Upcoming: A VIOLENT MASTERPIECE by Jordan Harper (Mulholland)

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Next year, Mulholland Books will publish the latest novel from Jordan Harper! I haven’t read nearly as many of his novels as I would like to have (so many books, so little time…), but thus far everything of his that I have read has been superb — most recently, Everybody Knows and The Last King of California — and this is an instant pre-order/buy. A Violent Masterpiece looks like it’ll be another gripping, gritty crime novel set in Tinseltown. Can’t wait. Here’s the synopsis:

A story of Los Angeles power brokers and those at the edge, and a single shattering incident that threatens to bring it all crashing down.

Los Angeles, right now. America with its back up against the wall. This Frankenstein’s monster of crimes and lurid dreams sewn together into something like a city. 

A city ready to explode: A Hollywood pedophile is arrested, and is ready to tear down the city to get his freedom. A young woman goes missing — and men in black rubber gloves who look like cops clean out her apartment in the middle of the night. And the serial killer known as the LA Ripper is on the loose, leaving tragic/graphic/brutal crime scenes in his wake. Three people trying to keep their heads above the dirty water will find themselves coming together to unite these strands into one enormous, unspeakable crime…

JAKE DEAL is a gonzo live-streaming nightcrawler, beaming the city’s chaos straight to his audience of blood-hungry subscribers, giving them the view from the top of the mushroom cloud — until a job he can’t refuse drags him back into his old life of Hollywood glamour, drugs, sex and sleaze. Armed with cameras and hidden mics, he’ll infiltrate private clubs, gather high-class dirt — and stumble onto a conspiracy woven into the center of LA’s most powerful men, who call themselves “The Kids in the Candy Store.”

DOUG GIBSON is a street lawyer, who fights for his clients against the army of cops, prosecutors and judges – he is the knife they bring to the gunfight. But when he’s hired by a Hollywood pedophile ready to sell out his friends for a chance for freedom, he’ll take on a fight bigger than he could have imagined. And when his client “commits suicide” in prison, Gibson will have to stop being a weapon – and become a warrior.

KARA DELGADO works for an underground private concierge company – a make-a-wish foundation for the terminally rich. She scores drugs, makes connections, and plans multi-million dollar sex parties.She has learned the secret truth of this world: there are no rules, only prices. Her best friend Phoebe has gone missing, and Kara’s the only person who knows that Phoebe’s place was wiped clean of evidence by men in black rubber gloves. But when she begins to unravel the mystery of what happened to Phoebe, and its connection to the killer known as the LA Ripper, it will drag her into the dark heart of the city.

As Jake, Doug and Kara all investigate these crimes, they’ll encounter ketamine-addled sitcom stars, bloody riots, homeless gangsters, a killer cop on death row, secret vaults in Beverly Hills, tech-bro orgies, medical cannibals, true crime junkies, private security wet-work teams, reality shows, street takeovers, car chases, coyotes, a sadistic Tarzan, and a three day, fifty million dollar wedding, before everything is revealed and they must each make their choice about how to fight back in this violent world before the bloody, blazing conclusion.

Jordan Harper’s A Violent Masterpiece is due to be published by Mulholland Books in North America, on April 28th, 2026.

Also on CR: Review of Everybody Knows

Follow the Author: Website, Goodreads, Instagram, BlueSky

Upcoming: FROM THE DUST by David Swinson (Mulholland)

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Next year, Mulholland Books are due to publish From the Dust — the next novel from David Swinson, the author of the excellent Frank Marr novels (which I highly recommend). A “soulful, rural noir story about belief”, here’s the synopsis:

When a murder occurs in a small town in Upstate New York, retired police detective Graham Sanderson, is drawn back into a vortex of violence, deception, and a series of murders which get dangerously personal.

Graham Sanderson thought he’d left it all behind. His years as a Washington, DC, homicide detective, his tragically dead wife, pain, violence. Taking over his father’s house in the remote Finger Lakes region of rural New York, and looking after his shut-in brother, Tommy, seemed like a respite. That is, until the first body is found.

The chief of the town’s small police jurisdiction, who is also a family friend, asks for Graham’s assistance. Graham’s instincts immediately kick in and he soon discovers there’s more to the area — the people, its brutally quiet, sophisticated hierarchies — than he or his family ever knew.

David Swinson’s From the Dust is due to be published by Mulholland Books in North America and in the UK, on March 31st, 2026.

Also on CR: Reviews of The Second Girl, Crime Song, and Trigger; Excerpt from Sweet Thing

Follow the Author: Website, Goodreads, Instagram, BlueSky

Excerpt: AUDITION FOR THE FOX by Martin Cahill (Tachyon)

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Martin Cahill‘s next novel is Audition for the Fox, a story of tricksters, acolytes, and found family. It is due to be published by Tachyon Publications next month. To celebrate the upcoming release, the publisher has provided CR with an excerpt to share with our readers! First, though, here’s the synopsis:

A trickster Fox god challenges a quick-witted (but underachieving) acolyte to save herself by saving her own ancestors. But are Nesi and her new friends from the past prepared to defeat the ferocious Wolfhounds of Zemin?

Nesi is desperate to earn the patronage of one of the Ninety-Nine Pillars of Heaven. As a child with godly blood in her, if she cannot earn a divine chaperone, she will never be allowed to leave her temple home. But with ninety-six failed auditions and few options left, Nesi makes a risky prayer to T’sidaan, the Fox of Tricks.

In folk tales, the Fox is a lovable prankster. But despite their humor and charm, T’sidaan, and their audition, is no joke. They throw Nesi back in time three hundred years, when her homeland is occupied by the brutal Wolfhounds of Zemin.

Now, Nesi must learn a trickster’s guile to snatch a fortress from the disgraced and exiled 100th Pillar: The Wolf of the Hunt.

Continue reading →

New Books (July)

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A rare crop of new books that’s mostly fiction! And some very intriguing titles, too, from authors I’m already familiar with and also some new-to-me authors. I think I have a lot of great reading ahead of me…!

Featuring: David Baldacci, Hallie Cantor, Anna Dorn, Patricia Finn, Bruce Holsinger, John Niven, Claire North, Matthew Pearl, Casey Scieszka, Shea Serrano, Oren Weisfeld, Don Winslow

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Upcoming: THE EDGE OF DARKNESS by Vaseem Khan (Hodder & Stoughton)

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Next year, Hodder & Stoughton are due to publish the sixth novel in Vaseem Khan‘s superb Malabar House series: The Edge of Darkness. I’ve been a fan of the series since the first book, 2020’s Midnight At Malabar House, and have eagerly anticipated each new book. Anyone who likes mid-20th Century mysteries (and mysteries in general) should check it out. Here’s the synopsis for the latest instalment:

India, 1951. After wilfully ignoring orders from her superiors, Persis Wadia, India’s first female police detective, has been exiled from Bombay to the wild and mountainous state of Nagaland. As India’s first post-Independence election looms, and tensions rise across the country, Persis finds herself banished to the Victoria Hotel, a crumbling colonial-era relic, her career in ruins.

But when a prominent local politician is murdered in his locked room at the Victoria Hotel, his head missing — a case appears quite literally on her doorstep. As the political situation threatens to explode into all-out havoc, Persis has only days to stop a killer operating at the very edge of darkness…

Vaseem Khan’s The Edge of Darkness is due to be published by Hodder & Stoughton in the UK, on January 15th, 2026.

Follow the Author: Website, Goodreads, Instagram, BlueSky

Upcoming: THE BURNING GROUNDS by Abir Mukherjee (Harvill Secker/Pegasus)

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I’ve long been a fan of Abir Mukherjee‘s Wyndham & Banerjee series of historical crime novels, set in early 20th Century India. I was relatively late to this series, but it fast became one of my must-read crime series. I finished the fifth novel in the series, The Shadows of Man, a couple of days ago, and it ended with one of the main character’s situations in limbo, so I am particularly eager to read this next volume.

This November, fans of the series will be able to get their hands on the highly-anticipated sixth novel in the series: The Burning Grounds!

In the Burning Ghats of Calcutta where the dead are laid to rest, a man is found murdered, his throat cut from ear to ear.

The body is that of a popular patron of the arts, a man who was, by all accounts, beloved by all: so what was the motive for his murder? Despite being out of favour with the Imperial Police Force, Detective Sam Wyndham is assigned to the case and finds himself thrust into the glamorous world of Indian cinema.

Meanwhile, Surendranath Banerjee, recently returned from Europe after three years spent running from the fallout of his last case, is searching for a missing photographer; a trailblazing woman at the forefront of the profession. When Suren discovers that the vanished woman is linked to Sam’s murder investigation, the two men find themselves working together once again – but will Wyndham and Banerjee be able to put their differences aside to solve the case?

Abir Mukherjee’s The Burning Grounds is due to be published by Harvill Secker in the UK (November 13th) and Pegasus Crime in North America (November 4th).

Follow the Author: Website, Goodreads, Instagram, BlueSky

Excerpt: SPACE SHIPS! RAY GUNS! MARTIAN OCTOPODS!, edited by Richard Wolinsky (Tachyon)

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Next month, Tachyon Publications are due to publish Space Ships! Ray Guns! Martian Octopods!, an Oral History of Science Fiction, comprised of a collection of interviews with authors, originally conducted for the radio. The collection was edited by Richard Wolinsky, and is sure to appeal to aficionados of the genre old and new. The publisher has provided us with the introduction, written by Wolinsky, to share with CR’s readers. Here’s the synopsis:

Today, depictions of aliens, rocket ships, and awe-inspiring, futuristic space operas are everywhere. Why is there so much science fiction, and where did it come from anyway? Radio producer and author Richard Wolinsky has found answers in the Golden Age of science fiction, between 1920 and 1960.

Wolinsky and his fellow writers and co-hosts Richard A. Lupoff and Lawrence Davidson, interviewed a veritable who’s who of famous (and infamous) science-fiction publishers, pulp magazines, editors, cover artists, and fans. The interviews themselves, which aired on the public radio, Probabilities, span over twenty years, from just before the release of Star Wars through the dawn of Y2K.

Probabilities was the home of a vivid cross-section of the early science fiction world, with radio guests offering a wide range of tales, opinions, theory, and gossip. It speaks to how, in the early days, they were free to define science fiction for themselves and push the genre to explore new ideas and new tropes in creative (and sometimes questionable) ways.

Space Ships! Ray Guns! Martian Octopods! is ultimately a love letter to fandom. Science fiction wouldn’t have survived as a genre if there weren’t devoted fanatics who wrote fanzines, organized conventions, and built relationships for fandom to flourish.

Continue reading →

Quick Review: IN A DISTANT VALLEY by Shannon Bowring (Europa Editions)

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Events in Dalton are coming to a head, as a record-breaking storm rolls in…

For a while, Rose Douglas believed life had given her a break. She was enjoying a steady job at the local clinic in Dalton; her two young boys, Adam and Brandon, were doing well in school; and their little family had found an easy friendship with widower Nate Theroux and his daughter, Sophie. The possibility of something deeper even hung between her and Nate—until the day Tommy Merchant, her ex and the father of her sons, showed up without warning on her doorstep. While Rose knows all too well his erratic and abusive nature, he swears he’s clean, and ready to turn over a new leaf.

Tommy isn’t the only one who’s found his way back to the town that defined him. Lost after a disastrous stint living down south with her father, Angela Muse has returned home to Dalton. There she runs into Greg Fortin, the friend who once saved her life when they were children and finally starts to believe there may be someone who understands her in a world that offers more questions than answers.

But secrets are the lifeblood of a small town, and everyone in Dalton soon finds themselves part of a chain of events hurtling towards outcomes beyond their control, where more than one future will be decided.

In a Distant Valley is the third, excellent novel in Shannon Bowring’s Dalton novels — following The Road to Dalton and Where the Forest Meets the River. It forms the end of a trilogy, of sorts, as the various characters are maneuvered into new situations and down new paths. I really enjoyed this. Continue reading →

Quick Review: THE PROOF OF MY INNOCENCE by Jonathan Coe (Europa Editions)

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A coming-of-age tale, wrapped up in a mystery, with a backdrop of state-of-the-nation and politics

When Phyl, a young literature graduate, moves back home with her parents, she soon finds herself frustrated by the narrow horizons of English country life. As for her plans of becoming a writer, those are going nowhere. But the chance discovery of a forgotten novelist from the 1980s stirs her into action, as does a visit from her uncle Chris — especially when he tells her that he’s working on a political story that might put his life in danger.

Chris has been following the careers of a group of students, all present at Cambridge University in the 1980s, now members of a think-tank which has been quietly pushing the British government towards extremism. And now, after years in the political wilderness, they might be in a position to put their ideas into action.

As Britain finds itself under the leadership of a new Prime Minister whose tenure will only last for seven weeks, Chris pursues his story to a mysterious conference taking place deep in the Cotswolds. When Phyl hears that one of the delegates has been murdered, she begins to wonder if real life is starting to merge with the novel she’s been trying to write. But does the explanation really lie in contemporary politics, or in a literary enigma that is almost forty years old?

Darting between decades and genres, THE PROOF OF MY INNOCENCE reimagines the coming-of-age story, the cosy crime caper and the state-of-the-nation novel with Coe’s trademark humour and warmth. From one of Britain’s finest living novelists, this is a witty, razor-sharp novel which explores how the key to understanding the present can often be found in the murkiest corners of the past.

The Proof of My Innocence is a very good read. An interesting blend of mystery, character focus and contemporary and past British politics, I was hooked from early on and read this in a couple of deep-into-the-night sittings. Continue reading →

Very Quick Review: TO DIE FOR by David Baldacci (Grand Central)

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Travis Devine gets an unusual babysitting assignment, which (of course) ends up being far more dangerous than expected…

The 6:20 Man returns, this time sent to the Pacific Northwest to aid in a complicated FBI case—and he’s about to come face-to-face with his nemesis.

Travis Devine has become a pro at accomplishing any mission he’s given. But this time it’s not his skills that send him to Seattle to aid the FBI in escorting orphaned, twelve-year-old Betsy Odom to a meeting with her uncle, who’s under federal investigation. Instead, he’s hoping to lay low and keep off the radar of an enemy—the girl on the train.

But as Devine gets to know Betsy, questions begin to arise around the death of her parents. Devine digs for answers, and what he finds points to a conspiracy bigger than he could’ve ever imagined.

It might finally be time for Devine and the girl on the train to come face-to-face. Devine is going to find out the difference between his friends and his enemies—and in some cases, they might well be both.

In the third novel starring Travis Devine, the accidental intelligence operative is sent to Seattle to babysit an orphaned girl with connections to a sprawling federal investigation. Naturally, Devine’s plans to keep this assignment quiet and easy (while simultaneously not really wanting to do it) go awry as the scope of the investigation and Betsy’s importance become clearer. In many ways, this novel is classic Baldacci. Continue reading →