SHACKLES (Private Investigator) – EX

Bill Pronzini – 17th in “Nameless” series

St. Martin’s Press, 1988 – Hardcover

Imagine leaving your girlfriend’s apartment a few days before Christmas, being forced into a car, handcuffed, chloroformed and awake shackled with a leg iron attached to a wall in an isolated mountain cabin with

13 week’s provisions and told you are being left to die there. This is the situation in which…

OPEN AND SHUT (Legal Thriller) – G

David Rosenfelt – 1st book

Mysterious Press/Warner Books, 2002 – Hardcover

His father, a retired district attorney, asks without an explanation New Jersey Attorney Andy Carpenter to take on the appeals case of death row inmate Willie Miller, whom he had prosecuted. Andy’s father dies a few days later and

leaves an inheritance of over $22 million, about which Andy had never

known. When he…

THE MURDER STONE (Gothic Suspense)- VG

Charles Todd – Standalone

Bantam, 2003 – Hardcover

Their grandfather, Francis Hatton, raised Francesca Hatton and her four male cousins, all orphaned at an early age. Each of the cousins has been killed in the Great War, and now Francisca is alone to grieve the death of her beloved

grandfather, whom she thought she knew.

But at the reading of his will, she reads a…

LIVE BAIT (Police Procedural) – VG

P.J. Tracy – 2nd in series

G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 2004 – Hardcover

When elderly, well-loved Morey Gilbert is murdered, Milwaukee Dets. Leo Magozzi and Gino Rolseth are called to investigate a sad, but basic murder. However, when other

elderly people in the same neighborhood and with a common history are also

murdered, it’s clear there more going on than first seemed.…

MAISIE DOBBS (Historical Novel/Mystery) – Okay

Jacqueline Winspear – 1st book

Penguin Books, 2003 – Trade Paperback

Set in England between 1910 and 1929 is the story of Maisie who goes from being the daughter of a fruit-and-vegetable man, to the in-between maid of wealthy aristocrats where she receives special tutoring, on

to college and then serving as a Nurse in France during WWI and, finally,

setting up an investigative…

It is almost unthinkable that a single maniac would murder two women miles apart on the same day. Yet the evidence is leading Detective Inspector Tom Thorne to a stunning conclusion: there isn't only one serial

killer on the prowl, but a pair of them, working in tandem. And any corpse that

turns up in the future just might be accompanied by a second. To stop them

both, Thorne must…

JUST ONE LOOK (Contemporary Mystery) – VG

Harlan Coben - Standalone

Suburban housewife Grace Lawson collects some pictures at the local Photomat. Included is an old print of her husband, Jack, and other college students. When Grace shows the photo to Jack, he drives

away and disappears. Grace's hunt for her missing husband sweeps her back into

a nightmare evening years ago when she survived a rock concert rampage that

left…

THE GAME OF KINGS (Historical Novel – non-mystery) – Ex

Dorothy Dunnett – 1st of series

In 1547 Francis Crawford of Lymond returns to his native Scotland, which is threatened by an English invasion and the bloody rivalries of its nobles. Accused of treason, hunted by friend and enemy alike, he leads a company of

outlaws in a desperate race to redeem his reputation, even at the cost of his

life.

This…

DEATH OF A NATIONALIST (Historical Novel/Mystery) – EX

Rebecca Pawel – 1st book

Set in Madrid, 1939, and the bitter civil war between the Nationalists, supported by the facists, and the Republicans, supported by the communists, with atrocities

committed by both sides. It is at this moment, when the Republicans have

surrendered, and the Guardia Civil has begun to impose order in the ruins of Madrid, that Carlos Tejada Alonso y…

THE BONE-PEDLAR (Historical Mystery) – VG+

Sylvian Hamilton – 1st of series

This is the world of medieval quest, of castles, journeys, of violent killings, and sometimes of unimaginable cruelty. It also a world deeply enmeshed with the supernatural, in which the holy remnants of saints may

be a matter of life and death. Against this background, of monks, witches,

children, mountebanks, women good and evil, and knights Templar, is…

DEAD TO THE WORLD (Supernatural Mystery) – VG

Charlaine Harris – 4th in series

Sookie Stackhouse, a telepathic Louisiana waitress, finds her bad luck has taken a new turn for the worse. Her love interest, Bill the vampire, runs off to Peru

to do research. In his place, she is stuck with Eric, Bill's boss, who appears

out of thin air buck naked with no memory of who he is or what he does. Then,

her brother Jason goes missing…

Chattie Cornfeld was murdered while jogging in the park. At first it looked as though she was the latest victim of the 'Park Killer', but it doesn't take Slider and Atherton long to establish that someone was trying

to pass the killing off as part of a pattern: only the pattern doesn't fit,

this one was personal.

This is a much-underrated series…

FLESH AND BLOOD (Amateur Sleuth – Non-cozy) – VG

John Harvey – Standalone

Retired Detective Inspector Elder is haunted by the unsolved disappearance of sixteen-year-old in 1988. One of the prime suspects, Shane Donald, has been released from prison, and Elder feels compelled to revisit the

scene of the crime. When Shane breaks parole and disappears and another young

girl is horribly murdered, Elder's involvement becomes crucial.…

MRS. MALORY AND THE SILENT KILLER (English Cozy) – Good

Hazel Holt – 15th in series

The village of Taviscombe is sent reeling when popular and respected Sidney Middleton has a tragic accident,

particularly when it becomes apparent his death was a deliberate act.

Mrs. Malory soon uncovers that his seemingly respectable man had dark--even

deadly--secrets.

Cozies are not my preferred genre, but I…

FATAL FLAW (Legal Thriller) – Okay-

William Lashner – 3rd in series

When old law school classmate Guy Forrest is accused of murdering his lover in their Main Line love next, Philadelphia lawyer Victor Carl agrees to represent him while keeping

silent about his own prior romantic involvement with the victim.

Let me start by saying I read books for character; if I don’t like the characters, it’s a good bet…

SHELL GAMES (Wildlife Investigator) – Okay

Kirk Russell – 1st book

Chronicle Books, 2003 – Hardcover

Lt. John Marques is head of a special operations unit with the California Department of Fish and Game. He is after Kline, a former drug runner now into the more lucrative

smuggling of abalone and a long-time enemy.

With the story set in my own San Francisco Bay Area, I very much enjoyed the locations…

INTERRUPTED ARIA (Historical Mystery) – VG

Beverle Graves Myers – 1st book

In late 1731, Tito Amato and fellow castrato Felice Ravello leave Naples for Tito's native Venice to sing with an opera company owned by a wealthy and powerful family. During one performance, the prima donna is

poisoned, and Felice, is jailed as the chief suspect. Tito is determined to

clear his friend and scours the Republic

of Venice for evidence…

DISSOLUTION (Historical Mystery) – VG

C. J. Sansom – 1st book

It is 1537; the English Reformation is in full swing; and Lord Thomas Cromwell, King Henry VIII's vicar-general, is busy shutting down papist institutions. When one of his commissioners is beheaded at a remote

Benedictine monastery, Cromwell dispatches a second emissary, hunchbacked

lawyer Matthew Shardlake, to investigate the murder. What Shardlake and…

UNWILLING ACCOMPLICE (Amateur Sleuth - non-cozy) – G+

Barbara Saranella – 7th book

Munch Mancini receives a call from her daughter's aunt, who wants the girl to meet her cousins. When one of the cousins goes missing soon after the meeting, Munch is drawn into finding the girl and discovers a ring of

exploited and endangered children and teens.

I didn’t feel this was the strongest book of the series and…

The East Bay Mystery Readers' Group -

6 April 2004 Meeting Recap