Back in 2009, Brad Parks introduced his Carter Ross series…and somehow I totally missed them all. Then, in 2017, his standalone thriller Say Nothing came out. Somehow I stumbled on it and it was TERRIFIC. So I was happy to have the chance to write an honest review of his latest standalone novel, Closer Than …
Not sure I have read any Brad Melzer books before, but the marketing, which includes a comparison to Girl With the Dragon Tattoo and high praise from Harlan Coben (one of my favorites) made me want to read The Escape Artist (Thanks to Grand Central Publishing and NeGalley, whp provided a copy in exchange …
I REALLY wanted to like this book. I had read and enjoyed his prior books Numbered Account and Rules of Deception, and when I read the blurb that referred to this as a “stylish breathtaking ride” in “the grand tradition of The Day of the Jackal and The Bourne Identity,” I was ready! And I am very grateful to …
I’ve been a fan of Chris Bohjalian for many years…I think possibly Midwives was the first one of his that I read. Anyway, he has written a ton of good books, many of which had unique characters, settings, or situations. In addition to Midwives, I especially liked The Sandcastle Girls because I learned so much …
I’d never heard of Simon Lelic before I got this book, but because his latest book The New Neighbors got a positive blurb on the cover from Tana French, I figured if it’s good enough for Tana, it’s good enough for me! The story revolves around a young couple named Jack and Syd who have …
I am a big fan of mysteries, and each year I read what seems like a ton of them – especially those featuring a “plucky heroine.” So I was pretty sure I had read Lisa Gardner before, but looking through goodreads and my blog, I see a bunch of Lisas (See, Wingate, Jewell) – but …
I started this book, and after a few pages of VERY intense and detailed narrative about bombs, bomb making, and what they can do, I just put it aside. I just wasn’t in the mood for something so dark. Then my husband picked it up and he REALLY liked it and thought I would as …
Back in 2015, I read and reviewed Time of Departure by Douglas Schofield, so when (thanks to St. Martin’s Press/Minotaur Books and NetGalley) I had the opportunity to read Schofield’s new novel, Killing Pace, in return for my honest review, I leapt at it. Like Time of Departure, Killing Pace also features a female protagonist …
SPOILER ALERT: The basic premise (which is a surprise at several points) of Karen Cleveland’s Need to Know is laid out here; so if you want total surprise, stop reading! But I’m not giving away the BFD ending which is designed to be a real shocker, so if you don’t mind reading a plot outline, …
I’ve enjoyed many books by Michael Connelly, and when I learned his new book, The Late Show, was coming out, I looked forward to reading it. I didn’t know anything about the storyline, and I think perhaps I assumed it would be another in the long line of Connelly’s crime novels set in Los Angeles …
UNSUB by Meg Gardiner has gotten GREAT reviews, so when I started it and found my mind wandering, I put it aside for a couple of weeks and picked it up again. I knew going in that the story involved a serial killer in the Bay Area with a catchy nickname, reminiscent of “The Zodiac …
Talk about a grabber: the description for Alan Drew’s book Shadow Man starts out “What Dennis Lehane does for Boston, Alan Drew does for Southern California in this gritty thriller…” I thought “what a trifecta!” I’ve been a Dennis Lehane fan for many years, I grew up in Orange County, CA (I am a huge …
I first became aware of Megan Miranda’s storytelling skill when I read her previous novel All the Missing Girls, which was told BACKWARDS. Not an easy thing to pull off, but she did it in a 5-star fashion, so I was ready with high expectations when I received an advance copy of her latest book …
I admit, the thing that initially compelled me to dive into this book in a frenzy of “oh-please-let-this-be-a-story-that-makes-me-unable-to-stop-reading-til-I-have-finished-it” were the strong quotes from Mary Kubica and Heather Gudenkauf praising it. I have enjoyed some of their psychological thrillers, so I figured, “YES! I HAVE ONE!!!!” The protagonist, Zoe Whittaker, lives a life that, to …
In her mid-20s, Arden Arrowood has inherited the family home on the banks of the Mississippi River in Keokuk, Iowa, where she lived as a child. When she was just eight years old, she was in the front yard of the elegant home, watching her twin sisters, Violet and Tabitha, who were almost two years …
Ink and Bone by Lisa Unger was high on my TBR list, but for some reason I kept not really getting into it. It had a couple of things that I don’t really “get” – namely, visions and tattoos. Both of these are fine for others, but just don’t do it for me…in my fiction …
I’ve been a fan of Mary Kubica’s densely plotted novels, including Pretty Baby and The Good Girl (a big hit with a book club I belong to) – so was looking forward to her latest effort, Don’t You Cry. The story unfolds along two tracks: the first involves the mysterious disappearance of Quinn Collins’s roommate …
This is another one of those CREEPY psychological thrillers involving young women who were friends as teenagers, then they lose contact, and years later they reconnect with more or less unpleasant results. In this one, Heather and Edie are the two main characters. The novel is definitely creepy and it all leads to a horrifying …
The first book in this series, Black Fridays, was released in 2012, and I have been recommending the author and the series ever since. The author and the protagonist, Jason Stafford, share the life experience of being Wall Street types, and the information about that whole complex way of life is interspersed throughout the series…but …
OMG. OMG. OMG. I just finished an AMAZING book! Now that I have that out of the way, let’s talk about Close Your Eyes by Michael Robotham (wish I knew how to pronounce his last name), which is the 8th in the Joe O’Loughlin series…but truly, if you haven’t read any in the series, you …