‘Do No Harm’ by Judith Cutler

Published by Joffe Books,
20 May 2024.
ISBN: 978-1-83526589-5 (PB)
Originally Published
18 January 2007 as
Cold Pursuit.

Chief Superintendent Fran Harman is considering several job offers as she prepares to retire from a successful career in the Kent Constabulary. After thirty years she is looking forward to fresh challenges including spending more time with her new partner. Then she gets a call from the Chief Constable and her planned departure is put on ice. Detective Chief Superintendent Henson, with whom Fran had a strained working relationship during the first book of the series, is seriously ill in hospital.  Henson’s investigation into a spate of indecent assaults on young women requires Fran’s expertise to oversee the enquiry and she agrees to mentor her talented friend and colleague Detective Chief Inspector Jill Tanner. For good measure, the Chief also tasks the two women with the responsibility of addressing a spate of so-called “happy slapping” assaults that are being filmed and posted online.  Fran soon finds herself once more confronting violent behaviour on the increasingly lawless streets of Kent.

Meanwhile, the armchair critics working for the press are keen to exploit the unsolved crimes for sensational headlines that criticise law enforcement officers.  One such reporter is Dilly Pound. She is new to Kent and still cutting her teeth as a journalist. When she confronts Fran at a press briefing it quickly becomes apparent that there is a leak in the department.  Fran is furious and the team can do without heightened anxiety within the community.  Fran also senses that there is something else worrying the reporter, and she’s not wrong! Jill, too, is having to contend with challenges she could well do without as some members of her team clearly regard domestic violence as less serious than other forms of assault. 

The book’s narrative is rich with intertwined plots that reveal the separate investigations as well as the personal and professional lives of the two female detectives and journalist Dilly Pound. The interconnected experiences of the three women are fascinating as they juggle high profile jobs whilst negotiating the highs and lows of their relationships.  Fran and Mark are still in the early stages of their romance and are working out how to manage the time they spend in each of their still separate homes. Jill is coping with two teenagers and a sometimes less than supportive partner.  Dilly’s issues prove to be even more complicated.  The contest between the private and professional lives of the three women never distracts from the criminal thriller at the heart of the book; quite the contrary, it provides a highly realistic and engrossing context within which professional women in the early years of the twenty-first century were still negotiating their way within a workplace that was still predominately male.

Do No Harm is the second in Judith Cutler’s Fran Harman’s Mysteries series, it works perfectly well as a stand-alone.  Previously published as Cold Pursuit, Do No Harm is a compelling thriller that is witty and captivating with a dash of romance.  A great read.
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Reviewer: Dot Marshall-Gent

Judith Cutler was born in the Black Country, just outside Birmingham, later moving to the Birmingham suburb of Harborne. Judith started writing while she was at the then Oldbury Grammar School, winning the Critical Quarterly Short Story prize with the second story she wrote. She subsequently read English at university. It was an attack of chickenpox caught from her son that kick-started her writing career. One way of dealing with the itch was to hold a pencil in one hand, a block of paper in the other - and so she wrote her first novel. This eventually appeared in a much-revised version as Coming Alive, published by Severn House. Judith has eight series. The first two featured amateur sleuth Sophie Rivers (10 books) and Detective Sergeant Kate Power (6 Books). Then came Josie Wells, a middle-aged woman with a quick tongue, and a love of good food, there are two books, The Food Detective and The Chinese Takeout. The Lina Townsend books are set in the world of antiques and there are seven books in this series. There are three books featuring Tobias Campion set in the Regency period, and her series featuring Chief Superintendent Fran Harman (6 books), and Jodie Welsh, Rector’s wife and amateur sleuth. Her more recently a series feature a head teacher Jane Cowan (3 books). Judith has also written three standalone’s Staging Death, Scar Tissue, and Death In Elysium. Her new series is set in Victorian times featuring Matthew Rowsley. Death’s Long Shadow is the third book in this series. 

 http://www.judithcutler.com

Dot Marshall-Gent worked in the emergency services for twenty years first as a police officer, then as a paramedic and finally as a fire control officer before graduating from King’s College, London as a teacher of English in her mid-forties.  She completed a M.A. in Special and Inclusive Education at the Institute of Education, London and now teaches part-time and writes mainly about educational issues.  Dot sings jazz and country music and plays guitar, banjo and piano as well as being addicted to reading mystery and crime fiction.  

The Glass Bell Shortlist 2024

 

The long awaited Glass Bell Award shortlist is here.
From a first-time longlist of fourteen titles,
 Goldsboro Books has whittled them down to just six,
for its 2024 Glass Bell Award.
Find out why we’ve chosen each of these brilliant novels.

A richly detailed historical mystery (THE SQUARE OF SEVENS by Laura Shepherd-Robinson), a dual-timeline thriller (THE TURNGLASS by Gareth Rubin), a poignant World War I novel (IN MEMORIAM by Alice Winn), a gripping alternate historical narrative (LADY MACBETHAD by Isabelle Schuler), a dark and twisted psychological thriller (STRANGE SALLY DIAMOND by Liz Nugent) and a vivid Greek retelling (CLYTEMNESTRA by Costanza Casati), all make up the female-dominated shortlist.

Now in its seventh year, the Award celebrates the very best in contemporary fiction. The only criteria needed for a book to be considered is that it must have been published in the English language for the first time the previous year. Goldsboro Books is proud that once again, this year’s shortlist showcases the remarkable array of talent we are enjoying in the literary world. With a diversity across genres, the list promises readers a captivating journey through each of the nominated works.

Goldsboro MD and co-founder, David Headley, said, “The Goldsboro Books Glass Bell shortlist showcases some of the most captivating and thought-provoking fiction being published today. Each of these books offers something unique and we are thrilled to celebrate such extraordinary talent. The job of narrowing down the books gets harder with each year, but we believe they all exemplify the qualities that the Glass Bell aims to honour.”

For further information and to join the conversation, please visit www.goldsborobooks.com | Twitter.com/GoldsboroBooks| Instagram.com/GoldsboroBooks #GlassBell

Shortlist:

In Memoriam by Alice Wynn (Viking)

Clytemnestra by Costanza Casati (Michael Joseph)

Strange Sally Diamond by Liz Nugent (Sandycove)

Lady Macbethad by Isabelle Schuler (Bloomsbury Raven)

The Square of Sevens by Laura Shepherd Robinson (Mantle)

The Turnglass by Gareth Rubin (Simon & Schuster)

About The Glass Bell Award

Launched in 2017, the GoldsboroBooks Glass Bell Award is awarded annually to an outstanding work of contemporary fiction, rewarding quality storytelling in any genre. The winner of the Glass Bell will receive £2,000 in prize money and an engraved glass bell. The team members from Goldsboro Books decide the contenders. There is no fee or limit to the number of books a publisher may submit, allowing established and debut authors a chance to win. Previous winners include Chris Cleave for Everyone Brave is Forgiven (Sceptre), John Boyne for The Heart’s invisible  Furies (Transworld), Christina Dalcher for VOX (HQ), Claire Whitfield for People of Abandoned Character (HoZ), Elodie Harper for The Wolf Den (HoZ) & Ayanna Lloyd Banwo for When We Were Birds.

 About Goldsboro Books

Goldsboro Books is an independent bookshop based in central London that specialises in signed first- edition books. Providing an expert, knowledgeable team and a carefully curated range is at the heart of the business, delivering the best book-buying experience for every customer. Goldsboro Books aims to interest and inspire book lovers, readers and collectors and provide the finest quality signed books in the world. Goldsboro Books was founded in 1999 by two friends and book collectors David Headley and Daniel Gedeon. Their reputation for spotting quality books early on, expert eye on future collectables, and enthusiasm and passion for bookselling excellence have grown with the business. Goldsboro Books has become a world-famous and much-admired bookshop. Their global reputation grew in 2013 when they were the only bookshop in the world to have signed copies of The Cuckoo’s Calling by Robert Galbraith, who turned out to be none other than J.K. Rowling.

https://goldsborobooks.com/ 

‘Murder at Lord’s Station’ by Jim Eldridge

Published by Allison & Busby,
18 July 2024.
ISBN: 978-0-74903078-0 (HB)

In March 1941, as the Blitz is in full sway, musician Rosa Coburg finishes her set at the Café de Paris deep under Leicester Square. She and her husband, DCI Edgar Coburg, have barely left to walk home when a bomb destroys the club and kills many of the people they have just been speaking to. Not long afterwards Coburg and his assistant Sergeant Lampson are asked to go to the disused Lord’s underground station where the body of a man has been discovered. He has been brutally murdered with what appears to be a cricket bat. Initial enquiries reveal that he is Desmond Bartlett, a first-class cricketer from the West Indies and a member of the British Empire XI which has been formed to play games in England during the war.

The investigation gradually spreads its wings. Bartlett’s fellow cricketers are soon questioned, with nobody having a bad word to say about him. Coburg then moves on to the RAF where Bartlett worked in the ground crew. Before long, promising new strands appear. There are dodgy bookies and illegal betting, allegations of match fixing, dishonest policemen, and a potential spy ring is identified when a German radio is found. There are also tensions and jealousies amongst air cadets. Soon there is a second death.

There is a sub-plot. The Baxter family, three ne’er-do-well boys led by their mother, the unpleasant widow Prudence Baxter, and their associates are involved in further deaths both before and after their abduction of Rosa and her fellow St John Ambulance driver. As two of the deaths are of Ma Baxter’s feckless sons, she swears vengeance on Coburg and his colleagues and this threat hovers over the rest of the novel.

Bubbling underneath is the fact that DCI Edgar Coburg, or Edgar Saxe-Coburg to give him his full name, is the younger brother of Magnus Saxe-Coburg, otherwise known as the Earl of Dawlish. The latter is a member of the MCC and a fine cricketer, and his knowledge is keenly sought by his brother. We also have the saga of Sergeant Lampson’s forthcoming marriage. He is a widower with a young son and not approved of by his future mother-in-law. She is determined that Eve, Lampson’s fiancée, is going to marry local businessman Vic Tennant. Eve makes it clear that she has no interest in Tennant, but he does not take his rejection lying down.

So, there is plenty to keep the reader occupied, with the main plot keeping us guessing. The wartime setting is convincing, particularly in the early pages, and the dangers, difficulties and tensions of that period play their part. Despite the occasional bouts of violence, it is an easy and enjoyable read.
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Reviewer: David Whittle

Jim Eldridge was born in the Kings Cross/Euston area of north London in November 1944. He left school at 16 and did a variety of jobs, before training as a teacher. He taught during the 1970s in disadvantaged areas of Luton, while at the same time writing. He became a full-time writer in 1978. He is a radio, TV and movie scriptwriter with hundreds of radio and TV scripts broadcast in the UK and across the world in a career spanning over 30 years. He lives in Kent with his wife.   

http://www.jimeldridge.com/  

David Whittle is firstly a musician (he is an organist and was Director of Music at Leicester Grammar School for over 30 years) but has always enjoyed crime fiction. This led him to write a biography of the composer Bruce Montgomery who is better known to lovers of crime fiction as Edmund Crispin, about whom he gives talks now and then. He is currently convenor of the East Midlands Chapter of the Crime Writers’ Association.

‘How Can I Help You’ by Laura Sims

Published by Verve Books,
25 July 2024.
ISBN: 978-0-85730-875-7 (PB)

Margo, real name Jane, has been working at a little known library for two years. Unknown to all her colleagues, she used to be a nurse. She had worked at several different hospitals, but always had to leave after several suspicious deaths. Margo has settled into a quiet untroubled life at the library, the only irritation being a couple of awkward patrons who visit there regularly.

One day however, a new member of staff, Patricia starts working there. She also is trying to start a new life after writing several novels but failing to get them published. At first, she and Margo get on fine, but she notices Margo sometimes acting rather strangely, making Patricia feel distinctly uneasy. However, at the same time she finds her fascinating and they become quite friendly. The only fly in the ointment is that Patricia reminds Margo of the head nurse at the last hospital she worked at when she had to leave hurriedly after a certain very suspicious death.

Then one of the “awkward patrons” dies in the library toilets. The police put it down to natural causes, but is it? Margo was found by the body insisting she was trying to help her, but was she really?

Unknown to Margo then, Patricia discovers some of the ex-nurse’s past and is so intrigued that she takes up writing again, using “Jane” as her main character. But what if Margo finds out?!

Then there is another death – this certainly cannot be put down to natural causes – the body is found in a dumpster!

What a deliciously creepy and eccentric thriller. Highly entertaining and absurdly amusing, especially as it is essentially a murder story. I found myself laughing out loud at the wonderful characters.

I cannot recommend How Can I help You, enough
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Reviewer: Tricia Chappell

Laura Sims is the author of the critically acclaimed novel, Looker. An award-winning poet, Sims has published four poetry collections; her essays and poems have appeared in The New Republic, Boston Review, Conjunctions, Electric Lit, Gulf Coast, and more. She and her family live in New Jersey, where she works part-time as a reference librarian and hosts the library’s lecture series. 

Tricia Chappell. I have a great love of books and reading, especially crime and thrillers. I play the occasional game of golf (when I am not reading). My great love is cruising especially to far flung places, when there are long days at sea for plenty more reading! I am really enjoying reviewing books and have found lots of great new authors.

‘Revenge Killing’ by Leigh Russell

Published by No Exit Press,
28 March 2024. 
ISBN: 978-1-83501045-7 (PB)

This is the latest police thriller from Leigh Russell.  A man is found dead, lying at the bottom of the stairs to his flat and it soon becomes clear that this is not an accident.  The dead man's landlord seeks advice from Detective Inspector Ariadne Moralis who is married to his friend.  Ariadne is not convinced she is getting the true picture either from the landlord or the elderly witness who overhears the tumble down the stairs. 

Identifying the killer is the raison d'etre of the entire novel and it is a really great plot which keeps you guessing right to the end.  Lots of references to Police procedure give the story a reliable basis and it is a well written and well plotted crime novel. 

Ariadne is covering the maternity leave of her friend Geraldine Steel.  Geraldine is struggling with coming to terms with her role as a new mother and her desire to be back in the front line of solving crimes.  A very relatable position for many new mothers.  She is delighted to be involved with the solving of her friend's case even on the periphery and gives some sound advice which helps solve what eventually turns out to be two murders. 

I really enjoyed this well-crafted story and particularly appreciated the believable characters that Leigh Russell presents to her readers.  Can't wait for Geraldine to get back to work after her maternity leave!
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Reviewer: Toni Russell

Leigh Russell studied at the University of Kent gaining a Master’s degree in English and American literature. Formerly a secondary school English teacher, with the success of her Geraldine Steel series, Leigh now writes full-time. Her debut novel, Cut Short, was published in 2009 by No Exit Press in the UK, there are now 22 books in the series  featuring detective Geraldine Steel.  Leigh also has a  series featuring Lucy Hall. Her most recent series features Poppy the dog. Leigh Russell is married with two daughters and lives in Middlesex.

 leighrussell.co.uk/

Toni Russell is a retired teacher who has lived in London all her life and loves the city.  She says, ‘I enjoy museums, galleries and the theatre but probably my favourite pastime is reading.  I found myself reading detective fiction almost for the first time during lockdown and have particularly enjoyed old fashioned detective fiction rather than the nordic noir variety.  I am a member of a book club at the local library and have previously attended literature classes at our local Adult Education Centre.  I am married with three children and five grandchildren.

‘Eye of the Beholder’ by Emma Bamford

Published by Simon & Schuster,
4 July 2024.
ISBN: 978-1-3985-2692-4 (HB)

Maddy Wight makes a living by writing other people’s memoirs for them – and a scant and precarious living it is until she’s commissioned by world-famous cosmetic surgeon Angela Reynolds, for a fee beyond her wildest dreams and the promise of high-profile contacts. But the job proves far more difficult than she expects. Not only does Angela require that she works in her remote Scottish house, and through brief online interviews; the deadline is far too tight, and personal information proves almost impossible to find.

The only redeeming feature, aside from the fee, is the arrival of Scott, Angela’s business partner. He and Maddy form a deepening relationship, marred only by his occasional lapses into depression so profound he seems to forget who she is.

Back at home in London, Maddy attends the launch of the memoir, and is as shocked as anyone to hear that Scott has been found dead at the bottom of a cliff near the house in Scotland. She has an even bigger shock a little while later: she sees Scott leaving an Underground station, very much alive.

This tense, pacy psychological thriller raises questions from the outset. Why has Angela chosen a relatively unknown ghost writer when she could afford to take her pick? Why is there almost no information about her online? Why is she so reticent about anything personal, and insistent that nothing of that kind goes into the book? And Scott: what is he doing in Scotland when his and Angela’s company is on the verge of a major development? Why does he undergo occasional personality changes? Who is the strange young woman hanging around the area? Is anything about the project what it appears to be? 

From bleak Scottish moorland with a hint of menace to luxury living with high-end art of the walls, overcrowded Tube station and sweaty nightclub to hipster coffee shop, Emma Bamford proves herself a mistress of atmosphere. There’s a claustrophobic feel to the story right from the start, occasionally leavened by glimpses of spacious, green parkland and empty streets in the small hours. This is heightened by the way the action rarely strays outside the core cast of three, and then only to three supporting players; and everything is perceived through Maddy’s eyes. It’s further reinforced because we never really get to know any of the six, except perhaps Sacha, Maddy’s friend and confidante, whose open and generous personality is a welcome contrast to the elusiveness and enigma of everyone else.

The questions keep on emerging and will keep you reading right to the big reveal. When it finally comes, it’s explosive, but not unexpected – very much ‘why didn’t I see that?’ rather than ‘where did that come from?’ As psychological thrillers go, this one’s a corker.
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Reviewer: Lynne Patrick

Emma Bamford is an author and journalist who has worked for the Independent, the Daily Express, the Daily Mirror, Sailing Today and BOAT International. She spent several years sailing among some of the world’s most beautiful islands and wrote two travel memoirs about her experiences, Casting Off and Untie the Lines. A graduate of the University of East Anglia’s Prose Fiction MA, she lives in the UK.

Lynne Patrick has been a writer ever since she could pick up a pen, and has enjoyed success with short stories, reviews and feature journalism, but never, alas, with a novel. She crossed to the dark side to become a publisher for a few years and is proud to have launched several careers which are now burgeoning. She lives in Oxfordshire in a house groaning with books, about half of them crime fiction.

‘Ostler’ by Susan Grossey

Independently Published,
21 August 2023.
ISBN: 978-1-91600199-2 (PB)

The 1820s, and former soldier Gregory Hardiman is the ostler at a busy Cambridge coaching inn. When the inn cook is murdered, he sets out to investigate – and soon finds himself discovering secrets of the hidden life of St Clement’s college – secrets which put his life in danger.

This novel transported me straight back into the past, and the sounds and sights of a coaching inn in the reign of George IV. Gregory Hardiman’s backstory wasn’t over-emphasised, but we got enough to make him a rounded, believable character: a former soldier whose skill with horses had got him a job as an officer’s horseman, he’d seen service against Napoleon in Spain, then gone with his regiment to be a convict guard at Port Jackson. He had, he mentioned, a daughter in Spain who’d soon need a dowry. Otherwise, his life was focused on now: looking after his horses – as a horse-lover myself, I particularly enjoyed the way his interaction with them was drawn. He’s improving himself with reading, going for walks in the country – and now, investigating George Ryder’s death and the goings-on at the college.

There’s a whole cast of interesting, credible characters: the inn’s hen-pecked owner, his harridan wife and Gregory’s fellow-servants; helpful townspeople like bookseller Giles and banker Fisher. There’s the hierarchy of people who make up the college, from the know-it-all porter who never refuses a tankard, through the worried junior butler and his money-taking senior, the ancient Librarian, the Bursar whose rooms smell suspiciously of a lady’s perfume, up to the Master himself.

Short chapters keep the plot moving swiftly, and though there’s a large cast in the novel, I didn’t have any difficulty in following who was who. One discovery leads to another, and another, and the ending is nearly wrapped up. The description is vivid, and I liked the way Gregory’s ‘voice’ in the first-person narration reflected the speech of the time.

A first-rate historical crime novel, with a sympathetic hero, a good plot and convincing language and atmosphere. It’s the first of a new series, and already I’m looking forward to the sequel.
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Reviewer: Marsali Taylor 

Susan Grossey has always made her living from crime – for twenty-five years as an anti-money laundering consultant and now writing historical financial crime novels.  In 2012 she published what she thought was a standalone book set in London in 1824, but it turned out that the true hero of Fatal Forgery was a magistrates’ constable who insisted on having a further six books written about him.  When he retired in 1829, Susan turned her attention to her hometown of Cambridge and the University constables who were created there in 1825.  She has published Ostler – the first of five planned novels narrated by university constable Gregory Hardiman – and is currently wrestling with the second in the series.  

Susan Grossey – Historical crime writer

Marsali Taylor grew up near Edinburgh and came to Shetland as a newly qualified teacher. Marsali is a qualified STGA tourist-guide who is fascinated by history, and has published plays in Shetland's distinctive dialect, as well as a history of women's suffrage in Shetland. She's also a keen sailor who enjoys exploring in her own 8m yacht, and an active member of her local drama group.  She lives with her husband. 

www.marsalitaylor.co.uk 

‘The Innocents’ by Bridget Walsh

Published by Gallic Books,
11 April 2024.
ISBN: 978-1-91354752-3 (PB)

Minnie Ward is in temporary charge of the Variety Palace Theatre, but takings are falling and every new idea her boss Tansie comes up with just seems to put them more in the red. Then one of the stars, Bernard, asks her to help him find his missing brother – and soon she and Albert Eastbrook are drawn into another investigation together.

This novel’s set in 1877, but it begins with a vividly told account of a disaster from fourteen years earlier, based on a real tragedy in the Victoria Hall, Sunderland, in which nearly two hundred children died. That’s the springboard for this investigation.

The Innocents follows straight on from the first Variety Palace Mystery, The Tumbling Girl, and the characters are still suffering fall-out from that investigation. In particular, Minnie is trying to distance herself from Albert, telling herself she’s too busy for romance. She’s an engaging heroine, with plenty of spunk, and she’s surrounded by a great cast of characters: Tansie, the impractical manager with big dreams, and his pet monkey; Bernard, who sees himself as a Shakespearean actor slumming it to earn a crust; Frances, the costumier who wants to forget her past; the elegant, enigmatic book-keeper, Mrs Lawrence. Then there are Albert, private detective, and his policeman friend John, who are always ready to help with an investigation, especially when it’s a case of murder. The plot takes us from the theatre out to the houses of both rich and poor, to an animal fight ring and even to the classier end of Broadmoor, all convincingly described. There are good twists, a Gothic feel and a high body count.

A fast-moving Victorian murder-mystery, with a quick-witted heroine, an enjoyable background setting and plenty of action. If you enjoy period crime that’s somewhere between cosy and Gothic, this is for you. Recommended.
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Reviewer: Marsali Taylor
The first book in the series is The Tumbling Girl.

Bridget Walsh was born in London and now lives in Norwich with her husband. After a degree in English Literature, she worked as English teacher for 23 years. She completed a PhD in Victorian domestic murder at Birkbeck, London University in 2009, and in 2019 completed the Creative Writing (Crime Fiction) MA at UEA where she was awarded the David Higham Scholarship and received the UEA Little, Brown Award for Crime Fiction.

Twitter:@bridget_walsh1
www.linktr.ee/bridgetwalshwriter 

Marsali Taylor grew up near Edinburgh and came to Shetland as a newly qualified teacher. Marsali is a qualified STGA tourist-guide who is fascinated by history, and has published plays in Shetland's distinctive dialect, as well as a history of women's suffrage in Shetland. She's also a keen sailor who enjoys exploring in her own 8m yacht, and an active member of her local drama group.  She lives with her husband and two Shetland ponies.

www.marsalitaylor.co.uk

‘The Silent Killer’ by Trevor Wood

Published by Quercus,
18 July 2024.
ISBN: 978-1-52943-250-3 (HB)

First it was a homeless man; next came a teenage girl in an unrelentingly grown-up story. There’s one thing you can rely on from a new novel by Trevor Wood: a protagonist unlike any other you’ve ever encountered. The main player in The Silent Killer, and in the series, it heralds, is a detective chief inspector – but I guarantee you won’t have met a detective chief inspector like Jack Parker.

The story opens with a bang – literally. Jack’s sergeant Laura Kemp is driving him home when another car smashes into theirs, killing Laura outright and effectively ending Jack’s life as he knows it. Not through the injuries he sustains in the crash, though they take a while to mend. The killer blow is administered while he’s in hospital, by a CT scan which reveals the early stages of the disease which changed his father’s personality and eventually led to his death: Alzheimer’s. 

Some senior detectives would accept the writing on the wall and take early retirement. Not so Jack Parker. He tells no one except his ex-priest brother and faced with a horrific murder case on his first day back at work, he sets out to prove to himself that he can still cut it. As well as the murder he is tasked with, he also starts to conduct his own investigation into Laura’s death, which he is convinced was not an accident. 

Fans of the genre expect false starts, blind alleys, red herrings; they all go with the territory, along with a bright smart-arse female DS and a victim you love to hate. All these are firmly in place, with Trevor Wood’s own take on everything, so there’s nothing run-of-the-mill about the way the case unfolds. What makes the story doubly unique is the way Jack Parker faces his incipient problems; he runs into them head-on, and not always successfully.

It’s set in Newcastle, the city Wood knows so well, and uses to advantage. Like most cities it has its dark corners and leafy avenues; both have their part to play, as do the places everyday life takes place. Jack’s marital home is cosy and welcoming; his brother’s bedsit is cluttered and dingy; his old school is poorly maintained and crumbling.

Wood has set up a cast of regular characters with immense promise. Jack himself is an old-school cop, sharp as a razor, risen from the ranks, with scant respect for the new regime of policing. Emma, his new sergeant, and Leon, his established one, are in constant competition. Then there’s Jack’s brother and confidant, the voice of common sense but with his own issues; and Helen, the best wife any cop could wish for. Frankie Grant is the local bad guy, foxy and slippery; he will no doubt lurk in the background.

First a trilogy, then a standalone, and now the first in a series; with DCI Jack Parker, Alzheimer’s or not, Trevor Wood is in it for the long haul. This is a police procedural series with a difference, and one that will run for some time. Something to look forward to. 
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Reviewer: Lynne Patrick

Trevor Wood has lived in Newcastle for 25 years and considers himself an adopted Geordie, though he still can't speak the language. He's a successful playwright who has also worked as a journalist and spin-doctor for the City Council. Prior to that he served in the Royal Navy for 16 years joining, presciently, as a Writer. Trevor holds an MA in Creative Writing (Crime Fiction) from UEA. His first novel, The Man on the Street, which is set in his home city, was published by Quercus 19 March 2020, winning the The CWA John Creasey (New Blood) Dagger 2020.    

https://trevorwoodauthor.co.uk

Lynne Patrick has been a writer ever since she could pick up a pen, and has enjoyed success with short stories, reviews and feature journalism, but never, alas, with a novel. She crossed to the dark side to become a publisher for a few years and is proud to have launched several careers which are now burgeoning. She lives in Oxfordshire in a house groaning with books, about half of them crime fiction.

‘Girl Friends’ by Alex Dahl

Published by House of Zeus Ltd,
11 April 2024.
ISBN: 978-180110833-1 (PB)

“How are they going to get out of this?  There has to be a way.”

Charlotte and Andreas Vinge live in Wimbledon with their two children, Madelaine and Oscar.  As their surname suggests, the family are originally from Norway.  They moved to their current residence when Andreas landed a top job in the city of London.  The relocation came with challenges for Charlotte, a medical doctor, who had to leave her job, friends, family and homeland.  Soon, though, the couple linked up with a community of Norwegian ex-pats and their circle of friends expanded.  Linda and Anette have proved to be good friends to Charlotte and for some years the trio have enjoyed annual breaks at her villa in Ibiza.  Moreover, she has more than matched her husband’s success thanks to an interest in the Keto diet which she has developed into a lucrative business.  So far so fairytale, then she meets Bianka LangeLand, and her world is turned upside down. 

An explosive opening chapter gives way to incisive descriptions of complicated female and familial relationships that underpin the novel.  Charlotte may be the Keto Queen, but her celebrity status doesn’t compensate for her husband’s coldness.  Bianka’s situation is more complicated as she resents having to share Emil’s affection with her stepson, Storm.  Perhaps these domestic tensions explain why Charlotte and Bianka are drawn to each other.  Yet, there is an inequality on both sides of their bourgeoning friendship; Charlotte’s personal triumphs dwarf Bianka’s achievements, on the other hand Bianka’s husband is the new CEO of Andreas’s firm.  Charlotte’s established bond with Linda and Anette is threatened when she informs them that she has invited new pal Bianka to join them on their annual jaunt to Ibiza. 

The accounts of the female relationships within the novel are relatable, realistic and unpredictable.  Violent emotions are never far from the surface.  Tension builds, releases, and builds again as the narrative moves towards a surprising dénouement.  Present tense is used throughout the tale and imbues it with a compelling immediacy.  Charlotte’s point of view is penned in the first person.  It clearly establishes her status as the chief protagonist.  Bianka and Storm, whose viewpoints are delivered through a third person narrator are no less compelling and provide an appropriate contrast to Charlotte’s tale. 

Girl Friends is a thrilling and thoroughly modern story that explores twenty-first century relationships and what happens when they go wrong.  Disturbing and fascinating in equal measure the novel delivers an astounding final twist – the perfect coup de grâce.  A super read.
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Reviewer: Dot Marshall-Gent

Alex Dahl was born in Oslo, Norway, and is half American, half Norwegian, fully Francophile, and London resident. Alex is the author of The Boy at the Door, published world-wide in 2018. She holds an MA in Creative Writing from Bath Spa University, as well as an MSc in Business Management. Alex loves to travel and has previously lived in Moscow, Paris, Stuttgart, Sandefjord, Switzerland and Bath.  To learn more about Alex Dahl, please visit her on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.

Dot Marshall-Gent worked in the emergency services for twenty years first as a police officer, then as a paramedic and finally as a fire control officer before graduating from King’s College, London as a teacher of English in her mid-forties.  She completed a M.A. in Special and Inclusive Education at the Institute of Education, London and now teaches part-time and writes mainly about educational issues.  Dot sings jazz and country music and plays guitar, banjo and piano as well as being addicted to reading mystery and crime fiction.  

‘Between Two Worlds’ Olivier Norek

Translated from the French by Nick Caistor
Published by Quercus,
23 May 2024.
ISBN: 0-85705-921-5 (HB)

Syrian police officer Adam Sirkis is afraid his cover as an anti-Bassad activist has been blown. He needs to get his wife and daughter out first, sending them with people-smugglers to France – to the Jungle in Calais. As soon as he can, he follows them – but there’s no trace of them at the camp, and it will take all his police training to survive there himself.

Each of Norek’s novels plunges you into a reality that’s miles away from a conventional crime novel. His Banlieue Trilogy followed the work of police officers in Paris’s most dangerous suburb. In Between Two Worlds he moves to newly-appointed lieutenant Bastien Millar, finding his feet in Calais. Like Adam, he has a wife and daughter, but his wife is suffering depression after the death of her father, and he throws himself into police work to escape his helplessness at home. He soon finds out that normal rules don’t apply in policing the Jungle and its thousands of refugees who try each night to escape on lorries bound for England.

Inside the camp, Adam is also finding out that his police instincts will only get him into more trouble. In this miileu, the violence in the book is almost taken for granted; the shocking opening pages where people smugglers tell a mother she must throw her coughing child overboard prepares us for the ruthlessness of those involved. Because of this, I’d almost forgotten the murders Adam wanted to investigate by the end of the book, but it turned out to be a whodunnit after all, cleverly plotted, with a central shocking and unexpected revelation, followed by another. Norek’s writing is swift-paced and vivid, taking you right into the migrants’ world.

A moving, haunting story of two ordinary policemen caught up in the violence of our times.
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Reviewer: Marsali Taylor

Olivier Norek served as a humanitarian aid worker in the former Yugoslavia, before embarking on a eighteen-year career in the French police, rising to the rank of capitaine in the Seine-Saint-Denis Police Judiciare. He has written six crime novels, which have sold a million copies in France and won a dozen literary prizes.

Marsali Taylor grew up near Edinburgh, and came to Shetland as a newly-qualified teacher. She is currently a part-time teacher on Shetland's scenic west side, living with her husband and two Shetland ponies. Marsali is a qualified STGA tourist-guide who is fascinated by history, and has published plays in Shetland's distinctive dialect, as well as a history of women's suffrage in Shetland. She's also a keen sailor who enjoys exploring in her own 8m yacht, and an active member of her local drama group.  Marsali also does a regular monthly column for the Mystery People e-zine. 

Click on the title to read a review of her recent book
Death At A Shetland Festival

www.marsalitaylor.co.uk

‘The Summer Dare’ by Joanna Dodd

Published by Canelo Hera Books,
11 July 2024.
ISBN: 978-1-80436-842-8 (PB)

Some childhood and teenage friendships fade away when life intervenes, and everyone goes their separate way. Others last into adulthood, held together by – what? Geography? Mutual interests? Or something darker: a long-held secret, perhaps?

Maddie, Hayley, Claire, Jenna and Lucy were members of the cool crowd at school. Well, maybe not Lucy, two years younger and a newcomer to the area, but the others took pity on her. Especially Maddie, the self-styled leader of their little group. Twenty-five years later four of them are still close and have formed a WhatsApp group calling themselves the FabFour. But Maddie hasn’t been seen since they were teenagers. She disappeared during a summer camp, and an extensive police investigation failed to turn up any trace of her.

Then Lucy starts to receive strange, vaguely threatening texts from an unknown number. And she thinks she’s being followed. And there’s something very important that they never told anyone about the night Maddie went missing, not even the police. Especially not the police.   

The FabFour set out to track down the sender of the texts, and it soon emerges that theirs is not the only longstanding secret. Joanna Dodd sends them down a twisty, multi-timeline path, and creates a vivid picture of complex adult relationships and even more tortuous teenage ones. As women, the four are almost like grown-up Spice Girls – a sporty one, a clever one, a shy one and a bold one. As teenagers they are still feeling their way, all but confident Maddie, who knows exactly what she wants and goes all out to get it, and ironically is the one who meets a sticky end. Or does she...?

The other characters – parents, spouses, people involved in the original investigation – all come to life too; there’s a real sense of ordinary people trying to get on with ordinary life after something huge crashed through it. It all helps create the tension that pulled them all together in the past and still pervades everything in the present. Maddie’s disappearance has always hovered in the background, because when a question like that remains unanswered, it never goes away.

The ending is as shocking as it is inevitable, and Joanna Dodd leaves a tantalizing loose end – not to make room for a sequel, but to let the reader decide what happened next.

So, what did happen to Maddie? There’s only one way to find out – read her story.
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Reviewer: Lynne Patrick

Joanna Dodd is fascinated by toxic friendship and family groups and the long shadows cast by old secrets. She lives in London and enjoys acting in plays, running very slowly, and spending time with her (lovely and not at all toxic) family and friends. She’s wanted to be a crime writer since she became addicted to Murder She Wrote as a teenager (although her real-life sleuthing skills are probably not quite as honed as Jessica Fletcher’s). When she’s not writing crime fiction, she also loves reading it!

 

Lynne Patrick has been a writer ever since she could pick up a pen, and has enjoyed success with short stories, reviews and feature journalism, but never, alas, with a novel. She crossed to the dark side to become a publisher for a few years and is proud to have launched several careers which are now burgeoning. She lives in Oxfordshire in a house groaning with books, about half of them crime fiction.