R.V. RAMAN'S PAGE 2: Harith Athreya series 3 & 4...PRAYING MANTIS, and THE LAST RESORT

THE LAST RESORT (Harith Athreya #4)
R.V. RAMAN
Pushkin Vertigo (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$13.99 ebook, available now

Rating: 3.75* of five

The Publisher Says: There's blood in the backwaters of Kerala…

BOLLYWOOD

Detective Harith Athreya is recuperating in the beautiful backwaters of Kerala when he meets a family of vacationing Bollywood royalty, who ask for his help making a murder mystery film.

BANKRUPTCY

But the family is not what it seems—there are rumours of major money troubles, links to organised crime, and rivalry between the scions.

BUTCHERY

When one of them is found dead, murdered exactly like a victim in the film, Athreya puts his holiday on hold to solve the case. Is this the work of an angry co-star, or something more sinister?

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.

My Review: Latest of the four (to date) Golden-Age inspired mysteries set across the wildly varied, beautiful subcontinent of India. Using plots we've all loved for generations, techniques of obfuscation and misdirection that work as intended here like they have since Mary Roberts Rinehart began practicing her craft over a hundred twenty-five years ago, Author Raman brings new delights and fresh energy to the film-becomes-crime plot. We meet Mrs. Athreya at last! Dekight beams out of every passage she appears in, as her lifelong love of Bollywood and its films is meshing with the Gurua family's vacationing next to the resort she;s brought her husband to as he recuperates from dengue fever.

It's permaybehaps not my own favorite, that would be Grave Intentions, as this entry lacks some expansiveness of characterization that it could've used. No one involved in the aforementioed Guria family is realized all that well, in fact as the mystery unfolds it begins to feel as though Author Raman simply hasn't got much interest in them, leaving them mostly feeling like labels. The murder being a near-pefect echo of a famous scene in a Guria-produced movie really doesn't feel organic but put there to pique Mrs. Athreya's ongoing interest in the proceedings...a kind of authorial bribe to the character from the auythor that sadly doesn't keep her onscreen nearly long enough.

I'm so deeply pleased we gave the Dramatis Personae, two maps, and a pretty detailed Guria family tree; it is very helpful indeed. I'm always happier with these inclusions in any murder mystery. It's not always clear from dialogue and narration how everything fits together without maps.

A series I'm very happy I've discovered, and expect will continue.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++


PRAYING MANTIS (Harith Athreya #3)
R.V. RAMAN
Pushkin Vertigo (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$13.99 ebook, available now

Rating: 3.25* of five

The Publisher Says: ISOLATION

Harith Athreya is taking a well-earned break at a boutique hotel in the Himalayan foothills. But his holiday is swiftly cut short when mysterious bloody handprints start appearing on the walls around the resort.

INCRIMINATION

When a woman then falls to her death, chaos and confusion reigns. The hotelier is convinced that the key to the case rests with four other young people who checked in at the same time as the victim, all pretending for some reason not to know each other.

INTRIGUE

Did one of these guests have something to do with it? Harith Athreya must get to the bottom of the case before the murderer strikes again…

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.

My Review: The PreCrime Unit strikes again, this time in a very exclusive resort in the sweetest spot possible: a castle in a Himalayan valley. The owner is a friend of Athreya's who's harboring dark suspicions about a small group of guests staying in his resort. Unease is not proof of guilt but Javed is willing to bet these five are bad news and innkeepers, like bartenders, are usually correct in their darker suspicions.

It doesn't take loong for there to be a murder, and even less time for Athreya to see past spurious alibis, though the motivation for the specific crime committed is not really believable to me. I got a bit over the fashion focus of this entry in the series as well...you're in the Himalayas! Tell me more about them not about fabric colors!

Personal crotchet, that; others will feel differently. It's so good to have the Dramatis Personae, the maps, and our brief character descriptions to refer to. I'm not going to tell you I loved the story, a take on one of Dame Agatha's most famous stories which even naming will give everything away. It's a good enough hommage to its famous progenitor. It isn't my favorite thing to have a woman in the story who's pretty thoroughly demonized for what felt to me to be ridiculous, overblown reasons. I'm not convinced by them as you can tell.

I can't quite go all four stars given my reservations but I'll most definitely be picking up book four.

R.V. RAMAN'S PAGE: Harith Athreya series 1 & 2...GRAVE INTENTIONS, and A WILL TO KILL

A WILL TO KILL (Harith Athreya #1)
R.V. RAMAN
Pushkin Vertigo (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$2.99 ebook, available now

Rating: 3.5* of five

The Publisher Says: MIST, MOUNTAINS, MURDER.

Ageing millionaire Bhaskar Fernandez has invited his relatives to the remote, and possibly haunted, Greybrooke Manor, high up in the misty Nilgiris.

He knows his guests expect to gain from his death, so he writes two conflicting wills. Which one of them comes into force will depend on how he dies.

Fernandez also invites Harith Athreya, a seasoned investigator, to watch what unfolds.

When a landslide leaves the estate temporarily isolated, and a body is discovered, Athreya finds that death is not the only thing that the mist conceals. . .

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.

My Review: First in a new series of private-investigator mysteries set in India. This Golden-Age style story about a murder yet to occur and fully expected by its purported victim that then morphs into a locked-room mystery is investigated by a Poirot-level famous private investigator. Or so we're told...I'm as always just a bit annoyed that I'm vouchsafed no evidence of this assertion, but that complaint is not one bit new or unusual.

I was set to love the read from the get-go because I read these reissues this summer. It's set in cool, misty mountains, and I about sobbed with jealousy as I compared that to the supersummer outside. *sigh* As I encountered more and more characters, beginning to wonder about a dramatis personae being notably absent. Such a simple thing to add, I mused, and so very helpful. It also struck me that the characters were more or less in the highwayman school: stand and deliver their piece of the narrative. That's a lot of time spent outside the narrative stagecoach waiting to get moving again.

A body is discovered. It means we're all in the stagecoach again, moving at a slightly bouncy, uncushioned pace. It becomes a locked-room mystery as we're moving along; no change of bouncing rocking pace as we clunk shins and bonk shoulders with characters who *are* going to say their piece, despite earlier attitudinal tics. It could have something to do with the sausage-fest we're having here, everyone is male and don't they just show it. A second body is discovered and there is more stand-and-deliver set-piece delivery. A big problem for me is no one who's died is at all, in any way, undeserving of their murder.

It's like a lesser Poirot story meant to convey the eerieness of The Pale Horseman. It works as a story well enough because we know where we're going. It's a bit less effective if the reader's not already on board with the Golden-Age conventions because then the solution, and its delivery by Athreya, ties everything to objects we're aware exist but not filled in on particulars about. It makes the solution a bit less impactful, more like the delivery of a sermon that we and everyone else, simply accept is true and so must be correct.

Points for period appropriateness, then, fewer for fair-play mystery solution, and please dear goddesses give me a damn list of who's who at the beginning. As a series starter I'm most definitely glad I've got all four in their reissue; I don't think I'd've picked up the second one (see below) if it had come out a year or more later.

The ebook is on sale, so definitely go get one!

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++


GRAVE INTENTIONS (Harith Athreya #2)
R.V. RAMAN
Pushkin Vertigo (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$13.99 ebook, available now

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: Death, a cursed archaeological dig, and a beloved detective feature in this cozy stand-alone mystery set in contemporary India.

SECRETS

Seasoned detective Harith Athreya is back, this time to investigate suspicious incidences on a riverside dig in the heart of remote Bundelkhand.

SUPERSTITION

In this place, rich in myth and history, the legend goes that anyone who sets foot on nearby island Naaz Tapu would be cursed forever.

SLAUGHTER

When an archaeologist defies local folklore, the fallout is swift and deadly. Is the death a result of the ancient curse, or is it a more down-to-earth case of murder? Athreya needs to unravel the truth from legend before the curse strikes again….

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.

My Review: Archaeology! Possible supernatural stuff! A Dramatis Personae! Yes, yes, yes to all of these as good omens, and ways to get my repeat business.

On to the story.

Book two sets itself the task of telling us binaries exist for a reason, there is nothing we do not want to be expressed in a well-matched faceoff between, eg, two young women who are chilly career driven professional/warm, inclusive, family-loving opposites. Athreya is on a holiday with the latter, a nibling of his, and the former is the director of a "cursed" archaeological dig where a local wise guy seems to be stealing artifacts the dig is uncovering. A local legend of lovers kept apart by centuries old political feuding placing the area under a curse offers a modern murderer cover is the first thought a mystery fan would have; but who wants the specific person dead and why? What is the dig site looking for? Do local customs only matter if the people flouting them are white/colonizer people?

Again requested to solve a crime yet to take place, Athreya immediately zooms in on the artifact thefts but...well...are they thefts or rescues of cultural patrimony? Who decides this? What difference does it make, if the end result is the object ends up far far away leaving nothing in its place? Knowledge of the past that will never be accessible to the cultural descendants is no more complete a theft than a profitably sold antiquity....

In the quest to solve the mysteries via fair play, Author Raman snuck a valuable clue past me...in plain sight! Well done, sir. I enjoyed the Murder in Mesopotamia meets The White Tiger vibes. It felt more cohesive and less speechifyin' in tone than A Will to Kill (above) did. The read passed with admirable velocity, the Dramatis Personae made a big difference to my sense of the read as under my control, and Athreya's enough more familiar to me this time around that I felt prepared from the off to invest in his resolution.

A career spent making corporate presentations and mentoring young entrepreneurs has taught Author Raman to stay nimble, to choose a principle at the center of the story he wants to tell then to be sure his story relates to that principle all the way through. That serves him well in this second Athreya mystery/thriller.

LOST IN YELLOWSTONE, Nicole Maggi's second National Park Mystery with ISB agent Emme Helliwell

LOST IN YELLOWSTONE: National Park Mystery #2
NICOLE MAGGI
Oceanview Publishing (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$23.99 ebook, available now

Rating: 4.25* of five

The Publisher Says: A foot in a geyser. A school in the wild. A truth no one saw coming.

When a human foot is ejected from a geyser in Yellowstone National Park, Special Agent Emme Helliwell of the National Park Service is assigned the chilling case.

Tasked with identifying the victim and uncovering what led to such a grisly end, Emme is drawn into the park's vast, unforgiving wilderness—and into the orbit of a private school for at-risk teens where extreme backcountry excursions are part of the curriculum. As disturbing truths begin to surface, Emme must also confront personal fault lines, including the unresolved tension with an ex-boyfriend who's suddenly back in her life and assigned to the same case.

In a place where danger hides behind natural beauty and good intentions can mask darker motives, Emme must navigate both treacherous terrain and emotional landmines to solve a mystery that could cost her everything.

Perfect for readers of C. J. Box, Paul Doiron, and Lisa Gardner

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.

My Review: In the course of doing my due diligence, I looked for published book reviews of this second Emme Helliwell mystery (after A Murder in Zion) and ran across a depressing reality of our time: They were mostly book reports. I think that's a shame because opinions are helpful in deciding on the suitability of a read for one's own TBR shelf. If you read my reviews, I'll give you an opinion about a book's merits. Of course you might end up disagreeing, or might not like my way of expressing my opinion; but you will know more than a restatement of the blurb can tell you.

So, here I go:

Another really weird case death under unusual circumstances brings Emme to Yellowstone in order to poke her nose into the situation. Her still-smarting ex, whom I called "Thrush" throughout because it's the best name for him...smarting because Emme just ghosted him with not so much as fuck-you in explanation...and the dude she met last book who's really perfect for her, Finn, are involved in this weird case. Thrush and Emme *have* to be, they work for the National Parks Service's Investigative Services Bureau, but Finn chooses to be. The unattached foot and its mysterious companion object, a red pocket knife spotted by the informant of the probable crime's commission, cost both Emme and Thrush actual skin in the form of burns suffered while retrieving them as the "game" takes shape.

Emme is, as in the last book which ended mere days before this one starts, still processing her mother's death, her uneasy relationship with her younger sister, and now her awfulness to Thrush needs mending too. It's not only about the restoration of Ma'at in this story. It's about Emme becoming aware of how true the truism "hurt people hurt people" really is. It's all internal in this story, as her trail of devastation through genuinely good guy Thrush's heart is never shown to lead to her making any sort of adult apology to him, never acknowledging the hurt and harm she's caused, seeking forgiveness, promising to change her ways towards him. It's like Author Maggi decided her inner awareness of her unkindness was enough.

It ain't.

The case brings these two together, and if I'm honest, I sorta hoped Thrush would brush off Emme's halfassed request to be friends. With great unkindness. I'm all about FMCs being as complicated in their emotional lives as males have always been allowed to be. Look at Harry Hole: Popular novels, popular TV show, miserable nasty guy, so bring it Author Maggi!

The investigation leads to an outdoor program developed to rehabilitate teen offenders. To no one's surprise it's not run in such a way as to make the families sending their kids there feel good about it. Emme is a representative of law enforcement, so automatically suspect to the young offenders; winning their trust to get information she needs taxes Emme to the utmost. Her character is developed as the story delves into some dark and violent territory (in retrospect, not immediate and present until the ending). The manner she comes into possession of information to resolve this case harkens back to her Zion National Park case, unsolved in the legal sense....

I like the storytelling as well as the story told here. It's a series with developing promise. I'm glad Oceanview brings these stories from debut and early-career authors out. Conglomerates only want hits, not to make careers for authors who might, or might not, throw a hit out one day. I predict Author Maggi will be one who does.

DOUBLE SHADOW, second Splinter Effect series time-traveling archaeologist story

DOUBLE SHADOW (Splinter Effect #2)
ANDREW LUDINGTON
Minotaur Books (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$14.99 ebook, available now

Rating: 4.5* of five

The Publisher Says: In this thrilling installment of the Splinter Effect series, time-traveling archaeologist Rabbit Ward returns to the past to help save his former adversary and track down a murderous thief in first century Jerusalem.

ROME, 2019. Time-traveling, Smithsonian archaeologist Rabbit Ward is back in the present, but not for long. Helen, his former adversary and growing ally, is in trouble with the law after being framed for a murder she didn’t commit. Stuck in hiding and running out of other options, she turns to Rabbit for help. "Help" in this case involves a trip to first century Jerusalem to track down a mysterious man named Einar Eshek.

But Rabbit won't have to do this mission alone; as soon as he arrives in 68 CE, he meets a younger version of Helen, one who has never met him before. Together, they work to track down Eshek, who turns out to be not only a time-traveling thief, but a murderous psychopath.

As they pursue Eshek through time, Rabbit and Helen feel something even bigger pulling them together. Torn between the two versions of the woman he knows, and with the clock ticking down on Helen’s fate in 2019, Rabbit might have no choice but to betray her past self to secure Helen’s safety in the future. Tensions rise as Jerusalem prepares to go to war with Rome, and Rabbit races to capture Eshek, clear Helen’s name, and make it back to 2019 in one piece—a feat that’s proving to be easier said than done—before everything falls apart.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.

My Review: Author Ludington...are you stark staring mad?! In this absolutely bonkers passage in world history, which no matter how long the editing process on this story took you were writing while the US political landscape's ablaze with AIPAC news, you release a book set in a rebellious Judea! It's a choice....

So, aside from the geopolitical timing seeming to my eyes a bit on the nose, I was verschmeckeled at the twist of Rabbit...I really wish his nickname wasn't evocative of Rabbit bloody Angstrom, that pusillanimous milquetoast...encountering a younger version of his frenemy Helen from the first book. I know a lot of people who find time travel stories not to their taste for this very trope, to the point of not watching Doctor Who despite the glorious beauty of Alex Kingston as River Song, if you can imagine such masochism, because she meets the Doctor at asymmetric moments in each of their lives. "It can't happen! It's never happened!" Maybe...but don't you crave a Jake-and-Sadie moment from 11/22/63? I, clearly, do not share this cavil. In this particular iteration of the trope, I found a real aha! moment for some things in the first book. I really like that in a series story. I want to feel there are webs of interconnection that I sense but don't yet see because that happens in life as well.

So all that to say I found this story as much to my liking as it's ever gonna get when there are straight people centering it. Rabbit and Helen's dynamic in particular feels richly textured with powerful emotions clashing and shifting in each of them every time they meet. In this story, as Helen does not know Rabbit yet, we get the unedited version of her responses to him. If the fact she's trying to kill him says anything, it's something *good* about her character...she is a professional with clear goals. I admit that, as the story began, I was a bit surprised that Helen reached out to Rabbit for this specific kind of help, but it made perfect sense as I was swept along in the tides of developments. Einar Eshek, our villain, was villainous. Rabbit, our hero, was resourceful, determined, and required always to think on his feet; that's a feat any author who's using this character trait gets kudos from me the more successfully they pull it off. I didn't notice Rabbit navigating his altered relationship to Helen as awkward or forced into convenient resolutions to knotty conflicts. That is a rare compliment from someone like me, very experienced in reading series stories.

I found the resolution to the central conundrum...chasing Einar, exonerating *2018-Helen...fit the facts, satisfied the overarching plot, and resolved the immediate story tensions with a very clear intent to publish more of these characters' stories in the future.

Bring it. Soon, please and thank you.

BRIDGET WALSH'S PAGE: The Variety Palace Mysteries series 1, 2 & 3

THE TUMBLING GIRL (Variety Palace Mysteries #1)
BRIDGET WALSH
Pushkin Vertigo (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$14.99 ebook, available now

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: The first in a sharp, witty series of Victorian mystery novels, The Tumbling Girl sees an unlikely duo team up to solve a grisly spate of murders.

1876, Victorian London. Minnie Ward, the feisty scriptwriter for the Variety Palace Music Hall, is devastated when her best friend is found brutally murdered. She enlists the help of private detective Albert Easterbrook, who already has his hands full trying to catch the notorious Hairpin Killer. But Minnie can't help getting involved in the investigation, and as the bodies begin to pile up, Albert's burgeoning feelings for his amateur partner start to interfere...

A dazzling debut for fans of Sarah Waters and Elizabeth Macneal, and shows like Miss Scarlet and the Duke.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.

My Review: What delight it is to find a dynamic duo, opposite genders and complementary skill sets uniting to solve a case not worth the police's time...the victim was "just" a performer and a female one at that...without slobbering over each other's sex appeal! Albert comes to realize what a treasure Minnie is without her body being his focus.

Minnie's clearly an unusual person, one who does not accept Authority's word as law. It makes her very much in step with my tastes in a person to read about. Albert is built up as a detective of skill and reputation, which made me a little disgruntled at some missteps he made that were Very Convenient for the plot...I didn't want to leave off that fractional fifth star, but for a while it looked like I'd be rating this story just under four stars.

What put the rest of the fourth star back on my opinion of the story was Albert and Minnie's response, a shared one, to the Hairpin Killer as a person. The killer has a deeply twisted motive for doing the revolting things done to the victims, and it offends Albert as much as it does Minnie because he sees the victims as real people in the way she does. He, the experienced detective, wants to catch the killer because he is mortally offended that these crimes *occur* to the killer, that it seems *okay* to do these things in a person's mind. Minnie, OTOH, is outraged that there's so little official interest in the killings because the victims are lower class.

All of that is sort of elliptical because it would be very easy to ruin the puzzle if I say more explicitly what the duo are responding to. It's not a cozy, y'all, and the crimes are not sugar-coated. I don't think, for my read anyway, that it's prurient in purpose to be as direct about what the results of murder are. It felt to me that the detective duo's different tonal responses to the realities of the aftermath were intended to make their partnership more nuanced, more relatable for future events in this story and later ones.

Of course I already knew there were more books in the series before starting this read, but that honestly made the ending bearable. The twist, if I'd had to endure a long wait for book two to come out, would've been excruciating! It was not an artificial, tacked-on, manipulative one; it was organic and it was kind of dreadful, but it worked. I'll warn you, gentle readers, to have book two to hand when you read book one.

I encourage you to read it. There is a lot to enjoy in a female-led Victorian detective duo solving nasty crimes by bringing justice to the perpetrator in spite of official indifference. Victims, in any afterlife that might exist, can feel their wrongs have been redressed.

On to book two!

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

THE INNOCENTS (Variety Palace Mysteries #2)
BRIDGET WALSH
Pushkin Vertigo (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$13.99 ebook, available now

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: The hotly anticipated follow-up to The Tumbling Girl, The Innocents follows Minnie and Albert on a new crime-solving quest in the world of a Victorian music hall.

Still reeling from the gruesome murders of the previous year, Minnie Ward is appointed manager of the Variety Palace. Times are hard, with performers shunning the 'cursed' music hall, and Minnie's relationship with Detective Albert Easterbrook is more complicated than ever. Despite the success of their last case, Minnie is terrified of the feelings that have started to grow between them. She has decided it’s definitely better for all involved if they stay as far away from each other as possible…

But when another killer begins to terrorise the city's streets, Minnie and Albert are thrown together once more. The crimes seem connected to a notorious tragedy that left nearly 200 children dead—and with so many lives affected by the incident, practically everyone is a suspect. As the investigation unfolds, dark truths begin to come to light, and Minnie is forced to confront her own past.

The Innocents is the 2nd book in the Variety Palace Mystery series, which can be read independently but continue the story of irresistible crime-solving duo Minnie and Albert. Taking place against the thrilling backdrop of the Variety Palace Music Hall in gritty Victorian London, it's perfect for fans of historical crime fiction, such as books by Sarah Waters, Stacey Halls and Elizabeth Macneal.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.

My Review: I'll start by noting that you really will enjoy this read a lot more if you read book one before picking this one up. (I'm soft-pedaling this because publishers are really anxious for y'all who resist series-reading unless the series is complete need you to buy the books.)

I'd say this was not *quite* up to the first one's standard of narrative refinement. The twist I mentioned that occurs in the last 15% of The Tumbling Girl is, to my surprise, allowed to keep affecting the action in this book. I felt that was surprising, not ordinary; I didn't mind it because the issue under investigation by Minnie and Albert is not an ordinary one, relating to and stemming from a decade-plus old cause. If we're seeing life unfolding as Life unfolds for us real people, let the recrudescence of complicating factors do the same. After all, ma'at is never done with us; why should plots be artificially tidy?

Because fiction isn't life, that's why.

Minnie is in a more complicated situation vis-à-vis the music hall in this entry, is still processing her complicated feelings for Albert, still juggling skatey-eight skabillion demands on her time...and still can not let an injustice, really a dereliction, with horrible real-world pain and anguish as its fruit go unaddressed once Albert makes her aware of it.

Albert's still the emotionally labile one of the pair. He loves Minnie and still doesn't demand anything of her just is there with her, supportive, while still giving her the impetus to use skills and talents she might be reticent to deploy as he guides her to do. She suffers the conflicted feelings that any PTSD sufferer would when confronted by a worthy, good partner: she isn't good enough, he deserves better, he is too good for her. Albert does not agree. Albert demonstrates this with patient kindness and sincere reassurance. It's like watching Ilya from Heated Rivalry tenderly reassuring Shane that everything's fine when stress causes a spin-out. Albert has earned Minnie's trust so he can focus her on protecting their friends from harm.

These stories are not sugar-coated. The terrible things that happen are not shied away from, minimized, in order to spare your 21st-century squeamishness. I'm okay with that, but in this story two things occur and get described that are...viscerally upsetting, child harm and cruelty to dogs. Both are condemned, both are presented as appalling to Albert, Minnie, and decent people everywhere. They're still in the story and not merely in passing.

I do not recommend this entry in the series to my sensitive pals. I had a hard time with the dog scene. I think y'all might as well skip this story who can't deal even with what I've told you.

Thicker-skinned folk will likely find the resolution to the multistranded miscreancy in this story worth powering past, or through, those dreadful byways. Minnie and Albert have annoying habits of not learning lessons from their pasts, but the author's set the books a couple years apart so that was enough of a fig-leaf for the issue in my reading experience.

It was a rather deus ex machina of an ending, though. Sort of late-career Agatha Christie vibes. It wasn't totally, utterly sprung on me but it was abrupt and not quite the very best work from Author Walsh. I'm still at four stars because Albert and the Variety Palace scoobygroup keep Minnie held together and moving forward in believable, investable ways.

Maybe you'll get as much from these two reads as I did by experiencing them back-to-back. I recommend it to the not-squeamish.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

THE SPIRIT GUIDE (Variety Palace Mysteries #3)
BRIDGET WALSH
Pushkin Vertigo (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$14.99 ebook, available now

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: A witty, propulsive historical murder mystery investigating a secretive spiritualist cult in Victorian London—and the 3rd installment in the beloved Variety Palace Mysteries series!

1879, Victorian London.

Tea room sting operations, seedy music hall secrets, elaborate disguises, and slow-burn romance…

Detective duo Minnie Ward and Albert Easterbrook return for another exciting case to uncover the dark secrets at the heart of Victorian London’s spiritualist scene.

This time, an investigation into two mysterious deaths leads this famed detective duo to the doors of the Spirit Sisterhood, a female-only spiritualist group that facilitates communion with the souls of the dead. And recently several of its visitors have been found dead themselves.

Minnie isn't buying it: there is more to the Sisterhood than there first seems. The more Minnie looks, the more covert operations come to light. She goes undercover at the organization’s secretive countryside home, where she quickly finds herself drawn into the dark but strangely alluring world of spirits and ghosts.

But, isolated from Albert and everyone she loves, Minnie's situation quickly gets out of hand. Can she find a way out of this remote cult before time runs out? And can she keep her own demons at bay long enough to withstand the Sisterhood?

A rip-roaring murder mystery brimming with theatrical detail, loveable characters, and an addictive plot, the 3rd book in the beloved Variety Fair Mysteries will keep you guessing until the very last page.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.

My Review: Albert's more assertive in this book, more worried about Minnie's immediate physical safety, and so more motivated to behave in a protective way. It's not unreasonable. Minnie is separated from him in the remote place that the target of their criminal investigation, the Spirit Sisterhood, has sequestered themselves away from prying eyes (like Minnie's since Albert can't come, or even visit).

Weird things begin to occur; Minnie, as a theatre person, can't *quite* dismiss them all as illusions. That is the most unsettling aspect of her stay with the Spirit Sisterhood. She is not taken in, of course, by the cruder illusions, but she is deeply troubled by the weird...immanence...of violence. There have been two murders already, and without the safety of her ever-attentive Albert, can Minnie navigate the eerie and threatening world of the Spirit Sisterhood?

Of course she can; of course the redoubtable Albert is there when he is really needed. It's the way the series works. And it's the series getting a shake-up with the spooky trappings of the Sisterhood that makes this entry a hit with me. Developments occur in a balloon. Speeches are made, laconic people wax eloquent, the rotten-souled abuser who's preying on young women is thwarted...though we're not privy to the inner workings of a louse's soul like we are with the Epstein Files, we're similarly positioned to watch the fall.

Less physically violent action marked a pleasant change to my mind. I like Albert, and really want him to end up with Minnie in all her prickly glory. I'm really pleased at how his character develops in this story. Minnie needs every second of the peril in this story to do hard, necessary emotional work; her relationship with Albert can't grow if she refuses to.

I very much approve of this outing. I hope the dynamic duo will be back to enliven the music-hall stage (foreshadowing, that) while making London safer for the ordinary working souls.

WILDWOOD, second in the Northwoods police-procedural series

WILDWOOD (Northwoods #2)
AMY PEASE
Atria/Emily Bestler Books (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$14.99 ebook, available now

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: From the acclaimed author of the “riveting debut” (People) Northwoods, a mother-son law enforcement team confront buried secrets in their small town as they work to expose a conspiracy that goes far beyond the tight-knit community.

Deputy Sheriff Eli North has spent the last year getting his life back together. He hasn’t touched a drop of alcohol, he’s working through his PTSD from his military deployment, and he’s repairing his most important relationships. When an undercover informant disappears and all signs point to murder, Eli must expose the dark underbelly of his idyllic Wisconsin small town while safeguarding his newfound stability.

Then, with the unexpected arrival of FBI Agent Alyssa Mason, Eli and his mother, the sheriff, are pulled deeper into a violent criminal network built on the backs of the lost and forgotten.

As the case deepens, loyalties fracture and the line between justice and survival begins to blur. In a town where everyone has something to hide, exposing the truth may cost them everything.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.

My Review: Marge and Eli are back! (Follow the link at the top to find out who they are.) They're making rural northern Wisconsin as safe from wrongdoing as they're able to. It's been simple up to now.

That's a joke. The truth is nothing in law enforcement is simple, nor has it ever been. It's always a balancing act, it's an exercise in how deep the shadows are that you can leave alone and still accomplish the goal of reinforcing Ma'at's web of right action and good behavior. Ancient Egypt's goddess of the social fabric ought to replace the yucky moralizing minatory system in place now...though of course that's always how humans will develop any system of control given enough time.

Back to Author Pease: Alyssa and Marge are developed in ways I would not have predicted they would be. In common with the rest of the series, Author Pease uses this story to give her characters personhood, real dimensionality; even contradictory and inconsistent pasts and goals that change. It makes them all feel like people I would be pleased to meet in real life. They are believably still dealing with the same kind of crisis as in Northwoods because these issues were not, could not be, resolved to an end point in one case (no matter how complex and wide-ranging it turned out to be).

That's really the secret of a solid, lasting series mystery. The scoobygroup needs to feel like a posse you'd want to join by reading about them. Their interactions and interdependence are the source of a social web that will either trap you or make you desperate to escape. I'm in the trapped camp.

Social disintegration, personal reconstruction, Life's endless stream of entropy...all in this very well-crafted and solidly written story of a family doing its dead-level best to battle for Right, Good, and Justice for All. Well worth your time and treasure, like the first one was.

JOSH LANYON'S PAGE: The Holmes & Moriarity mystery series

SOMEBODY KILLED HIS EDITOR (Holmes & Moriarity #1)
JOSH LANYON
Justjoshin Publishing(non-affiliate Bookshop link)
$19.99 paperback, available now

Rating: 4* of five...barely

The Publisher Says: Turning forty has left much to be desired for mystery writer Christopher Holmes. After both his boyfriend and long-time publisher dump him, he worries his life is officially at the start of a steep decline. Stranded at a writing conference for the weekend, he never expected to bump into an old flame... or stumble across a dead body in the woods.

Ex-cop JX Moriarty is soaking up all the newfound fame from his successful crime fiction. When the only bridge into the conference venue washes away to reveal a dead body, Moriarty falls back on old skills to secure and investigate the crime scene. But even his years of experience couldn't prepare him for the discovery of a second body: his ex-boyfriend Christopher's editor.

With all fingers pointing to Holmes, Moriarty has no choice but to clear the name of the man who broke his heart. Can the ex-lovers solve the murders and rekindle their passion, or will a killer attendee write them into the body count?

Somebody Killed His Editor is the first book in the madcap Holmes & Moriarty romantic gay mystery series. If you like tongue-in-cheek humor, crazy twists and turns, and sizzling chemistry, then you'll love Josh Lanyon's quirky novel.

I RECEIVED THIS BOOK FROM THE GOODREADS M/M GIFT EXCHANGE. THANKS!

My Review: I enjoy mystery fiction. I enjoy gay fiction. I should batten like a tick on this series of gay-themed Moonlighting-lite mysteries.

I liked this one fine. I was not enraptured, delighted, or more than amused (the banter between the exes was funny at times). That is, however, more than enough to get me to go further into the series. It really struck me how different it is to have my PoV character be forty. It's a lovely change from romances without mystery elements that feature hot boys. Kit (as he is called) Holmes being at a career and personal-life crossroads felt so relatable because it wasn't his first go-round...he's lost his audience for the mysteries he writes, and is doing whatever he can to get them back or find new people to amuse.

The romantic interest between Kit and JX is paced oddly, yet I found myself more intrigued by it because of that. We don't discover they're exes until almost halfway through this story! I mean the synopsis gives it away but it isn't established until later...this was peculiar, but worked for me, as Kit's strangely willing reluctance to get involved in JX's plans for what to do after the body's discovered made me feel really curious about this off-kilter attitude. In many ways this is the heart of the story...reuniting, re-meeting really, with a history neither of you is ready to confront and could never decide to confront. That's what makes dealing with older people so relatable. I'd guess most of us past forty have had this experience, probably not with a romantic entanglement though.

I did find my eyes rolling a bit when Kit declaims the solution to the mystery before a "you must be wondering why I've summoned you here" style audience. The murderer agrees with him. And that, laddies and gentlewomen, is that.

It's not the way I myownself prefer to get off the horse, but it's got the virtue of clarity. I will say I was not expecting the killer's motive, so points for that, Ms. Lanyon. I also note for more modern readers that the women in his story are repellently girly, all dressed pointedly in pink and mincing ever so ladylike through the action. It would demand howls of outrage if a man wrote it...it was uncomfortable to me anyway.

Decent series mysteries with gay leads are rare enough that I recommend it with only mild reservations.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

ALL SHE WROTE (Holmes & Moriarity #2)
JOSH LANYON
Justjoshin Publishing (non-affiliate Bookshop link)
$18.99 paperback, available now

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: Giving screwball mystery a whole deadly new meaning.

A murderous fall down icy stairs is nearly the death of Anna Hitchcock, the much-beloved American Agatha Christie and Christopher Holmes's former mentor. Anna's plea for him to host her annual winter writing retreat touches all Kit's sore spots: traveling, teaching writing classes, and separation from his new lover, J.X. Moriarity.

For J.X., Kit's cancellation of yet another romantic weekend is the death knell of a relationship that has been limping along for months. But that's just as well, right? Kit isn't ready for anything serious and besides, Kit owes Anna far too much to refuse.

Faster than you can say Miss Marple wears boxer shorts, Kit is snooping around Anna's elegant, snowbound mansion in the Berkshires for clues as to who's trying to kill her. A tough task with six amateur sleuths underfoot, six budding writers with a tangled web of dark undercurrents running among them.

Slowly, Kit gets the uneasy feeling that the secret may lie between the pages of someone's fictional past. Unfortunately, a clever killer is one step ahead. And it may be too late for J.X. to ride to the rescue.

Warning: Contains one irascible, forty-year-old mystery writer who desperately needs to get laid, one exasperated thirty-something ex-cop only too happy to oblige, an isolated country manor that needs the thermostat cranked up, various assorted aspiring and perspiring authors, and a merciless killer who may have read one too many mystery novels.

I RECEIVED THIS BOOK FROM THE GOODREADS M/M GIFT EXCHANGE. THANKS!

My Review: Note to self: this is a sippin' series, not a bingein' series.

Kit and JX are more in focus now, more dealing with relationship stuff...Kit's just enough older to feel insecure about JX's greater hotness indicating a willingness to, um, stray when offered opportunity to. JX is a romantic, a guy who needs his man to be sweet-nothing-spouting and, if not prone to offering, at least amenable to receiving romantic gestures. That ain't Kit, the sarcastic and self-protective pragmatist.

This is more relatable to me than the establishing of the relationship was...these are ral issues I've dealt with and understand, and make caring about the couplehood of Kit and JX more natural for me as a reader. “I threw a quick look back at J.X. His weary, drawn face reminded me of a young, handsome Don Quixote. I wouldn't have been surprised to spot pieces of broken windmill scattered in the sheets around him.”

That said we're still in a mystery series, so what was the mystery like? “Anyone who wasn't half-stoned on pain meds would have instantly realized what a really bad idea this plan was, but since that didn't include me, I didn't worry about it.”

It was fine. I didn't believe it particularly as it seemed far-fetched but it did the job. “This went beyond talent and hard work, this was gifted. This was the kind of acuity you were either born with or you weren't. Like having perfect pitch or Brad Pitt's cheekbones.”

You've got examples. You like the writing? You want a mystery that's got enough substance to it to keep you involved? Here you go.

THE BLACK SWAN MYSTERY, looking back nigh-on seventy years at a crime that rings familiar bells today

THE BLACK SWAN MYSTERY (Inspector Onitsura #1)
TETSUYA AYUKAWA (tr. Bryan Karetnyk)
Pushkin Vertigo (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$12.99 ebook, available now

Rating: 4.5 of five

The Publisher Says: THE JAPANESE CRIME FICTION CLASSIC: A prize-winning railway murder mystery set in 1960s Japan—for fans of Agatha Christie and Seicho Matsumoto! Full of devious twists and turns, this brilliant puzzle mystery is considered to be one of the greatest alibi deconstruction mysteries ever written

Early one morning, the owner of a local mill is found lying next to the railway tracks just outside of Kuki Station. Suspicion initially falls on the workers' union, with whom the man had been embroiled in a labour dispute, then on a new religious sect that has been gaining followers recently.

Chief Inspector Onitsura and his assistant Tanna are called in to investigate, and soon set off in a journey across Japan, from Tokyo to Kyoto and Osaka, and finally to the island of Kyūshu, in a hunt for the killer.

But as they investigate, the killer strikes again, and again. Will they be able to catch the murderer before even more people are slain?

Fans of Agatha Christie’s 4.50 from Paddington and Seicho Matsumoto’s Tokyo Express will delight in the devious twists and turns of The Black Swan Mystery, as well as in the characterisation and portrait of 1960s Japan.

The author, Tetsuya Ayukawa, is considered to be the master of alibi deconstruction mysteries–a talent that is on full display in this brilliant classic railway murder mystery, which won the prestigious Japanese Detective Writers Club Prize.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.

My Review: I really struggled to apply the tag "historical mystery" to the 1960s setting of this story. It was written in the time period, and wasn't ever revised by the author to reflect later knowledge; but people born in the 1960s are (great-)grandparents as I have cause to know. Historical mystery it is.

Japan's train-riding culture is alive and well today unlike the US version. That alone makes this short novel feel very much like historical fiction in 2025. That and the clues being heavily involved in facts of train-riding culture, so harking back to another of Dame Agatha's classic mysteries, The ABC Murders. An interesting side note on the choice of trains as the setting for this story is that the author was an employee of Japan's imperial colonial railway system in Manchuria until that regime ended in 1944.

The death of a wealthy industrialist embroiled in an ugly labor dispute is seldom cause for me to weep. As ma'at must be preserved, and as those who transgress must be made to feel the weight of their arrogation of the power of life and death, I was reluctantly drawn into the procedural search for a murderer whose crime seemed reasonable to my id.

There is a lot of to-and-fro travel as Onitsura-san does his evidence-gathering...it felt a lot like a train-travel brochure at times...but the result is one of those logic puzzles that, when it comes together, one can't unsee the pattern. I'm not a sympathetic audience to those who holler about spoilers. In the case of intricate designs like this, however, any tiny hint of the real way the thing happened can feel just too revealing too soon. The pleasure of this Japanese crime classic is matching wits with the criminal beside the sleuth. I'll assert my inalienable human privilege to be inconsistent and decline to say more about the mystery bit.

I'll tell you instead about the reading experience. Translator Karetnyk did a very good job of enabling me to feel I was reading a fresh, new work. I was not given the occasionally inevitable experience of dislocation, of distance from the story being told about a culture not my own in a time gone by.

That's quality work, that is. I really hope it sparks a demand to translate the entire series of Onitsura stories...I'm here for 'em. See if you are too.

FACE OF GREED is Detective Emily Hunter's first outing

FACE OF GREED (Detective Emily Hunter #1)
JAMES L'ETOILE
Oceanview Publishing (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$18.99 paperback, available now

Rating: 4.5* of five

The Publisher Says: Greed, corruption, and betrayal—no murder is as simple as it seems

When a prominent Sacramento businessman is killed and his wife injured in a brutal home invasion, Detective Emily Hunter and her partner, Javier Medina, are called to investigate. At first glance, it seems like a crime of opportunity gone horribly wrong, but Emily soon finds there might be more to both the crime and the dead man.

The high-stakes investigation also comes at a time when Emily is caring for her mother, who has early-onset Alzheimer’s, and Emily struggles to balance her job with her personal life. The city’s political elite seem to want the case solved quickly, but darker forces want it buried.

Could there have been a motive behind the attack, making it more than a random home invasion? Emily uncovers clues that cause her to reconsider her understanding of the crime. A deadly game of greed and deception pulls Emily deeper into the shadowy world of gang violence and retribution. She has to walk the razor’s edge to identify the killer—without becoming the next victim.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.

My Review: I was inspired to pick this book for a review by Luigi Mangione's case developments...most state charges dismissed, the fate of the evidence prosecutors wish to present uncertain. This novel predates that alleged crime by several years but still has resonances with it...powerful people want a conviction, other forces don't want any such thing for intense, irreconcilable forces each competing for their purpose to prevail.

As a procedural, Emily and Javier lead us through the maze of conflicting evidence. Their detecting seems to be run on vibes, the leads they follow up assessed and occasionally dismissed based on things I found unconvincing. In the end, Author L'Etoile crochets it all into one big design that was, once you've seen it, inevitable; it just takes a shift of your idea of the violent thing that happened to see.

Emily, as our lead detective and primary PoV, gets the majority of the development in the story. Her personal life is complicated by a mother with early-onset dementia and the urgently needed carer for mom living in her house. It adds stress to her already stressful life. In a lot of ways I felt Emily was responding to some...irregularities...in a key witness's account of what seems on the surface to be a terrible but random act with her own pent-up frustrations. Equally it can be argued that her pushback against what's clearly an attempt to shut her and Javier's fact-finding down before embarrassing truths are revealed is sharpened by that frustration.

Author L'Etoile moves the story along at a solidly even clip. I was no more done with emotionally processing a domestic event of Emily's than a key piece of evidence is suddenly...shifted...like playing Uno when the reverse card smacks you. It's deft, it's handled well, and it exemplifies his chops as a writer and plotter of mysteries. I was always ready to dismiss the case because it's clearly not one the PTB think needs a real resolution just a speedy end. It turns out Emily has a lot of stiffness of spine. She needs it as a woman in a misogynistic world and as a support for an increasingly dependent mother.

Quite a lot of cussin' and discussin' of women in sexualized terms happens. It's not presented in a way meant to titillate but in a matter-of-fact evocation of the milieu the characters inhabit. It will bother some, so be prepared for it or make your decision to read accordingly. I think the grittier edge it gives is both appropriate and within ordinary peoples' boundaries.

As is often the case with procedural stories, the whodunit bit of the story is almost less important than the whydunit bit. The motives for this crime are in the title; the blowback from Emily and Javier following leads is in the title; it was very clear, when I got to the proper perspective point in the story, why this particular man was killed.

Can't say I'm sorry to know he's dead. I suspect you won't be either.

J.D. ROBB'S PAGE: Eve Dallas series #61 FRAMED IN DEATH,& #62 STOLEN IN DEATH

FRAMED IN DEATH
J.D. ROBB
St. Martin's Press (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$14.99 ebook, available now

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: Death imitates art in the brand-new crime thriller starring homicide cop Eve Dallas from the #1 New York Times-bestselling author J.D. Robb.

Manhattan is filled with galleries and deep-pocketed collectors who can make an artist's career with a wave of a hand. But one man toils in obscurity, his brilliance unrecognized while lesser talents bask in the glory he believes should be his. Come tomorrow, he vows, the city will be buzzing about his work.

Indeed, before dawn, Lt. Eve Dallas is speeding toward the home of the two gallery owners whose doorway has been turned into a horrifying crime scene overnight. A lifeless young woman has been elaborately costumed and precisely posed to resemble the model of a long-ago Dutch master, and Dallas plunges into her investigation.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.

My Review: I'm new(ish) to the Eve Dallas storyverse. An abortive early run went badly and left me not interested in her. I tried again when someone whose taste is like mine, queer sex and crimes that do not involve above-the-necessary sexual violence aganst women and zero rapes (never gonna happen in Eve's world) told me to start at #40 (Obsession In Death) to get past some issues. I listened, I'm okay with the series now; but there is a LOT more straight-people sex than I ever want in a book I purchase for myself.

That said, this art-crime thriller gave good value for icks endured. The art world of 2061 is the art world of 1761 with faster transportation; the same sort of narcissists will always become artists because without that drive, why would one dream of putting one's creative soul out there for any- and everyone to opine about, comment on, write nastygrams about. Now thwart the narcissist's desire for eyeblinks, and watch the meltdown. It took the form of murder in a very arty setting this time.

Eve's no stranger to the stranger side of life. I don't want to harp on how she came by her PTSD, but it raised my hair (what's left of it) and my gorge. The revolting details...well, find out yourselves or start at book 40 and learn more slowly. Moving on...the body is discovered in a location that a stonking great clue. But Robb's no knob, she misdirects and obfuscates and casts doubt on the obvious, facile solution. I was sure I knew why, of course, it's in synopsis. I was most of the way to a conclusion (the right one) when Robb bobbed a big ol' red herring at me. I'm not five-starring the read because that certain reveal happened earlier than I prefer in my murder investigation stories.

Still, *happy sigh*

I like playing at solving the mysteries, and even more when Something Exculpatory Happens (but it gets explained later). Keeps me from autopiloting past the clues. Ma'at is served, of course. There are mysteries where the perp does not get punished, and that's okay; then there are the ones whose perps died before they're about to be punished. Those mildly do not please my orderly side.

I fear the Spoiler Stasi's shrieking vituperative hordes, so that is explicitly a general observation, not a hint. The entire point of this story is to examine in fine detail Entitlement. What could possibly be more timely. Just ask Prince Andrew.

A better-than-average reading experience for me, in a long series that seems not to sag as much as I'd expect for how long it's been running. The prose is never the problem, it's pleasant to read, but nothing stands out. I think that's a gift Robb gives to her readers: Shes's not calling attention to the Writerlyness or the Phrasesmithing. She is telling you the story effectively, unadornedly; you get the story, not the writer.

Generous of you, ma'am. Thank you most kindly for the gift.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

STOLEN IN DEATH
J.D. ROBB
St. Martin's Press (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$14.99 ebook, available now

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: A violent death and a vault of stolen treasures has Eve Dallas struggling to solve crimes old and new in the next thriller in the #1 New York Times-bestselling series.

A blow to the head with a block of amethyst has left multibillionaire Nathan Barrister dead—while nearby, a vault, its door ajar, sits filled with priceless paintings, jewelry, and other treasures. Lieutenant Eve Dallas’s husband, Roarke—who misspent his youth in Ireland as a scrappy thief—recognizes at least two stolen pieces among the hoard. The crime scene suggests a burglar caught in the act. But only one item seems to be missing.

Then it’s revealed that the vault had actually belonged to the victim’s late father—and no one in the household knew it was there until a recent remodeling project exposed it. To protect the family name and business, they explain to Eve, they’d been looking for a way to return the ill-gotten gains anonymously and avoid the police. But now the police are all over their elegant house, and have a bigger, bloodier mystery to solve.

By all accounts, Nathan Barrister was a good man, a generous employer, a devoted husband and father. As for his father—he clearly had secrets. Now it’s up to Eve and her team to find out if those secrets got Nathan killed—and if it was a crime of passion or revenge.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.

My Review: "The sins of the father" has a long, interesting history in English usage. I the sixty-second book in this (apparently immortal) series, it's prominently aimed at the very wealthiest in society. Greed and covetousness are very much in Roarke's past, and Eve deals with Entitlement all day every day. They need both outlooks to solve this weird crime.

I was very interested by the unusual set-up for the crime. It feels very surprising to me, very weird indeed. I did not expect to have the dead billionaire not be the real villain of the piece. The real villain was more satisfying.

Because it's not coming out until February, and because I've given this one and book sixty-one four stars each, I'm not risking my sanity to say more than, "I've never given one of the series more than 3.5* before...but these got 4" and leave you to discover why. Do not start here...see my review of FRAMED IN DEATH for my best series-order advice.

Let's just say I get it better now than ever.

MARY KELIIKOA'S PAGE: The Misty Pines Mysteries series

KILLER TRACKS (A Misty Pines Mystery #3)
MARY KELIIKOA
Level Best Books (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$5.99 ebook, available now

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: A peaceful retreat. A maze of smoke and murder. Is their remote getaway about to become a death trap?

Sheriff Jax Turner is worried about going off-grid and leaving his young team of deputies behind. But while his getaway with his ex is meant to help them reconnect, Jax is distracted by signs of a break-in at their rented lookout.

After a string of unsettling events and an approaching wildfire turn their isolated retreat into a danger zone, he’s stunned to find a dead body with marks tying it to a killer he put away a decade ago.

Terrified his attempt at reconciliation has led them both into a fatal setup, Jax rushes back to his estranged wife before she joins the list of victims. But his dedication to serving and protecting could become an Achilles heel as other players join them among the darkening trees.

Can he fight his way out of the woods before the flames of revenge consume everything?

Killer Tracks is the tense third book in the Misty Pines Mystery Series. If you like tangled relationships, edge-of-your-seat suspense, and small town sheriff procedurals, then you’ll love Mary Keliikoa’s page-turning game of cat-and-mouse.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.

My Review: Tangled emotions, a History that beats any failure of your own relationships, and a stressful job as The Crime-Solver in a town as magnetic to crime as Midsomer or St Mary Mead...I am in my happy place. The stakes are very high, the people are familiar enough to be my real life neighbors, and the setting makes me pine away for a small-town life that, if I had it, would make me feel desperate and trapped.

Jax and Abby are still trying to fix what got broken by the awfulness of their shared world...he's an ex-Portland cop (bet they want him back now) and her FBI world...because they just can't quit each other. So while they're off in the patch-up place aka back of beyond, Rachel the deputy is trying her goddamnedest to solve an arson covering up a murder...when in flies her dad, delivering a crucial cold-case clue like a gangrenous carrier pigeon. (Me no likee daddums; he was also Jax's Portland force partner...my hackles will not stay down when he's around.)

Into Abby and Jax's doomed privacy wafts Hannah...wait, who? Exactly! Who's she, where'd she come from, and when's she leaving?

So a series'-worth of Jax pining unrequitedly after Abby, a murder case Rachel really wants to solve without some old man buttin' in (be it her old man or Jax's predecessor as chief), and a serial-killer cold case. Have I forgotten anything?

You'll want to read for yourselves, so I ain't tellin'.

*eville cackle*

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

DEADLY TIDES (A Misty Pines Mystery #2)
MARY KELIIKOA
Level Best Books (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$16.95 paperback, available now

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: A missing surf legend. Waterlogged clues. Can he trust his gut instincts to end the wave of murder?

Sheriff Jax Turner is learning to live again. Holding tight to the hope of reconciling with his FBI agent ex-wife, the wary man is determined to keep his focus on his coastal Oregon community. And after a concerned brother requests a welfare check, Jax is troubled to find the absent surf shop owner's tracks lead to a pool of blood.

Now investigating a potential homicide, Turner chases a tip from his former spouse about a severed foot found on the beach. But when a torrent of leads links the victim to a politician's son, a jealous competitor, and a get-straight program for youth, the steadfast lawman fears layers of lies and secret agendas will keep him from stopping a vicious killer.

Can he unravel the fatal agenda before he's the next corpse to wash ashore?

If you like flawed heroes, gritty crimes, and dark twists and turns, then you'll love Deadly Tides, the chilling second book in Mary Keliikoa's Misty Pines Mystery Series.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.

My Review: Local surfer dies mysteriously; unconnected human foot washes up on local beach, handled by Jax's much pined-after ex-wife the FBI agent, who knows he can handle it so hands responsibility over; lying liars lie and abuse people...okay, it's Misty Pines. Good to be back.

Abby, the ex-wife and FBI agent, gets a third person PoV like Jax because we need to know things he couldn't and she feels reluctant to tell his simping-for-her self. It helped me keep details clear in my head. I can't help but wonder why her FBI partner Olek is so present...but I like Jax getting the eager young Rachel onto his deputeam. He's settling in to the job of being The Crime Solver for Misty Pines. He's not as unsure of himself. It begins to feel more like a set team is forming.

I confess I do not see Abby's side of their divorce. It doesn't matter much because, unless decades of series-mystery reading and recognizing the need for ma'at to be restored, they *will* get back together. In their profession of law enforcement, each is the other's ideal mate. This time apart will, I predict, pay dividends.

You will pay an attention tax. This book does not hold to a spanking pace as it privileges introspection and the unending process of grieving. Rather we're shown the emotional gyrations in Jax and, to a lesser extent, Abby, as they circle each other simply by virtue of sharing the most important trait of them all: Values.

I think this book would be so fraught as to be meaningless if one had not read book one, Hidden Pieces (q.v.). The cast, the pace, the fuller backstory, all help defray the attention cost of the story's inward focus. Not to be skipped, but don't start here.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

HIDDEN PIECES (A Misty Pines Mystery #1)
MARY KELIIKOA
Level Best Books (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
99¢ ebook, available now

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: Sheriff Jax Turner is staring down the barrel of his broken past. On the brink of ending it all, he feels like a failure following his daughter's tragic passing and his subsequent divorce. But when a schoolgirl vanishes and her backpack is found in a sex offender's backseat, the weary lawman drags himself into action and vows to nail one last sociopath.

Shocked to discover the teen's aunt had lost her life in an abduction years prior, the devastating outcome that he's taken personally, Jax believes the killer has returned with a vengeance. But as the desperate cop frantically hunts down a mysterious relative in search of a suspect, the girl's time keeps ticking away...

Can the jaded sheriff take down the culprit in time to bring the young girl home alive?

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.

My Review: We meet Jax in extremis...the very worst thing possible to happen to a person has happened, the depressingly most-common fallout of that hideous disaster has occurred and he is (he thinks) ready for The End.

He is not.

He is summoned back to participation in life by the disappearance of Allison, a teenaged missing person with frantic parents. Jax can gird himself to be involved, as he badly wants to give someone else the ending he did not get. All set in the scenic, peacfully beautiful coastal-Oregon town of Misty Pines. As a small town, it is of course a place of unspoken stuff Everybody Knows (or think they know) but which Jax, formerly a Portland detective, isn't privy to. And doesn't know he doesn't know.

All of this feeds the man's deep, well-entrenched anxiety about his skills, about his past coming home to roost, about his misery being without his FBI agent ex-wife who abandoned him...After. It's real, it happens, people are not their best selves when crushed by terrible grief. It does occupy a good deal of his mental energy, though not simply as plot dressing. Trust Author Keliikoa. She has a plan.

Why I wasn't offering nosegays and wreaths of stars comes down to the ending. It is something you'll resonate with or you won't. I felt it introduced more complexity than was necessary, even for a series mystery. But...and this is crucial to know...it was not simply pulled outta nowhere and tacked on. As a first in series read, I'll pin my reservations to my mind's corkboard and see if my issues are used to good advantage in a later book.

Definitely a series I recommend you pursue with me!

ELLE COSIMANO'S PAGE: Finlay Donovan series 3.5 through 5

VERONICA RUIZ BREAKS THE BANK(Finlay Donovan #3.5)
ELLE COSIMANO
Minotaur Books (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$1.99 ebook, available now

Rating: 3* of five

The Publisher Says: Offering the insight that listeners have been craving into fan-favorite Vero's past and a closer look at the moment Finlay and Vero first meet, Veronica Ruiz Breaks the Bank is a can't-miss addition to the Finlay Donovan series.

A hilarious short story diving into Finlay Donovan's partner-in-crime Vero's past.

Anyone can spot a window of opportunity, but not everyone can manage to fall straight through one.

Veronica Ruiz is on the run for the first time in her life—though certainly not the last. After being falsely accused of stealing money from her college sorority, she packs up and heads to her cousin Ramón's apartment, planning to change her name and rebuild start over away from backstabbing girls and university drama (and far, far away from her arrest warrant in Maryland).

At the local bank on the first morning of her new life, it occurs to Vero that she'd be a better bank teller than most of the current employees: she may not have much money, but what little she does have, she knows how to manage. Unfortunately, the only available position is a cleaning job and so, desperate for a fresh start, she takes the bank manager’s offer.

But nothing in Vero's world has ever been simple, so of course shortly after she begins work, she overhears a conversation between her new boss and a security guard: someone who works there has been stealing. Seeing a window of opportunity, Vero sets out to find the identity of the thief, present the evidence, and then push for the perfect job. All of which would be easier if her irresistibly infuriating childhood crush Javi wasn’t living in the same damn town.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.

My Review: A short story, to be pedantic, needs to be self-contained to work well. The story here is short, but if you didn't already know who Vero was, you might wonder why we should care about her. I'm not convinced it's really necessary to know any of the information in here, not because it isn't funny, but because it doesn't add any emotional resonance to her in-series life and behavior.

If I'd learned something new...if I'd found out some extra dimension of her concupiscence...if I'd been introduced to Javi for the first time *with* her not just more longing for her lost childhood crush, requited or not....

You get my point. As a read for a series-lover already besotted, it's satisfying enough. As a way to enhance my extant affection for Vero, it's a bit wanting. As a short story, it's just not good.

Like it okay but not much, then.

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FINLAY DONOVAN ROLLS THE DICE(Finlay Donovan #4)
ELLE COSIMANO
Minotaur Books (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$11.99 ebook, available now

Rating: 4.25* of five

The Publisher Says: Finlay Donovan and her nanny/partner-in-crime Vero are in sore need of a girls’ weekend away. They plan a trip to Atlantic City, but odds are―seeing as it’s actually a cover story to negotiate a deal with a dangerous loan shark, save Vero’s childhood crush Javi, and hunt down a stolen car―it won’t be all fun and games. When Finlay’s ex-husband Steven and her mother insist on tagging along too, Finlay and Vero suddenly have a few too many meddlesome passengers along for the ride.

Within hours of arriving in their seedy casino hotel, it becomes clear their rescue mission is going to be a bust. Javi’s kidnapper, Marco, refuses to negotiate, demanding payment in full in exchange for Javi’s life. But that’s not all―he insists on knowing the whereabouts of his missing nephew, Ike, who mysteriously disappeared. Unable to confess what really happened to Ike, Finlay and Vero are forced to come up with a new plan: sleuth out the location of Javi and the Aston Martin, then steal them both back.

But when they sneak into the loan shark’s suite to search for clues, they find more than they bargained for―Marco's already dead. They don’t have a clue who murdered him, only that they themselves have a very convincing motive. Then four members of the police department unexpectedly show up in town, also looking for Ike―and after Finlay's night with hot cop Nick at the police academy, he’s a little too eager to keep her close to his side.

If Finlay can juggle a jealous ex-husband, two precocious kids, her mother’s marital issues, a decomposing loan shark, and find Vero’s missing boyfriend, she might get out of Atlantic City in one piece. But will she fold under the pressure and come clean about the things she’s done, or be forced to double down?

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.

My Review: This entry in the series starts so soon after Finlay Donovan Jumps the Gun that anything I tell you is a spoiler. Be aware of that fact.

The way I see it, you only have two choices: you can fold—and probably go to jail—or you can go all in and take a gamble on yourself. You want my advice? Stop worrying about the cards you've been dealt. As long as you don't give anything away, no one else can see your shitty cards but you. Fake it 'til you make it, Finn.

There you have it. Gambling metaphor, inner monologue, character trying to overcome her deeply instilled self-doubt, like so many women who hook up with a controlling man spend the rest of a lifetime attempting...it's a summation of the overarching affect of the book, and the series.

As series fans already know, these books must be read in order or you'll end up puzzled by some of the interplay and where certain characters come from (unlike Steve the ex-husband who came directly from hell). Mama Susan is back this time, callooh! callay!, so you know some extra snark and wit will be forthcoming. Taking Vero to Atlantic City is...well...maybe not the greatest idea, but the choices are not great no matter what given the scoobygroup's going there to meet with a loan shark, Marco. Who is (in)conveniently dead when they arrive.

The best thing about the daffiness, for old gearhead me, was Javi and the Aston Martin. Author Elle, you chose your props with the greatest precision. Most would've gone for a Ferrari, but the Aston Martin is very much the choice that kind of character would make. Kudos, or should I say, props to you!

I'll see myself out.

In general, manic energy and West Wing-level repartee are all shining in the carefully calibrated glow of the casino lights. I'll give Finlay the last word, if you chuckle at this you're going to like the series:

"My schedule? Besides playing Weekend at Bernie's with two corpses while concealing the murders from the cops, hiding an irreverent teenager from people who wanted to kill him, and tracking down a stolen sports car so I could take down the leader of the Russian mob before he got to me first?"

Et voilà.

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FINLAY DONOVAN DIGS HER OWN GRAVE(Finlay Donovan #5)
ELLE COSIMANO
Minotaur Books (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$14.99 ebook, available now

Rating: 4.5* of five

The Publisher Says: Finlay Donovan may have skeletons in her closet . . . but at least there's not a body in her backyard.

Finlay Donovan and her nanny/partner-in-crime, Vero, have not always gotten along with Finlay’s elderly neighbor, Mrs. Haggerty, the community busybody and president of the neighborhood watch. But when a dead body is discovered in her backyard, Mrs. Haggerty needs their help. At first a suspect, Mrs. Haggerty is cleared by the police, but her house remains an active crime scene. She has nowhere to go . . . except Finlay’s house, right across the street.

Finlay and Vero have no interest in getting involved in another murder case—or sacrificing either of their bedrooms. After all, they’ve dealt with enough murders over the last four months to last a lifetime and they both would much rather share their beds with someone else.

When the focus of the investigation widens to include Finlay’s ex-husband, Steven, though, Finlay and Vero are left with little choice but to get closer to Mrs. Haggerty and uncover her secrets . . . before the police start digging up theirs. But who will solve the mystery first?

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.

My Review: Honestly, Finn, what were you thinking? Steven's a suspect in a murder that also inconveniences Mrs. Haggerty? Pop some popcorn, pull up a chair to the picture window, and watch the shenanigans across the street. You and Vero can not lose if you stay out, the kids'll get over the blow, and inconveniencing Mrs. Haggerty? *chef's kiss* That's the bonus schadenfreude. Sit back, watch, and send the kids to counseling about their utterly unjustifiable affection for that creep of a father you picked for them.

Vero, commonsensical soul that she is, urges this course on Finlay...does the dope listen? Why no, she does not. Of course she lets the quite-clearly innocent Mrs. Haggerty pollute the atmosphere chez Donovan. Of course she sets out to prove her children's father is innocent. Of course Vero provides my thoughts on the subject in far wittier words than I could manage.

Forevermore, Peacock/NBC, what are your development people even doing all day if not working this up for a wheel?

The series shifted into overdrive in this entry. We're familiar with the offerings. We know the kids'll be irritating. We know Steven's a cheating louse without an ethic in his body. We know Nick's hot for Finlay and Vero pines for Javi and Mrs. Haggerty...well now, there's development there, and it was not something I'd've picked out of the trope bag. Good on ya, Author Elle! The point being that, with the puzzle pieces familiar to us and agreeable in their lineaments, there's room and time to go after subtleties.

Happily, that is what Author Elle has chosen to do. I think we're now at the moment in a mystery series' development that casual, surface-gloss admirers are going to lose interest, while we who remain will delve deeper with Author Elle. I'm very much in for the duration. I love the way Author Elle pulls back the curtain just a bit in every iteration of Finlay and Vero's looking at a new murder to solve:

“Maybe you need to stop thinking about this as a case and start thinking about it like a story. Maybe it’ll make more sense to you that way.”
“What do you mean?”
She turned sideways on the bench seat to face me. “You’ve got all these little random plot threads, right? All you have to do is figure out how those plot threads connect. Ask yourself, what do Mrs. Haggerty and Penny Dupree have in common with that book? Figure it out, and that’s the solution to your mystery. Anything else is just a red herring.”

An author who trusts you enough to say outright, "this is how you read this story," while still keeping her powder dry to blow you away with ending, is a treasure.

You're a treasure, Author Elle.