Maxine’s book reviews

Core of Evil, by Nigel McCrery

2009-12-07T19:17:01Z

CORE OF EVIL is a book that slips down a treat. It's easy to read over a couple of hours, mashing up the traditional British detective novel (think Agatha Christie) with the modern police procedural. It seems obligatory in crime novels for prota...

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The Consorts of Death, by Gunnar Staalesen

2009-11-29T16:40:31Z

Translated by Don Bartlett. Varg Veum is a private detective based in Bergen. Although he's featured in almost 20 novels, only two of them are readily available in English, both published by Arcadia: THE WRITING ON THE WALL (first published in ...

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To Steal Her Love, by Matti Joensuu

2009-11-29T16:37:05Z

Translated by David Hackston Not having read this author's PRIEST OF EVIL (first published in 2003) as the subject matter does not appeal, I was pleased to discover that one of his earlier books, TO STEAL HER LOVE (first published in 1993), has ...

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No Escape, by N. J. Cooper

2009-11-29T16:34:55Z

NO ESCAPE is the first of a series by N J Cooper, previously known as Natasha Cooper, author of the Trish McGuire books. Like the earlier books, NO ESCAPE has an appealing female protagonist - this time a forensic psychologist called Karen Taylo...

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The Darkest Hour, by Katherine Howell

2009-11-29T16:31:44Z

The Darkest Hour by Katherine Howell is her second novel, telling two connected, interweaving stories with a cracking pace and confidence. I enjoyed it tremendously, despite not being sure about it at first. The book opens with Lauren Yates, a ...

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True Murder, by Yaba Badoe

2009-11-29T16:28:18Z

TRUE MURDER tells the story of Ajuba, an 11-year-old girl from Ghana whose parents' marriage is in great difficulty. She's therefore been dumped, uncomprehending, in an English boarding school. She befriends three other girls with whom she share...

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Sworn to Silence, by Linda Castillo

2009-11-21T20:52:36Z

I very much enjoyed this book. I shouldn’t have done if I am logical, as it is not only about a serial killer, but it concerns the murders of young women and girls in very gruesome, slow ways – topics on which I have more than once gone on record ...

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Wicked Prey, by John Sandford

2009-11-21T20:46:25Z

Wicked Prey is nineteenth in the Lucas Davenport series (there is a twentieth, Storm Prey, due out early next year). I haven’t read all of the previous books, but have read enough of them (about six) not to be lost at this late stage. Davenport is...

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Thumbprint, by Friedrich Glauser

2009-11-21T20:41:53Z

Translated by Mike Martin. Thumbprint is the first novel in a series written in the 1930s by Friedrich Glauser; a series so influential that Germany’s main crime-fiction award is the Glauser prize. The novel is a highly readable affair, opening...

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The Southern Seas, by Manuel Vazquez Montalban

2009-11-21T20:05:03Z

Translated by Patrick Camiller. If the Swedish authors Maj Sjowall and Per Wahloo, writing in the 1960s and 70s, are often held to be the parents of the modern police-procedural crime novel, then the Spanish Manuel Vazquez Montalban, writing a ...

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