Marilyn's Mystery Reads

Book Reviews

Work, more specifically her work as a detective in the Chicago Police Department, is now the only thing that is giving Harriet Foster’s life any meaning. 

Four years after the senseless murder of her teenaged son, she’s back in court to attend the re-sentencing of Reg’s killer.  At the time of the trial, Willem had been sentenced to ninety-nine years and a day without the possibility of parole, and now his court-appointed attorney wants it reduced to seventy-five years with the possibility of parole.

Harriet starts to speak from her prepared statement, but then she puts it aside and begins to speak from her heart.  She concludes by saying, “Given the same chance, he’d do the same again, and we all know it.”  The reduction in Willem’s sentence is denied, and Harriet’s life, such as it is, continues.

Then the novel switches its focus from Harriet to Marin Shaw on the day of the latter’s release from prison.  Formerly a member of the Chicago city aldermen council, Marin was convicted of corruption and sentenced to three years of imprisonment, her career thrown away for “$5,000, a two-martini lunch, and a lie.”

Her biggest regret is how she left things with her teenaged daughter Zoe.  Her husband Will is making every effort he can to thwart Marin’s attempt to spend time with Zoe and heal their relationship, but Marin is determined to persist.

Her best friend and lawyer, Charlotte Moore, is suggesting that she wait a week before contacting Zoe and that she stay at their downtown condo rather than return to the suburban house she and Will own. Marin reluctantly agrees, saying she will use the time to “settle some things.”  But when Charlotte asks, “What things?,” Marin doesn’t answer.

At the same time, several members of the Chicago aldermen council are reassessing their positions now that Marin has completed her sentence.  Two of them are feeling guilty, knowing they were as involved in the corruption as she was, but John Meehan, the man with the most power, has no feeling of remorse at all.  He simply wants to make certain Marin isn’t planning any kind of tell-all scenario that will implicate him and the others.

“No one walks away.  I know where the bodies are buried…,” he tells his colleagues in his attempt to control them, but regardless of his threat, two of the aldermen do walk out of the meeting.  Then one of those aldermen is killed, and the investigation moves Harriet into the lead on what becomes a media frenzy.

Harriet has an additional concern.  She and Vera Li have been partners for just about a year, ever since the suicide of her former partner and friend Glynnis Thompson.  Needless to say, Harriet was devastated, as was the entire homicide department.  Now Mike, Glynnis’ husband, has come to the police station to show Harriet what was placed in his mailbox two days earlier–a photo of his late wife who appears to be receiving a payoff from an unknown man.

Tracy Clark has written a spellbinding mystery that features a thrilling plot, believable characters, and a protagonist who is smart, tenacious, and above all human.  Foster has faults as well as strengths, and she is working hard to move ahead with her life, shattered as it has become.  Readers will root for her every step of the way.

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.

What’s the best way to describe August Snow?  Is he a vigilante, righting what he sees as wrongs outside the law?  Is he a savior, a protector, when the authorities can’t or won’t step in?  You might say he’s both.

While visiting Norway to spend time with his sweetheart Tatiana, August gets a frantic call from one of his neighbors, Lucy.  Sylvia, another neighbor, has had a heart attack, and in minutes August is on his way home.

He and his godfather Tómas drive directly from the Detroit airport to the hospital where Sylvia is a patient, and as they approach her room a priest exits it.  He nods to August, although the latter doesn’t believe he knows the cleric.

After assuring himself that Sylvia is receiving the best possible care, August visits another close friend, Father Grabowski.  The priest has recently retired, a move that surprises August; he’d always assumed that he would remain a Franciscan until the end of his life.

The two men have a brief conversation, and Snow mentions the man he’d seen outside Sylvia’s hospital room.  He tells  Father Grabowski that he’s learned that the man’s name is Father Petra, and when Grabowski hears the name, his face undergoes a startling change.  He ends the conversation almost immediately, saying he’s tired, but when August leaves and looks up at the priest’s window, he sees that the priest is watching him.

August visits Grabowski again the following day, and the cleric tells Snow the story of his early years in the priesthood when he was sent to Mexico.  It’s an unsavory story of cartel chiefs, drugs, and pedophile priests and young Grabowski’s efforts to handle the situation as best he is able.  Now it appears that the past has returned, and the priest is haunted by it.

August learns from another priest of a recent suicide in his church.  It looks as if Father O’Shannon hanged himself, but it’s possible he was helped, according to August’s friend, medical examiner Bobby Falconi.  There were a couple of anomalies around the body, including a white linen business card left on the church’s altar with an embossed X on it.  What makes it interesting to Snow is that, like Father Grabowski, O’Shannon spent some time in Mexico.  “Dumping grounds,” Snow says quietly.

August’s background as a police officer and the multi-million dollar settlement he won in his lawsuit over his unjust firing has left him with both the ability and the means to live the life he wants, helping people and sometimes dealing out punishments to those he believes are guilty of crimes.  He’s fearless and confident in his ability to do the right thing, especially where his friends are concerned.  Now he wants to learn what led to Father Grabowski leaving his order and his evident fear of Father Petra.

In this, the fourth novel in the August Snow series, Stephen Mack Jones brings the protagonist, his friends, and his community into sharper focus than ever.  Snow’s relationships with his girlfriend Tatiana; his neighbors Sylvia, Carmela, and Lucy; and his godfather Tomás all play pivotal roles in Deus X, and it’s a delight to meet them once again.

Stephen Mack Jones has written another thrilling mystery featuring a tightly-woven plot, a strong and determined protagonist, and a writing style that will make readers shiver with fear and laugh out loud in turn.

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.

I’m fairly certain that Robin Lockwood, the heroine of Phillip Margolin’s latest novel, is the mystery world’s only former MMA contender.  

Now a well-respected criminal defense attorney in Portland, Oregon, Robin put herself through college as a mixed martial arts fighter with a future plan to become an attorney.  She is successful until she fights Mandy Kerrigan, a higher ranked fighter, and was soundly defeated.  At that point she put all her efforts into getting into law school.  Now Mandy has come back into Robin’s life, this time as the suspect in a murder case. 

The Finch family, consisting of a mother, father, and two teenaged children, are shot to death.  They are found by the daughter’s English teacher, Arthur Proctor, who tells the police he came to talk to the family about a potential scholarship for their daughter and ran outside when he saw the carnage and called 911.

Several minutes before Proctor enters the Finch home, a neighbor sees a woman yelling and pounding on their front door.  When no one responds the woman walks away, and now the neighbor identifies her from a photo the police show her as Kerrigan.  The neighbor says she then saw Proctor, the teacher whom she knows from her son’s school, approach the Finches’ front door.  He enters the house, only to run out a few minutes later with his cell phone pressed to his ear.

Despite the typical suburban image that the Finches project, there are serious cracks below the surface.  Margaret Finch is a criminal defense attorney known to represent members of a Russian mob, the father is a chemist with a serious gambling problem, the son Ryan pushes drugs, and the teenaged daughter is carrying a harrowing secret.

To take part in a MMA match that she hopes will revitalize her career, Mandy buys a performance-enhancing drug from Ryan that he swears cannot be detected under testing.  But he is wrong, it is detected, and as a result her purse money is being held up and she’s in danger of being suspended from the league.  The connection between Mandy Kerrigan and Ryan is what makes the police believe she is the killer.

Although Kerrigan denies that she was ever inside the Finch house and there are no physical traces there to implicate her, the police feel they have sufficient circumstantial evidence to bring her to trial.

Mandy calls Robin from jail and asks her to represent her.  She swears she’s innocent, and Robin agrees to take the case.  To make this even more interesting, the prosecutor will be Tom McGee, the first man Robin has dated seriously since the death of her fiancé several years earlier.

Phillip Margolin is a New York Times best-selling author of more than two dozen books, seven featuring Robin Lockwood.  The author has created a protagonist who is believable, a skilled professional, and a warm and caring individual.

You can read more about Phillip Margolin 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.

My first thought when I saw the title of Burt Solomon’s mystery was wait, did I know that Andrew Johnson was murdered?  I knew that he became president after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, that he was not a believer in civil rights for formerly enslaved people, and that he was the first president (and for more than a century, the only president) to be impeached.  But had The Great Commoner been murdered?

The novel is told through the eyes of John Hay, a historical figure who begins his career as a private secretary and assistant to Lincoln.  He’s a journalist at the New-York Tribune who receives a telegram from his editor telling him that former president Johnson, “the most hated man in America,” has died unexpectedly.  Can Hay get to East Tennessee, the home of the Johnson family, and find out what happened?  Of course he can.

Johnson suffered a stroke that paralyzed him and died a day later, surrounded by his family and two physicians.  Seen through John Hay’s eyes, Johnson was perhaps the most unworthy successor possible to Lincoln.  Although he had his good points, including being the only Southern senator who supported the Union, Hay believes those were outweighed by his bad ones.  He was vindictive, never compromised, and remembered every slight against him.  He pardoned the Confederates and restored them to power.  He did everything possible to make certain Reconstruction was a failure, and now he was was dead at age 67.

On the way to the Johnson home, John is picked up by a Black employee of the family.  Although Bill was enslaved by the Johnsons before he was born through his mother, he apparently admired the president.  “Like a member of the family, they treat me,” he tells Hay, and he was with Johnson the night before the latter’s sudden collapse and death.

The former president’s family is a strange one, with at least two of his three adult children financially dependent on him–his daughter Mary Johnson Stover and her husband Daniel, and the Johnsons’ son Frank, who likes a hard drink as much as his father did.  Johnson’s wife, Eliza, is a recluse who has scarcely left her bedroom in years.  There is a great deal of animosity among the grown children, not helped by the fact that the ex-president died without a will.

Then there are two physicians, Dr. Cameron and Dr. Jobe, who cite professional confidentiality regarding the death of their late patient, and Captain McElwee, a former Confederate Army officer who spent time with Johnson shortly before he was taken ill.  And Hay hasn’t even gotten meet to with Johnson’s political enemies, of whom there are many.

Burt Solomon has written an intriguing mystery about a man who is mostly remembered for his impeachment, although, like Bill Clinton and Donald Trump, Johnson remained in office after his trial.  Filled with historical figures including President Ulysses S. Grant, newspaperman and failed presidential candidate Horace Greeley, and Hay’s millionaire father-in-law Amasa Stone, the late 19th-century is vividly brought to life.

In his Afterword, the author states that “my goal is for readers to feel like they’re there.”  He most definitely succeeds.  You can read more about him at this website.

Evelyne Redfern, through no fault of her own, is known in both France and England as “The Parisian Orphan.”  The only child of an ill-fated marriage between a French woman and an English man, she is sent to boarding school in England at the insistence of her father after the death of her beloved mother.

Now she is in London, just as the blitz is beginning.  She is working at an ordnance factory and living in a boardinghouse with her best friend Moira when she’s approached by an old friend of her parents who invites her to a job interview the following morning.

Mr. Fletcher obviously is working for some type of secret government agency, but exactly what its nature is, is never told to Evelyne.  He tells her that he is looking for someone to work in the typing pool at what will become the War Offices, a 1,100 room building that houses Prime Minister Winston Churchill and his extended staff.  But it is not a typing or secretarial job that Fletcher is hiring her for.

Everything she learns and does there is top secret, which is why he has her sign the Official Secrets Act.  He wants her to “monitor” what is going on in the building, and again Fletcher stresses that she must tell no one about her new position or what is expected of her.

Right from the start, Evelyne realizes there is a problem at the War Offices.  Somehow, in spite of all the precautions that are taken, information, some important and some not, is leaking.  The fear is that it’s just a matter of time before something vital falls into the hands of the Nazis.

There is a fascinating cast of characters at the WO.  The head of the typing pool is Miss Wilkes, who runs the pool with an iron hand.  The secretary/typist who gets most of the interesting assignments is Jean Plinkton, who seems to know more about the other workers than she should.  And then there are the various men who help make the policies–Mr. Faylen, who before the war was a neat and punctual man but who has become fussy and disorganized, blaming others for his problems; Mr. Pearson, who is a bit too friendly with all the typists; and Mr. Poole, a rather handsome man with an unknown background.

On Evelyne’s fourth day on the job, Miss Wilkes sends her for her first sun lamp treatment, a requirement because of the amount of time the typists live and work underground.  As Evelyne enters the room where the lamps have been set up, she sees a woman who appears to be asleep, her head resting on one of her arms.  As Evelyne gets closer, she realizes that what she thought to be a red design on the woman’s white sweater is, in fact, blood.  Then she hears the sound of a metal bolt swiping across the room’s door.  She’s locked in with a corpse.

Julia Kelly has written an absorbing mystery about 1940 London, a time when the blitz is beginning, neighborhoods are being destroyed, and the fear of a Nazi invasion is spreading through the population.  In Evelyne Redfern the author has created an engaging, clever, and fearless heroine, one who is perfect for the time she lives in.

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.

Every Walt Longmire novel is a joy to read, and Craig Johnson’s latest, the 19th in the series, is simply perfect.

The long-time sheriff of Absaroka County, Wyoming, is still continuing to think about retirement.  Readers don’t know how old Walt is, but since he served as a marine in the Vietnam conflict, he has to be seventy at the very least, doesn’t he?

In The Longmire Defense, it’s Walt’s incredible determination to find the truth about a long-ago event that brings him closer to death than ever before when he’s faced with the possibility that his deceased grandfather might have been a murderer.

The story begins three-quarters of a century ago when a group of Wyoming investors buy a bank after its failure.  The members of the bank’s board of directors, including Lloyd Longmire, are on a hunting trip when one of its members, Big Bill Sutherland, is accidentally shot to death.  Or so it’s believed at the time.

However, days later another member of the hunting party dies, and a year after that a third member disappears while on a fishing trip, never to be seen again.  Now Walt discovers that these three men plus his grandfather were involved in the handling of a Wyoming monetary fund that is the precursor of the Mineral Trust Fund; its value today is over eight billion dollars.

But it appears that various interested parties don’t want Walt’s inquiry to proceed, even so many decades later.  Lucian Connally, Absaroka County’s former sheriff, is hinting, not so subtly, to leave the case alone, and a man named Mike Regis has been sent from Cheyenne to help Walt “put the fire out,” as he refers to the sheriff’s investigation into the financial dealings of the state.

Then, while he’s out aiding a woman on a mountain road, Walt discovers an abandoned rifle, a .300 H & H Magnum, identical to the one that killed Sutherland years earlier.  It matches the gun in a photo that appears to have been taken the day Big Bill Sutherland was killed, and the weapon is being held by Luke Longmire.

Other things start happening.  A man Walt has asked to do some investigating about Sutherland is critically shot; a very high tech drone, military-style, is flying over the county; a man on a motorcycle is wandering around Walt’s daughter’s house in the middle of the night; and the rear window of Walt’s car is shot out.

Some personal things are going awry as well.  Walt is facing a possible challenge in the next election by one of his deputies, Santiago Saizarbitoria, a hero of the local Basque community.  And Victoria Morelli, another deputy and Walt’s long-time love interest, is missing.

As always, Craig Johnson has written a mystery that brings the reader directly into the heart of Absaroka County and the lives of those who live there.  Once again, meeting the members of the sheriff’s department as well as Walt’s daughter Cady is like catching up with people you’ve known for years, and the author’s gift for dialogue makes you feel that you are listening to actual conversations.

You can read more about Craig Johnson 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.

Newlyweds Mercy Carr and Troy Warner are looking for their first home together, one that is large enough to be comfortable for the two of them and the three others who make up their family–teenager Amy, her toddler daughter Helena, and Amy’s boyfriend Brodie.  Oh, and the couples’ two very large dogs–Elvis, Mercy’s Belgian Malenois, and Sugar Bear, Troy’s Newfoundland.

Mercy gets a call to view a home that has just come on the market.  Grackle Tree Farm had been owned by the famous Vermont poet Euphemia Whitley-Jones, and it consists of thirty acres and a magnificent, if very rundown, Victorian mansion.  Even knowing the enormous amount of work it will take to put the house in livable condition, Mercy and Troy immediately fall in love with it and its surrounding area.

However, a walk-thru with the realtor shows them something they weren’t expecting–a bedroom that was used as a beautiful library–with a dead body on the floor.

The following morning Mercy is awakened by a visit from her great-uncle Hugo Fleury and her sometime employer Daniel Feinberg.  Both men have interesting backgrounds–Hugo, a retired army colonel who now owns and runs a security agency, and Daniel, a billionaire who has hired Mercy to lead investigations on various occasions.

Fleury tells his great-niece that decades earlier he had been stationed in Europe and attended a party at the French estate of Whitley-Jones.  Fleury confirms what Mercy has heard, that everyone who knew the poet loved and admired her.  He tells her that he and Daniel have heard that a letter, a literary treasure in his words, is hidden somewhere inside the house or on the grounds of the Farm.

The two men believe the missive was a love letter, and Mercy tells them she has just learned of the rivalry between Euphemia and her sister Maude over an airman whose body was never recovered.  She has seen a memorial to Captain Michael Emil Robillard on the estate, and Hugo completes the story by telling Mercy that Robillard and Euphemia had been engaged when Robillard and Maude eloped, leaving Euphemia heartbroken.

To make the situation even more complicated, after her husband’s death Maude received his duffle bag with a letter Euphemia had written to him.  Thus the sister who had been the betrayer was now the betrayed.  The sisters never reconciled and left no immediate survivors.

Now that Euphemia and Maude have died, the sale is possible, and there are a number of prospective purchasers for the property, including developers and non-profit organizations as well as protestors who don’t want the property sold at all.  And where does the man who was killed in the house fit into all this?  And what about a possible heir in California, not a direct descent of either sister but a relation of Michael Emil Robillard?

Mercy and Troy are working together to solve the murder and thus purchase the Farm.  Given her military background and his current position as a detective in the Northshire police department, the two definitely have the skills to find the murderer and move into their dream home.  As in her previous books, Paula Munier has written a mystery with engaging characters, a fascinating plot, and a clever twist at the end of the novel.

Paula Munier, in addition to her writing, is a literary agent and a volunteer Natural Resources Steward in New Hampshire.  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.

Rarely has a book’s title been more apt.  Everyone, or nearly everyone, on the Connaught cul-de-sac in the small community of Stanhope has a secret, and some secrets are more deadly than others.

When Nora Blanchard tells William Wooler that she’s breaking off their affair, he’s crushed.  He can’t talk her out of it, and he goes home devastated.  His anger erupts when he sees his nine-year-old daughter Avery in the kitchen, since he knows she’s supposed to be at choir practice.  She tells him she was sent home because of her behavior, which is no surprise to him–Avery’s behavior has always been a major problem at school as well as at home.

Still upset about the end of his relationship with Nora, and enraged at his daughter’s casual dismissal of her uncontrollable behavior, William moves quickly across the kitchen and slaps Avery with such force that she falls to the floor.  Horrified at what he has done, he picks her up, puts her on a chair, and leaves the house.

When Avery’s older brother Michael comes home from his basketball practice, he’s upset to realize that his sister isn’t home.  She’s supposed to wait for him at school so they can walk home together, but he was a few minutes late leaving practice, so when he learned from the choir director that Avery had been dismissed earlier than usual because of her “disruptive” behavior, he expects her to be at their house.  He searches every room, but she’s not there, and finally he calls his mother to tell her that Avery is missing.

That’s when we learn how many people on Connaught Street are lying.  Of course, at first there are William and Nora, neither one anxious to tell their spouses or the police, who arrive quickly at the Wooler home, about how they spent the afternoon.  When one of the detectives asks if anyone saw Avery after she left school, “William can’t find his voice; it’s as if he’s paralyzed.”  And many of the neighbors interviewed are keeping their own secrets for reasons that seem necessary to them.  But nothing is helping to find the missing child.

Then Detective Gully finds the first clue that there’s something strange about Avery’s disappearance.  Erin, Avery’s mother, tells the detective what her daughter was wearing when she left for school that morning, and it includes a dark blue jeans jacket.  But as Gully passes the hall near the front door, she sees a jean jacket hanging on a high hook, much higher than the nine-year-old could possibly have reached to put it there, and she questions the parents about that.  Now, William thinks, they’ll all realize that Avery must have been home after school today.  Still, he says nothing.

Shari Lapena has written a mystery that will strike fear into every parent’s heart.  The agony of Avery’s parents, the guilt that William is experiencing, and the fears of the neighbors, both for and about their own children, are vividly drawn.  The ending, a total surprise and yet perfectly realistic, is outstanding.

Shari Lapena, formerly a lawyer and an English teacher, is the Canadian author of more than twenty books.  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.

It should have been a wonderful, relaxing trip for Captain Jim Agnihotri and his wife, Lady Diana Framji.  After all, they were traveling on HMS Etruria, a luxurious ship in the Cunard line.  Sadly, however, the former cavalry officer, while very much at home on horseback, is not dealing well with the movements of the liner, and he is so seasick on the first night out that he’s perilously close to fall over the railing into the Atlantic Ocean.

Then assistance appears in the person of an elderly man.  He leads Jim to a nearby deck chair, and the two men have a brief conversation.  Although Jim introduces himself, the other man doesn’t reciprocate.  Instead he asks Jim, “Do they return…here?”  Interestingly, Jim knows exactly what his rescuer means–“Do you see the soldiers you lost?”  Agnihotri admits that he does, adding that he also sees the others, men whom he killed in battle.  The unknown man says,”I did my duty.  It was my duty,” and then he walks away.

When Diana comes on deck a few minutes later, Jim relates the encounter, and she tells him she thinks the man must have been the Spanish grandee who came on board with his wife and secretary.  She reminds him of the strange occurrence that took place as the passengers were boarding earlier that day.  A woman was pushing a wheelchair up the gangplank when suddenly she stopped, frozen, while other passengers tried to maneuver around her.  She appeared to be looking at someone she recognized in the line ahead of her and her charge.  She stayed immobilized, until finally she continued on her way onto the liner.

Jim and Diana wonder whom the attendant was looking at.  Could it have been Jim’s mysterious benefactor?

The next afternoon a steward hands him a note, requesting his immediate attendance on Don Juan Nepomuceno, the Spanish grandee, at the nobleman’s cabin.  For some reason the request had not been passed to Jim immediately, so it isn’t until after lunch that he receives it.  As he heads to the promenade level and the Don’s stateroom, a crew member rushes past him, calling for the ship’s doctor.  Jim never gets as far as the stateroom, however, because as he and the physician pass the music room, they see a group of people, including the ship’s captain, in the doorway.  Don Juan Nepomuceno is slumped in a chair, obviously dead.

Captain Hawley is aware that Jim is a detective with the Dupree detective agency in Boston and asks for his assistance in finding the murderer.  He says that otherwise the Etruria will be held at Liverpool while an inquest is conducted, and with nearly a thousand people on board that would be a disaster for the steamship line publicity-wise as well as a major inconvenience for all the passengers and crew members.  So Jim reluctantly agrees to help.

The author’s notes at the end of the mystery fill readers in on the fascinating history behind The Spanish Diplomat’s Secret.  The novel’s characters and plot are extremely believable, and it’s a delight to meet Captain Jim and Lady Diana again.

You can read more about Nev March 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 horrors of the Holocaust and in particular the inhumane experiments of Dr. Josef Mengele make for difficult reading.  But the humanity of those caught in those situations can give us hope, as so eloquently expressed in the words of Anne Frank: “In spite of everything, I still believe that people are good at heart.”

Hugo Fischer, a detective on the Berlin Kriminalpolizei, is sent to Auschwitz in 1943 to investigate the death of Sisimund Braun, a colleague of Dr. Mengele at the camp.  Tristan Voigt, a camp officer, explains that a prisoner has already been arrested for Braun’s murder, but rumors have started about the death and the possibility that the accused is not guilty.  Now the Kommandant wants Fischer to make certain that the man, a nurse working under Braun, confesses.

One of the young prisoners in the camp, Gioele Errera, is an adventurous child.  He and his brother Gabriele, along with other twins, were separated by Mengele when they arrived at Auschwitz and given preferential treatment; they didn’t know or understand the doctor’s plans that would end in the death of all the twins at the camp.  Gabriele has been transferred to the infirmary, the boys’ parents are in Birkenau, the section of Auschwitz with the gas chambers, and Gioele is alone.

Gioele, very talented artistically, was quietly wandering the halls of the medical building when he comes across the corpse of Dr. Braun.  He draws several pictures of the dead doctor and his office, and when he meets Fischer he offers him the pictures provided that the detective search Birkenau for his parents.

There are certainly a number of people with motives to kill Braun.  Among them are the women at the camp he raped, his wife, her lover, and several of his colleagues.  Although the unofficial cause of the doctor’s death is that he choked to death on an apple, Fischer isn’t convinced that that was truly the cause, and Braun’s wife doesn’t want an autopsy done.

Hugo has heard rumors about the camp, but the reality of it is beyond his worst imaginings.  Immediately upon his arrival he witnesses the casual shooting of a young mother and the stomping to death of her infant, while around him the Jews arriving in the trains are herded to the “showers.”  He is told by Obersturmführer Tristan Voigt that “Every now and then these accidents do happen,” and although Hugo witnessed thousands of Jews board trains, with yellow stars pinned to their clothing, he hadn’t seen where the trains stopped.  Until now.

In addition to the stress of the investigation, Fischer is also dealing with severe post-polio syndrome symptoms.  He has to pretend that his pain and his limp are caused by war injuries, because any kind of physical or mental illnesses is viewed as a burden on the state and often results in the sterilization or execution of the disabled person.  He is forced to take his medication in private, but his symptoms are getting worse.

Oriana Ramunno tells readers in the Author’s Note that her great-uncle had been in the Flossenbürg concentration camp and that it was hearing his story that compelled her to write Ashes in the Snow many years later.  Her articulate and beautifully expressive, novel, I am certain, would have made him proud.

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.

Red Queen, the first mystery in the trilogy by Spanish author Juan Gómez-Jurado, is an outstanding combination of thriller and police procedural.  Its two protagonists, polymath Antonia Scott and Inspector Jon Gutiérrez of the Bilbao police could not be more different, but it is their very differences that make them a most formidable team.

Antonia Scott has hidden herself from the world following a tragic event that left her beloved husband in a coma three years ago.  As the novel progresses, readers will learn that what happened to Marcos was in no way her fault, but nevertheless she blames herself. 

Jon Gutiérrez is dealing with his own trauma, but this one is on him.  Attempting to rescue a teenage prostitute from her abusive pimp, he decides to put heroin in the pimp’s car and have him arrested.  However, as no good deed goes unpunished, he foolishly tells the young woman what he plans to do, not realizing that Desi is still in love with the man.  Desi and her procurer arrange for Gutiérrez to be filmed on her cell phone while he plants the drugs; now Jon has been suspended and is facing criminal charges.

A man calling himself Mentor offers Jon a prid pro quo option, Jon takes him up on it, and the video is removed from television stations and video sites.  The next step, which if successful would allow Jon to return to the police force, is up to him.  He must get Antonia, whom he’s never met, to go with him to Mentor.

When Jon first visits Antonia, she wants nothing to do with whatever it is that Mentor wants her to do.  She’s dealt with him before and is done with him.  Then she has a change of heart, and she and the inspector go to the mansion where Mentor is.  There a horrific scene awaits them.  The body of a teenager is arranged on the living room couch, dressed in a white shirt and pants, but his body is nearly transparent.  He has bled to death.

The combination of Antonia’s gifts in language, technology, and mathematics and Jon’s investigative ability are the reasons that Mentor has chosen them to solve this crime.  The young boy was the son of the head of a major Spanish bank, and his family is cooperating, almost completely, with the police.

At the same time, Carla Ortiz, the daughter of the world’s wealthiest man, is on her way to an equestrian meet with her beloved mare Maggie.  Her automobile, an enormous Porsche Cayenne, is stopped on a back road, her driver is killed, and she’s abducted and imprisoned.

How are these two crimes, one the murder of a teenager from a millionaire’s family, the other the kidnapping of the daughter of a billionaire’s family, related?  And why is neither family willing to be completely open to the police about the ransoms demanded, which they are not willing to pay?

Red Queen is a fascinating mystery that brings the reader into the Basque part of Spain.  Learning why Antonia has removed herself from the world and how Jon has armored himself against the homosexual slurs and prejudices of his colleagues is a major part of the appeal of this outstanding novel.

You can read about Juan Gómez-Jurado 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.

One of the most shameful episodes in American history is brought to life in the mystery Clark and Division.  Naomi Hirahara has taken the stories of the internment of thousands of Japanese-born and native-born Americans of Japanese ancestry following the Pearl Harbor attack and brilliantly woven it into a novel that will touch readers’ hearts as well as keep them guessing until the last page.

The Ito family has just been released from Manzanar, a “War Relocation Center” established by the United States government to house Japanese living in the States who are not eligible for citizenship.  Rose and Aki are teenagers born in the United States (Nisei) and are eligible for citizenship, but their parents, born in Japan (Issei), aren’t, so the entire family is sent to the center in 1942.

As the novel opens, Aki and her parents are set to join Rose in Chicago, where the War Relocation Authority has sent her, along with other Nisei, to help convince the public that Japanese born in America are loyal to the United States and not to the Empire of Japan.

When the three Itos arrive at Union Station, they’re surprised that Rose is not among the people waiting to greet them.  In the midst of the crowd is a young man they know from Manzanar.  He tells them, “There was an accident at the subway station last night,” and Aki immediately realizes that her beloved sister is dead.

At the coroner’s office the following morning, Aki is dealt a further blow.  She is told that Rose’s death was not an accident but suicide and that she recently had had an abortion.  Aki is devastated by the fact that her sister had had to go through the abortion alone, and she doesn’t believe she would have killed herself the day before her family was arriving in Chicago.  She determines to find out what really happened to Rose.

The book’s title refers to the subway station where Rose’s body was found, and it’s also Aki’s launching point in her investigation into her sister’s death.  Aki is fearless, traveling alone around the metropolitan area, talking to the police, fellow members of the established Japanese community, and recent Japanese arrivals from other internment camps to discover the truth.  She hears pieces of Rose’s story from members of each group, but it’s up to her to put them together to solve the mystery of her sister’s death.

Clark and Division is a fascinating and disturbing look into what was happening in the United States during World War II, the prejudices its government and its citizens held against the Japanese after Pearl Harbor, and the retaliation against immigrant and native-born Japanese alike.

Naomi Hirahara is the author of many novels, short stories, and biographies, and was formerly the editor of the Rafu Shimpo newspaper.  She also is the recipient of numerous awards, including the Edgar for the third mystery in her Mas Arai series, Snakeskin Shamishen.  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.

The disappearance of fifteen-year-old Lára Marteinsdóttir is a crime that remained unsolved for thirty years.  Fiercely independent, Lára persuaded her parents to let her take a summer job on the island of Videy, off the coast of Reykjavík.  Her cousin had worked there the previous summer at a cottage owned by Ólöf Blödal and her husband, Óttar Óskarsson, and she had had a good time.

At the time the novel opens in 1956, there are very few violent crimes and almost no murders in Iceland.  Thus when Lára didn’t call her parents at the usual time, they were at first only slightly concerned, but as the days went by they became worried, then frantic.  A young policeman, Kristján Kristjánsson, is sent to Videy to look around, but it’s obvious that the teenager isn’t there.

Óttar tells Kristján that Lára had told them, not long after she arrived, that she wanted to go home.  Although he and his wife were annoyed at her abrupt departure, he tells the police officer, they didn’t try to stop her, and so she took her luggage and headed for the harbor.

A phone call from Kristján’s supervisor while he’s at the cottage is a not-so-discreet reminder of the couple’s high status in Iceland.  Kristjánsson is told that they are not to be bothered any further, and the policeman leaves the island without any more information about Lára’s whereabouts.  He’s uneasy, but it’s been taken out of his hands.

And that’s the situation three decades later, in 1986.  As sometimes happens, however, various seemingly unrelated things come into play to bring about the solution to Iceland’s longest-running mystery.

Valur Róbertsson is a young journalist on the staff of the tabloid Vikubladid.  He has persuaded its editor, Dagbjartur Steinsson, to write a series of articles about Lára, her life and her disappearance.  Dagbjartur is reluctant at first but is won over when the first issue featuring a front page story about the missing teenager is the best-selling issue in the paper’s history, and the two subsequent issues sell out even more quickly.  Now Valur needs to finish the series with a big splash, the editor informs him.

Then Valur gets a phone call at work from a woman who won’t leave her name, and he can tell she’s calling from a phone booth to make certain she remains anonymous.  “It’s been a long time and the girl deserves better.”  She says she knows that Lára is dead, not missing, and it doesn’t matter how she knows.  “I just know she was killed.”  She says she’ll contact him again, then hangs up.

What brings about the beginning of the solution to Lára’s disappearance is the death of a man whose name was never even mentioned in connection with the missing girl.  When Finnur Stephensen, a wealthy businessman, lays dying in a Reykjávik hospital, his last words to his wife Thórdís are “Videy.  You have to go to Videy.”  Then he dies.

In their first collaboration, Ragnar Jónasson, the author of more than one dozen novels, and Katrín Jakobsdóttir, the prime minister of Iceland, have created a spellbinding mystery.  Their characters are alive, the plot keeps moving at a rapid pace, and the descriptions of Reykjavík and Icelandic society from 1956 to 1986 are wonderfully drawn.  Even though the novel begins nearly three-quarters of a century ago, the disappearance of a teenage girl is, unfortunately, as timely now as it was then.

You can read more about Ragnar Jónasson at this website and Katrín Jacobsdóttir at various sites on the internet.

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.

Returning to Ohio’s Amish Country is always a pleasure because it means spending time with Kate Burkholder, the Painters Mills Chief of Police.   Just days away from her wedding to John Thomasetti, himself a police detective for the state, Kate is called to investigate a particularly brutal death.

Aden Karn, a young Amish man, is riding his bicycle on his way to work, admiring the beauty of the countryside, when he’s struck by a bolt from a crossbow.  It has gone completely through him, sticking out of his back.  Then the killer stands over him, a second bolt is placed in his mouth, and his life is over.

When Kate goes to Karn’s parents and his girlfriend Emily to give them the sad news, they are unbelieving.  According to them and to Emily’s mother as well, Aden was funny, charming, never argued with anyone.  So why was he killed, and in such a barbaric way?

As the investigation progresses, however, certain things seem to point to another side of Aden.  He and his housemate, Wayne Graber, sold a reconditioned truck to one of the local toughs.  When the truck stopped working, Vernon Fisher demanded his down payment back, but Aden refused to return it.  Vernon, in turn, refused to pay the remainder of the price for the non-working truck, so Aden and Wayne went to Vernon’s house in the middle of the night and repossessed it.  Not unexpectedly, feelings ran high between the two men, but Vernon denies owning a crossbow or having any involvement in the death.

In addition, Kate is hearing disquieting stories about Aden and young women in the area. The Amish lead a restricted life until their mid or late teens, at which point many take advantage of rumspringa, literally “running around.”  During rumspringa they can drink, smoke, drive cars, use electricity, even have sexual relations, all of which are forbidden to the adults in the community.  It is hoped that after being a part of the non-Amish world for a period of time, the young people will realize the importance of the Amish way of life and return to it, and approximately ninety percent do.  But, of course, that leaves another ten percent who decide they prefer the alternative way.

Is this what caused Aden Karn’s death?  Did he become too fond of all the “English” things that are normally banned by the Amish?  The more deeply Kate looks into his life during his period of rumspringa, the more possible motives she discovers.

Linda Castillo has written another excellent novel in the Kate Burkholder series.  The novel’s plot is believable, Kate and John are wonderful characters, and the Amish and “English” communities both come alive in An Evil Heart.  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.

For Detective Inspector Matthew Venn, going home is always difficult.  Greystone is close enough to where he grew up to bring back unhappy memories.  It’s where his parents belonged to the ultra-conservative Barum Brethren, an evangelical Christian group in Scotland he left when he was eighteen.

But, of course, Matt must go where his job leads him, and now it’s to the small village where the naked body of famous adventurer Jem Rosco was found.  Rosco had grown up in Greystone, but since he became a world-wide celebrity, known for sailing around the world solo, trekking to the North and South Poles, and walking up the Amazon, he hadn’t returned.

Then, suddenly, a few weeks before his death, he walked into the local pub, the Maiden’s Prayer, had two pints and left.  But he returned every night after that, saying in response to questions, “I’m here to meet someone….I’m expecting them any day.”

It’s a strange case, Matt thinks.  The lack of blood in the small dinghy in which he was found shows he wasn’t murdered there, so why did the murderer send out a Mayday call to make certain the body was discovered?

Those living in Greystone rarely leave and move to other places, so there are still many people who knew Rosco when he was a small child and then a schoolboy.  They all have a story or an opinion to share with Venn and his team:  Mary Ford, who wrote numerous fan letters to him when she was a teenager and he was already famous; Mary’s father Alan, desperate for funding to send his grandson to the United States for medical treatment that he believes will save the boy’s life; Sammy Barton, who says Jem had a reputation as a “bit of a cocky bastard” even as a teenager; Davy Gregory, part-time taxi driver who picked Jem up at the railway station and brought him to Greystone and whose father was forced to sell the cottage where Jem had been staying; Barty Lawson, commodore of the town’s sailing club who describes the deceased as an “irritating oik” who never quite fit in; Eleanor Lawson, the woman Rosco named his first boat after; and his former wife Selina, who describes him as “a charmer” who believed all his own fantasies.

There is a strong sense of claustrophobia in The Raging Storm.  Some of that is due to the smallness and isolation of the village, and some is due to the hurricane-like storm that is cutting Greystone off from nearby towns.  There is also a sense of an almost inbred community, where families have lived for generations, doing the same work their parents and grandparents did, as well as the overwhelming influence and moral values of the Brethren.  It’s a mix that doesn’t bode well for Matt and his fellow investigators.

Ann Cleeves is a truly gifted storyteller, whether she is writing about Chief Inspector Vera Stanhope, Detective Inspector Jimmy Perez, or Detective Inspector Matthew Venn.  All three series featuring these protagonists have been adapted for television.  Her characters are true-to-life, her plots are believable, and her settings take readers right to the place where the action is.

You can read more about her about her at this website.