The Globe and Mail
End of Story, A. J. Finn (HarperCollins, 416 pages) A. J. Finn roared onto the bestseller lists six years ago with The Woman in the Window, which was immediately made into a TV series starring Amy Adams. Finn (the pseudonym for author Dan Mallory, who caused a stir in the publishing industry with wildly inflated tales of his own greatness) disappeared for a few years. He’s now back with an even better, even bigger book.
Brilliant bestselling crime novelist Sebastian Trapp is dying and with months to live, he invites Nicky Hunter, an expert in detective fiction and a pen pal, to move into his San Francisco home and write his life story while he’s able to tell it. For Nicky, it’s the chance of a lifetime.
Thirty years before, Trapp’s first wife and son disappeared and were never seen again. They were in different places and there was nothing to link the disappearances to Trapp. The police investigated thoroughly and without bodies, clues or anything else, the case went cold. While nothing led to Trapp, social media is convinced he did away with them. Nicky quickly discovers that, while Trapp is open to discussion on most aspects of his life, this one is off limits. She begins to learn about it through other members of the household, his second wife, Diana, and his adult daughter, Madeleine. There isn’t an extraneous paragraph in this excellent thriller with carefully constructed characters and a great premise.
Books we're reading and loving this week: Globe staffers and readers share their book picks
Death and Glory, Will Thomas (Minotaur, 304 pages) Call me old-fashioned but I love a good Victorian mystery with detectives chasing clues in hansom cabs. I never outgrew my adoration for the divine Sherlock and, thanks to Benedict Cumberbatch, I never will. Combine all that with a really intriguing plot involving Confederate renegades and I’m hooked.
The story is set, naturally, in London and the year is 1894. The American Civil War is long past when an interesting group of men appears in the offices of detectives Cyrus Barker and Thomas Llewelyn. They profess to be generals of the Confederate States of America, who have been exiled to South and Central America, and they want Barker and Llewelyn to arrange a meeting for them with the prime minister of England. Why? That’s not for Barker to know.
Barker is intrigued enough to call in some favours to get the meeting. When it happens, he’s pulled into service by Her Majesty’s Government, and ordered to continue the relationship with the Confederates. Just what they want and why is the heart of the plot and it’s not as obvious as a cursory read might imply. Will Thomas is a marvelous collector of historical arcana, which bring this tale to life. I read this and raced right out to get Thomas’s earlier novel Heart of the Nile, although I think Death and Glory is better.
The Cuckoo, Camilla Lackberg, translated by Ian Giles (HarperCollins, 432 pages) If you’ve been in a bookless cave for the past several years and haven’t already discovered Camilla Lackberg, often referred to as the queen of Scandi crime, this is the book to begin with. She’s written more than a dozen, 10 of them featuring the husband and wife team of policeman Patrik Hedstrom and true-crime author Erica Falck, and The Cuckoo is absolutely one of, if not the, best.
Told in different voices and in two different times, we begin in the village of Fjallbacka, as renowned photographer Rolf Stenklo is arranging the hanging of a new show of his work. Rolf is a perfectionist and hanging must be precise because this exhibition is special as it’s intended to pay a debt. Just what that is Rolf doesn’t say.
While Rolf is placing his pictures, Elizabeth and Henning Bauer are waiting by the phone. Henning is shortlisted for the Nobel Prize and the call to hear if he’s won should come any day. Meanwhile, they are about to celebrate their 50th wedding anniversary with a lavish party for old friends in the village hotel near their private-island home. Life has been very good to the Bauers but there have been some tragedies in their history. Still, with two sons, two grandsons and a place at the pinnacle of Swedish literary life, they are content.
Slowly, we follow the Bauers and their family and friends toward the party, which Rolf chooses not to attend. The next day, Rolf is dead, murdered in the gallery surrounded by the remnants of his exhibition, still unhung. He had no enemies, everyone assures Patrik, but someone wanted him dead.
The murder of Rolf is followed by a more vicious crime that crashes into the world of the Bauers and their friends. As Patrik searches for clues to the killing, Erica heads for Stockholm to research a murder from decades ago of a figure from Rolf’s past. I found this book completely irresistible and didn’t put it down until the last page.
The Gathering, C.J. Tudor (Ballantine, 360 pages) I read this book hard on the heels of watching the third (and, I think, best) season of True Detective so I had Alaska on the brain. When I realized that the story included vampires, or vanpyrs as they are called here, I almost canned the book. But, I confess, C. J. Tudor’s incredible characters and superb setting had me captivated. I couldn’t believe a writer this good would stoop to tired old horror tropes and I was right. At its heart, this is a superb mystery tale with vampires providing a screen.
The set up is great. Vampires once roamed the Earth but were nearly wiped out by fear and the belief that they killed humans. Now, they are a protected species living on reserves in remote areas. They are still threatened and, depending upon whose version you believe, are either protected killers or a persecuted minority.
Enter detective Barbara Atkins, certified (she has a PhD) vampire authority. A teenaged boy has been killed in Deadhart, Alaska, and the local residents are convinced a member of the nearby vampire community committed murder. The locals are enraged and vigilante justice is on everyone’s mind. It’s soon clear that things in Deadhart are at a dangerous point. Then there’s another death and the evidence is not what the local people want to believe. Will Atkins find the killer and deliver them to justice or will old fears and loathings lead to a bloodbath of the innocent?
Tudor keeps us engaged with clever characterizations and terrific ratiocination. She builds a world and then leads back into the reality of hatred and vengeance. Don’t be put off by the perceived theme. This is a terrific thriller with a real whodunit and a great twist at the end.
Every Time I Go on Vacation, Someone Dies, Catherine Mack (Minotaur, 352 pages) One of the biggest mysteries in this book is who wrote it. The publisher cannily informs us that Catherine Mack is a pseudonym for a bestselling writer. That said, this is a delightful debut under any name.
Eleanor Dash is a bestselling author who knocks off her characters in luxury vacation spots. Her detective solves cases while canoodling with her fellow traveller and charming con artist, Connor Smith. All should be well in this fictional land, but it turns out that there is a real Connor Smith, whom Eleanor was once involved with, and, for 10 years, he’s been threatening to sue her for defamation unless she gives him a healthy share of her royalties. Now, Eleanor has decided that her 10th book will be her last.
While Eleanor plans her literary swan song, she embarks on a book tour in Italy. There are several other authors, some favoured fans and eight cities to visit – and the real life Connor has tagged along. It’s at this point that he informs Eleanor that someone is out to actually kill him. Truth or more con? Has he caught on to the fact that Eleanor is about to give his fictional alter ego the kibosh? The clues are stretched and there are far too many convenient coincidences but it’s Eleanor, Mack’s writer, whose voice keeps the whole book going. She’s funny and smart and full of ginger, and she deserves all her royalties.
A Game of Lies, Clare Mackintosh (Raincoast, 368 pages) If you hate reality TV, this is the book for you. Clare Mackintosh’s second novel featuring Welsh detective Ffion Morgan is as slick and slimy as the snakes Survivor contestants have to eat. And it works a treat.
Detective Morgan is called into the Welsh mountains to a closed television set. It seems someone has uncovered a batch of bones in what they think may be a grave. Ffion travels, sees and quickly determines that the bones are animal, not human, and prepares to leave. At that moment, however, one of the reality contestants goes missing.
As Ffion investigates, he finds that each of the contestants has a secret they want to keep hidden. To survive and thrive on the show, they must reveal the secret of another contestant to the world. It’s clear that this show has been set up as a bait and switch and that someone has a secret no one is supposed to guess.