First Line: The urn the ashes came in was beautiful-- shiny and black, with an enamel swastika on one side.

Since protecting Princess Elizabeth at Windsor Castle, Maggie Hope has been training as a new member of the Special Operations Executive, an elite black ops group whose mission is to aid…

First Line: The dead talk to me in my dreams. When I wake up, I can't remember what they said.

The elections are over, and there's a new sheriff in Maricopa County. Former Sheriff Mike Peralta and his friend and Deputy David Mapstone are out of jobs-- but not for long.…

First Line: Magnolia Plantation wasn't really a Southern plantation, the guests milling about the wide verandahs and lush green lawn weren't really extras from Gone with the Wind, and that wasn't Scarlett O'Hara descending the curved staircase but my auntie KiKi in a green flouncy dress with…

First Line: Eleven-thirty at night, sweaty in his evening suit and shattered after a heavy night playing Rachmaninov, Mel Ferran plodded out of the artists' exit on the south side of the Royal Festival Hall.

Things are a bit slow for the Criminal Investigation Division in Bath, England,…

First Line: As she walked home, Lesego's head was full of Christmas.

Assistant Superintendent David Bengu of the Gaborone Criminal Investigation Department (known by everyone as "Kubu") has barely had time to make the acquaintance of the CID's first woman detective, Samantha Khama, when…

Like almost everyone else I don't just read mysteries, I also watch them-- "Inspector Morse," "Lewis," "Endeavour," "Castle," "NCIS," "Elementary"... the list of favorites is a long one. But for quite some time now, a Canadian mystery series has been right at the top of my favorites list. "Murdoch…

First Line: Dr. Atul Pradhan had just poured himself a cup of black tea when he heard what he thought was distant thunder.

If you're in the mood for a fast-paced tale of science running amok, consider picking up a copy of The Leviathan Effect, the second thriller…

First Line: On this storm-lashed island three hours off the north-west coast of Scotland, what little soil exists gives the people their food and their heat. It also takes their dead. And very occasionally, as today, gives one up.

An unidentified body has been discovered in a peat bog on…

I am one of those readers who feels most comfortable with a huge cache of books waiting to be read. Building that cache is a labor of love in many ways, and mine contains the books of dozens of new-to-me authors that I'm sure I'll enjoy. The trouble is... some of those authors can languish on the shelves…

Ever since visiting Pleasant Hill, Kentucky, as a teenager, I've been fascinated by the Shakers. I've read many books about the religion, and the first work of fiction I read about them was Janice Holt Giles' The Believers. Since then…

First Line: The bees travel along the high-tension wires, just as surely as one true sentence follows the next.

Albert Honig hasn't seen his next-door neighbors, Claire and Hilda Straussman, and that's unusual. Walking over to see if everything's all right, he goes into the house and…

First Line: At first he isn't even scared.

Dr. Ruth Galloway's old university friend Dan Golding has died in a house fire. Still reeling from that news, Dan's death is put in an entirely different light when she receives a letter he wrote and posted to her just before he died. In the letter,…

First Line: (From the Introduction) The seven stories in this collection were written between 1996 and 2011.

It's been a while since Sharan Newman's last Catherine Levendeur mystery, so I was thrilled to hear of this collection of short stories set in twelfth century Europe. This…

I know I'm not the only crime fiction fanatic who loves good historical mysteries. You know what I mean-- a mystery that not only has a strong story and wonderful characters, but that also takes us to another time. A time in which there are so many things that I can learn and enjoy without feeling that…

First Line: The leaves rustled on the bushes ahead.

Summer ("Sam") Westin is working on a twelve-week project for the National Park Service in Olympic National Park. One night when filling in as a firewatcher, she hears an explosion and sees fire light the sky over at Marmot Lake. When the…

As many of you know, not only do I love to read crime fiction, I love wildlife and the wide open spaces. A perfect day to me is my husband and I loading up the Jeep with food, drink, and cameras to head out on a trail to some much-less-traveled location where we can wander at will. When I can find crime…

First Line: The action began auspiciously.

The old adage "it never rains but it pours" has never been truer for Chief Inspector Mario Silva and his team. A suicide bombing which is the apparent work of militant Islamists has killed over sixty people, but the assassination of a gubernatorial…

First Line: Madame Keui was flesh and blood, or so they claimed, although nobody could remember touching that rewarmed flesh, nor seeing her bleed; not even when a second bullet passed through her.

Well into his seventies, Dr. Siri Paiboun, national coroner of Laos, has finally…

First Line: It had been years since she'd been in an English church.

With their youngest child having difficulties adjusting to any sort of daycare, Gemma and Duncan find their plans for the weekend ruined when Gemma is called out to investigate the murder of a lawyer. While Gemma…

When I read, I love to be immersed in the setting and the time period in which the book takes place. This doesn't mean that I like to be hit over the head with tons of facts because I don't. That's much too violent a method and tends to put me off the book. No, I said…