Monday, October 24, 2022

Published 18-25 October 2022

I've expanded on my monthly listing. Here are 11 books published between 18 and 25 October 2022.

Blurbs and covers taken from Amazon.

Beevis, Keri - The Sleepover 

When you’re a kid, you imagine monsters to have horns and fangs. That they hide under the bed or in the wardrobe. And you believe they can only come after you when it’s dark.
You don’t expect them to look like everyday people or that they may be someone you already know…

The summer in question started out with hot, fun-filled days and new friendships.
We had just turned thirteen and had our whole lives ahead of us.
But that was before 
her
Before we became known as the Hixton Five and our lives become defined by one night.

It’s hard to believe twenty years have passed since 
she was locked away.
But now 
she’s free and strange things have started to happen.
When I close my eyes, the creeping anxiety and fear is overwhelming and all too real.
Because the monster is back, and I know she has a score to settle with us.



Brody, Frances - A Mansion for Murder #13 Kate Shackleton, Bradford, 1920s 

1930, Yorkshire. Intrigued by a mysterious letter from a stranger offering important information, Private Investigator Kate Shackleton arrives in the mill village of Saltaire. At nearby Milner Field mansion, overshadowed by its reputation for misfortune and untimely deaths, she expects to meet the letter writer, Ronnie Creswell.


Kate soon hears the shocking news that Ronnie has been killed. At first his death appears to be a tragic accident at the mill, but soon it becomes clear that Ronnie's demise was no mishap. Kate is enlisted to help investigate the murder.

Kate moves into the tower rooms at Milner Field, as she tries to uncover resentments, industrial espionage, and old secrets in the close-knit village. Although she doesn't believe in curses, she wonders what sinister truth lies behind this latest in the litany of deaths connected to the infamous Milner Field.

Then just when things couldn't get any worse, a young girl in the village goes missing, and Kate must use all her strength and skill to unravel the mystery around the mansion once and for all . . .


Comley, M A - To Punish Them (ebook only) #6 DI Sam Cobbs 

Evil lies beneath...


When teacher, Fern Mitchell is reported missing, DI Sam Cobbs and her team cling to the hope that she will turn up safe. However, they’re devastated when her body is found at a popular tourist location a week later.

The investigation takes a sinister turn when a second woman turns up dead and the team uncover a crucial link between the two victims.

During one of her most complexing and frustrating cases, Sam is forced to deal with the added pressure of letting go of her past, except someone close to her has other ideas.


Dixon, Helena - Murder on Board #10 Miss Underhay 

Kitty Underhay is drowning… in murder.


Kitty Underhay hopes for plain sailing as she caters a 21st birthday party for the Chief Constable’s daughter aboard a luxury paddle steamer. So her heart sinks when she learns that the man her fiancĂ© Matthew has been tailing on orders from Whitehall, Gunther Freiburg, is aboard. And she’s even more horrified when she steps below deck to 
discover Gunther, dead in the engine room. One of the Chief Constable’s party must be responsible for his demise, but who, and why?

And the evening is on course for further disaster. As the lights go out around the candlelit cake, a terrible scream rings out over the merry hubbub. 
A priceless diamond necklace has been snatched from around the birthday girl’s neck… Something fishy is going on, but is this the work of the same sailing assassin, or is it a red herring?

With the local inspector in deep water having to investigate his own boss, Kitty and Matt dive in to help. But when Kitty’s eavesdropping puts her in mortal danger, 
will everything turn out shipshape, or will it be her turn to go swimming with the fishes…?


Hampton, Graeme - Shame the Devil #5 DI Denning and DS Fisher 

Sometimes catching a killer means looking close to home…

A young father is stabbed to death on his front doorstep in East London. Kieran Judd was a well-liked sports coach and family man, so why would he be targeted for such a brutal death?

D.I. Matthew Denning and D.S. Molly Fisher are quickly thrown into an investigation with no leads to follow … and when the body of respectable schoolteacher Susan Elliot is discovered, her murder mirroring that of Kieran’s, the case gets even more complex.

Faced with two murders with no obvious motive, East London Met worry that a random serial killer stalks their streets. But as Denning and Fisher uncover a dark secret linking the two victims, they are sent spiralling into an investigation in which exposing the truth will bring them directly into the sights of a killer with nothing to lose…


Marrs, John - Keep It in the Family

In this chilling novel from bestselling author John Marrs, a young couple’s house hides terrible secrets―and not all of them are confined to the past.

Mia and Finn are busy turning a derelict house into their dream home when Mia unexpectedly falls pregnant. But just when they think the house is ready, Mia discovers a chilling message scored into a skirting board: I WILL SAVE THEM FROM THE ATTIC. Following the clue up into the eaves, the couple make a gruesome discovery: their dream home was once a house of horrors.

In the wake of their traumatic discovery, the baby arrives and Mia can’t shake her fixation with the monstrous crimes that happened right above them. Haunted by the terrible things she saw and desperate to find answers, her obsession pulls her ever further from her husband.

Secrecy shrouds the mystery of the attic, but when shards of a dark truth start to emerge, Mia realises the danger is terrifyingly present. She is prepared to do anything to protect her family―but is it already too late?



Marston, Edward - The Railway Detective's Christmas Case #20 Det. Insp Colbeck, Scotland Yard, mid 19th Century 

December 1864. As a cold winter wind scours the Worcestershire countryside, an excursion train comes through a tunnel in the Malvern Hills to be confronted by a blockage on the line ahead. The driver manages to slow the train down so that the impact is minimised, but the passengers are alarmed. The first person to alight is Cyril Hubbleday, the man in charge of the excursion to the delightful spa town of Great Malvern. He walks to the front of the locomotive and as he is talking to the driver, fireman and guard, Hubbleday is shot dead by a sniper.

Christmas is coming all too soon and Inspector Robert Colbeck and Sergeant Victor Leeming are under pressure to solve the case quickly. However, with a number of disputes and enemies in the shadows behind the seasonal excursion and the investigation hampered by heavy snow, the hunt for a cold-blooded killer is far from straightforward.



Nattrass, Leonora - Blue Water #2 Laurence Jago, C18

Death came aboard with the cormorant. It arrived on the seventh day of our voyage...


This is the secret report of disgraced former Foreign Office clerk Laurence Jago, written on the mail ship 
Tankerville en route to Philadelphia. His mission is to aid the civil servant charged with carrying a vital treaty to Congress that will prevent the Americans from joining with the French in their war against Britain.

When the civil servant meets an unfortunate 'accidental' end, Laurence becomes the one person standing between Britain and disaster. It is his great chance to redeem himself at Whitehall - except that his predecessor has taken the secret of the treaty's hiding place to his watery grave.

As the ship is searched, Laurence quickly discovers that his fellow passengers - among them fugitive French aristocrats, an American plantation owner, an Irish actress and her performing bear - all have their own motives to find the treaty for themselves. And as a second death follows the first, Laurence must turn sleuth in order to find the killer before he has an 'accident' of his own.


Stafford, David - Skelton's Guide to Blazing Corpses #3 Arthur Skelton, Barrister 

Guy Fawkes Night, 5th November, 1930. Bonfires are blazing, rockets burst. In a country lane, revellers discover a car that has been set on fire. At first, they assume that this is the work of vandals taking the Guy Fawkes spirit a little too far, sitting at the wheel is a body, charred beyond recognition.

The initial assumption is that the owner of the car, Mr Harold Musgrave, a successful travelling salesman has taken his own life in a particularly grisly act of self-immolation. The post-mortem, however, reveals that Mr Musgrave was either unconscious or dead before the fire was lit. When Tommy Prosser, a local criminal, is charged with the murder, barrister Arthur Skelton believes him to be innocent, so sets out to ensure justice is served.




Watson, Sue - The Nursery

Then: Morning light shines into the nursery, casting shadows across the pale pink walls and wooden cot in the middle of the room. She opens the door expecting to hear the soft coo of her daughter Sofia stretching herself awake. But the room is silent. The cot is empty. Her little girl has vanished…

Now: Twelve years have passed, but Emily will never forget the night her life changed forever and she’s happy to have her daughter back beside her. A teenager now, Sofia – who was once a star student – is getting into trouble at school and she’s started asking questions about when she was a baby, but Emily can’t tell her what really happened the night she went missing. Nobody would understand why Emily did what she did, and if anyone ever found out, she could lose her daughter forever.

But when Emily catches Sofia messaging a stranger online, her heart pounds in her chest as she reads the last message received.

Your mother isn’t who you think she is.

Days later, Emily returns home to find the house silent. She checks every room but Sofia has vanished, again. She shudders as she remembers that night in the nursery. Has her past finally caught up with her? And is she already too late to save her precious daughter?


 Yarwood-Lovett, Sarah - A Cast of Falcons #2 Nell Ward

When the wedding of her oldest friend ends with a shocking murder, Dr Nell Ward is once again caught up in a web of subterfuge, secrets and lies...

When her childhood friend Percy announces she's engaged to handsome businessman Hawke McAnstruther, Dr Nell Ward rashly offers to host the wedding at Finchmere, her family's estate. But she hadn't anticipated Percy's parents' fiery disapproval of the groom.

The ceremony is barely over before Hawke's shady personal and professional life starts to unravel, and tension ripples through the assembled guests. When the wedding night ends with a shocking death, Nell, best-friend, Rav and DI James Clarke all find themselves embroiled in a murder mystery worthy of Agatha Christie.

Surviving a terrifying threat to her own life, Nell has to face up to the truth. Not just about murder at Finchmere, but about where her heart truly lies...

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