Author: Simon McDonald
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Taken by Dinuka McKenzie
The disappearance of an infant drives Dinuka McKenzie’s outstanding sophomore novel “Taken,” which sees the return of Detective Sergeant Kate Miles, back from maternity leave and the tumultuous events of “The Torrent.” McKenzie strikes me as an unrepentant classicist when it comes to crime fiction, and here, once again, she keeps the traditional police procedural […]
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Fire With Fire by Candice Fox
[Note: “Fire With Fire” is published April 2023] Hot on the heels of “The Chase” (‘her most ambitious and byzantine novel’), Candice Fox returns with another cinematic blockbuster loaded with nail-biting suspense, bountiful twists, and a crackling narrative style. It’s the kind of thriller you can’t stop reading, but don’t want to end: you’ll enjoy […]
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The Passenger by Cormac McCarthy
For all its pulpy accoutrements — a passenger has vanished from a crashed plane, and mysterious government agents are hunting down salvage diver Bobby Western — “The Passenger” is as much a thriller as “The Road” is a horror novel. Which is to say, yes — on a foundational level you can see glimpses of […]
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Friends, Lovers and the Big Terrible Thing by Matthew Perry
Matthew Perry’s “Friends, Lovers and the Big Terrible Thing” is antithetical to every celebrity memoir I’ve read. Which makes it one of the most extraordinary. This is no nostalgic trip down memory lane, replete with behind-the-scenes gossip and outrageous revelations about the cast of ‘Friends.’ There’s no swagger to Perry’s autobiography. Whatever hubris the man […]
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Triple Cross by James Patterson
The Alex Cross novels were a staple of my teenage reading, and I still like to check in now and again, even though the patented James Patterson storytelling formula has somewhat lost its lustre. In “Triple Cross,” the titular detective is investigating the brutal slayings of whole families around the D.C. area by ‘The Family […]
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A Heart Full of Headstones by Ian Rankin
When Ian Rankin retired John Rebus in “Exit Music” fifteen years ago and implied we’d read the last of the detective, I was gutted, obviously, but also impressed by the audacity of the decision to relinquish such an iconic character. Oh, sure; Rebus has aged in real time since his debut, and he’d reached that […]
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Desert Star by Michael Connelly
In Michael Connelly’s “Desert Star,” Renee Ballard has revived the LAPD’s Open-Unsolved Unit thanks to her benefactor on the city council, Jake Pearlman, and calls Harry Bosch out of retirement to work cold cases alongside a team of volunteers. Bosch left the department acrimoniously, but the chance to use the LAPD’s resources to work his […]
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The Woman in the Library by Sulari Gentill
Sulari Gentill adds an intriguing wrinkle to the mystery genre with “The Woman in the Library,” which sees Winifred “Freddie” Kincaid arriving in Boston from Australia as the recipient of a prestigious writers’ fellowship. While contemplating her manuscript in the Boston Public Library, a woman’s scream pierces the stillness, which becomes the central conceit of her […]
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Bad Actors by Mick Herron
Mick Herron’s caustically satirical spy series continues with “Bad Actors,” its eighth instalment, which deals with the disappearance of Sophie de Greer, a ‘superforecaster’ employed by the British government — who might be a Russian agent, which would be very bad news indeed for the man who hired her; Anthony Sparrow, the Prime Minister’s key adviser; and for MI5 chief Diane […]
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Your Show by Ashley Hickson-Lovence
Uriah Rennie was the English Premier League’s first Black match official. He was a trailblazer. Or, at least, he should’ve been — Rennie retired more than a decade ago, in 2008. Yet he remains the only Black referee to officiate a match in the world’s biggest football competition. Ashley Hickson-Lovence’s “Your Show” isn’t about Rennie’s legacy, but I can’t […]
Simon McDonald 