Review Roundup: Bolton, Carol, Carter, Den Tex, Edwards, Gordon-Smith, Hodgson, Jones, Kelly, Mankell, Marklund, Mogford, Patterson & Ellis, Staalesen

Here are sixteen reviews which have been added to the Euro Crime website today, all have appeared on the blog since last time.

If you like translated crime fiction then you may be interested in the International Dagger 2016 Speculation list of titles.

You can keep up to date with Euro Crime by following the blog and/or liking the Euro Crime Facebook page and follow on Twitter, @eurocrime.

New Reviews

Michelle Peckham reviews Sharon Bolton's Little Black Lies, set in the Falklands;

Susan White reviews James Carol's Prey, the third in the Jefferson Winter series set in the US;

Amanda Gillies reviews Chris Carter's I Am Death, the seventh in his Robert Hunter series set in LA;


Guest reviewer Bob Cornwell reviews the Dutch thriller Mr. Miller by Charles Den Tex tr. Nancy Forest-Flier;

Rich Westwood reviews Martin Edwards's The Golden Age of Murder - a history of the Detection Club;


Terry Halligan reviews Dolores Gordon-Smith's The Chessman, the ninth in the 1920s Jack Haldean series;

Terry also reviews The Last Confession of Thomas Hawkins by Antonia Hodgson, the sequel to the award winning The Devil in the Marshalsea;


Geoff Jones reviews J Sydney Jones's The Third Place, the sixth in the Viennese mystery series;

Geoff also reviews Jim Kelly's Death on Demand, the sixth in the Shaw & Valentine series set in North Norfolk;


Lynn Harvey reviews Henning Mankell's An Event in Autumn tr. Laurie Thompson;

Michelle also reviews Liza Marklund's Without a Trace tr. Neil Smith - the tenth and penultimate entry in the Annika Bengtzon series;

Lynn also reviews Thomas Mogford's Sleeping Dogs which takes Gibraltar-based lawyer Spike Sanguinetti to Corfu;

I review parts Three, Four and Five of Murder House by James Patterson and David Ellis


and Ewa Sherman reviews Gunnar Staalesen's We Shall Inherit the Wind tr. Don Bartlett which is the sixteenth in the PI Varg Veum series though only six are currently available in English and is the first of three from Orenda Books.

Review: The Chessman by Dolores Gordon-Smith

The Chessman by Dolores Gordon-Smith, August 2015, 240 pages, Severn House Publishers Ltd, ISBN: 0727885413

Reviewed by Terry Halligan.
(Read more of Terry's reviews for Euro Crime here.)

It is a Friday during 1925 in the very quiet, Sussex village of Croxton Ferriers and a couple of local ladies, Isabelle Stanton and Sue Castradon have gone to the church to change the flowers on the altar. As the fresh ones need different sized vases they entered the vestry to fetch them. Puzzled by a strange musty smell there, they opened this large cupboard and were horrified to discover on the shelf next to the vases, a naked corpse, wrapped in a tartan rug. This male corpse had been made unrecognisable by the mutilation of the head and removal of hands and feet.

Arthur Stanton, husband of Isabelle knows that the local village policeman would not be experienced enough to deal with this crime so he telephones an old friend, Detective Superintendent Ashley of the Sussex Police, who agrees to come. Ashley asks for Major Jack Haldean, former Royal Flying Corps hero and present day crime novelist for his help, as, as an amateur detective, he has been involved in solving several previous murder incidents.

Major Jack Haldean, finds in the cupboard where the body had been located, a black marble chess knight with crystal eyes. Soon several notable villagers are receiving typed letters with messages to the effect that their deaths are imminent and the letters are signed "The Chessman".

The day before Sue Castradon had entered the church and discovered the corpse, her solicitor husband Ned had had a violent argument with Jonathan Ryle a drunken chauffeur of local VIP Sir Matthew Vardon, which had been broken up by the local vicar and this event was a hot topic of gossip in the Croxton Ferriers tea-rooms.

The clues follow one another with astonishing speed and I found the story immensely exciting and very fast moving and the pages just shot by. The story is peopled with a very interesting mix of authentic, well described characters. It was very atmospheric and expertly researched giving a real glimpse of life in a Sussex village and the wider country in the 1920s.

There are a few red herrings to draw the reader up the wrong path before the dramatic and gripping conclusion is reached. I was really flummoxed before I reached the end of this book as to how it would end and of course I got everything wrong I'm pleased to say. I read for review her previous book AFTER THE EXHIBITION, the eighth in Jack Haldean series and was so impressed with that book I was very pleased to have this one to review as well.

Well Recommended.

Terry Halligan, September 2015.

New Reviews: Dunmore, Eriksson, Gibson, Gordon-Smith, Larsson, May, Neville, Simpson, Walker

Here are nine reviews which have been added to the Euro Crime website today, five have appeared on the blog since last time, and four are completely new. Interestingly, the settings of the books reviewed range from Canada to Venezuela.

NB. You can keep up to date with Euro Crime by following the blog and/or liking the Euro Crime Facebook page.

New Reviews

Terry Halligan reviews Helen Dunmore's The Lie writing that "it is not a book that will be forgotten very quickly";

Lynn Harvey reviews Kjell Eriksson's Black Lies, Red Blood tr. Paul Norlen which is the latest in the Ann Lindell series set in Uppsala;

Rich Westwood recommends Jasper Gibson's A Bright Moon for Fools set in an unvarnished Venezuela;

Terry also reviews Dolores Gordon-Smith's latest Jack Haldean mystery, set in the 1920s: After the Exhibition;

Michelle Peckham reviews the newest in Asa Larsson's Rebecka Martinsson series,  The Second Deadly Sin tr. Laurie Thompson, which is set in Northern Sweden;


Michelle also reviews Entry Island by Peter May which is now out in paperback;

Lynn also reviews Stuart Neville's The Final Silence, featuring DI Jack Lennon;


Geoff reviews Ian Simpson's  Murder on the Second Tee, set at St Andrews

and Amanda Gillies reviews Martin Walker's latest "Bruno, Chief of Police" mystery set in France: Children of War.


Previous reviews can be found in the review archive.

Forthcoming titles can be found by author or date or by category, here along with releases by year.

Review: After the Exhibition by Dolores Gordon-Smith

After the Exhibition by Dolores Gordon-Smith, April 2014, 240 pages, Severn House Publishers Ltd, ISBN: 0727883763

Reviewed by Terry Halligan.
(Read more of Terry's reviews for Euro Crime here.)

I was absolutely gripped and excited by this very well written and deftly plotted mystery set in London during the years 1924-5. The author, Dolores Gordon-Smith,has written seven other novels in this series and I was so knocked out by it I have bought the first and may buy the others as well!

Major Jack Haldean an author of crime novels and an amateur detective, with his friend Scotland Yard detective Bill Rackham attends Lythewell and Askerns’ exhibition of church art in Lyon House, London, which is expected to be a sedate affair. After all, Lythewell and Askern, Church Artists, are a respectable, old-fashioned firm, the last people to be associated with mystery, violence and sudden death. However, whilst they consider the exhibition rather boring and whilst they are waiting after the exhibition, a seller of flags for a charity appeal suddenly collapses. Later, their friend Betty Wingate, who is connected to the organisers of the exhibition is very surprised by her experience of a vanishing corpse and she tells Jack, who is also intrigued by it all; this all leads to a fascinating story which once started I just could not put down. The clues follow one another with astonishing rapidity and I found the story immensely gripping and fast moving and the pages just shot by. The story is peopled with a very interesting and rich cast of authentic, well described characters. It was very atmospheric and expertly researched giving a real glimpse of life in London and the wider country in the 1920s.

There are a few red herrings to draw the reader up the wrong road before the dramatic and very exciting conclusion is reached. I was really stumped before I reached the end of this book as to how it would end and of course I got it all wrong I'm pleased to say.

I'm very attracted to stories set during the 'Golden Age' of detective fiction and I see that this author is influenced by writers that I already admire such as Agatha Christie, Dorothy L Sayers and PG Wodehouse and having another writer of really gripping stories set during this time is excellent news. I will certainly look out for stories by this very exciting author and I'm pleased that I have already another seven to buy.

Recommended.

Terry Halligan, August 2014.

CrimeFest - Cosies

I have shrunk these photos down somewhat so people can view them on phones etc but unfortunately they are a bit fuzzy.

The opening panel on "Cosies" featured from left to right:

Deryn Lake, Dolores Gordon-Smith, Lauren Henderson, Carola Dunn and Frances Brody.


Here are some random jottings and thoughts from the panel:

Frances Brody's third book in the series will be out in September and her books should be published in the US next year. Deryn Lake's historical novels (as Dinah Lampitt) will be reissued under the Lake name. (I first knew of this author as Dinah Lampitt and devoured her Pour the Dark Wine about the Tudor Seymours which I read in 89 or 90). The Mills of Gold is the first in a new series and there is a new John Rawlings, Death at the Wedding Feast, published in July. Carola Dunn's Anthem for Doomed Youth is the darkest in the Daisy series so far.

There was some discussion of what the term cozies/cosies mean eg between people who know each other well. Cozies more of a US term? Usually used as a pejorative term. The murder methods may not be cosy (at one point Deryn Lake rattled off her book titles and the murder methods in them) but the level of detail would be low and no forensics involved.


The panelists agreed about enjoying house hunting for their characters. Another thing that identified cosies was that the killer didn't take trophies!


Lauren Henderson (whose crime books I wouldn't describe as cosies!) is currently writing YA and bonk-busters (as Rebecca Chance). She commented that her YA (clean) was not selling in the UK as not gloomy enough.

New Reviews: Fitzek, Gordon-Smith, Jego, Jones, Nadel, Rankin

Here are this week's new reviews and details of the current competition:

Latest Reviews:

Mike Ripley reviews the German best-seller - Therapy by Sebastian Fitzek which is full of tension and twists;

I review the second in the 1920s Jack Haldean series by Dolores Gordon-Smith - Mad About the Boy?

Norman Price reviews The Sun King Rises by Yves Jego and Denis Lepree and finds it doesn't live up to its Dumas aspirations;

Amanda Gillies reviews the disappointing The Last Straight Face by Bruce Kennedy Jones and Eric Allison - a collaboration between a former criminal and a journalist - which she finds predictable and tension-less;

Laura Root reviews the latest in the Francis Hancock series by Barbara Nadel - Ashes to Ashes - and she finds Hancock to be "one of the most personable and fully-realised amateur sleuths that I have read about"

and Maxine Clarke reviews Ian Rankin's penultimate Rebus: The Naming of the Dead.

Current Competition:

Win a copy of Our Lady of Pain by Elena Forbes*

* restrictions apply (ends 31 August)