Thriller and mystery roundup
The best of thills, spills, mysteries and murders from the recent weeks.
A killer motive by Hannah Mary McKinnon
Six years after the disappearance of her younger brother Max, Stella Dixon remains obsessed with the cold case and now hosts a true crime podcast. When a mysterious contact claims to have information, Stella is dragged into a series of sadistic, high-stakes tasks, but as Stella follows the clues, she realises the game is personal, targeting her family and unearthing buried secrets. A deft blending of traditional domestic suspense with the frantic pace of a scavenger hunt, this is a tense, twist-filled exploration of how far a person will go to fix the mistakes of the past.
6:40 to Montreal by Eva Jurczyk
Agatha St. John, a novelist grappling with severe case of writer’s block, boards a train from Toronto to Montreal, a unique writing retreat gifted by her husband. Agatha however, has other plans. The journey is derailed in a remote area when a blizzard strands the train and a passenger dies in the seat Agatha was originally assigned, and soon Agatha is viewing the tragedy as fodder for a new book. A twist filled, modern take on the locked-room mystery and an homage to classics such as Murder on the Orient Express.
Deceived by the light by Damien Boyd
Boyd steps away from his DI Nick Dixon series to introduce a new DI. Set in 1985, the story follows Detective Inspector Mungo ‘Bob’ Willis a detective facing forced medical retirement after a botched sting operation that left him broken and his partner dead. Convinced that the police framed an innocent man for a string of roadside murders, Bob launches an unofficial, "off-the-books" investigation tracking a serial killer before they strike again. Readers of Ann Cleeves, Rhys Dylan and Peter James will appreciate.
Softly calls the devil by Chris Blake
A taut and cleverly plotted crime novel set in around Haast, where sole charge police officer Matt Buchanan is posted after retiring as a Detective in the big smoke. When two men die in quick succession in the tiny community, Matt suspects they're connected to the murder of a family 40 years earlier, and the disappearance of a backpacker in the early 90s. Softly calls the devil follows on from The sound of her voice (written under a pseudonym Nathan Blackwell) but can be read as a standalone too.
Murder in the castle by C.L. Miller
In the third instalment in the Antique Hunters series, The Lockwood Antique Hunter's Agency head to the snow-swept Scottish Highlands, where Bella, a member of the Agendy disappears while tracking an art forger. Freya Lockwood and her eccentric Aunt Carole rush to an isolated castle to find her, only to discover a murdered laird and a missing collection of priceless ancient silverware. With Bella as the prime suspect and a blizzard cutting them off from the world, Freya must use her antiquarian expertise to unmask the real killer. A fun and quirky addition to the lighter end of the crime novel spectrum.
Every parent's worst nightmare - where is my child? When Lauren arrives to pick up her daughter Evie from university for the Christmas holidays, she discovers Evie hasn't lived in her dorm room for weeks and has voluntarily withdrawn from her course. Her phone is disconnected, no one knows where Evie has gone. Desperate and ignored by the police, Lauren and her son, Lucas, launch a frantic search through London, uncovering a web of digital lies and a secret relationship that suggests Evie isn't the person Lauren thought she was.
A chilling domestic drama centred on the toxic, lifelong bond between two women, Billie and Cassie. The story begins with a shock: Billie is in a New York apartment, holding Cassie’s four-month-old daughter, whom she has just kidnapped, while she listens to Cassie’s frantic screams from the floor above. Spanning from their childhood in the early 2000s to the present, the story unspools a shared history of trauma, class envy, and a dark secrets.
Little red death by A.K. Benedict
DI Lyla Rondell is investigating a string of macabre crimes dubbed the 'Grimm Ripper Murders'. Each victim is found in a grotesque tableau staged to resemble a classic Grimm fairy tale. The case is deeply personal for Lyla: twenty-five years ago, her childhood friend Allison disappeared, leaving behind only a half-eaten poisoned apple. Intercut with Lyla’s investigation is the story of Katie, a novelist who has been kidnapped by a man called 'The Wolf' and forced to write these very murder scenarios to save her own life.
