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Her Royal Spyness by Rhys Bowen Lady Victoria Georgiana Charlotte Eugenie, 34th in line for the throne, is flat broke. She’s bolted Scotland, her greedy brother, and her fish-faced betrothed for London. The place where she’ll experience freedom, learn life lessons aplenty, do a bit of spying for HRH — oh, and find a dead Frenchman in her tub. Now her new job is to clear her long family name.
The Kindness of Strangers: A Novel by Emma Garman London, 1953. Jimmy Sullivan lies dying on the drawing room floor while his housemates look on, their lives about to change forever. One foggy night in the dead of February, a young man arrives unannounced at 42 Tregunter Road in Chelsea. Self-styled Bohemian Mrs. Honor Wilson–who runs a minor literary journal and lodgings from this timeworn Victorian house–introduces him to her “dear house guests”: Robbie, the writer; Mina, the teenage sleuth; George, the debutante; and Saul, the haunted refugee. Jimmy Sullivan is a family friend, Honor says–yet clearly, something is not right. Despite everyone’s misgivings, she lets the stranger move into the attic. As they each try to disprove Jimmy’s dubious account of himself, secrets, jealousies, and disturbing schemes come to light, fracturing the household’s delicate allegiances and setting in motion, unstoppably, a tale of perilous self-invention, complicated love, and murderous revenge. In a house built on lies, the truth will get you killed.
The Dissident by Paul Goldberg A thrilling, witty, and slyly original Cold War mystery about a ragtag group of Jewish refuseniks in Moscow. On his wedding day in 1976, Viktor Moroz stumbles upon a murder scene: two gay men, one of them a US official, are axed to death in Moscow. Viktor, a Jewish refusenik, is stuck in Russia due to the government’s denial of his application to leave for Israel; he sits “in refusal” alongside his wife and their community of intellectuals, Jewish and not. But then the KGB spots Viktor leaving the murder scene. Plucked off the street, he’s given a choice: find the real murderer or become the suspect of convenience. His deadline is nine days later, when Henry Kissinger is arriving in Moscow. Ax murders, it seems, aren’t good for politics. A whip-smart, often hilarious Cold War thriller, Paul Goldberg’s The Dissident explores what it means to survive in the face of impossible choices and monumental consequences. To solve the case, Viktor ropes in his community, which includes his banned-text-distributing wife, a hard-drinking sculptor, a Russian priest of Jewish heritage, and a visiting American intent on reliving World War II heroics. As Viktor struggles to figure out whom to trust, he’s forced to question not only the KGB’s murky motives but also those of his fellow refuseniks — and the man he admires above all: the Secretary of State himself. Immersive, unpredictable, and always ax-sharp, The Dissident is Cold War intrigue at its most inventive: an uncompromising look at sacrifice, community, and the scars of history and identity, from an expert storyteller.
Murder in Constantinople by A. E Goldin A gripping, immersive historical murder mystery in which a wayward boy from London’s East End is pulled into the hunt for a serial killer on the eve of the Crimean War London, 1854. Twenty-one-year-old Ben Canaan attracts trouble wherever he goes. His father wants him to be a good Jewish son, working for the family business on Whitechapel Road, but Ben and his friends, the ‘Good-for-Nothings’, just want adventure. Then the discovery of an enigmatic letter and a photograph of a beautiful woman offer an escapade more dangerous than anything he’d imagined. Suddenly Ben is thrown into a mystery that takes him all the way to Constantinople, the jewel of an empire and the centre of a world on the brink of war. His only clue is three words: ‘The White Death’. Now he must find what links a string of grisly murders, following a trail through kingmaking and conspiracy, poison and high politics, bloodshed and betrayal. In a city of deadly secrets, no one is safe – and one wrong step could cost Ben his life.
Clark and Division by Naomi Hirahara Chicago, 1944: Twenty-year-old Aki Ito and her parents have just been released from Manzanar, where they have been detained by the US government since the aftermath of Pearl Harbor, together with thousands of other Japanese Americans. The life in California the Itos were forced to leave behind is gone; instead, they are being resettled two thousand miles away in Chicago, where Aki’s older sister, Rose, was sent months earlier and moved to the new Japanese American neighborhood near Clark and Division streets. But on the eve of the Ito family’s reunion, Rose is killed by a subway train. Aki, who worshipped her sister, is stunned. Officials are ruling Rose’s death a suicide. Aki cannot believe her perfect, polished, and optimistic sister would end her life. Her instinct tells her there is much more to the story, and she knows she is the only person who could ever learn the truth. Inspired by historical events, Clark and Division infuses an atmospheric and heartbreakingly real crime fiction plot with rich period details and delicately wrought personal stories Naomi Hirahara has gleaned from thirty years of research and archival work in Japanese American history.
The Silver Bone: A Novel by Andreĭ Kurkov A perplexing mystery introduces rookie detective Samson Kolechko in Kyiv as he is tackling his first case, set against real life details of the tumultuous early 20th century. Kyiv, 1919. World War I has ended in Western Europe, but to the East, six factions vie for control of Ukraine. Amidst the instability, young Samson Kolechko places his engineering career on hold. But in the city of Kyiv where competing patrols, black-market enterprise, and mayhem prevail everything remains up for grabs and new opportunity lurks just around the corner . . . When two Red Army soldiers commandeer his home, Samson plays the reluctant host. As Samson juggles his personal life a budding romance with the ingenious Nadezhda, a statistician helping run the city’s census with the soldiers’ imposition, he winds up overhearing their secret plans. Deciding to report them, Samson instead finds himself unwittingly recruited as an investigator for the city’s new police force. His first case is a perplexing mystery involving two murders, a long bone made of pure silver, and a decidedly unusual suit tailored from fine English cloth. With the odds stacked against him, Samson turns to Nadezhda, who proves to be more than a match.
The Widows of Malabar Hill by Sujata Massey Perveen Mistry, the daughter of a respected Zoroastrian family, has just joined her father’s law firm, becoming one of the first female lawyers in India. Armed with a law degree from Oxford, Perveen also has a tragic personal history that makes her especially devoted to championing and protecting women’s legal rights. Mistry Law has been appointed to execute the will of Mr. Omar Farid, a wealthy Muslim mill owner who has left three widows behind. But as Perveen is going through the paperwork, she notices something strange: all three of the wives have signed over their full inheritance to a charity. What will they live on if they forfeit what their husband left them? Perveen is suspicious, especially since one of the widows has signed her form with an X–meaning she probably couldn’t even read the document. The Farid widows live in full purdah–in strict seclusion, never leaving the women’s quarters or speaking to any men. Are they being taken advantage of by an unscrupulous guardian? Perveen tries to investigate, and realizes her instincts about the will were correct when tensions escalate to murder. Now it is her responsibility to figure out what really happened on Malabar Hill, and to ensure that no innocent women or children are in further danger.
Murder at Morrington Hall by Clara McKenna Spring, 1905: Free-spirited like the Thoroughbreds she rides across the Kentucky countryside, Stella takes adventure by the reins when she’s asked to attend a mysterious wedding in rural England. But once she arrives at the lush Morrington Hall estate, her cold and ambitious father confesses that he won’t only give away his best racehorses as gifts–he has also arranged to give away his daughter as bride to the Earl of Atherly’s financially strapped son … Stella refuses to be sold off like a prized pony. Yet despite a rough start, there’s something intriguing about her groom-to-be, the roguish Viscount “Lyndy” Lyndhurst. The unlikely pair could actually be on the right track with each other … until they find the vicar who was to marry them dead in the library. With culture clashes mounting between families, a scandalous murder case hangs over Morrington Hall. Now, Stella and Lyndy must go from future spouses to amateur sleuths as they team up to search for the truth–and prevent an unbridled criminal from destroying their new life together right out of the gate
Death and the Conjuror by Tom Mead In 1930s London, celebrity psychiatrist Anselm Rees is discovered dead in his locked study, and there seems to be no way that a killer could have escaped unseen. There are no clues, no witnesses, and no evidence of the murder weapon. Stumped by the confounding scene, the Scotland Yard detective on the case calls on retired stage magician-turned-part-time sleuth Joseph Spector. For who better to make sense of the impossible than one who traffics in illusions? Spector has a knack for explaining the inexplicable, but even he finds that there is more to this mystery than meets the eye. As he and the Inspector interview the colorful cast of suspects among the psychiatrist’s patients and household, they uncover no shortage of dark secrets–or motives for murder. When the investigation dovetails into that of an apparently-impossible theft, the detectives consider the possibility that the two transgressions are related. And when a second murder occurs, this time in an impenetrable elevator, they realize that the crime wave will become even more deadly unless they can catch the culprit soon. A tribute to the classic golden-age whodunnit, when crime fiction was a battle of wits between writer and reader, Death and the Conjuror joins its macabre atmosphere, period detail, and vividly-drawn characters with a meticulously-constructed fair play puzzle. Its baffling plot will enthrall readers of mystery icons such as Agatha Christie and John Dickson Carr, modern masters like Anthony Horowitz and Elly Griffiths, or anyone who appreciates a good mystery.
The Murder at World’s End by Ross Montgomery Set in Cornwall in 1910, this novel centers on the death of the Viscount of Tithe Hall, who is found murdered in a sealed room on a remote tidal island during preparations for the anticipated passage of Halley’s Comet. Suspicion falls on Stephen Pike, a recently hired under-butler with a troubled past. Assisted by an elderly member of the household, he becomes involved in uncovering the circumstances surrounding the crime. As the investigation unfolds within the confines of the country house, long-standing conflicts and hidden relationships emerge. The novel combines elements of historical setting with a classic locked-room mystery.
Darktown by Thomas Mullen Responding to orders from on high, the Atlanta Police Department is forced to hire its first black officers, including war veterans Lucius Boggs and Tommy Smith. The newly minted policemen are met with deep hostility by their white peers: they aren’t allowed to arrest white suspects, drive squad cars, or set foot in the police headquarters. When a black woman who was last seen in a car driven by a white man turns up dead, Boggs and Smith suspect white cops are behind it. Their investigation sets them up against a brutal cop, Dunlow, who has long run the neighborhood as his own, and his partner, Rakestraw, a young progressive who may or may not be willing to make allies across color lines.
The Wolf and the Watchman by Niklas Natt och Dag One morning in the autumn of 1793, watchman Mikel Cardell is awakened from his drunken slumber with reports of a body seen floating in the Larder, once a pristine lake on Stockholm’s Southern Isle, now a rancid bog. Efforts to identify the bizarrely mutilated corpse are entrusted to incorruptible lawyer Cecil Winge, who enlists Cardell’s help to solve the case. But time is short: Winge’s health is failing, the monarchy is in shambles, and whispered conspiracies and paranoia abound. Winge and Cardell become immersed in a brutal world of guttersnipes and thieves, mercenaries and madams. From a farmer’s son who is led down a treacherous path when he seeks his fortune in the capital to an orphan girl consigned to the workhouse by a pitiless parish priest, their gruesome investigation peels back layer upon layer of the city’s labyrinthine society. The rich and the poor, the pious and the fallen, the living and the dead—all collide and interconnect with the body pulled from the lake.
The Case of the Missing Maid: A Novel by Rob Osler Harriet Morrow has long been drawn to the idea of whizzing around the city on her bicycle as a professional detective, solving crimes for a living without having to take a husband … she seizes the chance when the prestigious Prescott Agency hires her as its first woman operative. Only an hour into the job, Harriet has an assignment: Discover the whereabouts of a missing maid from one of the most extravagant mansions on Prairie Avenue. Owner Pearl Bartlett has a reputation for sending operatives on wild goose chases around her grand estate, but Harriet believes the stunningly beautiful Agnes Wozniak has indeed vanished under mysterious circumstances.
The Final Problem: A Novel by Arturo Pérez-Reverte In this locked-room mystery set in 1960, a washed-up actor puts his on-camera detective skills to the test when a suspicious death shatters the quiet peace for a group of strangers staying at an isolated Greek island resort. June, 1960. Rough weather at sea leaves a group of strangers stranded on the idyllic Greek island of Utakos, all guests of the only local hotel. Nothing could prepare them for what happens next: Edith Mander, a quiet British tourist, is found dead inside a beach cabana. What appears at first glance to be a clear suicide reveals possible signs of foul play to Ormond Basil, an out-of-work but still well-known actor who in his glory days portrayed the most celebrated detective of all time. Accustomed to seeing him display Sherlock Holmes’ amazing powers of deduction on the big screen, the other guests believe that the actor is the best equipped to uncover the truth. But when a second body is discovered, there is not a doubt in Basil’s mind: a murderer walks among them. What’s more, the killer is staging each crime as a performance, leaving complex clues that bear an eerie resemblance to those found in the pages of Conan Doyle stories. This is a criminal who knows every trick in the book and is playing a deadly literary game. As the storm rages, Basil must become the genius detective he has only pretended to be
A Disappearance in Fiji by Nilima Rao 1914, Fiji: 25-year-old police sergeant Akal Singh would rather be anywhere but this tropical paradise. After a promising start to his career in his native India and in Hong Kong, he got sent to work in Fiji as punishment for a professional mistake he’s too embarrassed to talk about. Lonely and humiliated, Akal longs for the day he can finally solve a big case and win the inspector-general’s favor, thereby redeeming himself and being permitted to return to Hong Kong. Otherwise, he fears he will be stuck in Fiji forever. When an indentured Indian woman goes missing from a sugarcane plantation and Fiji’s newspapers scream “kidnapping,” the inspector-general reluctantly assigns Akal the case, giving Akal strict instructions to view this investigation as nothing more than cursory. Fiji’s economy depends on the already-controversial indentured servitude system; a high-profile case like this could imbalance the fragile colony. But as soon as Akal arrives on the plantation, he identifies several troubling inconsistencies in the plantation owners’ stories, and it seems there is more to this disappearance than meets the eye. Over the course of his investigation, Akal must confront not only the painful realities of the indentured workers’ existence and the racism of the British colonizers in Fiji, but also his own thorny notions of personhood and caste. As he closes in on the truth of what happened to the missing woman, he must ask himself: Should this case be the one that gets him sent in triumph back to Hong Kong? Or is it not so bad in Fiji after all?
A Curious Beginning: A Veronica Speedwell Mystery by Deanna Raybourn London, 1887. As the city prepares to celebrate Queen Victoria’s golden jubilee, Veronica Speedwell is marking a milestone of her own. After burying her spinster aunt, the orphaned Veronica is free to resume her world travels in pursuit of scientific inquiry–and the occasional romantic dalliance. As familiar with hunting butterflies as she is fending off admirers, Veronica wields her butterfly net and a sharpened hatpin with equal aplomb, and with her last connection to England now gone, she intends to embark upon the journey of a lifetime. But fate has other plans, as Veronica discovers when she thwarts her own abduction with the help of an enigmatic German baron with ties to her mysterious past. Promising to reveal in time what he knows of the plot against her, the baron offers her temporary sanctuary in the care of his friend Stoker–a reclusive natural historian as intriguing as he is bad-tempered. But before the baron can deliver on his tantalizing vow to reveal the secrets he has concealed for decades, he is found murdered. Suddenly Veronica and Stoker are forced to go on the run from an elusive assailant, wary partners in search of the villainous truth.
Lavender House by Lev AC Rosen Lavender House, 1952: the family seat of recently deceased matriarch Irene Lamontaine, head of the famous Lamontaine soap empire. Irene’s recipes for her signature scents are a well guarded secret–but it’s not the only one behind these gates. This estate offers a unique freedom, where none of the residents or staff hide who they are. But to keep their secret, they’ve needed to keep others out. And now they’re worried they’re keeping a murderer in. Irene’s widow hires Evander Mills to uncover the truth behind her mysterious death. Andy, recently fired from the San Francisco police after being caught in a raid on a gay bar, is happy to accept–his calendar is wide open. And his secret is the kind of secret the Lamontaines understand. Andy had never imagined a world like Lavender House. He’s seduced by the safety and freedom found behind its gates, where a queer family lives honestly and openly. But that honesty doesn’t extend to everything, and he quickly finds himself a pawn in a family game of old money, subterfuge, and jealousy–and Irene’s death is only the beginning. When your existence is a crime, everything you do is criminal, and the gates of Lavender House can’t lock out the real world forever. Running a soap empire can be a dirty business.
A Case of Mice and Murder by Sally Smith When barrister Gabriel Ward steps out of his rooms at exactly two minutes to seven on a sunny May morning in 1901, his mind is so full of his latest case-the disputed authorship of bestselling children’s book Millie the Temple Church Mouse-that he scarcely registers the body of the Lord Chief Justice of England on his doorstep. But even he cannot fail to notice the judge’s dusty bare feet, in shocking contrast to his flawless evening dress, nor the silver carving knife sticking out of his chest. In the shaded courtyards and ancient buildings of the Inner Temple, the hidden heart of London’s legal world, murder has spent centuries confined firmly to the casebooks. Until now . . . The police can enter the Temple only by consent, so who better to investigate this tragic breach of law and order than a man who prizes both above all things? But murder doesn’t answer to logic or reasoned argument, and Gabriel soon discovers that the Temple’s heavy oak doors are hiding more surprising secrets than he’d ever imagined.
Death in the Details by Katie Tietjen Maple Bishop is ready to put WWII and the grief of losing her husband, Bill, behind her. But when she discovers that Bill left her penniless, Maple realizes she could lose her Vermont home next and sets out to make money the only way she knows how: by selling her intricately crafted dollhouses. Business is off to a good start–until Maple discovers her first customer dead, his body hanging precariously in his own barn. Something about the supposed suicide rubs Maple the wrong way, but local authorities brush off her concerns. Determined to help them see “what’s big in what’s small,” Maple turns to what she knows best, painstakingly recreating the gruesome scene in miniature: death in a nutshell. With the help of a rookie officer named Kenny, Maple uses her macabre miniature to dig into the dark undercurrents of her sleepy town, where everyone seems to have a secret–and a grudge. But when her nosy neighbor goes missing and she herself becomes a suspect, it’ll be up to Maple to find the devil in the details–and put him behind bars.
A Test of Wills by Charles Todd Scotland Yard Inspector Ian Rutledge returns home suffering from shellshock and the emotional strains of World War I, but he soon goes back to work and must solve a murder case involving the killing of a retired military officer, a crime in which the main suspect is a highly decorated war hero.
Murder at the Brightwell by Ashley Weaver Amory Ames is a wealthy young woman who questions her marriage to her notoriously charming playboy husband, Milo. Looking for a change, she accepts a request for help from her former fiance, Gil Trent, not knowing that she’ll soon become embroiled in a murder investigation that will test not only her friendship with Gil, but will upset the status quo with her husband. Amory accompanies Gil to the luxurious Brightwell Hotel in an attempt to circumvent the marriage of his sister, Emmeline, to Rupert Howe, a disreputable ladies’ man. Amory sees in the situation a grim reflection of her own floundering marriage. There is more than her happiness at stake, however, when Rupert is murdered and Gil is arrested for the crime. Amory is determined to prove his innocence and find the real killer, despite attempted dissuasion from the disapproving police inspector on the case. Matters are further complicated by Milo’s unexpected arrival, and the two form an uneasy alliance as Amory enlists his reluctant aid in clearing Gil’s name. As the stakes grow higher and the line between friend and foe becomes less clear, Amory must decide where her heart lies and catch the killer before she, too, becomes a victim. Murder at the Brightwell is a delicious novel in which murder invades polite society and romance springs in unexpected places. Ashley Weaver’s debut is a wonderful testament to the enduring delight of the traditional mystery.
The Queen City Detective Agency: A Novel by Snowden Wright Meridian, Mississippi–once known as the Queen City for its status in the state–has lost much of its royal bearing by 1985. Overshadowed by more prosperous cities such as New Orleans and Atlanta, Meridian attracts less-than-legitimate businesses, including those enforced by the near-mythical Dixie Mafia. The city’s powerbrokers, wealthy white Southerners clinging to their privilege, resent any attempt at change to the old order. Real-estate developer Randall Hubbard took advantage of Meridian’s economic decline by opening strip malls that catered to low-income families in Black neighborhoods–until he wound up at the business end of a .38 Special. Then a Dixie Mafia affiliate named Lewis “Turnip” Coogan, who claims Hubbard’s wife hired him for the hit, dies under suspicious circumstances while in custody for the murder. Ex-cop turned private investigator Clementine Baldwin is hired by Coogan’s bereaved mother to find her son’s killer. A woman struggling with her own history growing up in Mississippi, Clem braves the Queen City’s corridors of crime as she digs into the case, opening wounds long forgotten. She soon finds herself in the crosshairs of powerful and dangerous people who manipulate the law for their own ends–and will kill anyone who threatens to reveal their secrets.
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