Martin Edwards, as a researcher and reader, knows Golden Age mystery fiction. With Rachel Savernake, he's created a worthy, strong, intriguing central character and given her a setting with arresting details and a solid puzzle to solve. Love how her mysterious past unfolds -- and how she takes all comers.
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I couldn't put it down
Mortmain Hall
By
Martin Edwards,
What is this book about?
A superb Golden Age mystery packed with twists, from the winner of the Diamond Dagger 2020
ENGLAND, 1930. Grieving widows are a familiar sight on London's Necropolis Railway. So when an elegant young woman in a black veil boards the funeral train, nobody guesses her true purpose.
But Rachel Savernake is not one of the mourners. She hopes to save a life - the life of a man who is supposed to be cold in the grave. But then a suspicious death on the railway track spurs her on to investigate a sequence of baffling mysteries: a death in a…
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My
2nd
favorite read in 2024
Swamp Kings
By
Jason Ryan,
❤️ loved
this book because...
The Murdaugh murder case captivated true crime junkies for months. Journalist Jason Ryan, who knows the quirks and characters in coastal South Carolina crime, has provided a fascinating journey into the dynasty that drew international headlines. He knows that "power" in the rural South isn't the same as "power" in gangland Chicago. Here, favor and friendship are valued currency -- something that lots of journalists covering the murder trial and financial shenanigans of Alec Murdaugh missed. If you want to know where the family came from and what coastal South Carolina is really like, this is the book to read.
Loved Most
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Immersion
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Writing
Writing style
❤️
Loved it
Pace
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I couldn't put it down
Swamp Kings
By
Jason Ryan,
What is this book about?
The stranger-than-fiction story of the now-notorious Lowcountry clan, in all its Southern Gothic intensity-by an author with unparalleled access to and knowledge of the players, the history, and the place.
The most famous man in South Carolina lives in prison. He stands convicted of a staggering amount of wrongdoing-more than 100 crimes and counting. Once a high-flying, smooth-talking, pedigreed Southern lawyer, Alex Murdaugh is now disbarred and disgraced. For more than a decade, prosecutors asserted that Alex was secretly a fraud, a thief, a drug trafficker, and an all-around phony. On the night of June 7, 2021, they claimed, he…
This is the 3rd of 4 books (so far) featuring detective Harbinder Kaur. If you love a real puzzle of a mystery, multiple viewpoints with interesting characters, and good writing, start with the first in the series (Stranger Diaries, which won MWA's Edgar Award for Best Novel in 2020) and enjoy your way through this exceptional series. Then give her Ruth Galloway series a try. Her crime novels are on my short list of go-to delights.
Cathy Pickens True Crime Stories of South Carolina Midlands
By
Cathy Pickens,
What is my book about?
Mischief and Mayhem in the Midlands. A thrilling account of dramatic and menacing crimes that shaped the central region of the state. Crimes that captured the attention of residents in the area and statewide over the years from gamblers with too much debt to insurance fraud and a famous cat burglar. A well-known televangelist had a run in with arson, and a murderer made his presence felt all the way in California. This collection of headlining stories features notorious serial killers, families divided, vicious politics and marital strife. Author Cathy Pickens brings her eye for a great story to Columbia and recounts with a novelist's detail the infamous crimes that rocked a region.
