Atria Books

William Kent Krueger: God’s Country

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Cork O’Connor #22

There are many different kinds of mysteries, and the really good writers know how to write a few of them – why, even Dame Agatha cranked out a series of spy thrillers doing her bit for the war effort. When William Kent Kruger uncorked (so to speak) his fantastic first novel Iron Lake, a modern whodunit, he achieved instant acclaim, and he impressively followed it up with Boundary Waters, which was much more of an adventure tale. Twenty-seven years later, God’s Country returns to that territory, literally and figuratively, with series hero Cork O’Connor once again setting out into the wilderness to confront the monsters who haunt the shadows, while also forced to deal with the darkness within that he summons to defeat them. read more

E.A. Jackson: Missing

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Debut

This was an unexpectedly wonderful read.  Set in London, the book follows Detective Inspector Martha Allen, who catches the 1990 case of a missing baby in a somewhat sketchy London hotel.  When the police arrive, the parents are utterly distraught (the mother has actually been sedated), and they go all out to find 5 month old Bella, who was snatched through an open window in the middle of the night, without waking the parents. This seems unlikely to DI Allen, but she and her team find clues, though most are frustrating dead ends. read more

Fall Book Clubs: The Stars Turned Inside out and Sarah Stewart Taylor

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Join us for our fall meetings on zoom!  Message me for a zoom link if you’d like to attend, all are welcome.  In October we’ll meet on Sunday, October 19 at 2 p.m. to discuss The Stars Turned Inside Out by Nova Jacobs.  Publisher’s description: Deep beneath the ground outside of Geneva, where CERN’s Large Hadron Collider smashes subatomic particles at breathtaking speeds, a startling discovery is made when the tunnel is down for maintenance: the body of Howard Anderby, a brilliant and recently arrived young physicist, who appears to have been irradiated by the collider. But security shows no evidence of him entering the tunnel, and for all of the lab’s funding, its video surveillance is sorely lacking. read more

William Kent Krueger: Spirit Crossing

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Cork O’Connor #20

I have read every Cork O’Connor book to date, and it’s a series that’s managed to stay fresh and entertaining through it’s now long (and classic) run.  The books follow Cork as sheriff in Aurora, Minnesota, as he raises his family, loses his wife, remarries, and leaves law enforcement and becomes a private investigator. However, I don’t think of these books as P.I. novels.  I think of them primarily as family novels.  I think the combination of Cork’s family story and the action and mystery Krueger brings to the table make these appealing to both male and female readers, something not always true in mystery novels, which tend to skew toward one gender or another in terms of readership. read more

Michael Bennett: Return to Blood

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Hana Westerman #2

This is an interesting new series.  In the first novel, New Zealand cop Hana Westerman took down a serial killer – and then walks away from the job.  She’s not just a New Zealander, she’s a Māori. The Māori culture is infused into both books, lending them an interest and snap.  She was conflicted in book one: is she a Māori, or is she a cop?  Is she meant to enforce laws against her own people?  In book two she’s back in the tiny seaside town where she grew up, living down the street from her father, Eru. Her daughter, Addison, and her roommate, PLUS 1, are back in Auckland living in Hana’s old place – and to Hana’s annoyance their new puppy is peeing all over her beloved garden. read more

William Kent Krueger and the Enduring Legacy of the series detective

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Many many long moons ago, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle not only created Sherlock Holmes, he created the concept of “a single character running through a series” a.k.a., the series detective.  While of course the stories themselves are wonderful, the creation of this series character has had perhaps the longest shadow over detective fiction, and, I would argue, the most enduring.  Series detectives are not just appreciated, they are beloved.  After a certain point in a series, the point is not really the story, the point is what is happening to the character.  They have their own lives, something which, I imagine, might be irritating for their creators (I know it was for Conan Doyle and Christie).  They can hardly be killed off, Sherlock Holmes being the most outstanding example as pastiches featuring Holmes outnumber Conan Doyle’s actual work. read more