WHERE COYOTES HOWL by Sandra Dallas

 

My thoughts

After reading LITTLE SOULS last year I was very excited about reading this book. It is both good and bad. Good in that it will definitely make you feel lots of deep emotions. Bad in that there is a bit too much devastation happening. Also I did not like the very end. To me it was just too much. I don't believe it would have happened. Thus I did find that part unbelievable and it lost a star for that. 

When Ellen comes to Wallace, Wyoming to be the new school teacher little does she know that her life is about to take a huge turn. Partly for good and a little not so good. She meets Charlie and they instantly fall in love. They don't really do a lot of courting but they do go on horse rides and to visit people. They go to the school picnic and after that they do seem to spend a lot of time together. They get married and live in a small shack that he built for them. Ellen becomes friends with several of the local ladies and her best friend turns out to be a prostitute turned wife who is very likable and pretty down to earth. Then the tragedies start. 

Life on the plains of Wyoming are hard. Winters so cold that you can't go outside without possibly freezing. Summer so hot you can barely stand it. There are some very mean men that live in Wallace also. Mean to their wives. Treat them as if they are nothing. Ellen's friend Ruth is one. I really liked Ruth very much. I kept thinking she should leave the monster but you do understand why she can't. Where would she go and how would she get there. Then you meet Julia who's husband kept her pregnant all the time with no time to even heal between babies. There was a lot of death during this time. A lot of children who died. It's quite heartbreaking to read. The life of a woman during this time is almost unbearable. Some survive and others just don't. Some actually lost their minds it was so bad. Seems the men faired pretty good which I found unbelievable in parts. I know men are tougher but it's still a hard life. 

This book is very well written and some of the characters are likable. Some are not. There are two men you would detest deeply. At least one woman you will root for to survive. As for the big love story between the main two characters.. I have no doubt they loved each other deeply but there was just nothing written to indicate that their love was any deeper or stronger than, say, the Gurleys. Yes they did love each other and other characters constantly reminded Ellen how much Charlie basically worshipped her but I didn't see it as any stronger than other couples. It could have been written in I think. I'm not saying this book is not excellent because it is. It's very good. You'll want Ellen and Charlie to be the loving couple that you read about. Deeply in love. I suppose it could be a given without writing all the mushy parts. They did love each other deeply but they were also very typical. Charlie did love Ellen and helped her in many ways. But she did him also. 

The two characters that I really liked were Hattie and Miss Ferguson. Miss Ferguson's story was good. It was sad but she was a tough woman and survived. 

This is a very heartbreaking story with a lot of loss. It might should have a trigger warning about all the children who die but alas back then it happened so often. It's a sad story but also has some happy things in it too. It's told by one of the characters and in the epilogue you'll find out which. I did guess who right before I got there. It had to be that one... Again, I didn't like the very ending. To me it was just not right. It didn't fit. 

Thank you #NetGalley, #SandraDallas, #StMartinsPress for this ARC. This is my own true thoughts about this book.

Four stars and I recommend it. It's very good and very well written. I just didn't like the end....

Synopsis

Beautifully rendered, Where Coyotes Howl is a vivid and deeply affecting ode to the early twentieth century West, from master storyteller Sandra Dallas.

Except for the way they loved each other, they were just ordinary, everyday folks. Just ordinary.

1916. The two-street town of Wallace is not exactly what Ellen Webster had in mind when she accepted a teaching position in Wyoming, but within a year’s time she’s fallen in love—both with the High Plains and with a handsome cowboy named Charlie Bacon. Life is not easy in the flat, brown corner of the state where winter blizzards are unforgiving and the summer heat relentless. But Ellen and Charlie face it all together, their relationship growing stronger with each shared success, and each deeply felt tragedy.

Ellen finds purpose in her work as a rancher’s wife and in her bonds with other women settled on the prairie. Not all of them are so lucky as to have loving husbands, not all came to Wallace willingly, and not all of them can survive the cruel seasons. But they look out for each other, share their secrets, and help one another in times of need. And the needs are great and constant. The only city to speak of, Cheyenne, is miles away, making it akin to the Wild West in rural Wallace. In the end, it is not the trials Ellen and Charlie face together that make them remarkable, but their love for one another that endures through it all.

TELL ME LIES by Teresa Driscoll

 

My Thoughts

This is a first for me. The first Teresa Driscoll book that is. I will definitely be looking for more of this author's work. This book was very good.

Two couples. Four good friends. What can go wrong? When one of them does the unthinkable. One spouse cheats on the other. Can things ever be the same again. What happens to friendships in this case. When one spouse cheats...

This is the story of two couples. Each has their problems. Each has a small child. Hannah and Sam have a daughter, Lily. They seem to be so happy and content with their life. Then everything falls apart. Sam has cheated on Hannah. Can she ever forgive him? Should she? 

Amy and Adam are married and have a small son. Amy and Hannah met at a swimming pool where their children are getting swimming lessons. Neither want their child to be afraid of water. Amy and Hannah become very good friends. The best of friends. Soon the two couples are doing things together. They are friends.... 

Something is not as it seems. Someone is not as they appear. Hannah and Sam go to Owl Cottage where they hope to be able to fix their broken marriage. They have their daughter Lily with them and seem to be doing ok. Then things start happening. Things that Sam seems to be shrugging off. Making light of. Hannah has already had a terrible experience in her life. When she lost her dad on a picnic when she was just a child. She's never really come to terms with that loss. 

This book is a good thriller that will keep you on the edge in places. Wondering what will happen next. Wondering who is doing things and who can you trust. Or more accurately who can Hannah trust. Seems like her husband has a few secrets. Her best friend Amy is not totally trust worthy and even Adam is hiding something. Who do you trust? Who can you trust. A neighbor who may have been murdered. Owlets that are turning up dead on the inside of the cottage. Knocks at the door and no one is ever there. What is going on? A mystery and a thriller. A book that has a lot going on but it's fairly easy to follow. 

Told from a few different people's perspectives and the before and after this book will keep you turning the pages. Keep you guessing. I did guess one part but to me it was a bit obvious. But the rest I didn't see coming...

Thank you #NetGalley, #TeresaDriscoll, #AmazonPublishingUK, #Thomas&Mercer for this ARC. This is my own true thoughts about this book.

Five stars and worth each of them. I do highly recommend this book.

Synopsis

From bestselling author Teresa Driscoll comes a chilling thriller of past secrets and present terror. Deep in a rural hideaway, it’s only the owls watching them…right?

After a betrayal that sent their marriage into freefall, Hannah and Sam are desperate for a fresh start with their eight-year-old daughter Lily—and where better than picture-perfect Owl Cottage in beautiful Cornwall. But something about the holiday home stirs dark memories for Hannah…

When she finds dead creatures on the doorstep and hears mysterious knocks at the door, Hannah can’t help wondering whether someone is messing with her—or whether the past she’s been running from has finally claimed her sanity.

As the disturbing events at Owl Cottage seep out into the local community and the police become involved, Hannah turns to Sam for help, but when he dismisses her worries, she wonders if she was wrong to ever trust him. Are the memories making her paranoid, or is this something more sinister than she dares imagine?

Mailbox Monday

Mailbox Monday is the gathering place for readers to share the books that came into their house last week.

Warning: Mailbox Monday can lead to envy, toppling TBR piles, and humongous wish lists!!

Mailbox Monday, created by Marcia @ A Girl and Her Books, has a permanent home now at Mailbox Monday.

 ************

Here’s a shout out to the administrators:
Emma @ Words And peace

Serena @ Savvy Verse And Wit
Martha @ Reviews By Martha's Bookshelf 

************

                THANKS to everyone for keeping Mailbox Monday alive.

1: LIE BY THE POOL by Susan Walter

     Courtesy of Publisher via NetGalley

A desperate woman. An irresistible invitation. An escalating nightmare of secrets, lies, and murder.

Bree’s new home is luxurious and private, with a fancy Beverly Hills address. What a shame it’s not hers. Widowed, penniless, living in her car, and out of options, she’s climbed the fence and crashed in the pool house. All she wants is a good night’s sleep. But when Sophie, the absentee owner, finds her, she gets a whole lot more.

Sophie invites Bree back for a party. When it winds down, Bree can’t resist sneaking upstairs to sleep in a real bed. But the next morning, she wakes to find Sophie’s dead body floating in the pool. As the resident vagabond, she’s both the only witness and the prime murder suspect.

Bree knows she shouldn’t run, but her husband’s death was mysterious, too. If she’s going to clear her name, she’s going to have to work fast. Because the killer is still out there, and she’s next.

2: THE OTHER YEAR by Rea Frey 

   Courtesy of Publisher via NetGalley

Can the entire course of a life be traced back to a single moment?

On a coveted two-week beach vacation, working mom Kate Baker’s nine-year-old daughter, Olivia, vanishes suddenly among the waves—a heart-dropping incident that threatens to uproot her entire reality. But in the next moment, Olivia resurfaces, joyously splashing.

What would I do if she didn’t come up? Kate wonders. How would I live without her?

In another set of circumstances that hold a different fate, Kate doesn’t have to wonder. Because in that “other” world, in the pulse-pounding seconds after Olivia goes under, she doesn’t come back up.

Told in parallel timelines, Kate begins to live two lives—one in which Olivia resurfaces and one in which she doesn’t. In the reality that follows her daughter’s death, she maneuvers through every mother’s worst nightmare, facing grief, rage, and the question of purpose in the aftermath of such profound loss. She endures, day by day, in a world without her daughter.

In her alternate timeline, while she explores a tremulous romance with her best friend, Jason, she finds herself grappling with the ex-husband who abandoned Kate and Olivia years prior. Even as Kate scrambles to hold her daughter close, Olivia pulls further away. The line between joy and loss seems to get thinner with each passing day.

Woven into a single story, both Kates discover a breathtaking fragility and resilience in their respective journeys. Bringing to light the drastic polarities dire circumstances often create, The Other Year explores truths about love, loss, and the sharp turns any life can take in the blink of an eye.

3: DREAMING OF WATER by A. J. Banner

    Courtesy of Publisher via NetGalley

A woman’s investigation into her past reveals family secrets and lies in this novel of discovery, redemption, and the mutability of memory by the bestselling author of The Good Neighbor and In Another Light.

Astrid Johansen swore she would never return to Heron Bay, Washington. In that idyllic coastal town, her little sister, Nina, drowned in a reflecting pool under Astrid’s watch seventeen years ago. Though guilt has kept her away, Astrid can’t ignore her aunt Maude’s urgent plea to come back. Maude claims to have found a letter that will change everything about the past.

When Astrid arrives in Heron Bay, she finds Maude unconscious, perhaps the victim of an attack. As Maude lingers in a coma, Astrid uncovers alarming evidence that Nina’s drowning that tragic night was no accident. But in a town rife with secrets, and in a family still fractured by grief, who knows the truth?

Astrid’s investigation leads her down a trail of dark memories, lies, and betrayals that will shatter her perception of everyone she thought she knew—even herself.

BOOK MAIL

I had to have this book. It's cover is so gorgeous and I love this author's books.

ONLY THE BEAUTIFUL by Susan Meissner

A heartrending story about a young mother’s fight to keep her daughter, and the winds of fortune that tear them apart by the New York Times bestselling author of The Nature of Fragile Things and The Last Year of the War.

California, 1938—When she loses her parents in an accident, sixteen-year-old Rosanne is taken in by the owners of the vineyard where she has lived her whole life as the vinedresser’s daughter. She moves into Celine and Truman Calvert’s spacious house with a secret, however—Rosie sees colors when she hears sound. She promised her mother she’d never reveal her little-understood ability to anyone, but the weight of her isolation and grief prove too much for her. Driven by her loneliness she not only breaks the vow to her mother, but in a desperate moment lets down her guard and ends up pregnant. Banished by the Calverts, Rosanne believes she is bound for a home for unwed mothers, and having lost her family she treasures her pregnancy as the chance for a future one. But she soon finds out she is not going to a home of any kind, but to a place far worse than anything she could have imagined.

Austria, 1947—After witnessing firsthand Adolf Hitler’s brutal pursuit of hereditary purity—especially with regard to “different children”—Helen Calvert, Truman's sister, is ready to return to America for good. But when she arrives at her brother’s peaceful vineyard after decades working abroad, she is shocked to learn what really happened nine years earlier to the vinedresser’s daughter, a girl whom Helen had long ago befriended. In her determination to find Rosanne, Helen discovers that while the war had been won in Europe, there are still terrifying battles to be fought at home.

ONLY THE BEAUTIFUL by Susan Meissner

 

MY THOUGHTS

I read my first Susan Meissner book several years ago and was hooked. I'll read any that she writes now and have a few to get too. I do so look forward to each one. My journey started with A FALL OF MARIGOLDS. It was the best book I read that year. I also read THE LAST YEAR OF THE WAR and THE NATURE OF FRAGILE THINGS. Each of these books were excellent. I devoured them. Ms Meissner is one of my very favorite authors. I'll read her books without reading the synopsis of the book. 

This book is the best one yet. I actually believe it's my all time favorite book. In the Historical genre I know it is. It was that good. The cover is gorgeous and from start to finish this book pulled me in and would not let go. I did a lot of ugly crying while reading it. I promise you it is worth reading. Worth all the tears. All the heartbreak. It's just that good honestly. 

This book is in two parts. The first part is Rosanne's story. It goes between before and after what happened. The year is 1938 and Rosie has lost her entire family. They were killed and she's left an orphan. At only sixteen she is alone and afraid. They had lived on the Calvert's vineyard Rosies entire life and that was all she knew. The Calvert's took her in as a kind of foster child but Celine Calvert made Rosie the maid. She was to work for them and she didn't mind. She is a good child and a very hard worker. Rosie has what I would call a gift. She sees colors when she hears sounds. They seem to fit what she is hearing and most are beautiful. She's doing great until something horrible happens and Celine sends her away to a mental hospital. Rosie is pregnant, seventeen, and alone. She's an orphan and scared. What happens to her at this place is horrendous. What makes it even worse is that it really happened back then and could possibly be happening still in some parts. Right here in the good old United States of America. 

 

Rosie's story is told before she's sent away and after. Before tells all she did and went through. All the ones she trusted with her whole heart. The things that lead up to what happened to her to cause her to be sent away. Then you read the after. Each chapter goes between those two things. You learn so much about what she endured. The sadness she goes through. Her life and how it's ultimately upended. How one persons horrible actions can change the life of one young girl. Rosie does not catch a break. You heart will break for her. Over and over again.

Then you meet Helen and get to know her. Helen is overseas working as a nanny. She's done quite a it of traveling and loves her life. Until she faces tragedy also. She loves her work and the family she is working for. When the war breaks out and things start getting very bad Helen's brother Truman wants her to come back home to the US but she refuses. She doesn't want to leave. The Nazis start taking children with disabilities from their homes and putting them into institutions. They are not treated well either. Helen's youngest charge is sent and she blames herself. When tragedy strikes this family Helen has to move on. 

Helen's story is told from two time lines also. The before and the after.

Helen starts working with others to help take children out of the Nazi territories where they will be safe. She is in Switzerland and has some help there. Over a course of time she saves several children from being murder by the German's just because they have a disability. Just because they may have to rely on someone the rest of their lives. How dare they. Who gives anyone the right to say that someone is a burden and needs to be put out of their misery. That is sick. Horrible. And the sad part is it could happen again. Never think we are all safe from these things. It happened before and it can happen again. 

This story talks about the sterilization of people. Taking away their rights to have children. Doctors playing god if you will. Who has that right. How dare they. Who did they think they were to decide who should or should not have children. Who should live or die. What children should have been murdered because they were not "perfect." 

From the very beginning of this story you will get to know two people. Rosanne and Helen. This is their story. What they went through. What they did to survive both physically and mentally. The good and the bad. 

December 1957 was a good year. Not only was it the year I was born but it was the year the Epilogue of this story is set in. I loved this ending. Yes it made me weep. It made me have so many emotions. It made me cringe in parts. Expecting everything to end up happy and all to be together finally. It gave me goosebumps. It was just perfect in my opinion. 

Never be afraid to read a book by Susan Meissner. She tells a story like you wouldn't believe. Pulls you in and captures your heart. You'll have many emotions and so far all happy endings. 

Burning Secret by R. J. Lloyd

Blurb

In 1844 Enoch Price was born into poverty. An ambitious youth, he becomes a bare-knuckle fighter amongst London’s underworld. In debt to a violent and unscrupulous moneylender and facing ruin and imprisonment, he escapes to Jacksonville, Florida, abandoning his wife and three young daughters, a decision that will haunt him for the rest of his life. By the time he arrives in Florida, Enoch Price has become Harry Mason.

Through a series of thrilling and risky escapades, he plays an important role in the development and history of Jacksonville, building an extraordinary new life of political and financial notoriety, the shooting of a rival, and the concealment of a murder. Despite imploring his wife to join him, she declines, exhausted by his lies. Tormented by loneliness and guilt, Harry seeks solace through a bigamous marriage, leading him into a web of deceit as he tries to conceal his true identity and past.

Meanwhile, lauded and enjoying popular success, Harry is elected in 1903 to the Florida State House of Representatives with the prospect of becoming State Governor. He advances his business interests through a series of corrupt practices, becoming a wealthy and successful politician. However, success brings neither happiness nor contentment, and, seeking redemption, Harry plans to return home – but life is rarely that simple as the First World War breaks out, the Spanish flu pandemic takes its toll, and the American government introduces prohibition.

Will there be a good end for Harry, or will his secrets prove to be the death of him?

Excerpt 1 Burning Secret

Like the word of the Almighty, the command thundered down, echoing off the high-domed ceiling which dominated proceedings.

‘The defendant will stand. State your name, age and business.’

The court’s commotion died away. A man in his late thirties, of above-average height and stocky build, shuffled to his feet. He hadn’t shaved in several days, and his heavy, dark moustache was unkempt. He looked drawn and tired, yet his hazel-green eyes were alert and intelligent. Stepping forward, he took hold of the wide brass railing surrounding the dock, revealing the size and strength of his hands. He cleared his throat. ‘Enoch Thomas Price. Born Bristol 1844. Manufacturer of corset stays and…’ His voice faded, weakening to a dry whisper.

‘Is it Mr Rosenthal who represents you in your case of bankruptcy?’ asked the court clerk, one hand cupped behind an ear in exaggerated theatrical condescension. ‘Well, sir, speak up.’

Price nodded. His lips parted to form words, but none came. The judge impatiently waved him to be seated.

In black gown and stockings, the prosecutor, with the appearance of a crow in search of carrion, pointed an accusatory finger. ‘You, sir, are nothing more than a scoundrel. A common cheat, conducting your nefarious business in broad daylight, and you do so as proud as any peacock. Am I wrong, sir? No, sir, I am not.’

Price, shaken by the condemnation, looked to the floor. His public humiliation was not yet complete, and the loss of his liberty seemed assured.

I'm the great-great-grandson of Enoch Price, the main character in the historical fiction, Burning Secret.

After retiring as a senior police officer, I turned my detective skills to genealogy, tracing my family history to the 16th century. However, after 15 years of extensive research, I couldn’t track down my great-great-grandfather, Enoch Price, whose wife, Eliza, had, in living memory, helped raise my mother.

It was my cousin Gillian who, after several more dead-ends, called one day to say that she had found him through a fluke encounter. Susan Sperry from California, who had recently retired, decided to explore the box of documents given to her thirty years before by her mother, which she had never opened. In the box, she found some references to her great grandfather, Harry Mason, a wealthy hotel owner from Florida who had died in 1919. It soon transpired that Susan’s great grandfather, Harry Mason, was, in fact, Enoch Price. From this single thread, the extraordinary story of Harry Mason began to unravel, leading me to visit the States to meet my American cousins, and it was Susan Sperry and Kimberly Mason, direct descendants, who persuaded me to write Burning Secret - where fact and fiction become a compelling tale.

I graduated from Warwick with a joint in Philosophy and Psychology and a Masters in Marketing from UWE. Since leaving a thirty-year career in policing, I’ve been a non-executive director with the NHS, social housing, and other charities. I live with my wife in Bristol, spending my time travelling, writing and producing delicious plum jam from the trees on my award-winning allotment.Follow the Tour

UNDERNEATH THE FIREFLIES by Marianne Scott

 

Book Details:

​Book Title:  Underneath the Fireflies by Marianne Scott
Category:  Adult Fiction (18+),  496 pages
Genre: Murder Mystery / Thriller
Publisher: Crowe Creations
Release date:  January 2023
Content Rating:  PG-13 - Colloquial expressions in dialogue.

Book Description:

No matter where Grace Walker goes, her extra sensory power goes with her. She's an empath and she sees things -- terrible things. After a tragic accident at the place where she works, she decides to take a mental-health break on a remote West Coast island. But she no sooner gets to Galliano Island when a vision of the murder of an Indigenous woman draws her into a disturbing and threatening dilemma.

BUY THE BOOK:
Amazon.ca ~ Amazon.com
​add to goodreads

Also Available for Your Reading Pleasure!

Book Details:

​Book Title:  Underneath the Fireflies by Marianne Scott
Category:  Adult Fiction (18+),  224 pages
Genre: Mystery / Thriller
Publisher: Crowe Creations
Release date:  October 2022
Content Rating:  PG-13 - mild profanity as in street dialogue

Book Description:

He's a Cold War spy hiding from one of his own. His real identity is tied to a treacherous past associated with American intelligence operations closed down after the end of the Cold War, and his enemy is relentless. All he has to do is change his name. Right? Wrong. Very wrong. Felix has eyes and ears everywhere.

BUY THE BOOK:
Amazon.ca ~ Amazon.com
add to goodreads

Meet the Author:

Marianne Scott is the Canadian author of four mystery thrillers and is currently working on her fifth novel, a sci-fi/thriller. She has a BA and a Diploma in Business Administration from Wilfrid Laurier University. She studied creative writing through Conestoga College and Humber College. She enjoys writing workshops such as those offered by Brian Henry, publisher of blog, Quick Brown Fox and One Lit Place, a writers’ hub by creator/editor Jenna Kalinsky. She has an author’s website and blog. She is a full-time writer who lives in the historic small Canadian village of Hespeler Ontario (now amalgamated with the city of Cambridge).  

connect with the author: website ~ twitter ~ twitter ~ facebook ~ instagram ~ goodreads

Enter the Giveaway:

UNDERNEATH THE FIREFLIES Book Tour Giveaway

 

Mailbox Monday

Mailbox Monday is the gathering place for readers to share the books that came into their house last week.

Warning: Mailbox Monday can lead to envy, toppling TBR piles, and humongous wish lists!!

Mailbox Monday, created by Marcia @ A Girl and Her Books, has a permanent home now at Mailbox Monday.

 ************

Here’s a shout out to the administrators:
Emma @ Words And peace

Serena @ Savvy Verse And Wit
Martha @ Reviews By Martha's Bookshelf 

************

                THANKS to everyone for keeping Mailbox Monday alive.

1: DEAD MAN'S WAKE by Paul Doiron

    Courtesy of Publisher via NetGalley

Game Warden Mike Bowditch's engagement party is interrupted by the discovery of a gruesome double murder in Dead Man's Wake, a new thriller from Edgar Award-winning author Paul Doiron.

On the evening of their engagement party, Maine Game Warden Investigator Mike Bowditch and Stacey Stevens witness what seems to be a hit-and-run speedboat crash on a darkened lake. When they arrive at the scene, their spotlight reveals a gruesome sight: a severed arm beneath the surface. As day breaks, the warden dive team recovers not one but two naked corpses: the dismembered man and the married woman with whom he was having an affair. Mike begins to suspect the swimmers' deaths were not a senseless accident but a coldly calculated murder. Alone among his fellow officers, Mike begins to sense the involvement of a trained professional, smarter and more dangerous than any enemy he has faced. As Mike and Stacey get closer to identifying the killer, their own lives are suddenly put on the line, leading to a confrontation designed to silence them forever.

2: WHEN I'M DEAD by Hannah Morrissey

    Courtesy of Publisher via NetGalley

One girl murdered. Another one missing. And a medical examiner desperate to uncover the truth in the latest Black Harbor mystery by acclaimed author Hannah Morrissey.

On a bone-chilling October night, Medical Examiner Rowan Winthorp investigates the death of her daughter’s best friend. Hours later, the tragedy hits even closer to home when she makes a devastating discovery—her daughter, Chloe, is gone. But, not without a trace.

A morbid mosaic of clues forces Rowan and her husband to question how deeply they really knew their daughter. As they work closely to peel back the layers of this case, they begin to unearth disturbing details about Chloe and her secret transgressions…details that threaten to tear them apart.

Amidst the noise of navigating her newfound grief and reconciling the sins of her past, an undeniable fact rings true for Rowan: karma has finally come to collect.

3: A KILLER IN THE FAMILY by Gytha Lodge

    Courtesy of Publisher via NetGalley

A woman uploads her DNA online, searching for her father--but the man who contacts her is Detective Chief Inspector Jonah Sheens. From the acclaimed author of Little Sister, this endlessly twisty crime novel asks: What might a family do to protect or expose a serial killer in its midst?

When the police found the first body, left on a bonfire in the fields, they worried it had the hallmarks of a serial killer.

Now, as they find the second, they know for sure.

Panic about the "bonfire killer" quickly spreads through the sedate, suburban area of Southampton. Women are urged not to travel alone at night, and constant vigilance is encouraged among the local residents. But single mom Aisling Cooley has a lot to distract her: two beloved teenage sons and a quest to find her long-lost father, whom she hasn't seen since she was a teenager growing up in Ireland.

After much debate she decides to upload her DNA to an ancestry website, and when she gets a match she is filled with an anxious excitement, that her questions about her father's disappearance from her life might finally be answered.

But to her horror, it's not her father who's found her. It's a detective.

And they say her DNA is a close match for the bonfire killer...

4: MY WORD AGAINST HIS by Lauren North

    Courtesy of Publisher via NetGalley

‘It’s me,’ says the voice on the other end of the line. It’s been thirteen years and I still recognise it. Thirteen years of nothing. Silence. Not even a birthday card. ‘It’s time for you to tell the truth. It’s life or death.’

Three hours later, car tyres screech and the air bags release. For a second, nothing happens. There’s only stunned silence and a ringing in my ears.

I peel open my eyes. What have I done? There’s a groan, and I gasp, terrified, at the sight of the man next to me. This is all his fault.

Fumbling with the door, I half step, half fall into the freezing cold air. I’m shivering all over as my knees land on the tarmac. ‘Help,’ I whisper into the dark, empty street.

Then there’s a flash of blue light. A siren. The police are coming. They will save me, and arrest him. They will see a dangerous man and an innocent victim – a loving mother with a son she cherishes.

They have to – because they can’t know the truth. They can’t discover what happened thirteen years ago and what happened tonight. All those years back, the lies nearly destroyed us. I won’t let that happen today.

It’s my word against his. And there’s no line I won’t cross to protect my family.

5: THE TAKEN ONES by Jess Lourey

    Courtesy of Publisher via NetGalley

Two girls vanished. A woman buried alive. Between two crimes—decades of secrets yet to be unearthed in a pulse-pounding novel by the Edgar Award–nominated author of Unspeakable Things.

Summer 1980: With no fear of a local superstition, three girls go into a Minnesota wood. Only one comes out. Dead silent. Memory gone. No trace of her friends. The mystery of the Taken Ones captures the nation.

Summer 2022: Cold case detective Van Reed and forensic scientist Harry Steinbeck are assigned a disturbing homicide—a woman buried alive, clutching a heart charm necklace belonging to one of the vanished girls. Van follows her gut. Harry trusts in facts. Their common ground is the need to catch a killer before he kills again. They have something else in common: each has ties to the original case in ways they’re reluctant to share.

As Van and Harry connect the crimes of the past and the present, Van struggles with memories of her own nightmarish childhood—and the fear that uncovering the truth of the Taken Ones will lead her down a path from which she, too, may never return.

BOOK MAIL THIS WEEK

1: THE HOUSE IS ON FIRE by Rachel Beanland

     I bought this from BOTM

The author of Florence Adler Swims Forever returns with a masterful work of historical fiction about an incendiary tragedy that shocked a young nation and tore apart a community in a single night—told from the perspectives of four people whose actions during the inferno changed the course of history.

Richmond, Virginia 1811. It’s the height of the winter social season. The General Assembly is in session, and many of Virginia’s gentleman planters, along with their wives and children, have made the long and arduous journey to the capital in hopes of whiling away the darkest days of the year. At the city’s only theater, the Charleston-based Placide & Green Company puts on two plays a night to meet the demand of a populace that’s done looking for enlightenment in a church.

On the night after Christmas, the theater is packed with more than six hundred holiday revelers. In the third-floor boxes, sits newly widowed Sally Henry Campbell, who is glad for any opportunity to relive the happy times she shared with her husband. One floor away, in the colored gallery, Cecily Patterson doesn’t give a whit about the play but is grateful for a four-hour reprieve from a life that has recently gone from bad to worse. Backstage, young stagehand Jack Gibson hopes that, if he can impress the theater’s managers, he’ll be offered a permanent job with the company. And on the other side of town, blacksmith Gilbert Hunt dreams of one day being able to bring his wife to the theater, but he’ll have to buy her freedom first.

When the theater goes up in flames in the middle of the performance, Sally, Cecily, Jack, and Gilbert make a series of split-second decisions that will not only affect their own lives but those of countless others. And in the days following the fire, as news of the disaster spreads across the United States, the paths of these four people will become forever intertwined.

Based on the true story of Richmond’s theater fire, The House Is on Fire offers proof that sometimes, in the midst of great tragedy, we are offered our most precious—and fleeting—chances at redemption.