May Crime Releases

This is a great series for fans of Joe Ide’s IQ series and gritty crime fans who love a vivid community. It stars August Snow, a PI who has moved back home and is trying to help out the neighborhood while also solving mysteries–this time, the case gets personal when a past employer of his mother’s hires him to look into being blackmailed and things go wrong real quick! If you want to start at the beginning pick up August Snow (Review–I didn’t keep TW notes back then)

If, like me, you haven’t read a good political/legal thriller in a while, this will scratch that itch. A supreme court judge goes into a coma and a law clerk learns that she’s been left power of attorney, which enrages his family and puts her in danger while she tries to figure out why… Bonus: The audiobook has a wonderful narrator, Adenrele Ojo. Double bonus: There are going to be two more books and I want them now. Triple bonus: It’s getting adapted into a show.

(TW attempted suicide, detail/ addiction/ briefly threatens sexual assault, doesn’t/ degenerative brain disorder/ genocide/ Islamophobia)

Looking for a start to a cozy mystery series in a small town with the returning-back-home trope and great food descriptions? Here you go! I especially loved that, along with the main restaurant, we get to visit a handful of other local restaurants, with full food descriptions. Yum!

If you like mystery series with a lot of humor and ridiculous characters, this one is a lot of fun. The setup actually reminds me of the format of The Princess Bride in that Poldi is always telling her most recent mystery adventure to her visiting nephew who is narrating the book to the reader. Poldi is in her 60s, will absolutely not be told what to do, probably hasn’t met a man she didn’t have the hots for, has a mouth that gets her in trouble, and is always entangled in a mystery after moving to Sicily. You won’t be lost starting with this book, but the whole series is fun and does have running side plots. So if you want to start at the beginning, pick up Auntie Poldi and the Sicilian Lions. (TW main case questioned to be suicide, detail)

A Japanese ode to Agatha Christie that fans of remote mysteries will not want to miss! (Review)

Absolutely a favorite read! Everything about this book is wonderful from the writing and characters to the ghost whose murder must be solved by a young girl. (Review)

A page-turning thriller with a mystery and contract killers that is twisty and takes the standard “must find children from long ago sperm donation” trope and goes in a different direction! (Review)

Here’s one that sounds perfect for fans of books about books. Jacob Finch Bonner is now a writing teacher because he didn’t make it as a novelist. So when a student with a fantastic plot idea dies before publishing, Bonner takes it as his own and gets the acclaim he always wanted. Until an email arrives saying someone knows he stole the book…

I’ve enjoyed Kubica’s previous work–always a slow-build suspense that manages to stay in the real world rather than having a far out there twist–so I have this audiobook loaded as my next pick. A decade ago, two women, separately, disappeared–one with her young daughter. Now the young daughter has been found. We’re taken into the past lives of neighbors, and the current lives of the found girl’s family, to try and piece together what happened, what is connected, and who is responsible and why…