Robin Agnew

Hank Phillippi Ryan: Mother Daughter Sister Stranger

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Nearly twenty books in, accomplished pro Hank Phillippi Ryan can keep you entertained, squeeze your heart, make you cry, give you a bit of a scare and make the whole darn thing look easy.  But this one achieves just a little bit more, with the characters so beautifully delineated, and the family tensions and problems that gives the plot its legs so poignant, that the book had me aching to actually reach into the pages and help the compelling characters in some way.

Ryan always has a great set up – here Eliza is caring for niece Piper for a week while her sister Bea takes some time away from it all after a divorce. The problems start when the day comes for Bea to collect Piper and she doesn’t show up. At first the family rationalizes that Bea must have gotten the wrong day. The following day is the annual family “remembrance day,” when Eliza, Bea and Piper go to the cemetery to visit the grave of Eliza and Bea’s parents, who died in a plane crash many years back. Since they know Bea packed an appropriate remembrance day dress, they conclude Bea must mean to meet them there, so they head over the next morning, but, again she’s a no show. read more

Kate Westbury: The Oxford Guide to Scandal and Lies

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Debut

Set in Oxford in 1951, this delightful first novel features an opposites attract type couple, Ginevra Bishop and Simon Braithwaite.  Bishop, Gin to her friends, is a well connected redhead familiar with the upper crust boys who have joined her at Oxford.  Simon Braithwaite, on the other hand, is a clever working-class veteran damaged by the war who has come to the campus in order to escape his ghosts (what we would now recognize as PTSD).

At that time, the after effects of the war remained inescapable, with both the student body and the faculty staffed with war veterans, all of them struggling with their own nightmare memories. As the book opens, Gin, searching for a study spot in the crowded Bodleian library, asks her favorite librarian, Tolliver, for a tip, and ends up next to a hostile and inhospitable Simon. Meeting cute, the two glare at one another over the top of their research tomes, and so far, so cozy.  It’s only when Simon and Gin discover the body of sweet old Tolliver at the moment he’s drawing his final breath that things take a slightly darker turn.  It’s murder, and the pair are soon recruited by British intelligence. read more

Jennifer Ashley: Murder in Blackfriars

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Below Stairs #9

There are quite a few historical mysteries set in Victorian London, but what makes this series so memorable is that the main character, Kat Holloway, is not of the nobility, connected to nobility or even someone who aspires to nobility, but simply a humble cook. For a mystery reader, encountering the working-class side of the city makes the series more relatable and the stakes the characters deal with a bit more resonant. The other reason I loved this one is simply that Jennifer Ashley, with over 60 novels to her credit, is a truly polished storyteller with an unerring instinct for what makes a narrative move and connect with the reader. read more

Jon St. Denis: Killer Art

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This is a fun excursion into the world of AI art theft (quite relevant at the moment) as well as a cozyish look into the world of academia, complete, of course, with a few murders.  This is a book I’d call “cozy adjacent” but it has many, many cozy elements: the main characters, Vika and Sam, are refugees from a fast paced life in New York City and are taking up new jobs as professors at a small California college.  Their new jobs are a world away from Vika’s as a curator at MOMA, and Sam’s as a crime reporter for The New York Times. Vika will be a professor of art, Sam a prof of journalism, giving both (they hope) time to work on, respectively, her painting and his writing. read more

Carolyn Marie Wilkins: Let the Murderer Say Amen

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Psychics & Soul Food #2

This lively and compelling mystery is set in a small town in Illinois in the 20’s.  While author Wilkins names her fictional town Agate, if you’d like to orient yourself it’s fairly close to Joliet, outside of Chicago. The central character is the charming Nola Ann Jackson, who is working for a caterer and lives with her Aunt Sarah.  Both women are psychics though Aunt Sarah has far more experience, and is known as a conjure woman.  Both can see auras.  I loved this aspect of their characters – it made them both more specific and more interesting. read more

David Lewis: The Paris Chase

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The Secret Churchill Files #3

This enthralling mystery is set in 1942 and begins with our heroine, Welsh woman and secret agent Catrine Colline, pondering her future after her woman only spy division, 512, is absorbed into the larger SOE (Special Operations Executive).  Determined to qualify to be sent to France, she’s passed all the physical tests, but can’t manage to speak the language like a native, so is seconded to the dreaded office work. Churchill, however, senses Catrine has something special, and when an SS agent disappears in Paris, he decides she’s the one to find him and bring him to London.  The man, Dieter Silber, had discovered the plans for Hitler’s gruesome “Final Solution,” and can’t stomach it. read more

Sarah Lotz: How to Kill a Crime Writer

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I was of two minds on this novel.  I enjoyed the main character, Niamh, who has just lost her mother and who has moved into her mother’s remote cottage in the English countryside.  She has a cat, Brian, but mostly she is (not) dealing with her grief by sofa surfing and playing video games. She is startled out of her “grief journey” (as her stepmother refers to it) by the appearance of the main character in her author mother’s books.  Her mother had written thrillers featuring someone I can only describe as a female Jack Reacher, differing in gender and in that she has a fixed place of abode. read more

MJ Soni: The Masala Chai Mystery Club

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Debut

This charming first mystery may follow several trendy and now familiar tropes, but that didn’t bother me in the least because the telling of the story and the characters in it are simply  delightful.  It’s set in an upscale condo development where the main character, the recently retired and widowed librarian Neeti Shah, lives with her niece Myra and her adorable great nephew, Ved.  The story begins when Neeti hears a scream across the road and hurries over to find her neighbor dead at the foot of his stairs, seemingly killed by a fall, but, surprise, Neeti is not convinced. read more

Robert Thorogood: The Mysterious Affair of Judith Potts

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Marlow Murder Club #5

This charming series inhabits the same universe as Richard Osman’s Thursday Murder Club books.  The books are intelligent, well observed, occasionally funny – as well as being very clever mysteries.  The “Marlow Murder Club” consists of the intellectual, crossword puzzle loving Judith; dogwalker Suzie; and Becks, the wife of the vicar of Marlow (the vicar plays a very small supporting role).  The unofficial member of the club is Tanika, an actual police officer, who has come to rely on them. read more

Kemper Donovan: Sweet Spot

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Ghostwriter #3

This is the third book in a series that is strikingly original in many ways.  In the first book, Donovan’s heroine was not even named.  She was just functioning as a ghostwriter (and amateur sleuth) for a Hilary Clinton-esque politician, who had recently lost an election. In the second, after writing about the crime she and the Hilary character solved, she’s a mini celebrity, and she’s asked on a cruise as a writing instructor.  By book two, she has a pen name – Belle Currer – though it’s made very clear it’s not her real name. In book three, Donovan has chosen to model his story on the heartbreaking 2002 abduction of Elizabeth Smart in Utah. read more