Fiction Review

Saturday tea at The Poisoned Pen is special, a time to listen to authors, have books signed, and enjoy the tea and baked goods by John Charles. It’s 2 PM this Saturday, June 8.

This Saturday, tea is with Jennifer Ashley, Kate Carlisle, and Lauren
Willig.

Ashley, Jennifer. Death in Kew Gardens (Berkley $15 June 8). This is a truly terrific Upstairs/Downstairs Victorian London mystery with evil housekeepers, a surprisingly stalwart butler, the murder of Sir Jacob-a mad collector of all things Chinese including plants, visits to Kew
Gardens, a Chinese gentlemen on a quest, and wonderful depictions of the meals prepared by Kat Holloway, the cook.  The third in the Death
Below Stairs series begins when Kat Holloway bowls over a Chinese
dressed in gorgeous but dirty silk while on her way home from market.Later that night when she steps out to share leftovers among the poor down the street, he appears and presents her with a beautiful box filledwith tea. Two days later when the kitchen erupts with the news that
Lady Cynthia’s next-door neighbor has been murdered. Known about
London as an “Old China Hand,” Sir Jacob claimed to be an expert in
the language and customs of China, acting as intermediary for
merchants and government officials. He also had a passion for plants
and frequented Kew Gardens. But Sir Jacob’s dealings were not what
they seemed, and when the authorities accuse Mr. Li of the crime, Kat,
the household, and her interesting friend Daniel find themselves
embroiled in a world of deadly secrets that reach from the gilded
homes of Mayfair to the beautiful wonder of the gardens. Read the
whole series

Carlisle, Kate. The Book Supremacy (Berkley $25 June 8). Here is lucky #13 in the Bibliophile Series. Newlyweds Brooklyn and Derek are enjoying the final days of their honeymoon in Paris. As they’re browsing the book stalls along the Seine, Brooklyn finds the perfect gift for Derek, a first edition James Bond novel, The Spy Who Loved Me. When they bump into Ned, an old friend from Derek’s spy days, Brooklyn shows him her latest treasure. Once they’re back home in San Francisco, they visit a spy shop Ned mentioned. The owner begs them to let him display the book Brooklyn found in Paris as part of the shop’s first anniversary celebration. Before they agree, Derek makes sure the security is up to snuff-turns out, the unassuming book is worth a great deal more than sentimental value. Soon after, Derek is dismayed when he receives a mysterious letter from Paris announcing Ned’s death. Then late one night, someone is killed inside the spy shop. Are the murders connected to Brooklyn’s rare, pricey book?

Willig, Lauren. The Summer Country (Harper $26.99 June 8). Willig has written many sorts of books, all rooted in history-she’s a meticulous researcher. She has outdone herself with a book she describes as her “full out M. M. Kaye” (one of my favorite authors who did the British Empire well). It takes you to Barbados where English sugar barons and local planters wrested fortunes from the cane and their slaves. She bookends her two-track tale with the fiery rebellion of 1816 on the island and the lead up to it from 1812, and with the cholera epidemic that struck in 1854. I learned so much from both (excellent Appendix with sources) along with following the absorbing narrative. It opens in 1854: Emily Dawson has always been the poor cousin in a prosperous English merchant clan-merely a vicar’s daughter, and a reform-minded vicar’s daughter, at that. Everyone knows that the family’s lucrative shipping business will go to her cousin, Adam, one day. But when her grandfather dies, Emily receives an unexpected inheritance: Peverills, a sugar plantation in Barbados-a plantation her grandfather never told anyone he owned. When Emily accompanies her cousin and his new wife to Barbados, she finds Peverills a burnt-out shell, reduced to ruins in 1816, when a rising of enslaved people sent the island up in flames. Rumors swirl around the derelict plantation; people whisper of ghosts. Why would her practical-minded grandfather leave her a property in ruins? Why are the neighboring plantation owners, the Davenants, so eager to acquire Peverills? As we zigzag from one set of characters to the other, we find out. This excellent standalone is not truly mystery but is so rich, moving, and relevant to today that it is our June Historical Book of the Month.

*****

If you can’t make it on Saturday, you can still order a signed copy of any or all of the books through the Web Store. https://store.poisonedpen.com

The current Hot Book of the Week at The Poisoned Pen is poet Ocean Vuong’s debut novel, On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous. There are signed copies of the novel available through the Web Store. https://bit.ly/2KAke2v

Here’s the description of On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous.

Named one of the most anticipated books of 2019 by Vulture, Entertainment Weekly, Buzzfeed, Los Angeles Times, Boston Globe, Oprah.com, Huffington Post, The A.V. Club, Nylon, The Week, The Rumpus, The Millions, The Guardian, Publishers Weekly, and more.

“A lyrical work of self-discovery that’s shockingly intimate and insistently universal…Not so much briefly gorgeous as permanently stunning.” —Ron Charles, The Washington Post

Poet Ocean Vuong’s debut novel is a shattering portrait of a family, a first love, and the redemptive power of storytelling

On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous is a letter from a son to a mother who cannot read. Written when the speaker, Little Dog, is in his late twenties, the letter unearths a family’s history that began before he was born — a history whose epicenter is rooted in Vietnam — and serves as a doorway into parts of his life his mother has never known, all of it leading to an unforgettable revelation. At once a witness to the fraught yet undeniable love between a single mother and her son, it is also a brutally honest exploration of race, class, and masculinity. Asking questions central to our American moment, immersed as we are in addiction, violence, and trauma, but undergirded by compassion and tenderness, On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous is as much about the power of telling one’s own story as it is about the obliterating silence of not being heard. 

With stunning urgency and grace, Ocean Vuong writes of people caught between disparate worlds, and asks how we heal and rescue one another without forsaking who we are. The question of how to survive, and how to make of it a kind of joy, powers the most important debut novel of many years.

On Thursday, June 6 at 7 PM, author Robin Burcell hosts David Ricciardi, author of Rogue Strike and Matt Goldman, author of The Shallows. Copies of both books are available through the Web Store. https://store.poisonedpen.com

However, today it’s Robin Burcell’s book that I would like to mention. Burcell is Clive Cussler’s co-author of The Oracle, the eleventh Sam and Remi Fargo adventure. Release date is June 11, and it’s available for pre-order. https://bit.ly/2WhpwlG

Here is the recent review of The Oracle, published in Publishers Weekly.

“In the prologue of bestseller Cussler’s exceptional 11th Sam and Remi Fargo adventure (after 2018’s The Gray Ghost, also coauthored with Burcell), Gelimer, the king of the Vandals, consults an oracle in a North African town in 533 C.E. Gelimer must retrieve a stolen scroll and return it to its rightful owner if his kingdom is to survive. The kingdom falls before he can find the scroll, whose location remains a mystery until the present day, when some clues turn up in an archaeological dig sponsored by Sam and Remi’s foundation. Meanwhile, the theft of a shipment of supplies to the girls’ school the Fargos support in Nigeria prompts the couple to travel from California to Africa to deliver replacement supplies. The subsequent kidnapping of Remi and some of the school girls by robbers appears to be related to the missing scroll. Witty dialogue, loads of detail about the local culture and food, and plenty of red herrings will delight Cussler fans. This entry may be the best yet in the series.”

The current Hot Book of the Week at The Poisoned Pen is Juliet Grames’ The Seven or Eight Deaths of Stella Fortuna. But, there are several fun facts you might want to know before diving into the blog. This is Juliet Grames’ debut novel, but she’s an editor for Soho Press, owned by Random House. Francine Mathews, an author at Random House, interviewed Grames for the event at the Pen. As Barabara Peters, owner of the bookstore, said, tables are turned, and an author gets to grill an editor. And, you can watch the program.

Signed copies of this Hot Book of the Week, The Seven or Eight Deaths of Stella Fortuna, are available through the Web Store. https://tinyurl.com/y4cusuq7

Here’s the description of the debut novel.

From Calabria to Connecticut: a sweeping family saga about sisterhood, secrets, Italian immigration, the American dream, and one woman’s tenacious fight against her own fate

For Stella Fortuna, death has always been a part of life. Stella’s childhood is full of strange, life-threatening incidents—moments where ordinary situations like cooking eggplant or feeding the pigs inexplicably take lethal turns. Even Stella’s own mother is convinced that her daughter is cursed or haunted.

In her rugged Italian village, Stella is considered an oddity—beautiful and smart, insolent and cold. Stella uses her peculiar toughness to protect her slower, plainer baby sister Tina from life’s harshest realities. But she also provokes the ire of her father Antonio: a man who demands subservience from women and whose greatest gift to his family is his absence.

When the Fortunas emigrate to America on the cusp of World War II, Stella and Tina must come of age side-by-side in a hostile new world with strict expectations for each of them. Soon Stella learns that her survival is worthless without the one thing her family will deny her at any cost: her independence.

In present-day Connecticut, one family member tells this heartrending story, determined to understand the persisting rift between the now-elderly Stella and Tina. A richly told debut, The Seven or Eight Deaths of Stella Fortuna is a tale of family transgressions as ancient and twisted as the olive branch that could heal them.

“Witty and deeply felt.” —Entertainment Weekly (New and Notable)

“The Seven or Eight Deaths of Stella Fortuna achieves what no sweeping history lesson about American immigrants could: It brings to life a woman that time and history would have ignored.” —Washington Post

*****

Now, Barbara Peters and Francine Mathews will introduce you to Juliet Grames, author of The Seven or Eight Deaths of Stella Fortuna.

Because Thomas Harris’ Cari Mora has been the Hot Book of the Week for a while, I wanted to point out an article you might have missed. Alexandra Alter interviewed Harris for The New York Times several weeks ago. He hadn’t given “a substantial interview” since the 1970s. If you missed it, you can find it here. https://nyti.ms/2Vux83P

You can order a copy of Cari Mora through the Web Store. https://bit.ly/2Wqkpnb

Here’s the description of the book.

From the creator of Hannibal Lecter and The Silence of the Lambs comes a story of evil, greed, and the consequences of dark obsession.

Twenty-five million dollars in cartel gold lies hidden beneath a mansion on the Miami Beach waterfront. Ruthless men have tracked it for years. Leading the pack is Hans-Peter Schneider. Driven by unspeakable appetites, he makes a living fleshing out the violent fantasies of other, richer men. 

Cari Mora, caretaker of the house, has escaped from the violence in her native country. She stays in Miami on a wobbly Temporary Protected Status, subject to the iron whim of ICE. She works at many jobs to survive. Beautiful, marked by war, Cari catches the eye of Hans-Peter as he closes in on the treasure. But Cari Mora has surprising skills, and her will to survive has been tested before.

Monsters lurk in the crevices between male desire and female survival. No other writer in the last century has conjured those monsters with more terrifying brilliance than Thomas Harris. Cari Mora, his sixth novel, is the long-awaited return of an American master.

Somehow, I missed the conversation between Anne Perry and Poisoned Pen bookstore owner Barbara Peters on the eve of publication of Triple Jeopardy. Triple Jeopardy is the second Daniel Pitt mystery. Signed copies of that book, and copies of Perry’s other books are available through the Web Store. https://bit.ly/2DEi5ju

Here’s the summary of Triple Jeopardy.

Young lawyer Daniel Pitt must defend a British diplomat accused of a theft that may cover up a deadly crime in this riveting novel from the New York Times bestselling author of Twenty-one Days.

Daniel Pitt, along with his parents, Charlotte and Thomas, is delighted that his sister, Jemima, and her family have returned to London from the States for a visit. But the Pitts soon learn of a harrowing incident: In Washington, D.C., one of Jemima’s good friends has been assaulted and her treasured necklace stolen. The perpetrator appears to be a man named Philip Sidney, a British diplomat stationed in America’s capital who, in a cowardly move, has fled to London, claiming diplomatic immunity. But that claim doesn’t cover his other crimes. . . .

When Sidney winds up in court on a separate charge of embezzlement, it falls to Daniel to defend him. Daniel plans to provide only a competent enough defense to avoid a mistrial, allowing the prosecution to put his client away. But when word travels across the pond that an employee of the British embassy in Washington has been found dead, Daniel grows suspicious about Sidney’s alleged crimes and puts on his detective hat to search for evidence in what has blown up into an international affair.

As the embezzlement scandal heats up, Daniel takes his questions to intrepid scientist Miriam fford Croft, who brilliantly uses the most up-to-date technologies to follow an entirely new path of investigation. Daniel and Miriam travel to the Channel Islands to chase a fresh lead, and what began with a stolen necklace turns out to have implications in three far greater crimes—a triple jeopardy, including possible murder.

Advance praise for Triple Jeopardy

“Readers may find themselves smitten with Daniel and with the dauntless Miriam fforde Croft, whose relationship with Daniel deepens in this episode. . . . Primarily identified for her authentic period sets and well-rendered characters, Perry writes in what she has called the “˜Put Your Heart on the Page’ method, with the focus placed squarely on what happens to people under the pressure of investigation. This book is an excellent example of her craft.”—Booklist

“Veteran Perry dials back the period detail and the updates on the lives of the continuing characters to focus on one of her most teasing mysteries, this time with a courtroom finale that may be her strongest ever.”—Kirkus 

*****

There will always be discussions of history and legal matters when Anne Perry and Barbara Peters get together. You can enjoy it through the video.

Becky Masterman, author of the Brigid Quinn mysteries, will be appearing at The Poisoned Pen on Sunday, June 2 at 2 PM. She’ll be signing the fourth book in the series, We Were Killers Once, and she has quite a story to tell. Once you read Masterman’s comments, and watch the video, I think you’ll want to check out the Web Store for her books. https://bit.ly/2HB0hGz

Here’s Becky Masterman’s letter, the story behind We Were Killers Once.

We Were Killers Once is the fourth book in my series which began with Rage Against the Dying.  In the series, Brigid Quinn is a former FBI special agent now trying to fit into retired life in a small town just outside of Tucson, Arizona.  Trying to figure out how to be normal, how to be married, trying to cook, trying to keep her neighbors from finding out she can still kill a man with her bare hands.  The series has been nominated for a lot of awards, praised by Janet Maslin of the NYT, as well as by NPR and even the AARP.

I’m writing to you personally this time because I’ve never been more excited by a story.  Here’s why:

In late 1959 the Clutter family, mother, father, and teenage children, were killed in particularly bloody fashion in a small town in Kansas, two in their beds, two in the basement.  

A couple of months later, it happened again.  This time to a family named Walker in a small town on the west coast of Florida.  A mother, father, and two children under the age of six, were shot in their living room near the Christmas tree.

Richard Eugene Hickock and Perry Smith, two petty felons, were convicted of the first mass murder.  It was a story of such enduring fascination that a documentary aired as late as 2018, though the crime was initially made famous by Truman Capote in a novel called In Cold Blood. He called the book “˜immaculately factual.’

Except that everyone now knows it wasn’t.

Though Smith and Hickock were passing through the small town in Florida at the time of the Walker murders, Capote gives that crime a scant few paragraphs.  A few interviews, a polygraph test, and that was that. Like Capote, the FBI and Kansas Bureau of Investigation weren’t so interested either. The case is still unsolved.

Who killed the Walker family?  What motivated Smith to confess to two of the Kansas murders and then later revise his confession to take responsibility for the entire Clutter family?  Why did Hickock, in a clemency hearing, state that they took more than a thousand dollars from the Clutter house, and not the forty dollars that’s in the original confession and Capote’s account?   Who was the “˜hitchhiking boy’ and why does Smith dwell on him in the story?

Unanswered questions and discrepancies like these abound among Capote’s story, police reports, several confessions, at least two unpublished manuscripts, and more than a thousand prison documents from the time Hickock and Smith spent on death row.

That brings us to the what-if that authors do, weaving fact and fiction into a narrative puzzle, highlighted with themes of marital jealousy and whether even monsters can change.  

What if, in We Were Killers Once, the nameless “˜hitchhiking boy’ that Smith described to Capote traveled with the two men around the country?  What if he’s still alive and he’s coming for Brigid Quinn’s beloved husband for reasons known only to himself?

If so, he has no idea what’s in store for him.  Because Brigid was a killer once, too.

*****

Here’s the book trailer for We Were Killers Once.

Bill Eddy was recently at The Poisoned Pen to discuss his latest book, Why We Elect Narcissists and Sociopaths. Although he’s been talking about high-conflict personalities for years, but this book is about politics. Eddy’s books, including signed copies of this one, are available through the Web Store. https://bit.ly/30MqBVZ

Here’s the description of Why We Elect Narcissists and Sociopaths and How We Can Stop!

Bestselling author, therapist, lawyer, and mediator Bill Eddy describes how dangerous, high-conflict personalities have gained power in governments worldwide–and what citizens can do to keep these people out of office.

Democracy is under siege. The reason isn’t politics but personalities: too many countries have come under the sway of high-conflict people (HCPs) who have become politicians. Most of these high-conflict politicians have traits of narcissistic personality disorder, antisocial (i.e., sociopathic) personality disorder, or both. This is the first and only guide for identifying and thwarting them. 

HCPs don’t avoid conflict, they thrive on it, widening social divisions and exacerbating international tensions. Eddy, the world’s leading authority on high-conflict personalities, explains why they’re so seductive and describes the telltale traits that define HCPs–he even includes a helpful list of forty typical HCP behaviors.

Drawing on historical examples from Hitler, Stalin, Mao, and Nixon to Trump, Maduro, and Putin, Eddy shows how HCPs invent enemies and manufacture phony crises so they can portray themselves as the sole heroic figure who can deal with them, despite their inability to actually solve problems. He describes the best ways to expose HCPs as the charlatans they are, reply to their empty and misleading promises, and find genuine leaders to support. Eddy brings his deep psychotherapeutic experience to bear on a previously unidentified phenomena that presents a real threat to the world.

*****

You can learn more about the topic and the book through the video.

Now is the time to sign up for creative writing classes and workshops at ASU Virginia G. Piper Center for Creative Writing.

Summer Classes and Workshops Featuring creative writing classes and workshops in fiction, poetry, social justice, spiritual writing and more with Todd Mitchell, Justin Noga, Stella Pope Duarte, Erin Noehre, Laura Maher, Mark Athitakis, and Saretta Morgan (some of which are free) Classes start as low as $99. All classes are not-for-credit, and are intended for and open to the public. Writers of all genres, backgrounds, and experience levels are welcome to attend. Don’t forget! Fellowships for the 2020 Desert Nights, Rising Stars Writers Conference close June 15.   Scroll down to learn more  or visit our website at piper.asu.edu/classes

Find a Class

Wild Transformations: Compelling Narratives with Todd Mitchell Saturday, May 18 Fiction WorkshopFictioneering the Non-Fictiony: Writing Games with Justin Noga Saturday, June 1 Free WorkshopWe Cannot Look Away: Social Conscience with Stella Pope Duarte Saturday, June 15 Mixed Genre Workshop

Writing Toward the Boundaries of Grief and God with Erin Noehre Tuesdays, June 18 – 25 Free Epistolary WorkshopConsider the Body: The Poetics of Disease and Health with Laura Maher Saturday, July 20 Poetry Workshop

Built Environments: Formal Innovation with Saretta Morgan Tuesdays, July 23 – Aug 13 Cross-genre Writing StudioBuilding a Freelance Writing Career with Mark Athitakis Saturday, April 3 Business of Writing

Keep reading to learn more about each class or visit our website at piper.asu.edu/classes

Find a Class

Wild Transformations: Vital Secrets for Creating Compelling Narratives with Todd Mitchell Date: Saturday, May 18, 2019, 10:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. Types: Generative Workshop, Workshop Genre & Form: Fiction, Novels, Short Stories Cost: $119 Regular, $99 StudentLearn More & RegisterAbout the Class Looking to create a story or character that leaves your reader wanting more? Learn the necessities of constructing compelling narratives with author and educator, Todd Mitchell. In this interactive workshop, participants will explore effective techniques for increasing conflict, revealing characters, and writing stories that readers (and editors) won’t be able to put down. Tip sheets and worksheets will be included so you can immediately apply concepts and get feedback during the session. By the end, participants will have a greater understanding of how to structure narratives to engage readers while using plot to explore and reveal characters.

Fictioneering the Non-Fictiony: Experimental Writing Games with Justin Noga Date: Saturday, June 1, 2019, 10:00 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. Types: Generative Workshop Genre & Form: Fiction, Flash, Memoir, Novels, Short Stories Cost: FreeLearn More & RegisterAbout the Class Your falling-out with a best friend from childhood. Your family’s buffoonery in a public setting. Your perceptions of sex last year, ten years back, twenty years back. These are all gems of our lives that, with a little snip or suture, can become springboards for fictions with real resonance. In this generative short workshop, we will use a series of experimental and collaborative writing games to mine out moments from our own lives—half-remembered or not—which we will bend and stretch and snap and reshape into fictions wholly their own. By allowing ourselves to shift these realities, we can harness the emotional energies of those old memories, and breathe new life into them.

We Cannot Look Away: Exploring a Social Conscience with Stella Pope Duarte Date: Saturday, June 15, 2019, 9:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. Types: Generative Workshop, Workshop Genre & Form: Human Rights, Mixed Genre, Research,  Social Practice, Therapeutic Practice, Women’s Studies Cost: $119 Regular, $99 StudentLearn More & RegisterAbout the Class When confronting a tragedy, we might ask ourselves several questions: What is going on over there? How can this be happening? Why doesn’t someone do something? These are questions often asked by writers who look at society with an eye for tackling tough issues and standing up for what is right. In this course, writers will explore society’s dark side. Pope Duarte will guide students through techniques for research, interviewing, and getting to the heart of a story, as these skills will be an open door for creating heart-warming, healing works that make a difference for generations to come, offering hope in the midst of despair. Participants will consider books that explore the human experience and deliver it with precision and power, often remain a part of our global memory—forever.

Writing Toward the Boundaries of Grief and God with Erin Noehre Date: Tuesdays, June 18 – 25, 2019, 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. Types: Generative Workshop, Workshop Genre & Form: Flash, Poetry, Spiritual Writing Cost: FreeLearn More & RegisterAbout the Class In this generative workshop will explore the ways poets have used the epistolary form to scatter grief to the heavens to relieve the pressure of pain that may have grown anger, resentment, and bitterness within us. The “god” here is not a religious god, but instead any figure, creature, or higher power we feel is a possible arch to throw our bereavement over. In this two-part workshop, we’ll discuss a few poems that use this form and examine how they use language to connect our bodies to grief. Then we will do some generative exercises and meet again to discuss how the process went for us and read each other’s work to provide feedback.

Consider the Body: The Poetics of Disease and Health with Laura Maher Date: Saturday, July 20, 2019, 10:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. Types: Generative Workshop, Workshop Genre & Form: Poetry, Hybrid Cost: $89 Regular, $69 StudentLearn More & RegisterAbout the Class  Participants will consider the ways in which language shapes our understanding of our bodies and how it impacts our experiences of good health and illness. Through readings, conversations, and writing and movement exercises, we will explore how we describe our bodies and their functions (or dysfunctions), how medicine and healthcare systems describe our bodies and their functions, and how poetry regards both. With a focus on inquiry and creative thinking, students will generate new work and engage with texts—both their own writing and the writing of others—to explore how we write lyrically about the body in health, disease, ability, disability, and more.

Built Environments: The Craft of Formal Innovation with Saretta Morgan Date: Tuesdays, Jul 23 – Aug 13, 2019, 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. Types: Generative Workshop, Lecture, Workshop Genre & Form: Creative Nonfiction, Experimental, Fiction, Hybrid, Poetry Cost: $199 Regular, $149 StudentLearn More & RegisterAbout the Class We experience our lives through form. The layout of a house, the format of a letter, or the etiquette of public interaction. When these forms shift, we are forced to take notice. In this cross-genre writing studio, we will examine how language and narrative develop differently according to structural decisions crafted by the author. Participants will explore how voice, themes and images emerge through attention to life’s many architectures, and experiment with new narrative and poetic forms based on their own unique personal experiences and close readings of a range of texts.

Building a Freelance Writing Career with Mark Athitakis Date: Saturday, August 3, 2019, 9:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. Types: Generative Workshop,  Workshop Genre & Form: Business of Writing, Creative Nonfiction, Journalism Cost: $99 Regular, $79 StudentLearn More & RegisterAbout the Class Looking to build or expand your freelance career? This workshop will guide you through the basics of freelance writing: finding your focus as a writer, identifying publications, crafting a pitch, connecting with editors, and building ongoing relationships. We’ll talk about what to expect out of contracts, managing money, tips for improving your chances at making a sale, and how to find supportive groups that can encourage you to keep working. Please come prepared to write and discuss a story idea you’d like to pursue.

You saw the recent list of summer books by CrimeReads, but I’ll always encourage you to examine another list for books you might want to read. With a holiday in the U.S., it’s the perfect day to kick off summer reading. When you check out the list of suggested titles below, don’t forget to look in the Web Store for any that might interest you. https://store.poisonedpen.com/

We’re lucky author Clea Simon misunderstood an editor’s assignment. Because she already put in all the work, she offered me a list that might entice you to add to your TBR (To Be Read) pile. Thank you, Clea.

*****

What are you looking forward to reading this summer? There are so many great books coming out. Here in the Boston area alone, we’ll be celebrating Hallie Ephron’s Careful What You Wish For, (Aug. 6) and Hank Phillippi Ryan‘s The Murder List (Aug. 20). On the cozy side, former Sisters in Crime president Leslie Budewitz has her Chai Another Day coming out June 11, and many others are due soon too. But recently I was asked by an editor to compile a list of summer mysteries and in my desperate attempt to pull together books that weren’t by friends or that haven’t been recently profiled on my own blog, I came up with the following. (Then I found out I had misread the assignment ““ he wanted books that were already out! Oops!). Anyway, here’s a small sampling of what I’m looking forward to, with an eye to every taste. Please let me know what you’re looking forward to ““ we’ve got time, at last, to indulge!

1. “One Small Sacrifice,” Hilary Davidson (out June 1)

 Author of the Anthony award-winning Lily Moore series launches a new police procedural series with NYPD detective Sheryn Sterling unraveling a complicated possible murder.

2. “Conviction,” Denise Mina, (June 18)

Newly single Anna McDonald tunes into a true-crime podcast for distraction only to realize that she knows what really happened ““ and she’s involved ““ in the latest grim psychological suspense from a Scottish master of the genre.

3. “Big Sky, “ Kate Atkinson (June 25) 

After an eight-year hiatus, Yorkshire ex-cop turned private investigator Jackson Brodie (with dog) surfaces in a quiet seaside village where a routine domestic case turns into something darker. 

4. “Paranoid,” Lisa Jackson, (June 25) 

Decades after Rachel Gatson accidentally killed her half-brother, her high school reunion ““ and a string of new murders ““ make her doubt her sanity in this bestseller’s latest psychological suspense.

5. “A Lady’s Guide to Gossip and Murder,” Dianne Freeman (June 26)

The follow-up to the series’ multiple award-winning debut, this frothy, fun historical cozy once again has the American-born Countess of Harleigh solving a murder in Victorian London’s high society.

6. “The Paper Bark Tree Mystery,” Ovidia Yu (June 27) 

The steamy Singaporean summer of 1937 smolders when private detective Su Lin’s ex-boss is murdered in a case involving diamonds, race, and political unrest in this third evocative Crown Colony mystery.

7. “The Whisper Man,” Alex North (June 27) 

A widowed father and his young son move into a strange house in a town haunted by the memory of a serial killer in this truly creepy debut thriller.

8. “The Chain,” Adrian McGinty (July 9) 

To ransom her kidnapped daughter, a mother must kidnap another child, whose parents must then do the same, in this fast-paced, nightmarish thriller from the award-winning suspense author.

9. “Lady in the Lake,” Laura Lippman (July 23) 

Having bolted from a stale marriage in 1966 Baltimore, Maddie Schwarz has transitioned from housewife to crusading journalist, heedlessly seeking the truth about a missing woman in this New York Times-bestselling author’s latest standalone.

10. “The Hounds of Justice,” Claire O’Dell (July 30)

In O’Dell’s second strikingly engaging dystopian Sherlock Holmes pastiche, Dr. Janet Watson once again joins covert agent (and fellow queer black woman) Sara Holmes in infiltrating an extremist group.

11.  “Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead,” Olga Tokarczuk, (Aug. 13) 

This Man Booker International Award finalist veers from straight mystery into fantasy as Janina, the local crank in a Polish resort town, takes a break from astrology to investigate a murder.

12. “The Swallows,” Lisa Lutz, (Aug. 13)  

Best known for the humorous Spellman Files books, Lutz follows up her thriller “The Passenger” by going very dark with this tale of revenge and secrets at a New England prep school.

13. “Play With Fire,” William Shaw (Aug. 13) 

In his fourth series outing, Detective Sergeant Cathal Breen can’t get into the swing of 1969 London, but with his pregnant partner Helen Tozer’s help he tackles the murder of a high-society call girl.

14.  “Thirteen,” Steve Cavanaugh (Aug. 13)

Conman-turned-defense attorney Eddie Flynn uses the crooked system against itself, but he’s out manipulated when he’s brought into a Hollywood star’s murder trial in this legal thriller. 

15. Anne Cleeves “The Long Call” (Sept. 3)

With her usual stunningly deft prose, Scottish master Cleeves (“Vera” and “Shetland”) debuts Detective Matthew Venn, who returns to the North Devon evangelical community he once fled when a body washes up on the beach.

*****

A former journalist, Boston’s Clea Simon is the author of more than two dozen mysteries, most recently A Spell of Murder (Polis), Cross My Path(Severn House), andFear on Four Paws (Poisoned Pen Press). She can be reached at www.CleaSimon.com.