April 13, 2016

2 New Books For Your TBR

Emma Cline’s The Girls

Literary Fiction

Expected publication: June 14, 2016. Find it on Amazon.

After reading Helter Skeleter, I have always been fascinated with Charles Manson so The Girls is one I look forward to reading.

“Northern California, during the violent end of the 1960s. At the start of summer, a lonely and thoughtful teenager, Evie Boyd, sees a group of girls in the park, and is immediately caught by their freedom, their careless dress, their dangerous aura of abandon. Soon, Evie is in thrall to Suzanne, a mesmerizing older girl, and is drawn into the circle of a soon-to-be infamous cult and the man who is its charismatic leader. Hidden in the hills, their sprawling ranch is eerie and run down, but to Evie, it is exotic, thrilling, charged—a place where she feels desperate to be accepted. As she spends more time away from her mother and the rhythms of her daily life, and as her obsession with Suzanne intensifies, Evie does not realize she is coming closer and closer to unthinkable violence, and to that moment in a girl’s life when everything can go horribly wrong.”
(Taken from NetGalley Description)

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Jane Casey’s After the Fire

For fans of Midsomer Murders or readers of police procedurals

Expected publication: May 3, 2016

A modern British whodunit After the Fire is number six in the Maeve Kerrigan series but you do not have to have read the other five in the series first. Essentially, a tenement house is set on fire, the police are called out and an investigation is launched. Among the victims is an MP (member of parliament) with insatiable desires for the wrong side of town style lust, an elderly widow with no familial support, two trafficked women, a child and her family that has a checkered present, and a mother and son living under assumed names, the woman a victim of domestic violence, hiding out from an abusive husband. Unlike the DCI on Midsummer Murders, the team of detectives in After the Fire have their own problems to deal with and have made hash of their own personal lives while meshing into a team that is effective and efficient. Maeve Kerrigan, the protagonist cannot eat due to an ulcer, is being stalked by someone she investigated and I believe arrested, among other problems in her currently and recently unattached life. Josh Derwernt is a charmer of the ladies, an unorthodox detective who higher ups would rather dismiss if he was not so good at collaring criminals, and an advocate of stamping out crimes against women, domestic or otherwise, even if he has to be the one to knock heads around or resort to less than lawful methods. Derwent is essentially a sometimes less than welcome in your face knight in shining armor.