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Thrillers

Review

If the Dead Belong Here

by Willy Williams April 3, 2025

Between 1830 and 1850, the U.S. government’s forced displacement known as the Trail of Tears removed thousands of Native Americans from their ancestral lands in the Southeastern United States. But according to Native folklore, some Indigenous people evaded the Removal, sheltered by supernatural Little People. Faust’s atmospheric debut focuses on a family descended from those survivors and the generational trauma they have endured. When six-year-old Laurel Taylor vanishes from her Wisconsin home early one morning in 1996, her devastated mother, Ayita, believes her abusive ex-husband Barron kidnapped their daughter, even though Barron had abandoned the family before Ayita realized she was pregnant. But as weeks pass by and Laurel remains missing, Nadine, her older sister, begins experiencing nightmares and hearing whispers, especially in the tree house where Laurel always played. Have the Little People taken Lauren or are other family ghosts responsible? To find answers, Nadine travels with her Aunt Rosebud to South Carolina, where her fractured family has deep roots. Faust, an enrolled member of the Edisto Natchez-Kusso Tribe of South Carolina, draws on his family history and Indigenous mythology to weave a haunting tale of loss and redemption that may remind some readers of Keith Donohue’s The Stolen Child with a touch of Poltergeist.

April 3, 2025 0 comment
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Review

Bitterfrost

by Henrietta Thornton April 3, 2025

Bitterfrost, Michigan, is a town that revolves around hockey—a rich local family, the Paynes, owns the adored IceKings team and the rink they play at—and nights frittered away at the Lost Loon, a dismal watering hole. Jimmy Baker works at the rink driving the Zamboni, which keeps him in the sport he loves even after his minor league career stalled. Jimmy was the guy the manager could rely on to take out members of the opposition, but it went too far and now he drives Zelda, enjoying small-town celebrity and missing the daughter his ex keeps from him. Then he wakes up sore all over and with a bloody face, black eyes, and drag marks in the snow outside his house. With no idea what happened—didn’t he have only one drink at the Loon?—he tells others he slipped on his porch, knowing it’s likely a lie and that his history means it was much worse. When a body is found in a burned car outside town, he fears the worst and is soon sitting in court. Defending him is Devyn Payne, daughter of the rink owner, who has a past of her own—a notorious court case that the town can’t forgive her work on. The defendant and attorney find themselves in the crosshairs of both town gossip and further violence, with all ending in an engrossing courtroom scene. This is the first in a series, thankfully, as readers will want to visit this chilly-in-every-way community again.

April 3, 2025 0 comment
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Review

King Sorrow

by Jeff Ayers March 27, 2025

Gwen Underfoot is a senior in high school, and her closest friends are all in college, including twins Donna and Donavan; Allie; Colin; and the young man Gwen has feelings for, Arthur, who works at the college library. An act of kindness ends up with him being blackmailed to ensure his mom stays alive: forced to steal first-edition books from the collection, Arthur wants a way out before he gets caught. The others devise a solution involving an ancient ritual and a journal bound by human skin that conjures up the dragon King Sorrow. The beast promises to help Arthur with his problem, but he and the others are now bound to the dragon, who will demand a sacrifice from each of them every year for the rest of their lives. Hill has crafted a brilliant story with well-rounded characters readers will love and hate, a terrifying spin on everyone’s worst fears, and a tale of six people bound together by a bad decision as they journey through life with that weight on their shoulders. There is even a blink-and-you-miss-it spin on the Greg Stillson campaign from Hill’s father, Stephen King’s, classic The Dead Zone. Don’t let the size of this book sway you from reading it. Joe Hill has another classic on his hands.

March 27, 2025 0 comment
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Review

The Living and the Dead

by Brian Kenney March 20, 2025

A powerful novel that spans generations as it takes us deep into rural western Sweden. It’s the holidays in the winter of 1999, and most people are anxious about little more than where to hide their money before it disappears into Y2K, when the police discover a terrifying accident. A car is found smashed into a tree, leaving behind a bloody steering wheel and the body of a local teen in the trunk. With such a small community, you would think that the secrets would come tumbling out. But no. These people aren’t talkers. Terse and taciturn, both adults and teens remain reserved. Even the new young officer, Siri Bengtsson—who is closely watching two young men as suspects—can’t successfully crack either the families or the teens. Jump ahead 20 years, when there is a similar murder, strange enough to coax Siri out of retirement, and to finally get some of those teens—now adults—talking. Carlsson (Blaze Me a Sun, Under the Storm), who has a doctorate in criminology, is the recipient of several prizes in Scandinavian crime writing. Readers who enjoy his work will also appreciate Liza Marklund, Ragnar Jónasson, and Tana French.

March 20, 2025 0 comment
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Review

Dying Cry

by Jeff Ayers March 20, 2025

A vacation/honeymoon for Mattie and Cole Walker, along with Cole’s young daughters, quickly goes awry in Mizushima’s (Gathering Mist) latest when the family is out snowshoeing and they hear a scream. Cole and the girls return to the lodge for help, while Mattie stays behind with her K-9 companion, Robo. They see someone hurt, but before they can get there to assist, a rockslide buries the victim, and if it weren’t for quick thinking, Robo would have been buried as well. The investigation proves rocky when Mattie realizes that the victim is someone her family knows; he’s the husband of Cole’s veterinary assistant, Tess. Mattie works with the investigative team for Timber Creek County, and when they start digging, the clues and evidence mount for Tess’s guilt. Isn’t it always the spouse? Mattie doesn’t believe it could be Tess, but the more she tries to prove her friend’s innocence, the more she puts her family in the crosshairs of a dangerous person who is willing to kill again. Mizushima has a terrific series with the Walkers and life in the fictitious Colorado Timber Creek County. Robo, her K-9 assistant, continues to shine. Ten books in, and Mizushima still gets better with every entry.

March 20, 2025 0 comment
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Review

Stillwater

by Henrietta Thornton March 20, 2025

Luke Harris knows lots of classic rock songs, but only the first half, because, although his dad, Quin, is a great musician, the man can only concentrate on one thing for so long. Quin’s also hopeless at being a small-time criminal and is in and out of jail. That’s why when Luke’s mom died when he was a child, he had to go to a group home. Now he’s an independent and resourceful young man, studying to be an accountant and working as an aide to disabled youth. Two things crash into that mostly broke existence: he takes a job looking after Phil, a young man whose wealthy father more or less abandons his son to Luke’s care, and Gus, a mobster who forced Luke to work for him when he was younger, finds Luke and wants him back on payroll. A maybe-romance with Emma, Phil’s actress sister, complicates Luke’s struggle to get out of Gus’s clutches, a journey that ends with scary characters and threats meeting in a tense showdown. Scott invites us deep into the tangles of a coming-of-age story that’s fraught with complicated loyalties, love, and desperation. A great read for those who enjoyed T. Jefferson Parker’s A Thousand Steps.

March 20, 2025 0 comment
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Review

The Bachelorette Party

by Willy Williams March 13, 2025

Agatha Christie’s 1939 And There Were None set the template for the island mystery with its protagonists trapped on a remote isle and stalked by an unknown killer. The arrival of cell phone technology has forced writers to up their thriller game. As with the guests in Sean Doolittle’s Device Free Weekend, the five girlfriends who arrive at Baltic Vinyasa on Isle Blind off the Swedish coast for a four-day yoga-themed bachelorette party must give up their cell phones and other digital devices to the proprietor, Irene. “I wish I wasn’t so addicted to my devices,” confesses Lena. Her sister Tessa, the bride-to-be’s best friend, has another, more secret, motive for joining the party. A true-crime podcaster whose latest episode crashed and burned in the wake of a scandal, she hopes to redeem her career by solving the mystery of the Nacka Four. A decade earlier, four young women, who had traveled to the archipelago for their annual reunion, disappeared, presumed by police to have drowned when their boat was found floating. Tessa suspects they may have been murdered on Isle Blind and is determined to find evidence. But from the moment she steps on the island, her sense of dread grows. While elements of this twisty mystery require a suspension of disbelief (the luxurious hotel is built on a rocky island too barren to support crops yet has plenty of water for hot showers), Sten (The Resting Place) excels at building the creepy horror and chilling tension. Readers who like their thrillers bloody and gory will enjoy this dark Nordic take.

March 13, 2025 0 comment
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Review

Her One Regret

by Brian Kenney March 13, 2025

Immensely powerful. Expertly written. Shocking time and time again. This novel poses the question: what should a woman do if she loves her child, but regrets being a mother? Real-estate agent Lucy Mendoza disappears, her groceries and baby abandoned in a Rhode Island supermarket parking lot. Immediately the media is on the case, as is Michelle, Lucy’s very best friend, who is certain Lucy would never abandon her child, and leads a search to exonerate Lucy. In fact, there are a number of theories about Lucy’s absence swirling about town. Cops who can’t help but compare her case to that of the several moms who disappeared over the years in a similar fashion; likely all acts of violence. And then there are the many husbands who decide that Lucy was a home-wrecker, so desperate to leave behind her family she bolted without a trace. And the secret that Michelle carries around: that Lucy regrets being a mother, so much so that she fantasizes about leaving her world behind. But Michelle knows that if information like this ever becomes public, Lucy would emerge from it persona non grata, a monster. What happened to Lucy? Freitas delivers a finale that readers will ponder time and again. A great choice for book groups

March 13, 2025 0 comment
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Review

Nightshade

by Jeff Ayers March 6, 2025

Sergeant Stilwell works for the sheriff’s office of Catalina Island, off Los Angeles, a job he was shoved into after an incident on the mainland involving his partner. Police politics and his dogged pursuit of the truth have placed him in a thankless job, but serving a warrant on a suspect in an animal-abuse case quickly turns ugly. When the murder of a young woman who waitressed at a gentlemen’s club puts him in the crosshairs of influential people, not to mention those of his former colleagues, Stilwell can either sit back and let everyone else solve things, or he can go against protocol and orders and pursue justice. Doing the right thing could jeopardize his career and future with a woman he’s fallen in love with on the island. Connelly has created a whole new cast of characters, and just like Bosch and Ballard, Stilwell and the rest are terrific. The case and the story flow nicely, and it wouldn’t be a Michael Connelly novel without a few surprises. His name on the cover guarantees a stellar read, and Nightshade is no exception and hopefully the start of a new series.

March 6, 2025 0 comment
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Review

Carved in Blood

by Willy Williams February 27, 2025

June in New Zealand means a chilly winter. But it also marks the rising of the sacred stars known as the Matarike, launching the start of the Māori New Year. “When Matarike rises, it is a time for remembering the dead; a time for saying goodbye. And it is also a time for starting anew.” Like the sacred Matarike celebrations, Bennett’s emotionally charged third Hana Westerman mystery (after Better the Blood and Return to Blood) revolves around a series of transitions, in which beloved characters say goodbye to loved ones and embark on new directions in their lives. Returning from festivities in his ex-wife Hana’s hometown, Detective Inspector Jaye Hamilton stops at an Auckland convenience store to pick up champagne to celebrate his daughter’s engagement when he is shot and seriously wounded by a balaclava-wearing assailant. The getaway car is quickly found and a young Māori man, Toa Davis, is implicated in the crime. But Hana, who has asked to join the investigation as a temporary constable, soon suspects that this was no random assault but a targeted attack. Could it be connected to Jaye’s work as an undercover cop years ago? Māori author Bennett delves deeper into New Zealand’s aboriginal culture (with helpful footnotes translating Māori words) while exploring the deeply embedded racism that the country’s first peoples face. An open-ended conclusion will have fans eagerly awaiting the next installment.

February 27, 2025 0 comment
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