I was initially drawn in by the period, title, and intrigue. I loved the premise of this novel, yet it felt so heart-wrenchingly sad. 

It’s New Year’s Eve 1969 when little Alice goes missing. For me, a parent’s worst nightmare. And when poor young farmhand Bobby James is convicted, well. With twists, lies, and deceit, I desperately wanted the truth to come out, and have injustices righted. Years later architect Willow James discovers the truth. Thank goodness. Hold on tight. No spoilers here. I found it a good read.

A double homicide in Sicily. Innocent, eccentric, small-town characters. The Mafia, the church, and a stifling, frightening nightmare world portrayed with humor, humanity, and a diamond-tipped eye for detail: that’s Leonardo Sciascia’s 1960s detective novel classic, To Each His Own (A ciascuno il suo). The writing is clean, clear, nervy, and seductive—some of the best crime writing, period. It even survives translation. This book is at least as good as The Godfather and better than anything by Andrea Camilleri. As you turn the pages, you’re not only transported to off-the-beaten-track, real-deal Sicily. You feel the grit. You smell it. You enter the heads and hearts of Sicilians. Written over 50 years ago, To Each His Own needs no refreshing. That world never changes.

I think Robert Stone was one of the greatest American novelists of the recent era, a man with a profound concern for how political situations affect the individual. I love Stone’s ability to delve into complex situations.

This is fiction, unlike the last two recommendations mentioned above, and takes place in Central America during the Seventies. I love books about political situations, and I love novels set in other countries. Stone is a master of both.

He was also a humble, good man, though maybe I’m not completely objective because he provided a generous blurb for my first novel. I had the pleasure of spending a little time with him after my novel was published, and I found him to be brilliant, funny, modest, and just a fun person to be around.

Like Dostoevsky, he was able to delve into deep matters by telling a great story with amazing characters.… show more.

A protagonist who is loyal to a fault and willing to put her life on the line to clear an innocent friend is a key ingredient to a cozy I want to read. So, I was naturally attracted to shoe designer Maddie Springer in Danger in High Heels who springs into action and risks her life to clear her wrongly accused BFF’s boyfriend of murder. I prefer amateur sleuths stumbling and bumbling their way to solving the case like Maddy does. Her snappy comebacks gave this cozy the spice that made the story zing. 

Set in a vividly described location in the Swiss Alps, Flowers Over the Inferno features a most refreshing protagonist. Teresa Battaglia is in her sixties, stocky, diabetic, and extremely grumpy. What’s not to like? The plot is dark, the location stunning, and the crimes intriguing, but it’s Teresa’s character that made it a stand-out book for me. 

I’m always onboard for a mystery set in the exclusive circles of London society, and Freddy Pilkington-Soames, a young gentleman in 1920s London, is just the ticket when I want a fun, lighthearted read. Freddy’s mother ropes him into helping clear away a bothersome little matter, a dead body in her front hall. Before Freddy quite knows what’s happened, he’s interviewing suspects and tracking down clues. Although Clara Benson is a modern author, I love how she’s captured the tone and language of the lighter Golden Age mystery romps. A Case of Blackmail in Belgravia’s is breezy and lighthearted. It’s fun to be swept along with Freddy as he tries to untangle a web of blackmail among society’s upper crust.

Deliciously Scottish with sparky dialogue that had me laughing out loud.

The characters are all flawed, making mistakes I can identify with. I find relationships difficult at times, and this book was reassuringly familiar—like I wasn't "the only one". I also love the wee boy Bertie and his desperate need not to hurt anyone, a familiar feeling I could relate to, and found myself forgiving the "pushover” in me.

This zany story about a gamer is packed full of laughs. Pete is looking forward to the release of a new game, but when he sells his dad’s old gaming console to afford the new game, things go really wrong, really fast. Let’s just say that was no gaming console he sold and now his dad is trapped in a video game. Pete has to save his dad, (and the world) by entering the game and winning! 

While I usually don’t like the whole getting-sucked-into-the-game trope, it totally works for this silly style of humor. Illustrations along the way don’t just break up the text, they add to the laughs.

This novel is enriched by being set in the theatre and based on a real dance troupe. We are caught up in an authentically realized experience of a stage company. It is set in Ngaio Marsh’s home country of New Zealand. Her knowledge of the Maori fertility symbol, the tiki, plays a significant role in the plot.

Her detective, Roderick Alleyn. Is also a gentleman, like Lord Peter Wimsey, but this time a professional policeman, who looks like a cross "between a monk and a grandee."

As with Dorothy Sayers, an extra interest is added in later books, with Alleyn’s edgy love affair with the artist Agatha Troy.

I discovered Kirschman through her non-fiction—a book called I Love a Cop: What Police Families Need to Know—when I was working on my first mystery.

Later I discovered she also writes a darned good story herself. Like this one, featuring Dot Meyerhoff, newly hired police psychologist. Dot’s job? Help the police cope better with their stress—those daily dangers, risks, uglinesses.

First client—Ben Gomez, a rookie who just encountered his first corpse. He strikes Dot as a little too sensitive. When Ben becomes a corpse himself, it looks like another cop suicide. Shouldn’t Dot have seen this coming? But she didn’t.

The secondary theme is significant and well handled: the prevalence of police suicide. I learned a lot. Hint: it’s a cozy, not a police procedural.