Eye for an Eye
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Ben Coes. St. Martin’s, $25.99 (400p) ISBN 978-1-250-00716-2
Coes’s heart-pounding fourth Dewey Andreas thriller (after 2012’s The Last Refuge) finds the ex–Delta Force member still fighting the world’s baddest bad guys and coming away bloodied but on top. Fao Bhang, China’s minister of state security, decides to have the American killed while he visits Argentina, but the mission goes awry, resulting instead in the death of someone close to Dewey. Bhang exerts diplomatic pressure to escape any official consequences for his actions, so Dewey strikes out on his own to exact revenge. The CIA and MI6 try to recruit him for their plan to terminate Bhang, but Dewey refuses, as this time it’s personal. Coes is a master at creating extended scenes of intense mayhem, and Dewey is a hero who will have patriotic readers standing in their seats cheering. An ambiguous ending leaves readers with a frightening question: will Dewey live to fight again? Agent: Nicole James, Aaron M. Priest Literary Agency. (July)
Tell Me
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Lisa Jackson. Kensington, $25 (416p) ISBN 978-0-7582-5858-8
A case that true crime author Nikki Gillette is considering for her next book strikes too close to home in bestseller Jackson’s loosely constructed third romantic suspense novel set in Savannah, Ga. (after 2004’s The Morning After). Notorious Blondell O’Henry was convicted 20 years earlier of killing her pregnant teenage daughter, Amity, and seriously wounding her two younger children, Niall, then eight, whose testimony was key to the prosecution, and Blythe, then five. Now Niall recants his testimony, which means Blondell may soon be free. Amity was Nikki’s best friend, and Nikki’s uncle was Blondell’s lawyer. Now Nikki’s fiancé, Det. Pierce Reed, and his police partner are charged with reviewing the evidence against Blondell. As Nikki probes the O’Henry family past, she encounters people, both sleazy and respectable, with secrets—and someone who’s willing to kill to keep those secrets hidden. Readers new to Jackson should be prepared for cliché-ridden prose and strained plotting. Agent: Robin Rue, Writers House. (July)
The Seventh Trumpet: A Mystery of Ancient Ireland
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Peter Tremayne. Minotaur, $25.99 (352p) ISBN 978-0-312-65862-5
Set in 670 C.E., Tremayne’s 20th full-length Sister Fidelma whodunit (after 2012’s Behold a Pale Horse) is one of the weaker entries in an otherwise strong historical series. Fidelma, a law-court advocate, has given up her title of sister in the hope of securing a more senior position, which has gone to another. Now acting independently of “any Rule or religious authority,” she finds herself in familiar territory after the discovery in a farmer’s field of a well-dressed male corpse with multiple stab wounds. This murder proves to be the first of several the sleuth must try to solve. Unconvincing perils and an unremarkable solution matter less than Tremayne’s inability to harness his talent to integrate the political intrigue and scheming of the time into the story in such a way as to make the stakes real to a modern reader. Agent: Charles Schlessiger, Brandt & Hochman. (July)
Midnight
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Kevin Egan. Forge, $24.99 (320p) ISBN 978-0-7653-3526-5
In Egan’s promising debut, the death of Manhattan judge Alvin Canter on New Year’s Eve in his chambers presents a serious problem to his law clerk, Tom Carroway, and his secretary, Carol Scilingo. When a judge dies, the members of his staff keep their jobs until the end of the year, so the two are suddenly faced with unemployment at the end of the day unless they can make it appear as if the judge died after midnight. Carol is a single parent and the only support for her son, Nick, and her mother, Rose, while Tom is heavily in debt to some unsavory people and his “collection agent” is not the patient sort. Tom comes up with a plan to keep the judge from being discovered until the new year, but complications arise. Some late action twists and reversals ensure that nothing turns out as expected. Egan deftly parlays a simple administrative rule and the desperation of regular people into a thrilling read. (July)
The Christmas Wassail
Kate Sedley. Severn, $29.95 (256p) ISBN 978-0-7278-8275-2
Sedley’s 22nd Roger the Chapman mystery (after 2012’s The Tintern Treasure), one of her best, perfectly blends action, detection, and period color. Although 1483 has been a tumultuous year for England with the ascension of Richard III to the throne (and the fate of the princes in the Tower unresolved), Roger is hoping for a bit of a break over Christmas, a wish that goes unfulfilled. Instead of quiet relaxation with family and friends, the occasional operative for Richard has a series of murders to solve. The violence begins with the stabbing death of an alderman, who utters the name “Dee” before expiring, a possible clue to the identity of his killer. When Roger tells the authorities of the dying man’s declaration, Sir George Marvell, a well-respected war hero who was at the victim’s side along with Roger, denies it was a name. Things play out in surprising ways, leaving the investigator in a moral quandary about not only others’ actions but also his own. (July)
Sugar Pop Moon: A Jersey Leo Novel
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John Florio. Prometheus/Seventh Street, $15.95 trade paper (215p) ISBN 978-1-61614-795-2
Set mainly in 1930 New York City, Florio’s lively if disjointed debut introduces Jersey Leo, a mixed-race albino who works as a bartender in a Hell’s Kitchen speakeasy called the Pour House. The pay is considerable, but so are Leo’s problems: he’s been conned into spending $4,800 of his boss’s money on worthless moonshine rather than the prime “sugar pop moon” that was expected. Now Leo must get the money back from a Philadelphia scam artist before his volatile boss finds out. Leo’s aggressive actions infuriate the Philadelphia mob and the corrupt police, while he becomes a target of a notorious voodoo sect with its own horrendous agenda. Haphazard flashbacks to 1906 covering the bitter story of Leo’s father, a black prizefighter who had a brief and unhappy liaison with Leo’s mother, could have been better coordinated. Still, the brisk story and its unusual hero pack a considerable punch. Agent: Elizabeth Evans, Jean V. Naggar Literary Agency. (July)
Snipers
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Kristine Kathryn Rusch. WMG (www.wmgpublishing.com), $18.99 trade paper (348p) ISBN 978-0-615-76205-0
The theme of this lackluster thriller from Rusch (G-Men) is time travel undertaken here to change history for the better. The book raises the familiar ethical and logical dilemmas involved in altering the past. In 2005, author Sofie Branstadter devotes herself to identifying the so-called Carnival Sniper, a murderer who struck in 1913 in Vienna. Since her parents were also killed by an unknown gunman, she has a personal reason for solving the cold case. When she gets the corpse of one of the victims disinterred, she finds an unusual bullet that she hopes will lead her to the truth. Alternate chapters describe the goings-on in 1913 as a series of men who shaped the course of 20th century history are gunned down one by one. Anton Runge, whose great-grandfather was in charge of the Carnival Sniper case, aids Sofie in her search. While Anton starts out hostile to the writer based on a book she wrote about the murders, few readers will be surprised by how their relationship changes. (July)
Damned by Logic
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Jeffrey Ashford. Severn, $27.95 (192p) ISBN 978-0-7278-8279-0
Copywriter David Ansell feels trapped in an unsatisfying career and marriage in this absorbing stand-alone from British author Ashford (Justice Deferred). A new assignment—to create an advertising campaign for client Rex Cruising Company—gives him some reason for hope. Ansell joins the Helios, a ship on a Mediterranean cruise, where he meets Melanie Caine, a prostitute being used as a diamond-smuggling mule. When Melanie twigs that she’s been made, she seduces Ansell and uses him to unknowingly offload the diamonds, intending to claim them later. It’s a fatal mistake, and one that soon has Melanie in trouble with her handlers and Ansell trapped in a web of his own lies. While Det. Insp. Glover focuses on Ansell as his sole suspect in two deaths, only contrarian Det. Constable Belinda Draper believes Ansell might be innocent. The engaging byplay between Glover and Draper and some nifty police work highlight Ashford’s clever resolution. (July)
Deadly Forecast: A Psychic Eye Mystery
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Victoria Laurie. NAL/Obsidian, $23.95 (368p) ISBN 978-0-451-23993-8
A spate of suicide bombings in commercial areas of Austin, Tex., engages FBI agent Dutch Rivers, the fiancé of psychic consultant Abby Cooper, in Laurie’s lighthearted 11th Psychic Eye mystery (after 2012’s Lethal Outlook). With a mix of charm and bluster, Abby inveigles her way into working on the case so she can foresee and protect Dutch from any harm that might come to him. As tension builds, the bomb threats and the couple’s upcoming wedding are equally stressful to Abby; she must deal with her type-A sister, Cat, who’s planning an extravagant “Cirque du Ceremony”—whether Abby likes it or not. While Abby’s inner monologue is always entertaining, Abby and Dutch’s inane squabbles make them poor coworkers and a vapid couple. Still, the plot moves at such a quick clip that readers needn’t read too deeply into the convenient timing of Abby’s psychic vibes. Agent: Jim McCarthy, Dystel & Goderich Literary Management. (July)
Blood from a Stone: A Jack Haldean Mystery
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Dolores Gordon-Smith. Severn, $28.95 (240p) ISBN 978-0-7278-8263-9
Christie and Sayers fans will find Gordon-Smith’s seventh Jack Haldean whodunit set in post-WWI England (after 2012’s Trouble Brewing) a well-crafted throwback to the golden age of detection that pairs deduction with solid writing. Crime writer Haldean gets involved in solving the case of a gruesome murder aboard a train. A man who was stabbed to death had his head ripped off when someone positioned the corpse at an open window, apparently in an effort to stymie the police by delaying identification of the victim. Robbery was not the motive, given that the killer left behind a stash of valuable sapphires. The murder may be the work of a thief known as the Vicar, whose calling card (Simon Templar–like) is the drawing of a cross with a halo on top. The railway slaying may connect with Terence Napier, a man suspected of murdering his aunt. The author cleverly draws the various threads together in the series’ best entry to date. (July)
