Penny’s exemplary 20th mystery featuring Chief Insp. Armand Gamache of the Québec Sûreté (after The Grey Wolf) picks up where its predecessor left off, with Gamache and his cohort reeling from the revelation that a conspiracy to poison Montréal’s drinking water was just the beginning of a far-reaching international espionage plot. At the outset, Gamache, along with his deputies Jean-Guy Beauvoir and Isabelle Lacoste, wrack their brains to decipher clues in a notebook left behind by biologist Charles Langlois, who was murdered in front of Gamache before he could reveal the extent of the scheme. Gamache’s determination to avert disaster, and his knowledge that high-ranking government officials might be compromised, leads him to reluctantly seek information from Marcus Lauzon, Canada’s former deputy prime minister, who masterminded the water plot. Lauzon’s scheme involved ceding control of primary industries to Americans, and the more Gamache uncovers, the more he realizes the Americans might hold the key to the case. Penny’s talent for nail-biting suspense and quiet character moments fuse with surprisingly topical subject matter to deliver an unputdownable installment of an ever reliable series. Readers will cheer. (Oct.)

Reviewed on 08/01/2025 | Details & Permalink

Todd’s latest whodunit featuring Scotland Yarder Ian Rutledge (after A Game of Fear) finds the long-running series in top form. In 1921, WWI veteran Rutledge is still plagued by shell shock and haunted by the voice of Cpl. Hamish MacLeod, whom he executed for refusing to follow an order that both knew would result in senseless bloodshed. Rutledge’s plans to spend Christmas with his sister are disrupted when his boss, Chief Superintendent Markum, directs him to Kent, where well-connected ex-colonel Lord Braxton claims an unidentified horseman tried to run him down, badly battering him before escaping. Braxton is sure it was a targeted attack and fears the assailant will strike again, so Rutledge puts aside his Christmas plans to investigate. Though he’s determined to tackle the inquiry with his typical diligence (and help from the voice in his head), Rutledge struggles with moral ambivalence about aiding a former military man. Todd keeps readers off-balance throughout and poignantly explores his lead’s emotional struggles as he interviews the people of Kent and comes to suspect that Braxton isn’t telling the whole story. Inspector Rutledge shows no sign he’s running out of steam. Agent: Lisa Gallagher, DeFiore & Co. (Oct.)

Reviewed on 08/01/2025 | Details & Permalink

In his energetic latest Swagger family novel (after Targeted), Pulitzer winner Hunter traces the sharpshooting dynasty back to 1897. Elderly Jack Swagger, his face “a net of fissures and gullies,” arrives at Callahan Ranch in Arizona territory looking for work as a hired gun. He puts on an impressive enough display that Colonel Callahan offers him a job protecting grain and flour deliveries to a corrupt official in Mexico. First, though, the colonel relays a cautionary tale about a previous employee known as Teacher, whose noble refusal to let horses suffer during a shoot-out led to his death. From the outset, Hunter makes it clear that Jack’s job search belies his ulterior motives, but author and character both keep their cards close to the vest. Meanwhile, Jack displays superb marksmanship while facing down foes including smuggler Joe Pye, Mexican army major Arau, and violent Frenchman Etienne d’Auclair. Hunter tends to favor ornate dialogue (“The ranch is America,” the colonel says at one point. “It is large, splendid, and provides for the many. Indeed, some sins have been committed to keep it on keel. That is always so of large entities”), but he keeps tension high throughout, and readers with a thirst for bullets will be satiated. This is a solid yarn. Agent: Esther Newberg, CAA. (Oct.)

Reviewed on 08/01/2025 | Details & Permalink

Detective Jimmy Perez returns (after Wildfire) in bestseller Cleeves’s crafty latest whodunit. It’s the Christmas season, and Jimmy, who has settled in Scotland’s Orkney islands, learns that his best friend Archie Stout has disappeared. Jimmy catches a ferry to the island of Westray and finds Archie dead, his head battered by a sacred Neolithic story stone stolen from the local heritage center. While visiting Archie’s widow, Jimmy learns that his friend never returned from the nearby Pierowall Hotel bar the night before. Suspects include popular teacher George Riley; Archie’s friend, Rosalie Greeman, with whom he might have been having an affair; and a pair of secretive archaeologists doing work on Orkney. When Jimmy finds George murdered in an ancient burial chamber beside another story stone, he broadens his inquiry, adding George’s brusque lover to the list of suspects. Tension builds until someone else turns up dead, and Jimmy discovers a pattern underpinning the killings. The intensely personal nature of the case infuses it with welcome emotional depth, and Cleeves keeps readers guessing until she delivers a gutting climactic reveal that few will see coming. This proves Detective Perez still has the goods. (Sept.)

Reviewed on 07/25/2025 | Details & Permalink

Sci-fi author Gerrib (One of Our Spaceships Is Missing) delivers a solid suspense debut. In 1986, high school senior Pat Kowalski is working on an oral history of Eastville, Ill., for his final project. He spends his birthday at his great-grandmother Barb’s nursing home in hopes that she might offer up useful stories, but he’s unsure how seriously to take her claims that, in 1896, a stranger with gold coins and a gun in his pockets dropped dead outside her Eastville home. Barb tells Pat she found the stranger’s bag nearby, which was overflowing with gold, and kept it for decades as a rainy day fund. She says $12,000 remains, but grows confused when Pat asks her where it is. With his father dying and his mother facing foreclosure on the family home, Pat sets aside his history project to track down the treasure with only Barb’s foggy testimony as his guide. His search catches the attention of his classmate, Vincent “Three Sticks” Bisceglie, who also needs cash, and who proves he’ll go to surprising lengths to get it. Gerrib wrings a lot of tense fun out of the treasure hunt, and Pat is an appealingly sensitive teenage lead. This grown-up Goonies riff is a treat. (Self-published)

Reviewed on 07/25/2025 | Details & Permalink

Addison’s third mystery featuring telepathic apothecary worker Alex Daniels (after A Hex for Danger) is a sparkling supernatural cozy. After announcing that the case of the Fisherman—a serial killer who stalked Bellamy Bay, N.C., in the 1980s—will be reopened, Bellamy Bay Bugler editor Jonah Fox is found dead. Horrified, Bugler reporter Pepper Bellamy tells Alex that she believes Fox had figured out the Fisherman’s identity and was killed before he could go public with his accusation. Alex—who learned she was descended from a Polish mermaid after moving to Bellamy Bay, lending her telepathic abilities—has sworn off mystery solving but soon fears that the stakes of the case are too high for her to sit on the sidelines. Reluctantly, she plunges back into the sleuthing game with help from her boyfriend, police detective Jack Frazier, and unearths a host of secrets seething beneath Bellamy Bay’s placid surface. Addison seamlessly folds fantasy lore into her well-oiled whodunit plot, sprinkling the reversals and red herrings with an extra bit of magic. Fans of Cindy Stark’s Crystal Cove series should check this out. Agent: Nikki Terpilowski, Holloway Literary. (Sept.)

Reviewed on 07/25/2025 | Details & Permalink

Horror author Miskowski (The Worst Is Yet to Come) shines in this inventive psychological thriller. After resolving to become a journalist during the Covid pandemic, Parker Dillon was hired to write for her aunt Jody’s modestly successful women-focused news and culture website, JG+2. Then Jody sold the site, and Parker was left directionless. Thumbing through a pile of unexamined JG+2 pitches at Jody’s house, Parker finds a letter and a manuscript sent three years earlier by a woman named Ann Mason. In the letter, Ann states that when she was 14, she wrote to actor Van Slate, star of her favorite private detective TV series. Though he never responded, Ann became obsessed with him, and she eventually confessed to Slate—and to JG+2—that she’d killed someone. Though Parker is unsure about the letter’s veracity, she decides to seek Ann out, figuring she can piece together a memorable feature story either way. After she tracks Ann down and starts to correspond with her, Parker realizes the woman is far more dangerous than she seems. Miskowski makes Parker’s desperate need to give her life meaning palpable and poignant, and hides a dazzling number of big surprises up her sleeve. This is a winner. Agent: Danielle Svetcov, Levine Greenberg Rostan. (Sept.)

Reviewed on 07/25/2025 | Details & Permalink

In this promising if familiar series launch, Colt (the Andy Roark mysteries) puts his New England upbringing and experience as a police officer to good use. Beleaguered Massachusetts state trooper Tommy Kelly, who’s been clashing with his boss while his marriage crumbles, has just been assigned a gruesome investigation on Nantucket. Recent construction has unearthed the 35-year-old remains of abused child Nick Steuben, and Kelly is tasked with figuring out how he died, despite his aversion to such cases as the father of two boys. To make things more difficult, Kelly is paired with Nantucket police detective Jo Harris, who’s frosty to off-islanders on her best days. As the pair pore over missing persons files and get the cold shoulder from the island’s tight-lipped residents, Colt mixes in chapters set in 1981, which follow a series of boys who vanished the same year as Nick. Some of Colt’s dialogue clangs, and the plot is littered with perhaps one too many red herrings, but he enlivens his standard setup with convincing local color and a surprisingly complex psychological portrait of his lead. There’s enough here to make police procedural fans look forward to the follow-up. Agent: Cynthia Manson, Cynthia Manson Literary. (Sept.)

Reviewed on 07/25/2025 | Details & Permalink

Herron’s preternatural talents for satire and spycraft are on full display in his latest Slow Horses novel (after Bad Actors). The crimes of a murderous informant who worked with British intelligence in Northern Ireland during the Troubles move a trio of former spies to seek recompense by blackmailing Diana Taverner, First Desk at the Regent’s Park headquarters of MI5. Rather than swatting the trio aside, Diana seizes the opportunity to shift blame for their findings onto some of her many rivals. Meanwhile, River Cartwright, grandson of late Service veteran David Cartwright, hears from the man curating his grandfather’s library that a book has gone missing. Still recovering from a near-fatal poisoning, River learns that the phantom volume is a repository of state secrets. As those potlines converge, Jackson Lamb, head of Slough House’s ragtag group of MI5 rejects, gets roped into Diana’s scheme. With his trademark balance of complex plotting and bone-dry laughs, Herron steers the narrative toward a jaw-dropping ending that leaves at least one key player dead and promises big changes for the future of the series. Overflowing with gritty action and mordant humor, this is as good as espionage novels get. Agent: Lizzy Kremer, David Higham Assoc. (Sept.)

Reviewed on 07/25/2025 | Details & Permalink

A woman worries she’s inherited her father’s sins after taking over his company in this enjoyable historical series launch from Pegau (Blood Remains). In 1912 New York City, Margot Baxter Harriman has become the head of canned goods producer B&H Foods after the death of her father, though her transition from boss’s daughter to boss has been met with skepticism from her male colleagues. She arrives at the B&H offices early one morning to find the dead body of Giana Gilroy—former assistant to her father—propped up in Margot’s chair. Under Giana’s hand is a cryptic note addressed to Margot that alludes to her father’s wrongdoings (“Your father and I were involved in a situation at B&H. People got sick. Some died”) and urges her to make things right. Startled, Margot hires spunky private eye Loretta “Rett” Mancini, who helps her look into Giana’s murder and the note’s implications while introducing Margot to New York’s queer world. Pegau’s plot moves in fits and starts, with protracted rising action and a rushed finale, but convincing period detail and likable leads save the day. There’s enough here to make readers excited for the sequel. (Sept.)

Reviewed on 07/25/2025 | Details & Permalink