Susan Rogers and John Roosen’s new novel Cobra Pose, second in their Yoga Mat Mystery series, is a fast-paced and skillfully plotted thriller involving the same protagonists as in their debut novel Dead Man’s Pose — yoga studio owner Elaina Williams and Ric Peters, her sleuthing partner and love interest…
Anne Eliot FeldmanFebruary 16, 2024
After six years of waiting, will justice be served? Kate Quinn and Janie Chang are the masters of historical fiction, and they take us on another whirlwind journey in The Phoenix Crown. This time, it's set in San Francisco in 1906. We follow Gemma and Suling, two women of very…
Lydia LefevreFebruary 13, 2024
Poor Hamish MacBeth. In “Death of a Spy” (Grand Central), the 39th Hamish MacBeth murder mystery from MC Beaton and RW Green, his neighbors still view him as an outsider in his patch in the Scottish Highlands, Lochdubh. His community views him as a lazy copper, and he craves to…
Jodé MillmanFebruary 12, 2024
From rock n’ roll, to blues, to punk, to love ballads and angry, angsty rebellions, music tells a story. But sometimes, that story is cut short, interrupted, or shrouded in secrecy. What happens when the truth is finally revealed? Is the power of music enough to recover, reunite and heal…
Megan BeauregardFebruary 7, 2024
Vamp is the seventh full-length novel in masterful author Loren D. Estleman’s Valentino, Film Detective series. These cinematic gems are as enticing as the buttery roasted aroma of fresh movie lobby popcorn. Film buffs and avid mystery readers can also ferret out several short stories featuring this intrepid film archivist…
Linda HitchcockJanuary 19, 2024
It’s well known that Alex Michaelides loves Agatha Christie. In fact, many people say that his writing mirrors her style. But in his third novel, The Fury, it becomes clear that his style is all his own. He is the master of the twist, but catches you in his web…
Lydia LefevreJanuary 16, 2024
What could drive someone to want to kill his own brother? The answer will leave readers of Blue Ridge by Peter Malone Elliott stunned. This debut psychological thriller follows a pair of identical twins, Cillian and Christopher, who are long estranged and filled with a deep hatred for each other.…
Madeline SuarezJanuary 9, 2024
It’s a subtle point. But the following quote tells you what the world of Clare Carlson is all about and, in turn, what R.G. Belsky’s sixth Clare Carlson mystery, Broadcast Blues (Oceanview), is all about. Well into the story, Carlson, the news director for a New York TV station whose…
Jim AlkonJanuary 2, 2024
“I had always thought of my memory as something like a historical record. Evidence. “Now, I’m not so sure. Now, I have a new appreciation for the unreliable narrator. Now, I understand how a normal person could go mad. It takes one tug at one thread, and the whole illusion…
Neil NyrenDecember 29, 2023
When Things Fall Apart injects new life into the modern crime thriller with a hero like we’ve never seen before, and a deranged killer without equal. Rookie police detective Kit Hanover tracks down leads in her first homicide case, hampered by racial prejudice and misogyny from within her own department.…
Michael FerryDecember 20, 2023
Death is not always black and white. Perhaps that has never been so clear — or gray, if you will — as in B.J. Cyprian’s The Gray Line, a combination exercise in group therapy to cope with the loss of a loved one and at the same time an intriguing…
Erin McGetrickDecember 13, 2023
Setting someone up for murder is a complicated way to get revenge – no matter what the circumstances. But is that what’s happening in the second book of author MHR Geer’s Anne Wilson Thriller Series, entitled Abandoned? It’s an intricate plot that begins with a simple text: “Trouble. Can you…
Jim AlkonDecember 7, 2023
Books & Looks: Real Books for Real Readers was started as a podcast to supplement Blaine Desantis’ website, ViewsOnBooks.com, and expand into audio interviews with authors. With Books & Looks, Blaine’s goal is to focus on real books that real people will read. At least half of the books he reviews are either…
BookTribDecember 6, 2023
Nita Prose didn’t intend to write a sequel to her bestselling debut sensation, The Maid. Not even with millions of readers begging for more of the novel’s highly relatable and internationally loved narrator, Molly. “For me, the question was, can I give readers more without giving them less?” Prose says…
Dawn IusNovember 29, 2023