Review: The Wych Elm, by Tana French

Who's afraid of the cold, hard truth? Practically everybody in this book is, for starters. The Wych Elm walks a delicate line between murder mystery and profound insight into what motivates us. What makes us 'us'? And can that change? Toby is about to find out. He's always been happy-go-lucky, cruising through life without any major mishaps, …

The Saturday Review: Flowers over the Inferno, by Ilaria Tuti

This book was an extremely pleasant surprise. I've not read many books by Italian authors- not even Elena Ferrante, believe it or not- so I approached the translation of Flowers Over the Inferno with a fair amount of interest. What I got back was an intriguing twist on the police procedural novel, featuring lost children, …

Review: The Last, by Hanna Jameson

What would you do if the world were ending? I mean, I would probably arm myself with a giant bar of chocolate and some brandy before settling down with a book, but that's beside the point. The Last asks a far more intriguing question: what would happen if you survived the apocalypse... and then had to solve …

Blog Tour: The Chestnut Man, by Soren Sveistrup

Who knew that chestnuts could be so creepy? I didn't know that Soren Sveistrup was the man behind The Killing TV show, but now I do, I'm both completely unsurprised, and even more in love with this book than I was before. It's gory, it's chills-down-your-spine cold, and it's got more twists and turns than …

Review: A Necessary Murder, by M. J Tjia

I first came into contact with M. J Tjia's work almost exactly a year ago, with the great book She Be Damned, and here, we're diving right back into the thick of things, into the lives of Heloise Chancey, Victorian courtesan and part-time mystery solver, and her mother, Amah, or Li Lee. This book continues …