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Reviews

Reviews

by Adrian McKinty - Fiction, Mystery, Suspense, Thriller

Slamming the door on the hellscape of 1980s Belfast, Detective Inspector Sean Duffy hopes that the 1990s are going to be better for him and the people of Northern Ireland. As a Catholic cop in the mainly Protestant RUC, he still has a target on his back. With a steady girlfriend and a child, the stakes couldn't be higher. After handling a mercurial triple agent, and surviving the riots and bombings and assassination attempts, all Duffy wants to do now is live. But in his final days in charge of Carrickfergus CID, a missing persons report captures his attention. A 15-year-old traveler girl has disappeared, and no one seems to give a damn about it. Duffy begins to dig and uncovers a disturbing underground of men who seem to know her very well. The deeper he digs, the more sinister it all gets.

by Colin Walsh - Fiction, Literary Fiction, Suspense, Thriller

In the seaside town of Kinlough, three old friends are thrown together for the first time in years. Helen, Jo and Mush were part of an original group of six inseparable teenagers in the summer of 2003, with motherless, reckless Kala Lanann as their group’s white-hot center. Soon after that summer’s peak, Kala disappeared without a trace. Now it’s 15 years later. Helen has reluctantly returned to Ireland for her father’s wedding; Joe is a world-famous musician, newly back in town; and Mush has never left, too scared to venture beyond the counter of his mother’s café. But human remains have been discovered in the woods. Two more girls have gone missing. And as past and present begin to collide, the estranged friends are forced to confront their own complicity in the events that led to Kala’s disappearance.

by Daniel Silva - Adventure, Fiction, Suspense, Thriller

Legendary art restorer and spy Gabriel Allon joins forces with a brilliant and beautiful master-thief to track down the world’s most valuable missing painting. But soon he finds himself in a desperate race to prevent an unthinkable conflict between Russia and the West.

by Kendra Elliot - Fiction, Mystery, Suspense, Thriller

Rowan Wolff was five years old when she, her brother and their babysitter were kidnapped by a serial killer. The babysitter was murdered. Rowan was saved. Her brother was killed and buried in the forest. The convicted killer refuses to say where he buried the boy. Twenty-five years later, Rowan is obsessed with finding her brother’s grave --- and closure. Detective Evan Bolton’s latest case is disturbing. There’s another serial killer hunting in Deschutes County, Oregon, and the crimes are identical to those committed by the sociopath languishing in prison. Each victim is linked to Rowan. When skeletal remains of several bodies are exhumed in the forest, Rowan’s connection becomes more entwined and impossible to ignore.

by Katharine Schellman - Fiction, Historical Fiction, Historical Mystery, Mystery

Life as a working-class girl in Prohibition-era New York isn’t safe or easy. But Vivian Kelly has a new job at the Nightingale, an underground speakeasy. Things are finally looking up for her and her sister, Florence...until the night Vivian learns that her friend Bea's uncle, a bouncer at the Nightingale, has died. His death is ruled a suicide, but Bea isn’t so convinced. She knew her uncle was keeping a secret: a payoff from a mob boss that was going to take him out of the tenements and into a better life. Now, the money is missing. Vivian and Bea uncover more than they expected when rumors surface of a mysterious letter writer who's blackmailing Vivian's poorest neighbors for their most valuable possessions, threatening poison if they don't comply.

by Caroline B. Cooney - Fiction, Mystery, Suspense, Thriller

1964: Christaphine is 20 years old and determined to make a home and a life for her and her husband, Tommy. But when Christaphine discovers Tommy and his friends on the verge of committing a horrible crime, she does what she has to do to stop them. Afterwards, she knows she can't ever go home again. So she disappears. Fifty years later: When Clemmie's neighbor, Muffin, drags her from Sunday morning service at Trinity Hill Church, convinced that the man she's just spotted across the aisle is a dangerous figure from her past, at first Clemmie thinks she's being dramatic. But as Muffin reveals to Clemmie what happened in the middle of a field in South Carolina five decades ago, Clemmie realizes her friend has been keeping dark secrets --- just as Clemmie herself has.

by Joe Ide - Fiction, Mystery

Danger has always followed Isaiah Quintabe, a reality he’s keenly aware of as he’s laid up in a hospital bed, recovering from injuries sustained in his last case. So he’s unaware that Grace, the love of his life, has been abducted by his sworn enemy, the professional hitman Skip Hanson. Now, Isaiah and his sometimes partner, ex-hustler Juanell Dodson, must track scant clues through L.A.’s perilous landscape as Grace’s predicament grows more uncertain. A complication arises in the form of Winnie Hando, a homicide detective with something to prove. Stubborn and effective, Winnie sees his efforts as an obstruction to the investigation. As the desperate hunt winds on, Isaiah fears that even if he can bring Grace home alive, things between them will never be the same.

by T. Jefferson Parker - Fiction, Suspense, Thriller

While reporting on a Tijuana animal shelter, journalist Bettina Blazak falls in love with one of her story’s subjects --- an adorable Mexican street dog who is being treated for a mysterious gunshot wound. Bettina impulsively adopts the dog, who she names Felix after the veterinarian who saved him. In investigating Felix’s past, Bettina discovers that his life is nothing like what she assumed. For one thing, he’s not a Mexican street dog at all. A former DEA drug-sniffing dog, Felix has led a very colorful, dangerous and profitable life. With Bettina’s story going viral, some interesting people are looking for Felix, making him a target --- again. Bettina soon finds herself drawn into a deadly criminal underworld from which she and her beloved dog may not return.

by Kate Morton - Fiction, Historical Fiction, Historical Mystery, Mystery, Women's Fiction

Adelaide Hills, Christmas Eve, 1959: At the end of a scorching hot day, beside a creek in the grounds of the grand and mysterious house, a local delivery man makes a terrible discovery. A police investigation is called, and the small town of Tambilla becomes embroiled in one of the most shocking and perplexing murder cases in the history of South Australia. Many years later, Jess is a journalist in search of a story. After her beloved grandmother, Nora, suffers a fall, Jess discovers a book at Nora’s house that chronicles the police investigation into a long-buried crime: the Turner Family Tragedy of Christmas Eve, 1959. It is only when Jess skims through the pages that she finds a shocking connection between her own family and this once-infamous event.

by Joe R. Lansdale - Fiction, Humor, Mystery

Charlie Garner’s ex-wife, Meg, has been missing for over a week. Neighbors claim she’s running from bill collectors, but Charlie suspects something more sinister is afoot. Meg was last seen working at the local donut shop, a business run by a shadow group most refer to as “The Saucer People” --- a space-age, evangelist cult who believe their compound to be the site of an extraterrestrial Second Coming. Along with his brother, Felix, and journalist Amelia “Scrappy” Moon, Charlie uncovers strange and frightening details about the compound (read: a massive, doomsday storehouse of weapons, a leashed chimpanzee!) When the body of their key informer is found dead with his arms ripped out of their sockets, Charlie knows he’s in danger but remains dogged in his quest to rescue Meg.