Review: GIVE UNTO OTHERS, Donna Leon

• 
   this edition large print from Gale at Thorndike Press, published 2022
  
•  ISBN-13 978-1-4328-9727-7
• 452 pages
• Brunetti series, Book 13

Synopsis (publisher)

What role can or should loyalty play in the life of a police inspector? It’s a question Commissario Guido Brunetti must face and ultimately answer in Give Unto Others, Donna Leon’s splendid 31st installment of her acclaimed Venetian crime series.

Brunetti is approached for a favor by Elisabetta Foscarini, a woman he knows casually, but her mother was good to Brunetti’s mother, so he feels obliged to at least look into the matter privately, and not as official police business. Foscarini’s son-in-law, Enrico Fenzo, has alarmed his wife (her daughter) by confessing their family might be in danger because of something he’s involved with. Since Fenzo is an accountant, Brunetti logically suspects the cause of danger is related to the finances of a client. Yet his clients seem benign: an optician, a restaurateur, a charity established by his father-in-law. However, when his friend’s daughter’s place of work is vandalized, Brunetti asks his own favors—that his colleagues Claudia Griffoni, Lorenzo Vianello, and Signorina Elettra Zorzi assist his private investigation, which soon enough turns official as they uncover the dark and Janus-faced nature of a venerable Italian institution.

Exploring the wobbly line between the criminal and non-criminal, revealing previously untold elements of Brunetti’s past, Give Unto Others shows that the price of reciprocity can be steep. 

My Take

I've named Donna Leon as one of the international award winning crime fiction authors for my U3A Crime Fiction readers group to look for. This is the 18th one that I have written about on this blog (since 2008).

The story is set in 2020, and Venice is bearing the impact of Covid 19: businesses have closed, there are no tourist boats, and many people are still wearing masks. There is actually little crime although gangs of kids are ransacking closed shops. Brunetti and others have time on their hands.

So when he is approached by someone he barely remembers from his childhood he decides to launch an unofficial investigation. But the longer this goes on, the more people are involved and the more complex everything becomes. 

One of Italy's big problems in 2020 is the collapse of investment schemes and many people are investigating alternative things to do with their money. Funds are flowing out of the Mafia and others into money laundering schemes. This is the background this book is set against. 

My rating:: 4.6 

I've also read

• ABOUT FACE
• THE GIRL OF HIS DREAMS
• THROUGH A GLASS DARKLY
• 4.4, A QUESTION OF BELIEF
• 4.5, BEASTLY THINGS
• 4.4, QUIETLY IN THEIR SLEEP
• 3.9, THE JEWELS OF PARADISE
• 4.8, DRAWING CONCLUSIONS
• 4.5, DRAWING CONCLUSIONS, Donna Leon - abridged audio version
• 4.6, DEATH IN A STRANGE COUNTRY
• 4.7, BY ITS COVER
• 4.5, THE GOLDEN GOOSE
• 4.8, THE WATERS OF ETERNAL YOUTH
• 4.5, FALLING IN LOVE
• 4.8, EARTHLY REMAINS
• 4.6, TRANSIENT DESIRES - #30
• 4.7, SO SHALL YOU REAP - #32 

Review: GABRIEL'S MOON, William Boyd

• 
   This edition read as an e-book on my Kindle
  
• An Amazon Best Book of the Month (Mystery, Thriller, and Suspense)
• ASIN ‏ : ‎ B0CW1B7PC7
• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Viking, September 5, 2024
• Print length ‏ : ‎ 263 pages
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0241542095 

Synopsis (Amazon)

Gabriel Dax is a young man haunted by the memories of a tragedy: every night, when sleep finally comes, he dreams about his childhood home in flames. His days are spent on the move as an acclaimed travel writer, capturing changing landscapes in the grip of the Cold War. When he’s offered the chance to interview a political figure, his ambition leads him unwittingly into the shadows of espionage.

As Gabriel’s reluctant initiation takes hold, he is drawn deeper into duplicity. Falling under the spell of Faith Green, an enigmatic and ruthless MI6 handler, he becomes ‘her spy’, unable to resist her demands. But amid the peril, paranoia and passion consuming Gabriel’s new covert life, it will be the revelations closer to home that change the rest of his story . . .

In his most exhilarating novel yet, William Boyd transports you from the vibrant streets of sixties London to the sun-soaked cobbles of Cadiz and the frosty squares of Warsaw in this thrilling adventure. 

My Take

Here is one slightly outside my comfort zone, not really crime fiction but a tale of espionage, the story of how a man becomes trapped into becoming a spy, a conveyor of packages and messages, working for MI 6, a carefully layered story.

I enjoyed the historical references too, to a period of that I remember quite well. 

My rating: 4.7

About the author

William Boyd was born in 1952 in Accra, Ghana, and grew up there and in Nigeria. He is the author of sixteen highly acclaimed, bestselling novels and five collections of stories. Any Human Heart was longlisted for the Booker Prize and adapted into a TV series. His books have won many literary awards, including the James Tait Black Memorial Prize, the Los Angeles Times Book Award for Fiction, and the Costa Book Award. He was named a Granta Best Young Novelist in 1983, and in 2005, he was awarded the CBE. Boyd is married and divides his time between London and southwest France.

Review: THE WEDDING PARTY, Rebecca Heath

• 
  This edition read as an e-book supplied by my local library on Libby
  
• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Head of Zeus -- an Aries Book
• Publication date ‏ : ‎ 7 January 2025
• Print length ‏ : ‎ 373 pages 

Synopsis (publisher)

Three families united by a terrible event must survive a deadly wedding in this latest gripping thriller from INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER Rebecca Heath, author of The Summer Party and The Dinner Party!

A group of old friends. A grieving mother. A lying bride.

Adele and Jason are childhood sweethearts. Their wedding day on the sunny Australian coast is a chance to reunite and celebrate with friends and family.

But Adele isn't telling the truth about her relationship. And some of the wedding party – still reeling from a tragic death in the group a decade before – hold secrets of their own.

What happened on the jetty all those years ago was an accident, everyone agrees.

Or do they?

My Take

Twelve years ago Ollie died as a result of a diving accident from the old jetty at this South Australian beach. His mother Melanie has never accepted it as an accident, but now on the second-worst day of her life she will watch his girlfriend Adele marry Jason, supposedly his best mate. And no-one is listening to Melanie!

It will be big wedding, many leadup events, and then Jason launches a surprise. 

This story has an interesting construction: several authors and several time frames. It's difficult, but successful. 

My rating: 4.6

I've also read

5.0. THE DINNER PARTY

4.5, THE SUMMER PARTY

Review: THE BOOKSHOP MYSTERIES: A Murder at the Church, S.A. Reeves

• 
   This edition on Kindle (Amazon)
• ASIN ‏ : ‎ B0DHV7QW1S
• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Stephen Haunts Ltd, January 21, 2025
• Print length ‏ : ‎ 274 pages
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1068720956
• Book 2 of 4: The Bookshop Mysteries  

Synopsis (Amazon)

When a craft fair turns deadly, Gemma and Mavis investigate a local man’s murder, unearthing many secrets.

In the peaceful town of Belper, Derbyshire, Gemma, the owner of the Bookworm bookshop and café, and her trusted assistant Mavis are exhibiting books at the town’s annual fair. But the tranquillity of the town is shattered when the body of a local man is found in the church.

A man is arrested amidst the chaos, and the evidence against him is compelling but Gemma and Mavis don’t buy it and set out to clear his name and uncover the truth. As they delve deeper, they uncover startling secrets hidden behind the town’s picturesque facade.

Gemma and Mavis must tread carefully as they race against time to uncover the actual killer. But will they go too far? Will their relentless pursuit of justice put them in harm’s way?

My Take

A true cozy. A rather unchallenging but comfortable read. Village life mixed with some character development, and an unexpected death thrown in for good measure.

My rating: 4.3

I've also read

4.4, THE BOOKSHOP MYSTERIES: THE BITTER PILL - #1 

Review: THE DAY IS DARK, Yrsa Sigurdadottir

• 
  This edition published by Hodder & Stoughton
  
• First published 2011
• English translation by Philip Roughton 2011 
• ISBN 978-1-444-70009-1
• 421 pages 

Synopsis (publisher)

In The Day is Dark, when all contact is lost with two Icelanders working in a harsh and sparsely populated area on the coast of Greenland, Thóra is hired to uncover the fates of the missing people. When she arrives in Greenland, she discovers that these aren't the first two to go missing. The local townspeople believe that the area is cursed, and no one wants to get involved in the case. Soon, Thora finds herself stranded in the middle of a wilderness, and the case is as frightening and hostile as the landscape itself.

Chilling, unsettling, and compulsively readable, The Day is Dark is a must read for readers who are looking for the next big thing in crime fiction coming in from the cold. 

My Take

I found this a challenging book to get into. Thora and her team are not clear what the Icelanders missing in Greenland have been working on, something to do with a mine. In any case all the other workers who had been there have have come back to Iceland and are refusing to return.  Thora has been employed by a bank who are covering insurance for the project.  She has been told that the local Greenland residents have been very hostile to the mining team and she discovers that there is at least one more of the mining team missing.

The book is slow to reveal what the project was about, and in the first part Thora's team is looking for the missing workers, initially without much success. 

I found there was a lot of local Greenland customs and superstitions to absorb, a lot of characters to get to know, and even by the end it needed a long denouement for me to understand what had happened, and what the book was about.

A challenging read.  

My rating: 4.5

I've also read

• 4.8, SOMEONE TO WATCH OVER ME
• 5.0, THE SILENCE OF THE SEA 
• 4.8, WHY DID YOU LIE? 
• 4.9, THE PREY 

SPOILER:  You might want to check this link to confirm the deadly disease that the missing drillers contracted, as well as the dead Greenland woman. It is the disease that the original Greenland villages died from (and why the land where the mine was situated was regarded as a prohibited area). It is an interesting comment on the persistence of deadly diseases.

Review: DEAD SWEET, Katrín Júlíusdóttir

• 
  This edition an e-book on Kindle (Amazon)
• ASIN ‏ : ‎ B0C7RC7Z3M
• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Orenda Books, Publication date ‏ : ‎ December 7, 2023
• Originally published in Icelandic 2020
• Translated into English by Quentin Bates 202
• Print length ‏ : ‎ 253 pages 

Synopsis (Amazon) 

When a celebrated government official is found dead after his surprise birthday party, a young police officer uncovers a terrifying world of financial crime, sinister cults and disturbing secret lives. Icelandic politician Katrín Júlíusdóttir's award-winning debut – first in a breathtaking series…

A murder is just the beginning…

When Óttar Karlsson, a wealthy and respected government official and businessman, is found murdered, after failing to turn up at his own surprise birthday party, the police are at a loss. It isn't until young police officer Sigurdís finds a well-hidden safe in his impersonal luxury apartment that clues start emerging.

As Óttar's shady business dealings become clear, a second, unexpected line of enquiry emerges, when Sigurdís finds a US phone number in the safe, along with papers showing regular money transfers to an American account.

Following the trail to Minnesota, trauma rooted in Sigurdís's own childhood threatens to resurface and the investigation strikes chillingly close to home…

Atmospheric, deeply unsettling and full of unexpected twists and turns, Dead Sweet is a startling debut thriller that uncovers a terrifying world of financial crime, sinister cults and disturbing secret lives, kicking off an addictive, chilling new series.

My Take

Those who read this blog regularly know that it takes a lot of provocation for me to write a negative review. I am a little daunted by the fact that this debut book won the Blackbird Award, an Icelandic crime-writing prize in 2020. Maybe it just illustrates how different my tastes are to those of Icelandic readers.

The longer this book goes on the more undisciplined the structure feels. - please be aware that what follows may be plot spoilers.

The plot begins with a murder of a man turning 50, on the eve of his birthday party; then we find that the murdered man is not the public spirited public servant he appears to be. That he has grown wealthy at the expense of  "clients", that he has profited from the sale of government property,  that he has set up dummy accounts and companies overseas and filled them with incredible amounts of money.  Also that his mother and sister are aware of a very nasty dark side to his character. His fiance however is apparently totally unaware.  And then one of the police investigators goes rogue, following a lead that takes her to America which unearths even seedier information about the dead. 

Now add another couple of unrelated plots. 

By this point, the whole story had really lost its credibility and  I was really turned off.

From my point of view, not only did the book need tighter plot lines, but also the writing (or maybe the translation) needed greater maturity of language. 

My rating: 3.2

About the author

Katrín Júlíusdóttir received the Blackbird Award, an Icelandic crime-writing prize, for her first novel, Dead Sweet in 2020. Her debut novel was reviewed well by critics and hit the best-selling lists in the first weeks after publication. Katrí n has a political background and was a member of Parliament from 2003 until 2016. Before she was elected to Parliament, Katrí n was an advisor and project manager at a tech company and a senior buyer and CEO in the retail sector, as well as the Managing Director of a student union during her uni years. She worked from a young age in the fishing industry, as a store clerk and took nighttime shifts at a pizza place. She studied Anthropology and has an MBA from Reykjaví k University. She was raised in Kó pavogur, about 15 minutes' drive from downtown Reykjaví k. She now lives in the neighbouring town of Garð abæ r with her family. She is married to author Bjarni M. Bjarnason, who encouraged her to start writing. They have four boys. 

About the translator

Quentin Bates escaped English suburbia as a teenager, jumping at the chance of a gap year working in Iceland. For a variety of reasons, the gap year stretched to become a gap decade, during which time he went native in the north of Iceland, acquiring a new language a new profession as a seaman and a family, before decamping en masse for England. He worked as a truck driver, teacher, netmaker and trawlerman at various times before falling into journalism, largely by accident. He is the author of a series of crime novels set in present-day Iceland (Frozen Out, Cold Steal, Chilled to the Bone, Winterlude, Cold Comfort and Thin Ice which have been published worldwide. He has translated all of Ragnar Jó nasson’ s Dark Iceland series.

Review: THE BOOKSHOP MYSTERIES, A BITTER PILL, S.A. Reeves

• 
  This edition read as an e-book on Kindle (Amazon)
  
• ASIN ‏ : ‎ B0D9W3VBGG
• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Stephen Haunts Ltd, Publication date ‏ : ‎ September 19, 2024
• Print length ‏ : ‎ 306 pages
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1068720925
•  Book 1 of 4: The Bookshop Mysteries
  
  ★★★★★
  WINNER of the 2024 Firebird Book Awards in the Cozy Mystery Category
  WINNER for the Literary Titan Book Awards
  GOLD WINNER for the Global Book Awards (Women's Crime Fiction)
  FINALIST for the Reader Choice Awards for Best Adult Book
  SHORT LIST nomination for the Murder and Mayhem 2024 Awards
  ★★★★★ 

Synopsis (Amazon)

When a book signing turns deadly, two bookshop owners turn detectives.

Gemma loves the quiet life of her bookshop, the Bookworm—a haven for book lovers in a quaint town in the heart of Derbyshire. But everything changes when Gemma discovers the body of local author Dominic Westley during the shop’s latest book signing event.

When the police rule the death as an accidental overdose, Dominic’s estranged widow points the finger at one of his past lovers. Gemma and her trusty assistant, Mavis, won’t rest until they uncover the truth. Was it an accidental overdose or something more sinister?

Fans of cozy mysteries will delight in The Bookshop Mysteries - A Bitter Pill, a charming and suspenseful read that will keep you guessing until the very end. If you enjoyed books like The Thursday Murder Club or The Missing Maid, then this is the perfect book for you to curl up with.

My Take

A new cozy series to read on my Kindle: featuring two ladies who work in a bookshop. A local author who appears to be a rising star is invited to give a presentation at  the bookshop to an avid group of readers, and then collapses and dies in the middle of his presentation. A couple of likeable sleuths, and a variety of plausible characters. At times the scenario felt a bit "soft", but in general it was credible and all the loose ends were tied off. I'll be reading another. 

My rating: 4.4

About the author
S. A. Reeves is the pen name of a husband and wife writing duo, who have been married for over twenty years. They are based near the Peak District in Derbyshire (United Kingdom).

They both like to read and watch murder mysteries, and will frequently stand in front of a whiteboard, plotting the perfect murder—for creative Fiction purposes, of course.

Review: THE PREY, Yrsa Sigurdadottir

• 
  this edition supplied by my local library
  
• published by Hodder & Stoughton 2023
• translated from Icelandic by Victoria Cribb
• ISBN 978-1-529-37743-9
• 341 pages

Synopsis (publisher)

THE FIRST PHONE CALL SHOCKS A FAMILY

A box of photo albums is found in the attic of a house in Hofn, a small fishing village on the south coast of Iceland. The new owners return it to the man who sold them the house, along with a muddied child's shoe with a name written on the sole: Salvor. The man is baffled; they never knew anyone called that. Shortly after the phone rings - it's the nursing home where his mother, an Alzheimer's patient, lives. She's suffered a heart attack and the doctors don't expect her to live much longer. The nurse asks him to let his sister, Salvor, know as well. Their mother has been asking for her.

THE SECOND TRACKS TWO MISSING COUPLES

Johanna is a member of a search and rescue team in Hofn and she's searching for two couples from Reykjavik. Their phones' last location has been pinpointed as the road leading up into the highlands. It's far from clear why these people would have made such a risky trip in the middle of the harsh winter, and they soon find the first dead body. More troubling, Johanna senses her team is being tracked out in the snow.

A THIRD FROM BEYOND THE GRAVE?

Hjorvar works at the Stokksnes Radar Station in the highlands. He is alone when the phone connected to the gate rings. It's the first time it's done so since he began working there five months ago. He picks up the phone but can hear only interference and what sounds like a child's voice asking for her mother.

How are these events connected? And what may be searching for its prey out on the ice? 

My Take

It is some time since I last read a book by this author but I have recommended her as one of the authors my U3A crime fiction reading group will discuss this year.

I had forgotten how well she writes and how complex her plots can be.

This one is no exception. It is a stand-alone which is structured as three separate stories and the connections between them don't immediately emerge. In fact, the reader is not told the total story until the final chapters, and even at the end, you have the feeling that there is still another element that may rise up in the future. 

My rating: 4.9

I've also read

• 4.8, SOMEONE TO WATCH OVER ME
• 5.0, THE SILENCE OF THE SEA 
• 4.8, WHY DID YOU LIE? 

Review: THE GIRL WHO WAS TAKEN, Charlie Donlea

• 
  This edition made available as an e-book on Libby by my local library
  
• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Kensington
• Publication date ‏ : ‎ April 25, 2017
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• Print length ‏ : ‎ 352 pages
• ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1496701003
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1496701008 

Synopsis (publisher)

Charlie Donlea, one of the most original new voices in suspense, returns with a haunting novel, laden with twists and high tension, about two abducted girls—one who returns, one who doesn’t—and the forensics expert searching for answers.

Nicole Cutty and Megan McDonald are both high school seniors in the small town of Emerson Bay, North Carolina. When they disappear from a beach party one warm summer night, police launch a massive search. No clues are found, and hope is almost lost until Megan miraculously surfaces after escaping from a bunker deep in the woods.

A year later, the bestselling account of her ordeal has turned Megan from local hero to national celebrity. It’s a triumphant, inspiring story, except for one inconvenient detail: Nicole is still missing. Nicole’s older sister Livia, a fellow in forensic pathology, expects that one day soon Nicole’s body will be found, and it will be up to someone like Livia to analyze the evidence and finally determine her sister’s fate. Instead, the first clue to Nicole’s disappearance comes from another body that shows up in Livia’s morgue—that of a young man connected to Nicole’s past. Livia reaches out to Megan for help, hoping to learn more about the night the two were taken. Other girls have gone missing too, and Livia is increasingly certain the cases are connected.

But Megan knows more than she revealed in her blockbuster book. Flashes of memory are coming together, pointing to something darker and more monstrous than her chilling memoir describes. And the deeper she and Livia dig, the more they realize that sometimes true terror lies in finding exactly what you’ve been looking for.   

 My Take

 A very noir two-stranded story - one strand dealing with girls who have disappeared, some of whom  have returned, and the other strand about what is involved in the training of a pathologist. Livia Cutty, pathologist in training, has won an exacting fellowship. In a year she will perform at least 250 autopsies, and every day she is expecting that the body on her slab could end up being her missing sister Nicole.

The final solution comes out of left field. A very gripping read. 

My rating: 4.6 

I have also read 4.6, THE WOMAN IN DARKNESS

Review: THE MYSTERY OF THE BLUE TRAIN, Agatha Christie

• 
  This edition read as an e-book on my Kindle (Amazon)
  
• ASIN ‏ : ‎ B0FBWL1762
• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Zenith Horizon Publishing, 2025
• Originally published 1928
• Print length ‏ : ‎ 307 pages
• Book 6 of 38: Hercule Poirot  

Synopsis  (Amazon)

A glamorous train. A priceless jewel. A shocking murder.
All aboard for a deadly ride on The Mystery of the Blue Train, one of Agatha Christie's most thrilling Hercule Poirot mysteries!

When the luxurious Blue Train departs Paris for the Riviera, it carries a dazzling heiress—and a priceless ruby. But when she's found murdered in her compartment, it's up to the legendary Belgian detective Hercule Poirot to solve a mystery filled with secrets, suspicion, and style.

This gripping novel delivers Christie's signature twists and turns, set against the backdrop of high society, stolen gems, and cold-blooded crime.

My Take

One of the books I am re-reading for discussion with my U3A Agatha Christie reading group. It is a book that I have read a number of time before and have reviewed on this blog here and here 

Here are some of the points I'd like to cover in our discussion (I'm sure the group will raise others):

• The novel has two major events: the theft of a ruby and the death of its owner while they are on The Blue Train which is taking holiday makers to the French Riviera. It reveals glimpses of the French underworld, a description of the lifestyle of the well to do in post-war Europe, and the plot is characterised by a lot of misdirection and red herrings. Poirot has some doubt that theft and the murder are done by the same person. 
• This novel is set in the late 1920s and there are comments about the social structure, with a sense of a declining aristocracy, but still no understanding, by those who consider themselves aristocracy, of the lower classes. We might also consider what Katherine Grey, recently the beneficiary of an elderly woman's will, and on her way to Nice to stay with her relative Lady Tamplin, is trying to do.
• the introduction of characters who will re-appear in later books. e.g. Mr Goby, reference to Inspector Japp, and first appearance of the valet George, whom Poirot uses as a sounding board, a position that had been occupied by Hastings in earlier novels.
• The author's  decision to do without a narrator
• the nature of Ruth Kettering's father  
• Christie claimed that this was one of the books she liked least, however the critics did not agree with her.
• The fact that originally the wrong man goes to jail. i.e. Poirot initially gets it wrong
• Poirot's relationship Katherine Grey and her relationship with other male characters 
• the introduction of St Mary Mead

My rating: 4.5

You can find all my reviews of Agatha Christie novels here.