Marilyn's Mystery Reads

Book Reviews

When Detective Casey Duncan and her husband Sheriff Eric Dalton founded Haven’s Rock as a place of sanctuary deep in the Yukon forest, they hoped to improve upon Rockton, the place where they met years earlier.  Rockton had also been envisioned as a place of safety for those wanting to leave their horrific pasts behind, but over the years things there had changed, and it was no longer fulfilling that need.

Thus Casey and Eric, with the financial help of an heiress who supports their project, established Haven’s Rock.  Now a town of sixty-seven adults and two children, Haven’s Rock is even more remote than Rockton, and it has the additional benefit of virtually unlimited financial resources.  But it still has dangers from its residents, carefully vetted as they are.

Casey and Eric are awakened shortly after midnight by Sebastian, a member of the community.  He tells them that Kendra, another resident, was attacked and dragged into the forest but managed to escape her assailant.  Kendra tells Casey that she had two drinks at the Roc, the town’s only restaurant, one over her usual limit, and that on her way home she felt dizzy and tipsy. She was trying to put her key in her front door when she was hit twice from behind and dragged through the snow into the woods.  Sebastian heard her screams, found her, and carried her back to the settlement.

The consensus is that Kendra’s drink was drugged, and it is pure luck that she was rescued.  Now Casey and Eric must find the assailant before he/she strikes again.  Finding the person who put something in Kendra’s drink is made more difficult by the fact that she was sitting with two other women at the Roc, and their drinks had been left on the bar’s counter for a minute or two before being taken to their table.  Was Kendra the intended recipient of the doctored drink, or was it really meant for one of the other women?

Then there’s a second assault, this one deadly.  Another woman is taken into the forest, stripped naked, and staked in the snow, and the presumption is that her attacker watched her suffer and die.  In this small community, how could such a person have escaped the vigilance of the committee screening prospective entrants as well as the people living in Haven’s Rock?

An additional complicating factor is Casey’s pregnancy.  She and Eric are delighted about having a child, but at the moment it’s complicating her ability to investigate the crimes.  Much as she doesn’t want to admit it, now that she’s in her eighth month she’s more tired than usual and her mobility is definitely compromised.  Her husband is watchful, perhaps more than she would like, because they are hundreds of miles away from the nearest hospital.  April, Casey’s sister, is Haven’s Rock physician, but April is a neurosurgeon, not an obstetrician.

Cold As Hell is the third volume in the Rockton series.  It continues the stories of multiple characters in the village, but such is Ms. Armstrong’s talent that even those readers who have not read the earlier two novels will have no trouble following the plot.  The characters are realistic, Casey and Eric are a delightful and strong couple, and the plot is scarily believable.

You can read more about the author at this website.

Mercury Carter is an independent mail carrier, like a delivery man from UPS or Amazon except that he works for himself.  It doesn’t sound as if that’s something that would put him in danger until he has to make a delivery to attorney Rachel Stanfield.  Merc’s motto is Rules are Rules, and thus begins the novel that changes lives.

Rachel and her husband Glenn are in the midst of an argument, although neither is quite certain what they’re fighting about, when their back door opens and four masked men enter their house.  A moment later the couple is sitting on their couch, with their hands zip tied behind their backs, guns pointing at them.

Glenn doesn’t know what the men are there for, but Rachel does.  The leader of the group, Finn, waylaid her two days earlier, demanding that she give him a document he wants.  She explains that she can’t do that legally, that it hasn’t been filed and thus she can’t release it, but Finn doesn’t care about the legalities.

Now in her home he tells her,”You have sixty seconds to produce the document or we’re going to remove your husband’s fingers,” pointing to a man holding a pair of pruning shears.  Even after Rachel gives Finn the document, he wants more.  He wants the address of a woman named Stella Wolford, but Rachel denies knowing anything about her or where she can be found.

Glenn offers the leader of the group money, millions he says, and Rachel looks at her husband in disbelief.  Finn is interested, and it’s obvious that his new plan is to get Glenn’s banking information and then kill the couple.  He herds them to the basement, and at that moment the doorbell rings.

It’s Merc Carter, with his delivery for Rachel, and he is politely insistent that it must be delivered into her hands only.  Finn is annoyed, saying Rachel isn’t home and he doesn’t know when she’ll return, but Merc doesn’t relent.  He agrees to wait in his car, but Finn is not pleased with that.  He tells Stone, one of his gang, to “go ahead and handle it,” and he attempts to do as he’s told and heads outside.

As Stone tries to force the mail carrier to leave his car, he receives a face full of Mace from Carter.  The next thing he knows, he’s zip tied and gagged.  He’s still able to answer Merc’s questions by nodding, and Merc learns that there are three other gang members in the house, that Rachel is still alive, and that her husband is with her.  Now the mailman is prepared.

Carter had been a member of the Postal Inspection Service, and its members carry guns and have the power to arrest suspects.  After a number of years in the PIS, two traumatic events changed the course of his life.  Now Merc is forced to use the skills he learned in the Service, skills he thought he’d never need again.

The MailMan is an exciting, outstanding novel which I hope is the first in a series.  Its plot will keep you turning pages, and all its characters are utterly believable, from Rachel and Glenn and Glenn’s daughter Abby to the unsavory Finn and the mystery man he’s working for.

You can read more about Andrew Welsh-Huggins at this website.

Desmond Aloysius Limerick (Dez to his friends) is back.  He’s a “gatekeeper,” which means he has the ability to enter any locked/secured facility, a skill he learned in the British military.  Even though he’s now retired, his gatekeeping skills are still coming in handy, along with the many other abilities he possesses.

As Chain Reaction opens, Dez and Mr. Jamison, the latter a member of the British espionage establishment, are in Spain to purchase, for an unbelievably large sum, a formula for synthetic opioids that has no addictive qualities, developed by a Spanish chemist.  Within seconds of their entering the chemist’s lab Dez realizes that it’s all a sham.  The professor is no more Spanish than Dez is, and the formula he shows Dez and Jamison is that of the atomic structure of caffeine.

Then a group of gangsters tries to enter the lab, but thanks to Dez’s skills they don’t have a chance.  He has boobytrapped the door leading to the lab, messing with the electronic locking device on the door and using liquid nitrogen that he puts together, wounding the men as they attempt to force their way in.

The alleged professor and his assistant lead Limerick and Jamison out of the building, leaving behind the wounded gang members of the cartel who were there to stop the sale they believed would end their lucrative drug trade.  And when Dez and Jamison turn around, the two con artists have disappeared.

The time and place shift, and it’s eighteen months later in New York City.  A day earlier Dez had received a text supposedly from his friend and former bandmate Kansas Jack, asking if he can substitute for an ailing guitar player the following evening at a performance in Manhattan.  Dez is delighted to accept and takes the next flight to New York City.  The room reserved for him is at one of the hotels inside the brand-new Liberty Convention Center in Newark, New Jersey.

Before meeting Kansas Jack, Dez walks around the Center and becomes aware of several pairs of military men trying to fit into the crowds of tourists in the hotel’s lobby.  They’re dressed in civilian clothes, but to a former military man such as Dez it’s obvious what they are.  As he’s deciding what to make of this, a young woman comes over to his table.  It’s Catalina Valdivia, known professionally as Cat, the “professor’s assistant” from Madrid.

As they reconnect in a martini bar in the Center, Limerick tells Cat his suspicions about the men he’s seen walking around.  Are they robbers, Cat asks?  Could they be terrorists?  Less than a minute later they hear the first of three almost simultaneous explosions; the thousands of people inside the Center are at risk.  Dez immediately works out a plan to thwart the terrorists or robbers, whomever they are, and the loss of innocent lives is averted.  The ones who planted the bombs are not so lucky, however.

Dez then meets with his friend Kansas Jack and learns that the text asking him to come to New York did not come from him.  Obviously someone wants him in Manhattan, and Dez believes he knows who.  Now Dez, Cat, and FBI hostage negotiator Stella Ansara are working together to get the hostages safely out of the Liberty Hotel, uncover those behind the takeover, and learn the reason that Limerick was lured to the city.

Chain Reaction successfully continues the spellbinding adventures of Dez Limerick.  As in the two previous novels, Gatekeeper and Deadlock, Dez is a compelling character, and his abilities and charisma will keep you reading until the final page.  James Byrne has done it again.

You can read more about the author at this website.

Five college friends.  A weekend at the cliffside vacation home belonging to one of them.  Spouses and significant others are invited.  A secret that has haunted some of them over the years.  What could go wrong?

The timeline of The Weekend Guests is from 2001 to 2019.  The story is told by various characters, most, but not all, of whom are present on this weekend.  The first voice is Brandon’s, the reluctant owner of the spectacular home that is the site of the reunion.  He and his wife, Aline, are the hosts, he unenthusiastically, she with unbridled delight.  Aline, with her extraordinary beauty, unlimited money, and compelling personality, has brought the group together for the first time in many years.  And she has a reason.

She, Rob, and Michael were students together in Edinburgh, and Sienna, a visiting American, was part of that group for several months.  Brandon, another American, came into the group a bit later.  And there are two other women–Nikki, Michael’s wife, and Cass, Rob’s latest and temporary significant other–who are there for the weekend.  Finally there’s Milly, a student at the London School of Economics and Aline’s temporary nanny; she will be taking care of Aline and Brandon’s two children and Sienna’s two girls.

We start learning about the initial group–Aline, Rob, and Michael–from the journals of Darryl, a graduate student at the university who is struggling both with his dissertation and his life.  Darryl is watching as the three undergrads move into the flat across the hall from him.  The statement he writes, “They will not change my life,” may be one of the most inaccurate statements in literature.

Desperately lonely, Darryl reconsiders his first thought and decides he wants nothing more than to be friends with these students.  He and Rob start a weekly chess game, but as Darryl becomes more erratic in his behavior, Rob pulls away until finally there are no more games or invitations to join any get-togethers.  That loss affects Darryl profoundly, eventually impacting on his unrequited fixation on his dissertation advisor.  He is a lonely, broken soul with a tragic backstory.

There are many strands tying the guests together, most of them twisted.  Aline and Brandon’s marriage is not the perfect one it seems on the surface.  Michael and Nikki are dealing with economic problems and a nursing baby who will not stop crying.  Rob’s latest girlfriend, Cass, is obviously ill-at-ease with his friends, and Sienna, his former lover, adds even more tension to the scene simply by being there.

In addition, the weather plays a major part in the novel, with Aline using all of her guile and powers of persuasion, urging the group to go on dangerous hikes regardless of the rain, thunder, and lightning that is present every day.

The trope of a small group of people together in a remote spot is a familiar one, but Liza North has made it her own with insightful writing, a brilliant plot, and an ending that took me totally by surprise.  This novel will make you think twice before accepting invitations from long-ago friends.

You can read more about the author at this web site.

Check out the complete Marilyn’s Mystery Reads at her website.  In addition to book review posts, there are sections featuring Golden Oldies, Past Masters and Mistresses, and an About Marilyn column that features her opinions about everything to do with mystery novels.

Imagine yourself on a plane from Hobart to Sydney, Australia.  You are sitting quietly, perhaps reading a book or watching the small screen on the back of the seat in front of you.  Suddenly a middle aged woman begins walking down the narrow aisle, pausing for a few moments at each row, saying something, and then moving on.  At first nothing seems amiss, but after she stops several times there’s a stir in the air as if something unpleasant is happening.

It takes a few minutes for people to realize the situation.  The woman is talking at the passengers, not to them.  As she moves down the aisle, people begin to understand her words.  “I expect catastrophic stroke.  Age seventy-two.”  “Heart disease.  Age eight-four.”  “Workplace accident.  Age forty-three.”  “Drowning.  Age seven.”

The woman making these predictions, later to become known as the “Death Lady,” had boarded the plane quietly, nobody noticing her.  But she and several of the travelers whose futures she predicts would shortly be known all over the country.

The passengers to whom the woman speaks react differently.  Not surprisingly, the ones whose deaths were predicted at more advanced ages were not unduly upset.  Eighty-four.  Ninety-three. Ninety-five.  Those predictions were okay.  But thirty-seven.  Forty-three.  Seven.  Not okay.

The flight attendants, all of whom are busy with unrelated tasks, aren’t aware of exactly what’s going on, but finally the cabin manager Alexa is alerted and is able to lead the woman back to her seat.  Her final comment is directed to Alexa.  “I expect self-harm—age…age..twenty-eight.”

The talking among the passengers continues until the plane lands.  There is a lot of conversation about psychic powers, their reliability or lack thereof.  But then the first death occurs, exactly as predicted, followed by two more.  It’s scary.

The novel is told in various voices.  We hear from Alexa; Ethan, a passenger who is told he will die at thirty (he’s twenty-nine); Paula, a young mother whose son is predicted to die by drowning at age seven; and several others.  We note their reactions to the predictions and wonder, what would we do in that situation?

We also hear from the woman who has become notorious.  Although she doesn’t say more to each individual than their age of death and the cause, she observes, “Fate won’t be fought,” which is hardly comforting for those whose death date is sooner rather than later.

Here One Moment, as well as being an outstanding mystery, is a novel that is truly thought-provoking.  It raises at least two questions.  First, do you believe in prophesies?  Second, if you do, how would you try to avoid yours, assuming it told of your early or imminent death?  Would you give up your favorite hobby, rock climbing, if you were told you’d die in a fall?  Would you never go in the water if it were foretold that you would drown?  Or would you dismiss the predictions and proceed with your life as if you’d never been told the date and manner of your demise?

Liane Moriarty continues her streak of excellent thrillers, novels with excellent plots and characters you care about.  You can read more about her at various sites on the web.

Check out the complete Marilyn’s Mystery Reads at her website.  In addition to book review posts, there are sections featuring Golden Oldies, Past Masters and Mistresses, and an About Marilyn column that features her opinions about everything to do with mystery novels.

The protagonist of Death in the Air, Ro Krishna, is the American-born son of Tamil parents.  He spent most of his life in the United States, then moved to England where he received a law degree at Oxford, and since then has traveled widely in Europe, becoming fluent in French and German.  In other words, he’s a cultured man.

As the novel opens, Ro has just lost his position at an international firm.  His boss had been speaking against him behind his back and took all the credit for his work.  He’s not worried about his financial status, but he’s upset and hurt nevertheless.

Almost on the spur of the moment, he decides to go to the world-famous Samsara Spa at the foot of the Himalayas to relax, unwind, and revitalize his body and mind.  It’s located in Rishikesh, where the Beatles studied transcendental meditation.

As it turns out, several of Ro’s friends and acquaintances will be at the spa also.  Like Ro, they are all super-wealthy, worldly, and sophisticated.  They are also very quick with cutting remarks.  Celebrating Ro’s birthday shortly before he leaves for India, one woman asks Amrita, who will play a major part in the novel, about a party she attended.  “It was a great party, if you’d never been to a party before,” Amrita responds.  Ouch!

Among the guests at Samsara are Ro’s friend Joss, a theatrical agent; Chris, the movie star he represents; Chris’ wife Catherine, formerly a diplomat; Mrs. Banerjee, the grande dame who runs the hotel; Makesh, a valued staff member specializing in yoga and meditation; and Amir, another visitor.

Amrita and Ro spend much of the first day talking and discovering a bit about each other, but at dinner she’s obviously upset.  She tells him she’s lost her watch, which had belonged to her mother, and Ro tries to reassure her, saying he’s sure it will turn up.  Then, while they’re eating, Amrita is called away from the table to take a phone call, and when she returns she’s smiling.  Her watch has been found, she is told over the phone, and she decides she’ll pick it up at Reception immediately.

After dinner, Ro and several of his friends decide to do some star-gazing. He and Lala, another guest, go to the laundry room to pick up blankets for the group to lie on.  Hands full, they return to the grounds, Lala in the lead, when suddenly she begins to scream.  In front of them on the grass is Amrita’s corpse.

No one appears to have a motive to murder Amrita, but hers will not be the only murder at the spa.  And the others will appear to be motiveless as well.

Ram Murali has written a wonderful first novel.  Its setting in the Himalayas is both beautiful and remote, and the guests are definitely living the lives of “the other half.”  The dialog is clever and often sarcastic, although never to the victim’s face, only behind their back.  Perhaps that goes with being in the top one percent.

Still, that being said and multiple murders notwithstanding, if someone would like to invite me to spend a week at the Samsara Spa, I’m game!

You can read more about the author at this website.

These days everyone wants to be famous.  Not for developing a vaccine to fight a pandemic sweeping the world or for writing a novel that wins the Pulitzer Prize for fiction.  Honestly, anyone can do those things.

No, people want to be famous as an Influencer, someone with thousands, if not millions, of followers on TikTok or Instagram.  And the people with rather small followings but who believe they should have thousands more are very vulnerable to an agency promising that they can make that happen.

Rosie D’Antonio doesn’t need an agency to bump up her profile.  She’s a best-selling author and a noted media personality.  But she does need a bodyguard because a character in one of her books is obviously based on Vasiliy Karpin, a Russian billionaire, and he took exception to the way he was portrayed and has twice attempted to kill Rosie. 

That’s why she and Amy Wheeler, a bodyguard who works for Maximum Impact Solutions, are on Rosie’s private island in the waters off South Carolina.  Until MIS can neutralize this threat, Amy and Rosie need to stay out of the public eye.

Jeff Nolan, CEO of MIS, is clearly taking no chances with Rosie’s safety.  He has already “lost” three influencer clients to unexplained deaths, and he certainly doesn’t want to lose any more.  He’s not in doubt about who is behind these deaths.  It’s François Lubet, a former client and money-smuggler, and Jeff is writing to him to let him know that he will take steps to stop this threat to his business if Loubet doesn’t cease and desist.  But who is François Lubet?

As it happens, in each case where a client was murdered, Amy Wheeler was in the vicinity.  Now her father-in-law Steve wants to talk to her about the latest murder victim, Andrew Fairchild.  Andrew was just beginning his career as an influencer when his body was found.  He’d been shot, tied to a rope, and thrown from a boat into the Atlantic.

Jeff wants Amy to come back to London to help him solve these murders, and she’s about to leave Rosie on her South Carolina island with a second bodyguard, an ex-Navy SEAL named Kevin, when Kevin comes into the room and points a gun at her.  He tells her to handcuff herself behind her back, which she does, and starts to lead her to the panic room that Rosie had installed.  Suddenly he’s hit on the head with a golden statue held by Rosie, and then the two women manage to put Kevin in the panic room.  His gun is useless there, Rosie tells Amy.  “He’s in there for the long run.”

And thus the Rosie and Amy begin their trip around the world, stopping only to bring Steve to America to join them, and the three of them start to work together to solve these murders.  Their stops include Dubai and Dublin and then back to Dubai, ending up in London.  There are murders along the way, suspicious influences, money-laundering criminals, and murderers.  All in all, it’s a fabulous trip.

Richard Osman continues the winning streak he started with The Thursday Murder Club, creating another group of characters who are utterly charming and beguiling, funny and determined.  I imagine We Solve Murders is only the first in the author’s new series; all I can say is that I hope so.

You can read more about Richard Osman at various sites on the web.

Check out the complete Marilyn’s Mystery Reads at her website.  In addition to book review posts, there are sections featuring Golden Oldies, Past Masters and Mistresses, and an About Marilyn column that features her opinions about everything to do with mystery novels.

Agnes Glin’s life has been dominated by two men, her father and her grandfather.  Now she’s going to Iceland, where both men were born, to find the truth of the secret that has ruled all three lives ever since she can remember.

Agnes was very close to her grandfather Einar, closer than she was to her father, visiting him every Sunday until his death a year earlier.  All she knows about the men’s lives in the small village of Bifröst is what led them to come to California, a tragedy known as the Frozen Madonna case.  It’s something her father, Magnús, would never talk about, nor would Einar.  Einar’s last words to Agnes on the subject were, “There is no before.  My life began when you were born,” but Agnes knows that cannot be true.

Now a true crime podcast is being developed by Nora Clark, an American who has gone to Bifröst to try to discover the story of the deaths of Marie Hvass, her paternal grandmother, and Marie’s infant daughter Agnes.  It’s forty years after the horrific event, and not everyone who was alive at the time is still alive and living in the village, and not everyone wants to remember the story.

Marie was a beautiful Danish young woman who married Einar and moved to the small village of Bifröst.  They had two children, Magnùs and Agnes, the latter for whom Agnes Glin is named.  No one knows what really happened to the mother and her daughter, but everyone thinks they know.  Their bodies were found in the snow by their six-year-old neighbor Ingvar.  Marie’s throat was slashed, the infant Agnes was drowned.

The villagers believed that Einar had murdered his wife and child, although it was never proven.  Then, when Einar and Magnús left for America, selling their land to a relative who had adjoining property, never returning to Iceland, the unofficial verdict against them was solidified.  Einar was guilty.

It’s a year after Agnes’ own life-changing event occurred, a fall that resulted in a badly injured left leg, leaving her with constant pain and a limp.  Perhaps it is that event that made her decide to accept the invitation to go on Nora’s podcast and hopefully learn the truth about the Frozen Madonna Murder.

When she arrives, another village-wide search is in progress.  A young woman, Ása Gunnarsdóttir, has gone missing, and everyone is looking for her.  Nora tells Agnes, “She was reported missing yesterday, and I have reason to believe it’s connected to your grandmother’s case.”

Although she’s fighting jet lag and the experience of being in a place where she doesn’t speak or understand the language, Agnes doesn’t want to be constrained by Nora’s interviews.  She meets Ingvar, the boy who discovered the two bodies; his mother, now suffering from dementia; Thor Thorsen, a relative of Einar’s;  and his father, Thor Senior, who is now  in a nursing home and blames his son for putting him there.

Melissa Larsen has written a compelling novel about secrets that lie buried for generations and what happens when they’re uncovered.  The relentless snow and ice that cover Biförst can’t hide the truth forever.

You can read more about the author at this website.

Mirror Me is a mystery unlike any other I’ve read.  It’s a story of familial dysfunction, interracial adoptions, and mental illness, ending with a twist that I never saw coming.

Eddie Asher is the adopted son of the Asher family, a well-to-do Jewish family in Manhattan.  There are four Ashers–Eddie, his mother, his father, and his older brother Robert, the Ashers’ biological child, who alternately protects and torments Eddie.

When we meet Eddie, he’s a patient at the Hudson Valley Psychiatric Hospital.  His therapist is the renowned Dr. Richard Montgomery, a specialist in the condition variously known as split personality disorder, splintered personality disorder, or multiple/dissociative identity disorder.  In Eddie’s case, his “other” identity is Pär, who, along with Eddie, takes turns narrating the novel.

Whatever the condition is called, the patient has two or more distinct identities in control at various times.  The patient may have memory lapses caused by the switching of one personality to another, with one trying to gain control.  There are several causes of DID, and the reader won’t discover which one is the main cause of Eddie’s condition until nearly the end of Mirror Me.  Then perhaps you’ll wonder, as I did, why you didn’t think of it sooner.

Growing up, Eddie was the easily recognizable son, the one with brown skin.  His biological mother was a teenaged Swedish exchange student visiting New York City, his father a Black exchange student from an unknown African country.  When Britta discovers that she’s pregnant and contacts the father, she finds out he wants nothing to do with her or the expected baby.  She delivers Eddie, immediately signs the papers for him to be adopted, and leaves the hospital at once, not looking back.

The two brothers go their separate ways to college, and then Robert moves to Seattle and reconnects with Lucy, a young dancer he knows from New York City.  When Eddie visits, there’s an immediate connection with Lucy, due in part to the fact that they’re both biracial and were adopted by white Jewish families.  But, at least on Eddie’s part initially, the connection is stronger than that–is it lust or love that he feels?  And does Lucy feel the same, or is she simply a master manipulator who enjoys her power over him?

As Eddie becomes, in the words of Lucy, enmeshed with her and her family, her hold on him becomes stronger.  Eddie discovers that his is not the only dysfunctional family–Lucy’s family is as well.  And who is this Andy, whom Eddie hasn’t met but is constantly being mistaken for?

Eddie has memory lapses and occasional violent outbursts.   Pär doesn’t, but he isn’t omniscient, so can the reader trust his version of Eddie’s story?  The scenes in the hospital, with Eddie strapped down to protect himself and those around him from his violent actions, are hard to read, and we have to wonder how helpful Dr. Montgomery’s therapy is.

The novel is a disturbing look into mental illness, its causes, and its impact not only on the patient but on nearly everyone around him.  Lisa Williamson Rosenberg has written a strong mystery with conflicted and confused characters you are rooting for to conquer their demons and go on with their lives.

You can read more about the author at this website.

Check out the complete Marilyn’s Mystery Reads at her website.  In addition to book review posts, there are sections featuring Golden Oldies, Past Masters and Mistresses, and an About Marilyn column that features her opinions about everything to do with mystery novels.

Drug user, extreme party-goer, stalker–there’s so much not to like about Dylan Welch.  When his multi-millionaire father asks private investigator Sunny Randall to find his missing son, she refuses, but when Dylan’s mother turns up at Sunny’s office, it becomes a different story.

Lydia Welch insists that Sunny must take the case, saying that “You’re the best out there.”  Sunny tries to remind her that her previous encounter with Dylan did not end well for him, but Lydia is insistent.  And when she writes a check for an amount greater than Sunny has ever received previously and tells the detective that she and her son share a special relationship, she convinces Sunny to investigate the disappearance.

Dylan is the head of the company that produces Gonzo, a best-selling energy drink.  At least he’s nominally the head of it, but in fact the brains behind the organization belong to his college friend, Sky Farley.  Sky, whom the Welches consider to be a “daughter,” tells Sunny that when Dylan has disappeared in the past, she’s always known where he was, but not this time.

Sunny searches Dylan’s office and discovers his cell phone in a desk drawer.  After a few futile tries, Sunny guesses his password.  The phone reveals more than two dozen messages from a blocked number, and every text says MURDERER.  Then Sky and Maurice Depree, head of the organization’s security, show Sunny a video that was taken earlier that day.  It’s of a woman who was in the company’s offices, and even though there’s no sound, it’s obvious that the woman is screaming and out of control.

Although Dylan’s behavior didn’t make him a lot of friends, the only person Sky and Maurice can think of who might have been responsible for the texts is Rhonda Lewis, the woman in the video.  Rhonda’s seventeen-year-old daughter died after drinking three cans of Gonzo mixed with alcohol.  Rhonda sued Dylan’s company and lost the suit, but she’s appealing that decision.  Obviously not content with waiting for legal recourse, she came to Dylan’s office to confront him.  Now Sunny is going to confront her.

Sunny is also dealing with a major issue in her private life.  Her former husband has moved to New Jersey and wants Sunny to move there also, at least for part of the year.  Her love for her ex has resurfaced, and she’s torn.  Does she really want to uproot herself from Boston, the only city she’s ever lived in?  In addition, Richie tells her he’s worried about her and would like it if she took on less demanding, less dangerous cases.  Can she do that?  Does she even want to?

After Robert B. Parker’s death, Ms. Gaylin was asked by his estate to continue the Sunny Randall series.  The author does an excellent job of bringing Parker’s protagonist to life.  Sunny is smart, determined, and a force to be reckoned with when she’s facing an opponent.  Readers will welcome her back.

Alison Gaylin is the author of numerous thrillers and the winner of an Edgar and a Shamus award.   You can read more about her at this website.

Check out the complete Marilyn’s Mystery Reads at her website.  In addition to book review posts, there are sections featuring Golden Oldies, Past Masters and Mistresses, and an About Marilyn column that features her opinions about everything to do with mystery novels.

Roman Grady’s family has been touched by tragedy and trouble more times than seems possible.  His maternal grandparents were killed in a car accident, his father committed suicide, his mother is a recovering alcoholic, and he and his girlfriend, parents of four-year-old Mason, are drifting further apart each day.

Roman had been a graduate student in journalism at New York University with a bright future ahead of him.  An essay he wrote won a major prize, and he was on his way to California to accept a prestigious fellowship at the Los Angeles Times.

But then things changed in a major way.  His girlfriend Ashley got pregnant, and Roman decided to defer the fellowship for one year, and then one year became four, and they’re still living in Upstate New York with Tara, Roman’s mother.

Tara had not been a good, caring mother for Roman during his early years, and now she’s determined to make up for it with her grandson.  She has become his primary caregiver, although that has made for some friction in the relationship with her son’s girlfriend.  Tara believes that Roman and Ashley are both suffering from depression and aren’t the best parents.  Both are working part-time jobs, and their combined incomes are barely holding things together.

Ashley and Roman had agreed when they started dating that theirs would be an open relationship, and that included Ashley’s lesbian relationship with Bella, a high school friend.  Then the two women had a falling out and hadn’t spoken in years, so Roman is stunned to discover that Ashley had been to a party at Bella’s home the previous evening and that it wasn’t the first time they’d been together.

Roman, however, is in no position to point a finger at his girlfriend as he spent the night with an old flame in Manhattan, never calling home to tell his mother or his girlfriend where he was.  Thus when he’s on the way home the following morning and gets a call from Ashley’s boss at the local coffee shop to say Ashley hasn’t turned up for work and isn’t answering her phone, Roman isn’t unduly upset.

However, she’s not at the home they share with Tara and John, Tara’s fiancé, and she’s not at the gym where she teaches yoga.  When Roman calls his mother, he discovers that Tara hadn’t seen Ashley since the night before.  Roman drives to Bella’s house on the chance Ashley is there.

After he and Bella’s cousin look through the house to no avail, they go outside to the sloping lawn that ends at the Hudson River.  Down at the bottom is Ashley, dead.

I Dreamed of Falling has many what ifs and if onlys, the thoughts we all have about how our lives would have been different if we hadn’t done some of the things we did.  As Roman mourns, he discovers that Ashley had kept not only her renewed relationship with Bella a secret but her plan for a major life change as well.

Julia Dahl has written a truly suspenseful book, one in which the characters continue to make decisions that are not well thought out and that continue to affect every part of their lives.  Roman, Ashley, and Tara are definitely flawed, almost constantly doing the wrong things, but they are human and trying their best.

You can read more about Julia Dahl at this website.

Check out the complete Marilyn’s Mystery Reads at her website.  In addition to book review posts, there are sections featuring Golden Oldies, Past Masters and Mistresses, and an About Marilyn column that features her opinions about everything to do with mystery novels.

Police Detective “Harri” Foster is working the dark streets of Chicago, still trying to prove that her late partner, Glynnis Thompson, did not die by suicide as everyone believes.  When Glynnis’ husband comes to Harri with a photo purporting to show his late wife accepting a payoff from an unknown man, Harri becomes more convinced than ever that Glynnis’ death was in fact murder.  She’s continuing to try to prove it despite the efforts of the Chicago Police Department, which would like the whole embarrassing incident swept under the rug.

Now there’s a new murder that must take priority for the detective.  Brice Collier, the only son and heir to the Collier fortune, is found outside Hardwicke House, the Gilded Age mansion on the Belverton College campus where he and a number of his college friends live. 

Several of the buildings on the campus bear the family name–the Collier School of Science and Technology, the Collier Library, and the Collier Business School.  Thus there’s immediately a great deal of pressure from Brice’s father Sebastian, the Chicago Police Department, and the media to solve this case ASAP.

When Harri and the other police officers arrive at the scene of Brice’s death, they see the young man’s body lying in a field of snow and ice.  It’s February and the temperature is below freezing, but Brice is shirtless, showing a tattoo on his upper right arm of a mythical creature holding a double-edged axe.  The corpse reeks of alcohol and vomit.  Could he have staggered out of Hartwicke House on his own, too drunk to know what he was doing?  Or was he taken to the field and left there to die?

Brice is found by two women who were at the party at the House.  Shelby Ritter makes the call to 911, and her friend Hailie Kenton is with her.  Both are students at Belverton and say they knew Brice slightly and thus had invitations to the party, but they say they left before it was over.

Before she begins questioning them, Harri suggests going inside the House, where it will be warmer and more comfortable than sitting in the police car answering questions.  The girls refuse, and the detective wonders why.  And why were they out walking the snow-covered field before six in the morning in the freezing cold weather?  Their stories don’t make sense, but Harri lets them go home with a warning that she may need to speak to them again.

To make matters even more tense, Harri is getting anonymous phone calls.  The caller says he was wronged and that Harri has a “debt to pay.”  She tells him she doesn’t understand what he’s talking about, and she doesn’t, but he continues talking.  “It’s about you.  You’re the get.  Where the road ends.”

Tracy Clark takes the reader on a thrilling ride with a believable plot and wonderfully drawn characters.  Harri Foster is a dedicated police officer, always willing to go the extra mile to solve a case, but she has a number of demons that she lives with every day.  Ms. Clark has written another outstanding novel in this series.

You can read more about the author at this website.

A new term for me is “baby gangs,” referring to groups of young teenagers who are running wild on the streets of Venice.  They arrange violent clashes with each other, getting the word out via social media, trying to prove which group is the toughest and strongest while at the same time vandalizing and destroying property.

When two groups decide to meet at the Piazzetta del Leoncini, they have the bad luck to congregate just when the police squads are changing shifts.  That means that for a few minutes there is double the number of police at the site than would ordinarily be there, so it was relatively easy for the officers to round up the baby gang members and bring them to the police station.

After several hours almost all the boys are picked up by their parents, none of whom is happy to be pulled from their homes in the middle of the night.  Orlando, one of the younger boys, tells Commissario Claudia Griffoni that he lives only with his father and that his father’s cell phone is turned off every night at eleven.  Reluctant to leave him overnight at the station, Griffoni decides to accompany him to his home, a decision that will have far-reaching consequences.

At the same time, Commissario Guido Brunetti learns about a pattern of violence and intimidation against his colleague and friend Bocchese, chief technician of the police station’s lab.  Brunetti is shocked when he enters Bocchese’s office; the latter is pale and drawn and obviously on edge about something.  He finally admits to Guido that he’s being harassed by the teenaged son of the family who lives in his building.  He says that this boy trips him on the stairs, hits his parents, and has made threatening remarks about Bocchese’s pride and joy, his collection of antique statues.

Bocchese has collected numerous statues over the years, some quite valuable, and he believes that the teenager has been going into his apartment and moving his statues around, apparently not worrying about Bocchese’s reaction.

The technician tells Brunetti that he’s decided to sell most of his collection, possibly because of his fear of his young neighbor, and would like the commissario’s opinion about which ones to keep.  When Brunetti goes to his apartment that night to look at the statues, he sees his friend with a bloody nose and blood on his jacket.  “The bastard tripped me,” Bocchese says, but he says there’s really nothing to be done about it.

A somber thread runs through A Refiner’s Fire with the author’s comments about the state of life in Venice.  Corruption is rife, there is venality everywhere, and the criminal court system is a joke.  It is no wonder that gang members are getting younger, as apparently under Italian law and actual practice there is nothing that can be done to anyone under 18. It’s a dispiriting scenario, one that has gotten more troubling with each of Ms. Leon’s novels.

Not surprisingly, per the author’s request, the novels in this series are not translated into Italian, although they are available in many other languages.

A Refiner’s Fire is a worthy addition to the Guido Brunetti series, bringing readers once again into the warmth and closeness of the protagonist’s family and contrasting that with the violence surrounding them.

You can read more about the author at this website.

Check out the complete Marilyn’s Mystery Reads at her website.  In addition to book review posts, there are sections featuring Golden Oldies, Past Masters and Mistresses, and an About Marilyn column that features her opinions about everything to do with mystery novels.

Newly trained in spycraft and now part of Great Britain’s Special Investigations Unit, Evelyne Redfern is sent on her first assignment.  She’s disappointed in the seemingly prosaic nature of it, to perform a security test at Blackthorne Park and discover how several of the specialized materials used there have gone missing, but of course she’s determined to succeed at this task.

She’s not the only agent in the Unit who is disappointed.  David Poole would rather be working in the field, but he’s told he will have to remain in London and act as Evelyne’s handler, or supervisor, for her first job.

Putting additional pressure on the pair is the fact that Prime Minister Winston Churchill is scheduled to arrive at Blackthorne Park later in the week to see a series of demonstrations of the weapons produced there.  Time, therefore, is of the essence in discovering who is responsible for the missing materials.

At ten o’clock on the evening of her arrival in the town of Benstead, Evelyne surreptitiously enters the grounds of the Park.  She has just picked the lock on the front door and entered the house when she hears a gunshot.  She rushes to the room where she believes the sound came from, the room according to the blueprint she was given before she left London is Sir Nigel’s office.  There she discovers the body of the scientist, in a pool of blood.

Given that Sir Nigel’s corpse was found at his desk with his gun in his right hand, suicide seems obvious.  Evelyne, however, feels that something is not right about the scene, and when the coroner arrives he confirms her suspicion.

Although the cause of the death was the gunshot wound, the doctor points out a faint red pinprick on Sir Nigel’s neck to Evelyne and David.  Dr. Morrison believes that someone stood behind him, used a hypodermic needle with a sedative on him, and then put the gun in the scientist’s hand and pulled the trigger.

Evelyne and David learn Sir Nigel was not an easy man to work for, and there is a great deal of tension among the several members of the Park.  His behavior had become increasingly difficult over the past few months, whether due to the missing materials or something else the investigators must discover.  The stress levels are high at the mansion, and the upcoming visit of the prime minister is doing nothing to help.

One of the many delightful things about this novel is its excellent sense of time and place.  The time is November 1940, the very beginning of World War II, and the place is one of the many stately homes/mansions in various English counties that were requisitioned by the government to aid the war effort.  The reader is immediately drawn into the world of food and clothing rationing, disrupted careers, and the various emotions of a group of people living and working together not by choice.

Julia Kelly has written an outstanding mystery again.  The characters are beautifully drawn, and the plot is suspenseful and believable.  Betrayal at Blackthorne Park ends with the promise of a third adventure for Evelyne and David, a promise this reader hopes the author will keep.

You can read more about Julia Kelly at this website.

Check out the complete Marilyn’s Mystery Reads at her website.  In addition to book review posts, there are sections featuring Golden Oldies, Past Masters and Mistresses, and an About Marilyn column that features her opinions about everything to do with mystery novels.

The streets of Los Angeles are grittier and meaner than ever before, and even the fabulously wealthy aren’t immune.

Police Detective Margaret Nolan and her partner Al Crawford are called to investigate the case of a man’s body found in a BMW Series 8 in an unsavory part of town.  The driver’s window is down, leading the police to believe that he knew his killer and had lowered the window to talk to them.

No identification is found on the corpse, but he’s identified by the car’s license plate.  He was Bruce Messane, co-founder  of  Peppy Pets, an organic pet food company that boasts that their products are good enough for humans to eat.                        

Messane and the Peppy Pets chief financial officer, Cynthia Jackson, had scheduled a meeting with the president of Wilder Foods for today.  Their company is on the verge of being acquired by the Wilder group, an international conglomerate, but its president informs Jackson that Messane needs to be there in person to sign the papers.  No Messane, no deal.

So after Bruce’s non-appearance at the meeting and because he doesn’t answer his phone, Jackson rushes out of her office to track him down.  She doesn’t know about his murder yet, but she soon will.

The morning following Messane’s death, the wife of the company’s co-founder, veterinarian Rome Bechtold, is abducted.  Now there are two crimes connected to the company, although it’s hard for Detective Nolan to see how they’re related.

Peppy Pets, after a brief period of financial problems, is doing very well, according to Jackson, and that turnaround was due to Messane.  In addition, with the impending takeover by Wilder, Messane, Jackson, and another employee at Peppy Pets were expecting a substantial financial windfall.  So, Nolan wonders, what is the motive for the company president’s death?

Then, despite the kidnappers’ warning not to involve the police, Bechtold reluctantly notifies them, and soon his house is swarming with LAPD officers.  Desperate for a few minutes to himself, Bechtold gets permission from one of the policewomen to take his dog for a walk around the block, but before he realizes what’s happening, the veterinarian is hustled into a passing car and injected with a drug that will put him out of commission while they take him away from his home and the authorities.

Unknown to the president of Wilder Foods, its outside counsel is also having problems.  Monserrat De Leon is becoming disenchanted with her advisory role to the company and is particularly unhappy with its president.  Her job at a prestigious law firm is no longer to her liking, and Wilder’s offer to become general counsel for his firm is less than appealing.  She definitely doesn’t need the money, as her father is a multimillionaire, but she does enjoy the work and the prestige of being the legal counsel for important corporations.   Then she receives two strange messages, one from her  erratic sister and one from her imperious father, and Monserrat needs to decide where her loyalties lay.

P. J. Tracy has written another exciting entry in the Margaret Nolan series, one that looks not only into the crimes committed but into the minds and actions of the people involved.  Margaret Nolan is a very appealing and realistic character, and Ms. Tracy helps bring Los Angeles and its many disparate parts to life.

You can read more about the author at this website.

Check out the complete Marilyn’s Mystery Reads at her website.  In addition to book review posts, there are sections featuring Golden Oldies, Past Masters and Mistresses, and an About Marilyn column that features her opinions about everything to do with mystery novels.