Death of a New American, by Mariah Fredericks. Minotaur Books, 2019In Fredericks second in this historical mystery series, it’s 1912, and ladies maid Jane Prescott is accompanying her charge, Louise, to the Long Island mansion of the Bentleys. Louise is marrying William Tyler at his aunt and uncle’s home, and they are going early to get everything ( Read more... )

Wild and Crooked, by Leah Thomas. Bloomsbury, 2019When Kalyn’s grandmother has a stroke, she and her unstable mother must move back to the small town Kalyn was born in. Due to circumstances, Kalyn enrolls into high school under an assumed name, Rose. Her last name, Spence, is dirt in this town; her teenaged father killed another teen, the high ( Read more... )

The Vanishing Box, by Elly Griffiths. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt 2018Set in 1950’s Brighton, this fourth installment in the authors Magic Man Mystery series gives us Max Mephisto- one of the Magic Men- and his daughter, Ruby, playing a gig at the Brighton Hippodrome. On the same bill is Vic Cutler’s tableaux vivante, where almost naked young women ( Read more... )

A Student of History, by Nina Revoyr. Akashic Books, 2019
Grad student Rick Nagano’s life isn’t going well. He’s been stuck on his thesis for months and sees no future for it, his grant is about to run out and not be renewed, and his girlfriend has dumped him. Then things turn better: his friend is leaving the country, and leaving her job as a ( Read more... )

The Poison Bed, by Elizabeth Fremantle. Pegasus Books, 2019
In 1615, Frances Howard and her husband Robert Carr, are imprisoned separately in the Tower of London, accused of poisoning Sir Thomas Overbury. In alternating chapters, they tell the reader what led up to this ( Read more... )

The Wolf and the Watchman, by Niklas Natt Och Dag. Atria Press, 2017
In Sweden in 1793, some children find a body floating in a particularly gross part of the river. They call on Mickel Cardell, a watchman moonlighting (and drinking) as a bouncer, and he fishes the body out. It’s not odd that there is a body in the river, but this one is missing ( Read more... )

The Golden Tresses of the Dead: A Flavia de Luce Novel, by Alan Bradley. Delacorte Press, 2019
Flavia de Luce is the 12 year old heroine of a series of mysteries; this is the tenth installment. At this point, she is an orphan, with one sister marrying and one sister ensconced in the library. Her father figure is Dogger, her late father’s aide (and ( Read more... )

The Way of All Flesh, by Ambrose Parry. Canongate, 2018
In 1847, Will Raven has just been accepted as an assistant under the supervision of Dr. James Simpson. Simpson was a real person, an obstetrician who pioneered the use of anesthesia for childbirth. This granted him a room in the Dr.’s house to live in, which was a good thing as Raven already ( Read more... )

The Council of Twelve, by Oliver Potzsch. Mariner Books, 2018
In 1672, the executioners of Bavaria are having a meeting of the Council of Twelve, a prestigious group- well, as prestigious as a hangman can be in a time and place where they are considered dishonorable and tainted. Jakob Kuisl takes his entire family there- his married daughter ( Read more... )

Tiffany Blues, by M.J. Rose. Simon & Schuster, 2018
While the narration starts in 1957, after the destruction by fire of the former home of Louis Comfort Tiffany, much of the action takes place in 1924 and even earlier. Painter Jenny Bell tells the story of the summer she and her best friend, rich socialite artist Mix Deering, spent in Laurelton ( Read more... )