A pulse-pounding Amish thriller (really!) that’s all too relevant to our time.
A white-hot case reunites old friends who'd been estranged for years.
Leaving the Amish community behind, Kate Burkholder was struggling to survive in Columbus, Ohio, when she met ambitious Gina Colorosa. They became friends, shared an apartment, and graduated from the police academy together. But when Gina started accepting freebies and bribes, their friendship foundered, and Kate eventually left to take a job as police chief in Painters Mill. Now Gina’s in trouble with fellow vice squad officers who think she stole a pot of drug money they were supposed to share. She barely escapes with her life when a no-knock warrant brings them to her house in the dead of night. The only person she can trust even after 10 years of silence is Kate. In the middle of a blizzard, Gina crashes her truck and almost freezes before she’s found by Amish widower Adam Lengacher, a childhood friend of Kate’s. When Kate arrives, Gina tells a sordid story of corruption at the highest levels and coverups concerning innocent civilians killed in a raid. The warrant out for Gina’s arrest and her own doubts about Gina’s incredible story put Kate in a tough spot. So she calls her boyfriend, Bureau of Criminal Investigation agent John Tomasetti, for advice. Snowed in, Gina tries to adapt to living in an Amish home with three small children and Adam, who’s clearly attracted to her. While they wait for Tomasetti to mine his sources, several of the crooked cops plot to track her down and kill her in what will look like an arrest gone wrong.
A pulse-pounding Amish thriller (really!) that’s all too relevant to our time.Pub Date: July 7, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-14289-4
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Minotaur
Review Posted Online: July 13, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2020
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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