Dedicated fans of the franchise may enjoy watching Meier’s heroine negotiate the distance between public and private life.
A small-town reporter faces big changes, both personal and professional.
After coming home to Maine from her father-in-law’s funeral in Florida, Lucy Stone runs slap into a major kerfuffle at the Pennysaver, Tinker Cove’s premier (and, let’s face it, only) print news source. At first, it looks as if Lucy’s about to lose her star reporting gig because publisher Ted Stillings will sell the paper. But no—what he’s actually done is buy an adjacent town’s local weekly, the Gilead Gabber, planning to expand their merged newsrooms and start an online edition while maintaining each paper’s print masthead. He’s even hired Rob Callahan away from the Cleveland Plain Dealer to give his new venture some big-city cachet. Not surprisingly, Rob turns out to be a bossy know-it-all who edits mistakes into Lucy’s city budget article while lounging in Ted’s office. But she’s not about to allow pushy Rob to steal her prize story: the battle for the post of Grand Marshal of the Gilead Hibernian Knights Society’s annual Irish Parade. While she tussles to retain her turf at the office, there’s a new threat at home. Her husband, Bill, has received a letter from a younger woman claiming to be his half sister, complete with a DNA test. Instead of being horrified to discover that her late husband may have had a child with another woman during their marriage, Edna Stone is thrilled to meet this new member of her family. Given all this domestic strife, Lucy’s nonplussed when Tinker’s Cove latest fatality is none of the players mentioned above but a corrections officer suspected of harassing female inmates.
Dedicated fans of the franchise may enjoy watching Meier’s heroine negotiate the distance between public and private life.Pub Date: Jan. 26, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-4967-1039-0
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Kensington
Review Posted Online: Nov. 17, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A fresh and clever whodunit with an engaging twist.
A 16-year-old savant uses his Groundhog Day gift to solve his grandfather’s murder.
Nishizawa’s compulsively readable puzzle opens with the discovery of the victim, patriarch Reijiro Fuchigami, sprawled on a futon in the attic of his elegant mansion, where his family has gathered for a consequential announcement about his estate. The weapon seems to be a copper vase lying nearby. Given this setup, the novel might have proceeded as a traditional whodunit but for two delightful features. The first is the ebullient narration of Fuchigami’s youngest grandson, Hisataro, thrust into the role of an investigator with more dedication than finesse. The second is Nishizawa’s clever premise: The 16-year-old Hisataro has lived ever since birth with a condition that occasionally has him falling into a time loop that he calls "the Trap," replaying the same 24 hours of his life exactly nine times before moving on. And, of course, the murder takes place on the first day of one of these loops. Can he solve the murder before the cycle is played out? His initial strategies—never leaving his grandfather’s side, focusing on specific suspects, hiding in order to observe them all—fall frustratingly short. Hisataro’s comical anxiety rises with every failed attempt to identify the culprit. It’s only when he steps back and examines all the evidence that he discovers the solution. First published in 1995, this is the first of Nishizawa’s novels to be translated into English. As for Hisataro, he ultimately concludes that his condition is not a burden but a gift: “Time’s spiral never ends.”
A fresh and clever whodunit with an engaging twist.Pub Date: July 29, 2025
ISBN: 9781805335436
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Pushkin Vertigo
Review Posted Online: July 4, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2025
A top-class cozy infused with dry wit and charming characters who draw you in and leave you wanting more, please.
Four residents of Coopers Chase, a British retirement village, compete with the police to solve a murder in this debut novel.
The Thursday Murder Club started out with a group of septuagenarians working on old murder cases culled from the files of club founder Elizabeth Best’s friend Penny Gray, a former police officer who's now comatose in the village's nursing home. Elizabeth used to have an unspecified job, possibly as a spy, that has left her with a large network of helpful sources. Joyce Meadowcroft is a former nurse who chronicles their deeds. Psychiatrist Ibrahim Arif and well-known political firebrand Ron Ritchie complete the group. They charm Police Constable Donna De Freitas, who, visiting to give a talk on safety at Coopers Chase, finds the residents sharp as tacks. Built with drug money on the grounds of a convent, Coopers Chase is a high-end development conceived by loathsome Ian Ventham and maintained by dangerous crook Tony Curran, who’s about to be fired and replaced with wary but willing Bogdan Jankowski. Ventham has big plans for the future—as soon as he’s removed the nuns' bodies from the cemetery. When Curran is murdered, DCI Chris Hudson gets the case, but Elizabeth uses her influence to get the ambitious De Freitas included, giving the Thursday Club a police source. What follows is a fascinating primer in detection as British TV personality Osman allows the members to use their diverse skills to solve a series of interconnected crimes.
A top-class cozy infused with dry wit and charming characters who draw you in and leave you wanting more, please.Pub Date: Sept. 22, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-98-488096-3
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Pamela Dorman/Viking
Review Posted Online: June 30, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2020
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