Posts tagged with mystery
Exposed, by Kimberly Marcus
Kimberly Marcus's Exposed is a YA novel written entirely in free verse. It's a gimmicky approach, but the poetry format proves to be a perfect fit for this book—it takes a dark, gripping story an...
The Dark Days of Hamburger Halpin, by Josh Berk
When I opened the package containing Josh Berk's debut novel The Dark Days of Hamburger Halpin, I assumed it was a book aimed at elementary school students. The colorful cover, the goofy nam...
Sammy Keyes and the Wedding Crasher, by Wendelin Van Draanen
We adore Wendelin Van Draanen's books, but we understand why the director of the recent film adaptation of her novel Flipped re-set the plot in the 1950s—Ms. Van Draanen's unif...
Killer Summer, by Ridley Pearson
Ridley Pearson's Killer Summer is his third book featuring Walt Fleming, the sheriff of Sun Valley, a small Idaho resort town. I'm always hesitant about starting a ser...
Tribute, by Nora Roberts
When I channel-flipped past Lifetime’s made-for-television adaptation of Nora Roberts’ novel Tribute a few days ago, I thought it looked ridiculous—the TV equivalent of spray-can cheese, with...
Behold, Here's Poison, by Georgette Heyer
Behold, Here’s Poison features one the most creative weapons in murder-mystery history, and is my favorite of the three Heyer novels we’ve reviewed in the past week. Why Shoot a Butler? and...
Why Shoot a Butler?, by Georgette Heyer
Why Shoot a Butler? is perhaps Georgette Heyer’s most conventional detective story. Her murder weapons are unremarkable, her plot centers around a missing will, and her sleuth displays a lev...
The Unfinished Clue, by Georgette Heyer
While Georgette Heyer is best remembered for her Regency romances, she also wrote a handful of superb detective stories. These mid-twentieth century British mysteries amply display Heyer’s g...
Kisses and Lies, by Lauren Henderson
Kiss Me Kill Me, the first book in Lauren Henderson’s series featuring 16-year-old Scarlett Wakefield, was an unexpected delight: a YA mystery that blended the guilty pleasures of the Gossip Girl series with...
In The Woods, by Tana French
Tana French’s bestselling novel In the Woods opens with a never-solved mystery: three children in 1970s Ireland vanish from their suburban neighborhood. One is found, but he has no memory of what happene...
Cover-Up: Mystery at the Super Bowl, by John Feinstein
John Feinstein’s Cover-Up: Mystery at the Super Bowl offers an appealing alternative to the majority of books aimed at preteen male readers (most of which seem to feature wizards, spies, and/or laser-toting aliens). While Cover-Up includes its fair share of armed thugs and sneering bad guys, it’s basically a thoughtful, entertaining novel about the world of sports journalism...
Poltergeist, by Kat Richardson
Kat Richardson’s Poltergeist (sequel to 2006’s Greywalker) is a sharp, sinister urban fantasy that blends storytelling with Seattle history. Painstakingly researched and intelligent, this series is perfect for fantasy/horror fans looking for something more than a spine-tingling cheap thrill...
Three Bags Full, by Leonie Swann
The set-up is stock casual mystery: in a rural Irish town, a friendly, reclusive shepherd is found dead in his pasture with a spade in his stomach. Everyone in the town had a reason to not only want him dead, but also to fear his death. None of the locals, including the police, care to investigate. Instead, the mystery is left to be solved by a set of lovable amateurs—the shepherd’s abandoned flock...
Evil Genius, by Catherine Jinks
Catherine Jinks’s novel Evil Genius opens with a list of the classes offered at the Axis Institute. Students can sign up for “Applied Physics”, “Cultural Appreciation”, or “Pragmatic Philosophy”. There’s even a wholesome-sounding offering entitled “Coping Skills”. It looks a lot like any other class list... or it would, if someone hadn’t crossed out the official class names and written in more accurate descriptions...
Christine Falls, by Benjamin Black
I’m not much of a mystery fan. I’m more of a fantasy/sci-fi kind of guy. But despite the appalling family secrets, ominous settings, and rampant alcoholism in Benjamin Black’s Christine Falls, I still found myself compulsively turning pages. It’s a brilliant book, gloom and all...
The Watchman, by Robert Crais
I thoroughly enjoyed Robert Crais’s action/suspense novel The Watchman. Crais’s book is neither deep nor plausible, but it is fast, fun, furious, and capped off with a satisfyingly noisy shoot-‘em-out ending. It doesn't have any of the intellectual ambitions of the last action/suspense novel that we reviewed, but it's much more entertaining...
Size 14 is Not Fat Either, by Meg Cabot
Size 14 Is Not Fat Either is the best series installment Meg Cabot has produced in years. It’s sunny-tempered (well, as sunny-tempered as a story featuring a beheaded cheerleader can be) and witty, and it does a great job of displaying Cabot’s gift for engaging characterization...
Jane and the Barque of Frailty, by Stephanie Barron
Stephanie Barron’s Jane Austen mysteries are always clever, but some of the books in the series are more emotionally effective than others. It’s difficult to forget the facts of Austen’s life—she...