Ellen Hart: Taken by the Wind

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In A Wrinkle in Time, Madeleine L’Engel writes of “the educated heart,” a quality Ellen Hart possesses in spades.  Hart’s novels, populated with a variety of overlapping characters and a variety of life experiences, form a rich and complex tapestry where she can spin her tales.  She’s also one of the best “traditional” mystery writers at work at the moment, utilizing the format of the detective story, with clues, characters, red herrings, suspects and a driving narrative style that propels the reader forward.  To me this combination of her matrix of character and setting along with her use of the classic mystery format is an irresistible one. read more

Tim O’Mara: Crooked Numbers

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I loved O’Mara’s first book, Sacrifice Fly, and I think I like this one even more.  His main character is Brooklyn teacher (now dean) Raymond Donne, who used to be a cop but thanks to an injury sustained on the job is now a teacher.  Ray gets involved with different crimes because (so far at least) they’ve involved his students.

crookednumbersOne of the strongest elements in this new series is not only the very Brooklyn specific setting, but the school setting.  The parts O’Mara the real life teacher adds to his novels about his fictional teacher Ray ring with authenticity and add real emotional texture to his stories.  It’s a weird comparison, but the way cozy writer Denise Swanson brings her school psychology experience to her books, adding detail and interest,  O’Mara is setting his books apart in the same way Swanson has. read more

Tasha Alexander: Behind the Shattered Glass

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I can’t think of a more delicious way to allocate your book buying budget than to buy a Tasha Alexander novel.  Alexander, who began this Victorian series with her central character of Lady Emily falling in love with her recently dead husband after the fact, has only continued to spice up her characters.  Lady Emily’s love of all things Greek and the scholarly attributes that come with her passion make her a believable investigative partner for her husband, Colin Hargreaves, who works undercover for the crown. read more

Julia Spencer-Fleming: Through the Evil Days

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I think what makes some series writers special – or one of the things, at least – is the ability to treat each installment differently.  The characters belong to the arc, but each story is told in a specific and different way that almost makes each novel a standalone.  Julia Spencer-Fleming has this skill, and she proves herself to be spectacularly versatile in her seventh novel, delivering a pure thriller.

evil-daysIn each novel her setting of Miller’s Kill, New York, is a character in some sense.  In this novel it’s an aggressive character in the form of a horrible ice storm that never seems to end.  It makes you shiver and hope February, when it arrives, isn’t this terrible. read more

Chris Grabenstein: Escape from Mr. Lemoncello’s Library

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Chris Grabenstein, charming and personable author of the John Ceepak mysteries, has now veered into young adult territory, with striking success.  He has a few books he’s written with James Patterson for middle grade readers, and this one, a standalone, is pretty much an instant classic.  Bearing a similarity to Charlie and the Chocolate Factory in format, this fun volume is a love letter to libraries, reading and enthusiastic young readers everywhere.

MrLemoncellosLibraryMuch like Willy Wonka, Mr. Lemoncello is a legendary figure, a puzzle and game creator extraordinaire.  He’s also rehabbing the local library in Alexandriaville, Ohio, and he’s holding a contest to let twelve lucky twelve-year-olds be the first patrons of the new town library.  They’ll be locked in for a weekend of fun, games and puzzles.  All the kids have to do to get to be one of the twelve is write an essay telling why they want to be a part of the new library opening. read more

Patricia D. Cornwell: Postmortem

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postmortemMy 13 year old son was spending lots of time reading graphic novels – he’s a bit past the YA novels available – and wondering how to get him into reading actual books, I gave him a copy of Mystic River for Christmas. He devoured it, even going into his room and shutting the door to read in peace. Since then he’s also become a giant Harlan Coben fan (he’s reading The Woods right now), but he seems to like serial killer novels, having also enjoyed Connelly’s The Poet. So, bad mother that I am (what kind of mom gives her 13 year old a copy of a Dennis Lehane novel, after all?) I of course thought he might as well read one of the true classics of the serial killer genre, Patricia Cornwell’s Postmortem. Well, that was another close the door and leave me alone read for him, and when he had finished it, it was of course lying around the house, so I thought I would re-read it, wondering if I would enjoy it as much as I did in 1990, when it was first published. read more

Pamela Branch: The Wooden Overcoat

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“Cor! What a bit o’ fat! I got away with it!” – Benji Cann, on his release from prison

woodenovercoatLeave it to Rue Morgue to provide me with my read of the month; when modern mysteries aren’t grabbing me, it’s delightful to read one of the gems of the past unearthed by the Rue Morgue Press, in this case this very funny novel by Pamela Branch, written in 1951. The tone is very similar to those hilarious British comedies of the 50’s – The Lavender Hill Mob,Tight Little Island, Kind Hearts and Coronets, and more recently A Fish Called Wanda, that take place in the most ordinary sorts of places but thanks to dry humor and a generous dollop of improbable plot, build the laughs until they bubble up on every page as you read (or watch, in the case of the movies) along. This book has a great starting point – a house full of murderers takes in one of their own, to give him more or less a fresh start in life. The unwary Benji Cann finds himself lodging and dining with a group of people who make him uneasy, especially after he figures out who they are. Especially delicious is the “Creaker” and his repulsive cat; so called because of his creaky wooden leg. His crimes are too disgusting to be revealed (which certainly sets the wheels of the brain turning). Benji actually lives next door in a house full of artists, and unfortunately, rats. read more

Alan Bradley: The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie and Patricia Wentworth: Anna, Where Are You? (also known as Death at Deep End)

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sweetnessatthebottomofpieSince I grew up in a place filled with rambling old houses that had decaying and mysterious corners, and this place (Mackinac Island) is also filled with the various kinds of enchanted, woodsy paths and clearings that are found in many an English detective novel, these books have never felt a bit foreign to me. Classic British detective stories, set in rambling old houses apart from the rest of the world, feel like reading about home. As Flavia, the heroine in The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie, thinks as she looks out into her family’s garden early one morning: “Sparkling dew lay upon everything, and I should not have been at all surprised if a unicorn had stepped from behind a rose bush and laid its head in my lap.” Of course into this heaven a dead body is usually discovered, but somehow the enchanted spell is still difficult to break. read more

Mary Elizabeth Braddon: Lady Audley’s Secret

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ladyaudleyssecretAll I can say is – delicious. Mary Elizabeth Braddon was disdained by her contemporaries as a sensationalist – but she was lapped up and read by the public. Today’s public should find her tale of the devious and complicated Lady Audley no less fascinating. In true Victorian fashion, this is a novel rife with coincidence and conspiracy, and with the fiendish but seemingly angelic Lady Audley at its center, the story is one you may not be able to put down. It opens with the proposal of Lord Audley to his neighbor’s governess – she agrees, telling him that it exceeds her wildest dreams – and thus the tale begins. read more

Margery Allingham: Sweet Danger

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sweetdangerMargery Allingham is one of the authors I think of as the “Big Five” – Agatha Christie, Ngaio Marsh, Dorothy L. Sayers and Josephine Tey being the other four – and of the five, she is easily the most original and eccentric, Sweet Danger being a case in point. Like contemporary writer Christopher Fowler, Allingham was hewing to a traditional detective storytelling mode while at the same time pushing and twisting all the boundaries as far as she could, and few of her books show this effort more beautifully than Sweet Danger. read more