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Review

The Verifiers

by Brian Kenney

Heads up! A smart, witty amateur detective has entered the crime fiction galaxy, and you won’t want to miss her. Twenty-five-year-old Claudia Lin, from a Taiwanese-American family, doesn’t live up to anyone’s model-minority expectations. She visits her mother in Queens monthly (not weekly), dates girls (not nice Chinese boys), and has a job (not a career). But her position at Veracity, a sort of detective agency that can suss out the truthfulness of one’s online dates, turns out to be tailor made for her. So much so that when Iris, one of her clients, suddenly disappears, Caroline falls down the rabbit hole in pursuit of her, unearthing shocking information both about online dating companies and the fate of Iris. While solving the mystery is central to the novel, Claudia’s complicated relationships with her mom, Harvard-educated brother, and beautiful, vain sister provide wonderful distractions. For readers who enjoy quirky characters, strong female leads, and love/hate family relationships.

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Review

Hold Me Down

by Henrietta Thornton

Simon, prolific author of the Witch Cats of Cambridge series, here mines her past as a rock critic. The tale looks at former rockers visiting their own past when they reunite for a benefit after former bandmate Aimee dies. During the concert, Gal Raver, frontwoman of the band and of the book, sees a familiar face in the crowd. It’s TK, the band’s old roadie, who’s later found dead in an alleyway behind the club. Walter, Aimee’s husband, is charged with murdering TK and seems curiously apathetic when Gal tries to help him fight the accusation. Finding out what happened involves numerous murky flashbacks to Gal’s past as a messy, angry drug and alcohol addict, and her behavior and the battle for fleeting success give the book a feeling of darkness. Simon’s evocative writing puts readers inside sweaty clubs that stink of beer and vomit (so much vomit!), and reaches its first height when describing the moment the fledgling band finally gels onstage. The music fades in the last part of the novel, which explores hard truths and the differing ways they can be remembered, with Simon’s depiction of Gal’s slowly unfurling memories a second high point. Note that rape is described here in some detail. For readers who enjoy dark stories and fans of music-themed mysteries.

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Review

And There He Kept Her.

by Brian Kenney

Here’s the premise: two teens, a boy and a girl, break into Emmett Burr’s house in search of opiates. The house is remote, set on Sandy Lake in northern Minnesota, and the kids just assume that Emmett, old and immensely obese, will be passed out. But everything that can go wrong, does go wrong. Emmett shoots and kills the boy, while the girl, Jenny, is chained and left in a cell in the basement. It’s clear that she’s just the latest in a series of girls who’ve been locked up, abused, and eventually murdered. Fortunately, Jenny’s mother is quick to notice that her daughter is missing; she calls Sheriff’s Deputy Ben Packard, and the search is on. Ben, who recently moved from Minneapolis, spent his childhood summers on the lake; in fact, he’s related to Jenny. Packard’s search takes him to the dark underbelly of Sandy Lake, where alcoholism and drug abuse and violence and crime rule. Low-key Packard, who has his own secrets—he’s gay and just inching out of the closet—is as compelling and potentially as complex a cop as Louise Penny’s Armand Gamache. This is a remarkable debut—sharp, suspenseful, and emotionally powerful—sure to appeal to readers of Karin Slaughter and Lisa Gardner.

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Review

Cold Brew Corpse: A Coffee Lovers Mystery #2

by Brian Kenney

A mystery with all the right ingredients, in all the right proportions: compelling crime, eccentric characters, dishy police chief, fascinating location, and above all else, Lana Lewis, a quirky, smart, witty, and sarcastic protagonist. After getting laid off from her job as a journalist in Miami, Lana moved back to her hometown of Devil’s Beach, a barrier island north of the city, and opened Perkatory, a happening coffee shop. When Raina—who owns the hot yoga studio next door—goes missing, Lana dusts off her journalism creds and heads into the contentious, and gossip-ridden, world of yoga to cover the story for the local paper. But finding Raina takes a village, and Lana gets help from a wonderful cast, including her yoga-loving, hippie Dad—whose medical marijuana prescription is always filled—and Noah Garcia, the aforementioned police chief. Lana and Noah’s burgeoning relationship, despite plenty of professional conflict, is a strong element in the novel. But at the book’s heart is Lana, a complex character who’s recovering from a divorce, wary of romance, and uncertain about her career, yet with a great sense of humor. If I can’t spend the afternoon hanging out with Lana in Perkatory, then please get me the next volume in this series ASAP.

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Review

Find Me

by Henrietta Thornton

Hope Miller, as she’s known these days, is stuck in a legal no-man’s land. After she was found injured in a car crash, she never regained her memory, doesn’t know who she is, and has continued to live, for years, as a kind of foster daughter of a whole New Jersey town. Police pretend not to notice that she’s driving without a license. She works cash jobs. And her best friend, defense lawyer Lindsay Kelly, who found Hope in the wreck of her car all those years ago, carefully tends to her friend’s safety. Lindsay tries to understand when Hope moves to the Hamptons and asks for no contact for a while, but she’s frantic when the vulnerable woman disappears from the Hamptons home. Looking for Hope, and trying to remain loyal to her while uncovering disturbing truths, has Lindsay examining the case of an already-captured serial killer who stalked women a thousand miles from New York decades before. She’s assisted in the investigation by gutsy NYPD detective Ellie Hatcher, whom readers will know from the previous five books in this series. Also familiar will be Burke’s talent at gripping storytelling, creating thought-provoking characters that make readers squirm with ambivalence, and oh-so-clever endings. There’s no need to read the other books to follow this one, but you’ll want to.

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Review

48 Hours to Kill

by Brian Kenney

A gripping thriller that is begging to be made into a motion picture. Ethan Lockhart, serving time in a Nevada jail for armed robbery, is released on a 48 hour furlough to attend the funeral of his younger sister, Abby. Ethan is devastated—he and Abby were super tight—but he’s also suspicious: his sister Abby was clearly assaulted in her home, but her body was never found. Ethan suspects Shark, his former boss, a one-time minor loan shark who’s now a major Reno crime boss. Ethan teams up with Abby’s best friend, Whitney—sparks fly!—and they descend into the criminal underground he had hoped to have left behind. The plot never wavers, and the few subplots all add to the story. Bourelle really cranks up the pace—the book just flies—and each chapter is ingeniously named after how many hours are left before Ethan needs to turn himself in. Netflix, please get on this!

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Review

The Village

by Brian Kenney

Every few weeks I get a hankering to visit the scariest place on earth: A British country village. And this standalone from Caroline Mitchell—the author of several series, including DI Amy Winters—more than does the trick. Naomi, a London journalist, is making the move to the rural village of Nighbrook along with her new husband, Ed, a filmmaker; and Ed’s daughter Morgan, the teenager from hell. Except Naomi has a secret. She’s long been obsessed with the story of the infamous Harper family, the members of which mysteriously disappeared from their Nighbrook cottage a decade ago, leaving the TV on, the stove ready for a batch of cookies, and no sign of a struggle. Now, not only is Naomi moving her family to Nighbrook but she’s bought Ivy Cottage, the Harper family’s old home, which has been empty this past decade. No one in her family knows its background, but what, after all, can go wrong? Let’s start with the villagers, who could teach a master class in glaring and whispering, and are united in withholding all information. Add to this the police who are in cahoots with the villagers, creeps from the Internet, a dangerous snowstorm, and so much more. Naomi will be lucky if she can get her family out alive, while readers will be happy to read this book in one, terrified, sitting.

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Review

The Lightning Rod

by Henrietta Thornton

Meltzer, Brad. The Lightning Rod (A Zig and Nola Novel #2). March 2022. 432p. William Morrow.
The intriguing setting here is life around Dover Air Force Base’s mortuary, where fallen soldiers are prepared for burial. In the opening title in this series, Escape Artist, Dover mortician “Zig” Zigarowski helped the Army’s Artist-in-Residence, Nola Brown, who was on the run. Now, Nola, a master at sabotaging the military’s plans for her, clandestinely attends a funeral at Dover, and the action revs back up. Meltzer’s thrilling plot veers from flashbacks to Nola’s dangerous childhood to glimpses inside the military’s orchestration of public knowledge about threats to our lives. Meltzer’s talent for detail makes even idle moments leap to life. While Nola waits for a computer program to load, a gust of wind rolls a beer can into a shopping cart that’s on its side; a nurse who encountered Nola has a necklace with a charm for each of her children, all boys. These mundane moments also highlight the casual viciousness that faces characters at every turn. Personalities, too, offer extreme contrasts: Zig prides himself on having done a loving job with the care of dead soldiers, while his foes care for nobody and stop at nothing to win. Fans of military thrillers should clear a weekend for this; it’s gripping.

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Review

Like a Sister

by Henrietta Thornton

From the outside, Desiree Pierce had it all. Famous hip-hop producer father, starring role on a rich-kid reality show, a huge audience following her every diamond-studded move on Instagram. But her sister, Melina, or Lena, has waited years for the phone call saying that drugs have finally killed Desiree, and that moment is here. Fed up as she is with donning her metaphorical Super Black Woman cape, Lena drags it on, again, to start picking up the pieces. But the background to Desiree’s supposedly accidental death starts to look off. For starters, she was terrified of needles and never would have injected heroin like the police say. And what was she doing in Lena’s residential Bronx neighborhood, miles from her glitzy lifestyle? Lena’s fast-paced investigation of what she believes to be a murder takes her back to painful episodes with her family, a clan tight-knit enough to care deeply about one another but that at the same time can get exasperated to the point of estrangement. Twists combine with deft writing and compelling characters—especially the relatable Lena—to create a memorable novel that’s perfect for those who like tales of flawed love and strong women.

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Review

Nine Lives

by Brian Kenney

Nine people receive an envelope in the mail that contains one piece of paper, a list, with just nine names on it, including their own. They don’t know each other, live all over the country, and, superficially at least, have nothing in common. The group includes a musician, an aspiring actor, an oncology nurse, and an FBI agent. Most pay the letter scant attention—a chance occurrence, perhaps?—and toss it aside. Then, one by one, they are murdered, often in the most extraordinary of ways. This sort of over-the-top plotting can seem completely unrealistic or completely suck you in, and in Swanson’s talented hands, it’s the latter. The author alternates the chapters among the potential victims, but does so with such deftness we never lose track of who’s who. And despite the many characters and locales, this book doesn’t have an ounce of fat on it—every fact and every detail adds to the story, propelling it forward. Unlike many suspense novels that slam into the conclusion, we discover our murderer gradually and the poignant back story emerges slowly. For fans of Jo Nesbø and Tess Gerritsen.

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