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May 1, 2013

Black Country, Alex Grecian

3 missing, 2 days, 1 eyeball.

In the follow up to The Yard, Day and Hammersmith and Kingsley are sent to Blackhampton, a coal mining town being slowly subsumed by the tunnels that produce its lifeblood.

The area is rife with superstitions, locals who won’t talk, or talk too much, and where are the rest of the villagers?

To complicate matters someone is trailing the men from Scotland Yard, someone hell bent on settling an old score.

The Last Girl, Jane Casey

DC Maeve Kerrigan is part of the team investigating a double murder in one of London’s most luxurious neighbourhoods during a vicious heatwave. The two survivors, a successful barrister and his least favourite daughter don’t seem to want the case solved and who was the real target?

On the personal front Kerrigan’s fledging relationship with colleague Rob is taking a pounding and her chief, the man she has always trusted is behaving very oddly.

The Stranger, Camilla Lackberg

Patrik Hedstrom is getting married but he won’t have time to be nervous. There’s a reality show filming in town and someone just murdered one of the contestants.

Conducting a murder investigation in the glare of national publicity is playing havoc with their other cases, and Patrik has a hunch that the answers to solving the case may have been staring them in the face, all along.

Sacred Games, Gary Corby

It’s Day 1 of the 80th Olympiad and a champion of Sparta lies dead.

Timodemus, his Athenian challenger stands accused of the murder and will be executed in four days time unless his friend Nico can save him.

Nico is appointed to investigate the crime along with his opposite number the Spartan, Markos. Helped by Diotima, his clever priestess girlfriend Nico races to unmask the real killer who may be trying to start a war.

Corby’s third book in this series is engrossing, funny, racy and strewn with the minutiae of daily life in another time.

Seduction, MJ Rose

The Island of Jersey 1853. Victor Hugo, in self-imposed exile, becomes obsessed by the idea of contacting his dead daughter but his séances bring something ancient and evil into his home, something that dangles a terrible bargain before him.

Jersey, present day. Jac L’Etoile is visiting Theo, an old friend that she lost touch with after an incident at the Blixer Rath Institute where both were being treated.

Theo’s offer to show Jac the ancient Celtic sites on the island also hides another obsession, finding Victor Hugo’s missing journals, it will also uncover secrets held by Theo’s family and Jac’s ancestors, some of them deadly.

Conspiracy of Faith, Jussi Adler-Olsen

#3 in the annals of Department Q gives Rose her first case, a message in a bottle. Written in blood it’s a desperate cry for help.

Assad’s stringing together cold arson cases and Carl Morck the brilliant but lazy head of Q feels like he’s herding cats.

Together the dysfunctional team (with assistance from Yrsa), uncover multiple kidnap for ransom schemes, where each time the money is paid and the kidnapper is protected by a conspiracy of faith.

A conspiracy Department Q will have to shatter.

Every Contact Leaves A Trace, Elanor Dymott

“I went into a dark room with my camera for a time and I came out with a photograph of a woman I had never seen before.”

Alex Petersen was studying law at Oxford when he met Rachel, an English major. Their paths don’t cross again until their degrees have turned into careers. Rekindling his love for her, Alex marries Rachel soon afterwards. On a trip back to the same Oxford college Rachel is murdered. Alex has lost her again, but did he really know her?

What can Alex define from Rachel’s old ID cards, library fines, love letters, speeding tickets, blackmail notes…How could he miss what was going on right under his nose? And Alex has his own secrets too.