Darling Rose Gold, by Stephanie Wrobel (Berkley)
Death in Avignon, by Serena Kent (Harper)
Death of a Bean Counter, by Sandra Balzo (Severn House)
The Deep, by Alma Katsu (Putnam)
Do No Harm, by Max Allan Collins (Forge)
The Eighth Girl, by Maxine Mei-Fung Chung (Morrow)
Eight Perfect Murders, by Peter Swanson (Morrow)
88 Names, by Matt Ruff (Harper)
The Evil Men Do, by John McMahon (Putnam)
Face of My Assassin, by Jan Huckins and Carolyn Weston
(Cutting Edge)
The Familiar Dark. by Amy Engel (Dutton)
Girl Can’t Help It, by Max Allan Collins (Thomas & Mercer)
The Glass Hotel, by Emily St. John Mandel (Knopf)
Gone by Midnight, by Candice Fox (Forge)
Grinning in His Mashed Potatoes, by Margaret Moseley (Brash)
Hammer to Fall, by John Lawton
(Atlantic Monthly Press)
The Herd, by Andrea Bartz (Ballantine)
Hide Away, by Jason Pinter
(Thomas & Mercer)
The Hook, by Tim O’Mara (Severn House)
Hour of the Assassin,
by Matthew Quirk (Morrow)
In an Instant,
by Suzanne Redfearn (Lake Union)
Jane Goes North,
by Joe R. Lansdale (Subterranean)
The Joseph File, by Alfred Harris (Brash)
The Keeper, by Jessica Moor (Penguin)
A Killer’s Wife, by Victor Methos (Thomas & Mercer)
The Kiss Off, by Jim Cirni (Brash)
The Lady of the Lake, by Peter Guttridge (Severn House)
The Last Tourist, by Olen Steinhauer (Minotaur)
The Leonardo Gulag, by Kevin Doherty (Oceanview)
Less Than a Moment, by Steven F. Havill (Poisoned Pen Press)
Like Flies from Afar, by K. Ferrari (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
Line of Sight, by James Queally (Polis)
Long Range, by C.J. Box (Putnam)
Lost Boy Found, by Kirsten Alexander (Grand Central)
Maigret’s Childhood Friend, by Georges Simenon (Penguin)
Masquerade for Murder, by Mickey Spillane and
Max Allan Collins (Titan)
A Murderous Relation, by Deanna Raybourn (Berkley)
My Dark Vanessa, by Kate Elizabeth Russell (Morrow)
Night Train to Murder, by Simon R. Green (Severn House)
No Quiet Among the Shadows, by Nancy Herriman (Beyond the Page)
The Now-and-Then Detective, by William Wells (Permanent Press)
The Operator, by Gretchen Berg (Morrow)
The Perfect World of Miwako Sumida, by Clarissa Goenawan
(Soho Press)
Please See Us, by Caitlin Mullen (Gallery)
Precious You, by Helen Monks Takhar (Random House)
Pride of Eden, by Taylor Brown (St. Martin’s Press)
A Reasonable Doubt, by Phillip Margolin (Minotaur)
The Red Lotus, by Chris Bohjalian (Doubleday)
The Return, by Rachel Harrison (Berkley)
Revolver Road, by Christi Daugherty (Minotaur)
Running Out of Road, by Daniel Friedman (Minotaur)
Safe House, by Jo Jakeman (Berkley)
The Sea of Lost Girls, by Carol Goodman (Morrow)
She Lover of Death, by Boris Akunin (Mysterious Press)
The Silence, by Daisy Pearce (Thomas & Mercer)
A Silent Death, by Peter May (Quercus)
A Star Is Dead, by Elaine Viets (Severn House)
Stop at Nothing, by Michael Ledwidge (Hanover Square Press)
Sword of Shadows, by Jeri Westerson (Severn House)
That Left Turn at Albuquerque, by Scott Phillips (Soho Crime)
Trace Elements, by Donna Leon (Atlantic Monthly Press)
Trust Me, by Richard Z. Santos (Arte Publico Press)
Unfollow Me, by Charlotte Duckworth (Crooked Lane)
Victim 2117, by Jussi Adler-Olsen (Dutton)
When Harry Met Cubby: The Story of the James Bond Producers,
by Robert Sellers (History Press)*
The Woman in the Mirror, by Rebecca James (Minotaur)
You Are Not Alone, by Greer Hendricks and Sarah Pekkanen (St. Martin’s Press)
You Don’t Know Me,
by Sara Foster (Blackstone)
Your Turn, Mr. Moto, by John P. Marquand (American Mystery Classics)

MARCH (UK):
After Dark, by Dominic Nolan (Headline)
Black Rain Falling, by Jacob Ross (Sphere)
Black River, by Will Dean (Point Blank)
Blinded by the Lights, by Jakub Zulczyk (Legend Press)
The Blood Is Still, by Douglas Skelton (Polygon)
Bobby March Will Live Forever, by Alan Parks (Canongate)
Borrowed Time, by David Mark (Severn House)
Circle of Death, by Chris Ryan (Coronet)
The Corpse in the Garden of Perfect Brightness, by Malcolm
Pryce (Bloomsbury)
Darkness for Light, by Emma Viskic (Pushkin Vertigo)
Death in Saint-Chartier, by Ivo Fornesa (Allison & Busby)
Death of a Prominent Citizen, by Cora Harrison (Severn House)
Deep Dark Night, by Steph Broadribb (Orenda)
The Devil, by Nadia Dalbuono (Scribe)
The Evil Within, by S.M. Hardy (Allison & Busby)
The Familiar Dark, by Amy Engel (Hodder & Stoughton)
Forced Confessions, by John Fairfax (Little, Brown)
Hostage to Fortune, by Sarah Hawkswood (Allison & Busby)
How a Woman Becomes a Lake, by Marjorie Celona (Virago)
Keeper, by Jessica Moor (Viking)
Keep Him Close, by Emily Koch (Harvill Secker)
Knock Knock, by Chris Merritt (Bookouture)
Lazarus, by Lars Kepler (HarperCollins)
Liar Liar, by Mel Sherratt (Avon)
Liberation, by Imogen Kealey (Sphere)
Little Doubt, by Rachel Lynch (Canelo)
The Man on the Street, by Trevor Wood (Quercus)
The Message, by Mai Jia (Head of Zeus)
Mexico Street, by Simone Buchholz (Orenda)
The Molten City, by Chris Nickson (Severn House)
Mrs. Hudson and the Samarkand Conspiracy, by Martin
Davies (Canelo)
The Murder House, by Michael Wood (One More Chapter)
Murder on the Moorland, by Helen Cox (Quercus)
My Perfect Wife, by Clare Boyd (Bookouture)
None the Wiser, by Rachel Amphlett (Saxon)
One Dark, Two Light, by Ruth Mancini (Head of Zeus)
Our Little Cruelties, by Liz Nugent (Penguin Ireland)
The Pottery Cottage Murders, by Carol Ann Lee and Peter
Howse (Robinson)*
The Reckoning, by M.J. Trow (Severn House)
The Silent House, by Nell Pattison (Avon)
Stop at Nothing, by Michael Ledwidge (Headline)
Summer of Reckoning, by Marion Brunet (Bitter Lemon Press)
To Kill a Man, by Sam Bourne (Quercus)
The Treatment, by Michael Nath (Riverrun)
When Shadows Fall, by Alex Gray (Sphere)
Without a Trace, by Mari Hannah (Orion)
Young Blood, by Tricia Fields
(Severn House)

APRIL (U.S.):
The Abstainer,
by Ian McGuire (Random House)
Alabama Noir,
edited by Don Noble (Akashic)
All We Buried,
by Elena Taylor (Crooked Lane)
American Coup, by Emanuel Cleaver II (Story Plant)
The Backward Boy, by Kenneth Cameron (Felony & Mayhem)
Barker House, by David Moloney (Bloomsbury)
The Best Friend, by Adam Mitzner (Thomas & Mercer)
The Big Finish, by Brooke Fossey (Berkley)
The Body in the Garden, by Katharine Schellman (Crooked Lane)
Both Sides: Stories from the Border, by Gabino Iglesias (Agora)
Broken, by Don Winslow (Morrow)
The Butcher of Casablanca, by Abdelilah Hamdouchi (Hoopoe)
Camino Winds, by John Grisham (Doubleday)
Cheater’s Game, by Paul Levine (Herald Square)
The Closer You Get, by Mary Torjussen (Berkley)
The Coyotes of Carthage, by Steven Wright (Ecco)
Crash, by David Hagberg and Lawrence Light (Forge)
Creeping Jenny, by Jeff Noon (Angry Robot)
Dead Land, by Sara Paretsky (Morrow)
Deadly Anniversaries: A Collection of Stories from Crime Fiction’s Top Authors, edited by Marcia Muller and Bill Pronzini
(Hanover Square Press)
Death in Fancy Dress, by Anthony Gilbert (Poisoned Pen Press)
Death in Her Hands, by Ottessa Moshfegh (Penguin Press)
Death of an American Beauty, by Mariah Fredericks (Minotaur)
Fake Truth, by Lee Goldberg (Thomas & Mercer)
The Faking of the President: Nineteen Stories of White House Noir, edited by Peter Carlaftes (Three Rooms Press)
Final Judgment, by Marcia Clark (Thomas & Mercer)
Have You Seen Me? by Kate White (Harper)
The Haunted Lady, by Mary Roberts Rinehart (American
Mystery Classics)
The Heights, by Parker Bilal (Severn House)
He Started It, by Samantha Downing (Berkley)
Hid from Our Eyes, by Julia Spencer-Fleming (Minotaur)
A Hundred Suns, by Karin Tanabe (St. Martin’s Press)
James Bond: Reflections of Death, by Greg Pak, Andy Diggle, Benjamin Percy, etc. (Dynamite Entertainment)
The King’s Beast, by Eliot Pattison (Counterpoint)
The Last Hunt, by Deon Meyer (Atlantic Monthly Press)
Little Secrets, by Jennifer Hillier (Minotaur)
Little Siberia, by Antti Tuomainen (Orenda)
The Marshal and the Mystical Mountain, by C.M. Wendelboe
(Five Star)
Masked Prey, by John Sandford (Putnam)
Mastering the Process: From Idea to Novel, by Elizabeth
George (Viking)*
A Match Made for Murder, by Iona Whishaw (Touchwood Editions)
Mourning in Malmö, by Torquil MacLeod (McNidder & Grace)
Murder on Pleasant Avenue, by Victoria Thompson (Berkley)
The New Husband, by D.J. Palmer (St. Martin’s Press)
The Night Raids, by Jim Kelly (Allison & Busby)
No Going Back, by Sheena Kamal (Morrow)
One Fatal Flaw, by Anne Perry (Ballantine)
Playboy, by Joe Thomas (Arcadia)
Pretty Things, by Janelle Brown
(Random House)
Rough Justice, by Matt Hilton
(Severn House)
Savage Son, by Jack Carr (Atria/Emily Bestler)
The Secrets They Left Behind, by Lissa Marie Redmond
(Crooked Lane)
Sin Eater, by Megan Campisi (Atria)
Something She’s Not Telling Us, by Darcey Bell (Harper)
The Split, by Sharon Bolton (Minotaur)
The Stolen Gold Affair, by Bill Pronzini (Forge)
Strike Me Down, by Mindy Mejia (Atria/Emily Bestler)
A Stroke of Malice, by Anna Lee Huber (Berkley)
Take Me Apart, by Sara Sligar (MCD)
That Affair Next Door, by Anna Katharine Green (Poisoned Pen Press)
The Third Sister, by Sara Blaedel (Grand Central)
Three Hours in Paris, by Cara Black (Soho Crime)
Walk the Wire, by David Baldacci (Grand Central)
What's Left of Me Is Yours, by Stephanie Scott (Doubleday)
Who Speaks for the Damned, by C. S. Harris (Berkley)
You Let Me In, by Camilla Bruce (Tor)

APRIL (UK):
All in Her Head, by Nikki Smith (Orion)
Arrowood and the Thames Corpses, by Mick Finlay (HQ)
Avenge the Dead, by Jackie Baldwin (One More Chapter)
Bent, by Joe Thomas (Arcadia)
The Black Art of Killing, by Matthew Hall (Michael Joseph)
The Body Falls, by Andrea Carter (Constable)
Call of the Raven, by Wilbur Smith (Zaffre)
The Chemical Reaction, by Fiona Erskine (Point Blank)
City of Fallen Angels, by Paul Buchanan (Legend Press)
Curse the Day, by Judith OReilly (Head of Zeus)
The Cutting Place, by Jane Casey (HarperCollins)
Date with Danger, by Julia Chapman (Pan)
The Dead Line, by Holly Watt (Raven)
The Dirty South, by John Connolly (Hodder & Stoughton)
Driftnet, by Lin Anderson (Pan)
Execution, by S.J. Parris (HarperCollins)
The Figure in the Photograph, by Kevin Sullivan (Allison & Busby)
Framed, by S.L. McInnis (Headline)
The Gilded Cage, by Camilla Lackberg (HarperCollins)
The Grove of the Caesars, by Lindsey Davis (Hodder & Stoughton)
Hitler’s Peace, by Philip Kerr (Quercus)
Hold Your Breath, by B.P. Walter (Avon)
If Looks Could Kill, by Olivia Kiernan (Riverrun)
The Island, by Ben McPherson (HarperCollins)
The Last Crossing, by Brian McGilloway (Dome Press)
The Last Protector, by Andrew Taylor (HarperCollins)
Little Disasters, by Sarah Vaughan (Simon & Schuster UK)
Lockdown, by Peter May (Riverrun)
The Lost Child, by Emily Gunnis (Headline Review)
Lucky Bones, by Michael Wiley
(Severn House)
Magpie Lane, by Lucy Atkins (Quercus)
The Mist, by Ragnar Jónasson
(Michael Joseph)
Mortmain Hall, by Martin Edwards
(Head of Zeus)
The Mothers, by Sarah Naughton (Trapeze)
Mr. Campion’s Seance, by Mike Ripley (Severn House)
Murder at the Music Factory, by Lesley Kelly (Sandstone Press)
The Murder Game, by Rachel Abbott (Wildfire)
The Music Box Enigma, by R.N. Morris (Severn House)
The Octopus, by Tess Little (Hodder & Stoughton)
Power Play, by Tony Kent (Elliott & Thompson)
A Question of Betrayal, by Anne Perry (Headline)
The Return, by Rachel Harrison (Hodder & Stoughton)
The Saracen’s Mark, by S.W. Perry (Corvus)
Sarah’s List, by Elizabeth Gunn (Severn House)
Seven Lies, by Elizabeth Kay (Sphere)
The Silence, by Susan Allcott (Borough Press)
Sister, by Kjell Ola Dahl (Orenda)
Southern Cross Crime, by Craig Sisterson (No Exit Press)*
Strangers, by C.L. Taylor (Avon)
Three, by D.A. Mishani (Riverrun)
Vale of Tears, by Sarah Hawkswood (Allison & Busby)
Venetian Gothic, by Philip Gwynne Jones (Constable)
We Begin at the End, by Chris Whitaker (Zaffre)
When Angels Sleep, by Mark Griffin (Piatkus)

MAY (U.S.):
Archie Goes Home, by Robert Goldsborough (Mysterious Press/
Open Road)
Auntie Poldi and the Handsome Antonio, by Mario Giordano (Mariner)
Berkeley Noir, edited by Jerry Thompson and Owen Hill (Akashic)
The Bounty, by Janet Evanovich and Peter Evanovich (Putnam)
Castle Skull, by John Dickson Carr (Poisoned Pen Press)
Catherine House, by Elisabeth Thomas (Custom House)
The Chocolate Cobweb, by Charlotte Armstrong (American
Mystery Classics)
Close Up, by Amanda Quick (Berkley)
Cold Kill, by Rennie Airth (Severn House)
Coldwater, by Tom Pitts (Down & Out)
The Darkling Halls of Ivy, edited by Lawrence Block (Subterranean)
Death By Shakespeare: Snakebites, Stabbings and Broken Hearts,
by Kathryn Harkup (Bloomsbury Sigma)*
Death in the East, by Abir Mukherjee (Pegasus)
Death on Tuckernuck, by Francine Mathews (Soho Crime)
The Divinities, by Parker Bilal (Indigo Press)
Edgar Allan Poe and the Empire of the Dead, by Karen Lee
Street (Pegasus)
The End of October, by Lawrence Wright (Knopf)
Fair Warning, by Michael Connelly (Little, Brown)
The Falling Woman, by Richard Farrell (Algonquin)
From the Grave, by David Housewright (Minotaur)
A Full Cold Moon, by Lissa Marie Redmond (Severn House)
Ghosts of Harvard, by Francesca Serritella (Random House)
The Goodbye Man, by Jeffery Deaver (Putnam)
A Good Marriage, by Kimberly McCreight (Harper)
The Guest List, by Lucy Foley (Morrow)
Hard Cash Valley, by Brian Panowich (Minotaur)
Hot Lead, Cold Justice, by Mickey Spillane and Max Allan Collins (Kensington)
Hunting Ground,
by Meghan Holloway (Polis)
If It Bleeds, by Stephen King (Scribner)
Indigo, by Loren D. Estleman (Forge)
In the Name of Truth, by Viveca Sten (Amazon Crossing)
The Last Trial, by Scott Turow (Grand Central
The Law of Lines, by Hye-young Pyun (Arcade)
Lord High Executioner: The Legendary Mafia Boss Albert Anastasia, by Frank Dimatteo and Michael Benson (Citadel)*
Maigret and the Wine Merchant, by Georges Simenon (Penguin)
Meadowlark, by Melanie Abrams (Little A)
MS-13: The Making of America’s Most Notorious Gang,
by Steven Dudley (Hanover Square Press)*
My Life as a Villainess: Essays, by Laura Lippman (Morrow)*
The One Who Got Away, by L.A. Detwiler (One More Chapter)
The Paladin, by David Ignatius (Norton)
The Poison Flood, by Jordan Farmer (Putnam)
Postmark Berlin, by Anne Emery (ECW Press)
A Private Cathedral, by James Lee Burke (Simon & Schuster)
Roar Back, by John Farrow (Severn House)
Rigged, by D.P. Lyle (Oceanview)
Robert B. Parker’s Grudge Match, by Mike Lupica (Putnam)
Shadowplay, by Joseph O’Connor (Europa Editions)
Shakespeare for Squirrels, by Christopher Moore (Morrow)
The Shooting at Château Rock, by Martin Walker (Knopf)
The Streel, by Mary Logue (University of Minnesota Press)
Street Music, by Timothy Hallinan (Soho Crime)
These Women, by Ivy Pochoda (Ecco)
What Lies Between Us, by John Marrs (Thomas & Mercer)
The Wife Stalker, by Liv Constantine (Harper)
Worse Angels, by Laird Barron (Putnam)
Wrath of Poseidon, by Clive Cussler and Robin Burcell (Putnam)
Your Friendly Neighborhood Death Peddler, by Jimmy
Sangster (Brash)

MAY (UK):
Angel, by L.J. Ross (Dark Skies)
Ash Mountain, by Helen FitzGerald (Orenda)
The Babysitter, by Phoebe Morgan (HQ)
Blood Business, by Barbara Nadel (Headline)
Cast the First Stone, by C.B. Hanley (Mystery Press)
Cracked, by Louise McCreesh (Hodder & Stoughton)
The Creak on the Stairs, by Eva Björg Ǣgisdottir (Orenda)
Dear Child, by Romy Hausmann (Quercus)
Death of a Mermaid, by Lesley Thomson (Head of Zeus)
The Disappearance of Stephanie Mailer, by Joël Dicker
(MacLehose Press)
Double Agent, by Tom Bradby (Bantam Press)
Faithful Unto Death, by Sarah Hawkswood (Allison & Busby)
Festival of Death, by Laurence Anholt (Constable)
Find Them Dead, by Peter James (Macmillan)
From Devon with Death, by Stephanie Austin (Allison & Busby)
Gallows Rock, by Yrsa Sigurdardottir (Hodder & Stoughton)
Grave’s End, by William Shaw (Riverrun)
The Heatwave, by Kate Riordan (Penguin)
The Inner Darkness, by Jørn Lier Horst (Michael Joseph)
I Saw Him Die, by Andrew Wilson (Simon & Schuster UK)
Just My Luck, by Adele Parks (HQ)
Kill the King, by Sandrone Dazieri (Simon & Schuster UK)
The Mystery of Henri Pick, by David Foenkinos (Pushkin Press)
Red Corona, by Tim Glister (Point Blank)
Rogue, by James Swallow (Zaffre)
The Spoilt Kill, by Mary Kelly (British Library)
The Stranger, by Simon Conway (Hodder & Stoughton)
A Testament of Character, by Sulari Gentill (Crime & Mystery Club)
Tokyo Redux, by David Peace (Faber and Faber)
Warlock Holmes: The Finality Problem, by G.S. Denning (Titan)
Where the Innocent Die, by M.J. Lee (Canelo)
The Winter Agent, by Gareth Rubin (Michael Joseph)
X Ways to Die, by Stefan Ahnhem (Head of Zeus)

As incredible as it may seem, this inventory is nowhere near comprehensive. There are plenty more works of a crime, mystery, and thriller nature set to fill your to-be-read pile this season. If you know of other worthy releases to recommend, please do so in the Comments section at the end of this post.

1 comment:

Road Wallace said...

"A gleaming, dark masterpiece by one of Southern fiction's leading voices" is Kirkus's description of Michael Farris Smith's latest, Blackwood, which just hit store shelves. I devoured all four of Farris Smith's previous novels (okay, one's a novella) in quick succession after belatedly stumbling upon his 2017 country noir Desperation Road - which has drawn favorable comparisons to the world of Daniel Woodrell - and right now I honestly can't think of a fiction writer who's more deserving of bigger readership.