The Globe and Mail
The Dentist, Tim Sullivan (Atlantic Crime, 370 pages) When an experienced and acclaimed film and TV writer takes to crime fiction – à la Anthony Horowitz – we expect something special and Sullivan, who has worked on A Handful of Dust and Sherlock Holmes, delivers. The first in a series, The Dentist is slick, smart and has a plot that will keep you reading long into the night.
Detective George Cross, of the Bristol PD, is the star of the team, with a long history of solving difficult cases. He is also on the autism spectrum and therefore difficult to “manage,” according to his fellow officers. He insists that rules be followed meticulously, documents be scrutinized, and all bits and pieces of every case be itemized and revealed. For George, all of life is a complex puzzle: What is the appropriate response to a smile? When is a straightforward comment rude? What makes him survive in the world also makes him an ace detective and this case, the death of a homeless alcoholic, is just right for his style. The police say he was murdered by a compatriot over a cache of cider but George sees far more. After all, he says, the suspect didn’t take the cider.
Book recommendations: What we're reading in February
That precision is what makes this book so readable. As we follow his intense, logical mind, the evidence leads to another murder, one never solved and that destroyed an entire family. I couldn’t put this book down and I can’t wait for the next one.
Five Found Dead, Sulari Gentill (Raincoast, 320 pages) Vancouver-based Raincoast continues to bring us some of the most inventive crime and mystery books. This delightful pick is the perfect example of what mystery fans adore about locked-room tales. Limited suspects, no escape and a truly gory crime scene.
The central character is crime-fiction author Joe Penvale, who has just completed a gruelling medical treatment. To recuperate, he and his sister, Meredith, decide to go on a grand train tour – the legendary Orient Express. Joe looks for rest and luxury; Meredith hopes the trip will reignite his desire to write. The pair wake to the cabin next door awash in blood but with no body. If it’s not murder, what is it and why? They join the others passengers in an attempt to solve at least one of the mysteries – and then someone dies.
Gentill previously won Australia’s Ned Kelly Award for her Rowland Sinclair series and she is definitely a writer to discover.
My Husband’s Wife, Alice Feeney (Flatiron Books, 320 pages) However implausible the plot and characters seem to be, Feeney’s books somehow work. A woman goes for a jog and it’s an important day for her – the opening of her first art exhibit after a decade of caring for a disabled daughter. She runs with abandon, enjoying both the freedom and the anticipation. When she returns home, she puts her key in the lock but it doesn’t open. When she rings the bell, a woman who looks remarkably like her opens the door. When she says her name, the woman looks puzzled. She calls her husband, who comes and angrily sends the jogger away. She’s an imposter and if she remains, he’ll call the police. With nothing on her – no ID, no money, no phone – the jogger has no way to prove anything.
From that start, Feeney takes us on a wild ride of searching for clues and answers. There are several voices telling various bits of the story and no one is reliable. The puzzle, when finally revealed, is even more devious than usual and, despite my dislike for coincidence and unrevealed clues, I kept going to the final page.
The Quiet Mother, Arnaldur Indridason, translated by Philip Roughton (Minotaur, 346 pages) The king of Icelandic Noir does a masterful job with this tale of a search for a child, which morphs into a murder and then a ghost story.
Our hero, Detective Konrad, is retired, except for taking the odd interesting private case, when he’s approached by an elderly woman named Valborg. She wants him to find the child she gave up for adoption 50 years ago; she doesn’t even know the sex of the child and no records exist. Konrad turns her down but she persists and he eventually meets with her, although he decides not to take the case. Two months later, she’s dead. When the homicide squad arrives, a page with Konrad’s name on it is discovered on her desk. Konrad decides to honour her wish and find the lost child.
Twists abound here as Konrad and then a psychic search for the child. This all offers a glimpse into the underside of Icelandic life and, as always with Indridason, a dip into Icelandic history.
These Are the Fireworks, Vicki Grant (Vagrant, 320 pages) Grant is a well-known Haligonian author of several young-adult novels, but this is her first book for the adult crowd and it’s a winner. She has a gift for character-building and it pairs brilliantly with the twisty plot, which may or may not involve a murder.
Malcolm Fforde was a much-beloved and highly respected member of the community. When he dies suddenly in a bicycle accident it hits his family hard, especially his two daughters, Nina and Libby. So it’s a shock when their mother, Petra, (known to the girls as “Jackie O” for her tasteful perfection) seems to have lost her way – she’s wearing blood-red lipstick and tacky floral sundresses. Then, an old buddy of Petra’s shows up at the funeral and mentions a medical practice in the Congo. A few days later, Petra is seen entering a cheap motel and leaving with a much younger man. Libby and Nina see signs of disaster everywhere but all Petra will say is, “It’s my life and I’m going to live it.”
Grant tells the tale in different voices, pointing out that perception is everything. What you see isn’t what someone else, even someone very close, sees. And what you think you know, you don’t.
All the Little Houses, May Cobb (Sourcebooks, 480 pages) If you’ve read or watched The Hunting Wives, you’ve encountered the intelligent and vengeful world that Cobb is writing about. Her heroines and her villainesses aren’t nice girls. They’re mean and feisty and full of spite and they make great storytellers. This is Cobb at her best.
Drab Longview, Tex., in the 1980s, isn’t much and Nellie Anderson, the richest and prettiest girl around, is used to getting what she wants when she wants it. Then a new family moves to Longview with two daughters who just might upset Nellie’s self-directed life. When a girl can’t do for herself, she goes to Mama, and Charleigh Anderson is a force to be reckoned with. Who dies and who survives and what secrets are buried are all eventually revealed through multiple narrators. This is definitely better than The Hunting Wives.
The Fair Weather Friend, Jessie Garcia (St. Martin’s, 320 pages) This is another multiple-points-of-view mystery from Garcia, author of The Business Trip, and it also features a smart and interesting woman. The difficulty is that the woman here is Faith Richards, Detroit’s favourite television meteorologist, and she’s dead.
Garcia smartly doesn’t immediately go to the investigation. Instead, she neatly takes us into the victim’s life and work. Who loved her? Who hated her? Garcia reveals all through a series of chapters from everyone except the victim herself. Slick and readable right to the finale.
Wreck Your Heart, Lori Rader-Day (St. Martin’s, 352 pages) I don’t know a thing about country music, but Rader-Day makes me understand why people love the songs and the people who sing them. This book is a master class in how to use something a bit different to elevate an ordinary mystery. If you remember Dick Francis’s jockeys, you’ll love this book.
Dahlia (Doll) Devine entered this world laden with problems not of her making. Her fraught childhood and adolescence are the very epitome of what makes country music authentic. But Doll has thrived and now she’s showcasing her talents at Chicago’s McPhee’s Tavern.
Her rise to the top, however, hits a nasty patch when her boyfriend, Joey, absconds with the rent money. Doll is trying to process that disaster when her errant mother shows up after 20 years of no contact. Hard on Mom’s heels comes a young woman claiming to be her sister. When a body appears in front of McPhee’s, the action begins.
How a book cover comes to life
Evil Bones, Kathy Reichs (Simon & Schuster, 336 pages) Two dozen books later, we know what to expect from a Kathy Reichs novel. There will be grisly forensics, plenty of scientific talk and a good plot. This time out, we get a bit more. First of all, there’s a return to Montreal, which, I think, always improves her books, and she’s introducing a new (to me) character, Toby, which gives more depth to forensic anthropologist Temperance Brennan.
The plot revolves around macabre killings and mutilations of animals in North Carolina, which turn into a really horrible murder. That leads Brennan into the convolutions of both human and veterinary science – and makes the plot zing.
You Belong Here, Megan Miranda (Simon & Schuster, 352 pages) On a grim winter’s day, it’s nice to imagine being in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia, laden with gorgeous scenery and plenty of traditions. Both those items are abundantly used for place and plot in this terrific novel.
Wyatt College in Virginia’s Wyatt Valley is a place Beckett Bowery fled from and, for 20 years, she’s managed to avoid returning even though her parents, both professors at the school, still live there. When her daughter, Delilah, decides to attend, she’s not pleased but Delilah is adamant and she has a full scholarship. Beckett, however, knows all too well that traditions and customs, including Wyatt College’s famous “howling” initiation rite, are more dangerous than unsuspecting students know and she’s intent on making sure Delilah is safe. But someone in Wyatt Valley has an eye on Beckett and her daughter and an old, awful memory of what happened all those years ago is about to come back to haunt her today. This is one of Miranda’s best books so far.