Borne by Jeff VanderMeer MCD/Farrar, Straus and Giroux, $26.00, 323 pages, ISBN 978-0-374-11524-1 With their uncanny ability to somehow tap into the future, science fiction writers have been stimulating readers minds for the past hundred and fifty years . . . usually with tales of science which benefits the human race as it propels us the stars, and spreads our kind throughout the universe. But there’s an alternative point
Bad Boy Boogie by Thomas Pluck Down and Out Books, PB, $17.95, 334 pages, ISBN 978-1-943402-59-5 For all of my adult life, New Jersey was a place I landed in and took off from at Newark International, rented a car and headed up the Garden State Parkway, bound for the family homestead in the Catskills. Jersey was a place overcrowded with traffic, bad roads and wretched, impatient, sue-happy drivers
Crime Song by David Swinson Mulholland Books/Little Brown and Company, $26.00, 354 pages, ISBN 978-0-316-26421-1 Last winter, in MBR No. 275: The Second Girl, we introduced our audience to an ex-Washington D.C. cop turned crime-fiction writer named David Swinson, who’s created one of the best anti-heros to come down the pike in, I dunno, like forever. He’s a retired D.C. cop turned private investigator named Frank “Frankie” Marr. The
Sorrow Road by Julia Keller Minotaur Books, PB, $15.99, 351 pages, ISBN 978-1-250-08959-5 The green rolling hills of West Virginia are the nearest thing to Heaven that I know though the times are sad and drear and I cannot linger here they’ll keep me and never let me go . . . are the opening words to a song that was made famous by Emmylou Harris. It was written
The Freedom Broker by K.J. Howe Quercus, $26.99, 361 pages, ISBN 978-1-68144-310-2 This week’s MBR is an international thriller by a debut author that takes off with the first sentence like an F-18 Hornet under full military power, and never, ever, ever stops accelerating! And hey . . . I can almost hear you thinking . . . That’s a pretty bold statement Johnny, and, like Animal said to
Celine by Peter Heller Alfred A Knopf/Penguin Random House, $25.95, 334 pages, ISBN 978-0-451-49389-7 In order to be successful, today’s crime fiction writer must be able to come up with a unique, new and different kind of detective that readers haven’t encountered before. Let’s face it, we’ve all seen Sam Spade, Spenser, Marlowe and Miss Marple many many times already . . . as well as an endless number
The Lioness is the Hunter by Loren D. Estleman Forge/McMillan, $25.99, 246 pages, ISBN 978-0-7653-8845-2 The battered city of Detroit, Michigan seems like the perfect setting for a beat-down, cynical and wise-cracking private eye who’d be considered a real loser . . . if he wasn’t so damn good at solving the toughest cases in the face of near-impossible conditions. His name is Amos Walker and he’s as hard-boiled
A Divided Spy by Charles Cumming St. Martin’s Press, $26.99, 356 pages, ISBN 978-1-250-02104-5 For some arcane reason . . . known only to themselves and the cosmos . . . the Brits are the masters of the spy novel universe. One only has to think of the names Ian Fleming and John LeCarré, or their iconic fictional spies, James Bond and George Smiley to know what we mean.
What You Break by Reed Farrel Coleman Putnam/Penguin Random House, $27.00, 357 pages, ISBN 978-0-399-17304-2 One year ago—May 2016—in MBR No. 246, we alerted our readers to a new, compelling and haunting crime fiction character by the name of Gus Murphy. He’s the embodiment of the noir persona, a man dealing with a boatload of personal pain and grief, while living and operating on the gritty south shore of
Vicious Circle by C.J. Box Putnam/Penguin Random House, $27.00, 367 pages, ISBN 978-0-399-17661-6 Although our focus here at the MBR has always been finding debut authors with promising talent and an outstanding story to tell, the unvarnished truth is that there’s a few A-list writers . . . James Lee Burke, Dennis Lehane, or Michael Connelly for example who we always read and review, whenever they publish a new