The French Powder Mystery is a golden age novel “authored by” Ellery Queen who is also the protagonist. The true authors were cousins Frederic Dannay and Manfred Lee who collaborated on many of this celebrated sleuth’s mysteries. The first eight published are known as the international series because they have […]
The First Time I Knocked, fourth in the Garnett McGee series, is a suspense/mystery about a psychologist with extra-sensory abilities who investigates crimes with her chief of police boyfriend. In this offering, Garnett and her boyfriend Ryan fly down from Vermont to New Orleans to help out her boyfriend’s ex-wife […]
On a recommendation from a family member, I read the mystery novel The Door by Mary Roberts Rinehart. Many people have forgotten this woman, but in her time, her novels rivaled Christie’s in popularity. At one point, she was called the American Agatha Christie. The Door was published in 1930 […]
In the YA thriller Little Creeping Things by Chelsea Ichaso, a teenage girl named Cassidy (Cass) overhears a potential murder and hunts for the victim. Cass, also known as Fire Girl, is haunted by her past where she may have accidentally killed her best friend. Unfortunately for Cass, the high […]
Mystery and thriller often go hand-in-hand, but some stories are excellent mysteries but not solid thrillers and vice-versa. And then there’s Ruth Ware’s One By One: a mystery, a thriller, and a great book. Snoop, a company built on a music app, decides to hold its business retreat in the […]
Mysterious, isolated island? Check. List of victims…er, guests? Check. Atmospheric setting? Check. Victim? Uh…victim? Hello? The Guest List is a mystery without a victim through most of its story, and therein lies the genius. Lucy Foley has concocted a story where the reader has to make it through most of […]
Jo Macgregor’s The First Time I Fell is the second of the Garnet McGee series of a psychology student who has a knack for landing in the middle of a mystery. In the first novel, Garnet gained certain abilities after dying and coming back to life, leaving her with not […]
Jo Macgregor’s The First Time I Died: Garnet McGee Book One is a mystery thriller about an amateur detective who returns to her hometown and may or may not have gained psychic powers after an accident there. The main character and sleuth, Garnet McGee, flees her town of origin after […]
Brina Williamson’s The Pale Rose is a cozy mystery set in the 1940s in the spirit of the Thin Man movie series. One can almost visualize Myrna Loy playing housewife Amelia Humble, wife of detective Charles E. Humble. Amelia and Charles have the witty repartee that was so delightfully represented […]
“Secrets to ears and wishes to dandelions: both spread in the same fashion.” At one point, a key character shares this saying to another in Karma Lei Angelo’s latest thriller The Hummingbird Feeder. The line summarizes a good portion of this gripping and suspenseful novel. From the first chapter to […]