It’s been a quiet week. The heatwave has moved on, so we’re back to normal summer temperatures. We’ve even had the occasional shower. After spending most of the previous week travelling, it was nice to be able to cook for myself, get some admin out of the way and catch up on my reading.
Anyway, here’s what I read and bought this week and what’s coming up next.
It’s been a mixed reading week. Two cozy supernatural mysteries kept me entertained as I drove. A quirky Science Fiction novel turned out to have more substance than I’d expected. A serial killer thriller with a K-9 police officer as the main protagonist surprised me by bringing the characters to life so vividly. I had one crime novel that I set aside halfway through because it was too dark for me, and a full-cast audiobook novella about an obsessive police detective in New Orleans that I finished but wished I hadn’t bothered with.
The Vampire Knitting Club books are perfect for listening to on long drives. My wife and I listened to books two and three back-to-back while driving to and from Liverpool this week. The narration is easy on the ear. The mystery plots are just complicated enough to be engaging without taking my attention away from my driving.
The expanding ensemble cast is full of engaging characters. Our heroine, Lucy Swift, is easy to like. She’s new to everything: living in Oxford rather than her native Boston, running a knitting shop when she doesn’t know how to knit, hosting a nest of vampires who are fiendishly good at knitting and one of whom is her own recently deceased but now undead grandmother, and being a witch with powers she didn’t know she had and has yet to learn how to use.
I’ve read the first three books in this fifteen-book series, and so far, each book has been better than the one before it. That’s partly because Nancy Warren seems to have thought through the story arc for the series, and each book is richer in detail and pulls me deeper into Lucy Swift’s world.
My review for ’Stitches and Witches’ and ‘Crochet and Cauldrons’ is HERE.
Detective Mina Harker has built a reputation as the sharpest mind in the New Orleans Police Department, closing cases no one else can crack.
But the case that’s been haunting her for years is unlike anything else in her files. The victims leave behind no forensic evidence, no witnesses, and not a single drop of blood in their bodies.
When FBI Special Agent Jon Weston enlists Harker to help track a serial killer who’s striking in New Orleans, she knows two things: he’s closer to the truth than he knows—and she can’t let him get too close. Because the truth isn’t just about the killer. It’s about her too.
Five years ago, Harker survived an encounter that should have killed her. What it left behind still torments her, and it’s getting harder to control. And as victims turn up across New Orleans, and a shadowy figure from her past tightens his grip on the city, Mina is running out of time to decide: is she the hunter or the prey?
‘Harker’ (2026) is being heavily promoted on Audible at the moment. It looks great, has a no-nonsense title, has Christina Ricci as the lead in a full-cast production, was co-written by Duane Swierczynski, was only three hours long and was included in my Audible membership. Sadly, it turned out that being short and free were the best things about it.
‘Harker’ was a disappointing collection of clichés dressed in borrowed glamour. It was almost insultingly derivative. It had a weak story with a limp ending. It had a strong cast who did their best with a thin script but who couldn’t salvage the sloppy storytelling.
My review is HERE
Anders Jensen is having a bad month. His roommate is a data thief, his girlfriend picks fights in bars, and his best friend is a cyborg…and a lousy tipper. When everything is spiraling out of control, though, maybe those are exactly the kind of friends you need.
In a world divided between the genetically engineered elite and the unmodified masses, Anders is an engineered, but still broke and living next to a crack house. All he wants is to land a tenure-track faculty position, and maybe meet someone who’s not technically a criminal-but when a nightmare plague rips through Hagerstown, Anders finds himself dodging kinetic energy weapons and government assassins as Baltimore slips into chaos.
His friends aren’t as helpless as they seem, though, and his girlfriend’s street-magician brother-in-law might be a pretentious hipster – or might hold the secret to saving them all.
Edward Ashton is probably best known for his Mickey7 novels, the first of which was made into the movie ‘Mickey 17’. ‘Three Days in April’ (2015) was his debut novel, and it was a doozy. It was fast, fun, original and plausible. Labelling it ‘darkly comic’ underestimates how weaponised the humour is.
I loved that this wasn’t just a ‘look how bizarre we are’ satire. It tackles some big issues with a remarkable clarity of vision and the ruthless use of violence.
Edward Ashton is skilled at letting the story get complex and twisty without losing its lightness of touch. He uses multiple points of view to enhance the story, not just by broadening the scope of the narrative, but by building characters who see the world differently, not letting one view become the dominant one.
This was a fun read. A story full of surprises, told in a unique voice that I want to hear more of.
Now Deputy Sheriff in his new town, Turner seems to be finally escaping his past and creating a new life for himself. That is, until a routine traffic stop results in a young man being sprung from jail, a brutal assault on the Sheriff and Turner risking everything in his wild pursuit.
I set ‘Cripple Creek’ aside at 54%. I couldn’t sit with it any more. It felt like a nighmareish, Southern Gothic version of a set of Lake Woebegone tales. It was a slice-of-life tale that wasn’t taking me anywhere except into darkness, and, having endured 160 minutes of it, I’ve had more than enough of that.
My review is HERE.
Officer Kate Marino has a complicated relationship with her hometown. But there’s one thing that could bring her Her seventeen-year-old niece Alice disappeared two days ago. And she’s not the only woman who’s gone missing.
With police dogs Nero and Bella (now retired) in tow, Kate returns to her childhood home and the ghosts that inhabit it. It’s not just the looming presence of her father, however, that hinders Kate’s investigation. Something even more sinister awaits her there.
Dead bodies confirm the missing women are the work of a serial killer who hunts his prey through the New Hampshire wilderness. With time running out, Kate’s determined to find Alice before she becomes his next victim.
Alongside Deputy Sheriff Roy Hoover, Kate and her loyal dogs scour the area for clues, motive, and the secrets harbored by each victim. Kate ran away from Cooperton once before—but this time, she’ll stay and face its demons…
‘In The Killer’s Sight’ will be published on 1st September. I picked it up early because it was an Amazon Prime First Read.
When it started, I was worried that it was going to be another novel that wanted me to spend most of my time inside the head of a serial killer, but it was a delightful surprise: a mystery with a strong plot, good pacing, a credible female lead, believable (although not always pleasant) family relationships and two very good dogs.
What I liked most were the scenes in the family. The way the women talked to each other felt real. These conversations grounded the rest of the book.
Kate Marino was an excellent lead character – not a superhero, but a woman whose strength had been tested by having bad things happen to her and who keeps moving forward because she is a single parent with a teenage daughter.
The plot was solid and kept me guessing about who the killer was. I liked that the women the killer took were more than victims or necessary plot devices. They were drawn as clearly as the rest of the characters.
My best surprise was that each of the dogs got a chapter written from their point of view. For me, they were two of the best chapters in the book. I loved being inside their heads.
‘In the Killer’s Sight’ is the first in a series. I’ll certainly be back for more.
This week, I bought six books: three were published this year, two are Science Fiction novels by authors whose back catalogue I’m exploring, and one is the first book in a long-running Canadian crime series that has since been adapted for television.
‘I’m Not the Only Murderer in my Retirement Home’ (2026) is a fit for my Women Who Kill and my Novels About Old People collections. I couldn’t resist the title or the premise. It launches a new series, so I’m hoping this will be the start of something good.
’The Night Stairs’ (2026) seems to be a mix of Gothic horror and Dark Academia. I’m hoping the stress is on the former, as I rarely do well with Dark Academia (perhaps because most academia seems dark to me).
‘A Nest of Wasps’ (2026) continues the travails of geriatric ex-spy, Felicity Jardine. As in the first book ‘A Sting in Her Tale’, people are still trying to kill her, and she’s trying to stop them.
I enjoyed Fonda Lee’s ‘The Last Contract of Isako ’, so I’m checking out ‘Jade City’ (2017), the first novel in ‘The Green Bone Saga.
‘Pilgrim Machines’ (2024) is the sequel to ‘The Salvage Crew’ (2020), which was one of my favourite Science Fiction reads in 2022
’The Suspect’ (1985) is the first book in a crime series set on Canada’s Sunshine Coast. It spawned the 2024 TV series ‘Murder in a Small Town’. I’m hoping it won’t feel too dated and that I’ll want to read the next eight books in the series.
When former serial killer Carol takes her place in a luxury retirement home, she begins to find her feet with a small new group of friends. If she can only keep her past hidden, maybe she has a chance at happiness.
That’s when she discovers that, absurdly, every other one of Sheldon Oaks’ residents was involved in the law somehow. It’s not long before her true identity is leaked, and when a former police commissioner resident is murdered, naturally all eyes turn to her…
Now she must solve the case to prove her innocence – just as her new friends start their own investigations into whether there is more than one killer at Sheldon Oaks.
When schoolgirls start fainting one after the other at a convent boarding school, old legends twist into new scandals. From irresistible bestselling storyteller Erin Kelly comes the new thriller that will leave you craving to read more.
Centuries of tradition are coming to an end at St Cordula’s school. Deputy Head, Fiona Fox, is about to preside over a controversial move to save it from ruin. But it’s not easy to change things at a school this old.
Legend has it that the ghost of fifteenth-century nun, Sister Matilda, will keep St Cordula’s safe. But only as long as the words ‘GOD FORGIVE ME’, scrawled by Matilda on a chapel staircase wall before she fell to her death, are repainted every year. The words have only been allowed to fade once, in 2002. But then, fits of vertigo spread through the pupils, and a second girl fell to her death on the night stairs. Only three people know the truth of what happened on the night of the tragedy.
Now the vertigo is back, and Fiona must stem the outbreak before it threatens St Cordula’s future, or worse, another girl loses her life. But when one of her pupils begins a dangerous investigation into the past, old secrets start to twist into new scandals…
After a month of various people clearing up various messes, Felicity Jardine is finally cleared to go back to her little village cottage.
But when a celebratory cream tea with her new and well-connected friend Percy is interrupted by a sniper’s bullet, she’s off again, to a safe house in Notting Hill.
There her only contact is her former colleague Matthew, still with MI6, who offers her a bit of investigation she can do online to pass the time.
But Felicity is not one to work from home when she can be out and getting stuck in, especially when someone on the inside seems to be betraying her…
Jade is the lifeblood of the city of Janloon – a stone that enhances a warrior’s natural strength and speed. Jade is mined, traded, stolen and killed for, controlled by the ruthless No Peak and Mountain families.
When a modern drug emerges that allows anyone – even foreigners – to wield jade, simmering tension between the two families erupts into open violence. The outcome of this clan war will determine the fate of all in the families, from their grandest patriarch to even the lowliest runner on the streets.
Humanity has spread to the stars…
For the first time in thousands of years, we have also discovered the Other. The alien. A being so unimaginably complex that it makes us all look like children.
The PCS Blue Cherry Blossom, a long range interstellar freighter, is tasked with the ultimate voyage. What lies at the heart of the galaxy? Who and what is out there? Is it even possible to survive?
Against a backdrop of relentless political and corporate maneuvering, a new crew sets out, prepared to risk their lives and their deaths to set forth into the void and look for answers. To go where no human has ever gone before.
British Columbia’s Sunshine Coast isn’t always so sunny for Staff Sergeant Karl Alberg. To Karl Alberg a quiet coastal town is exactly what he needs to soothe a psyche that’s been battered by big-city police work. But this gentle paradise has more than its share of secrets.
Bees buzz among the roses, and the local librarian is attractive, intriguing, and unattached. Perhaps he has at last come in from the cold.
But a murder in small town can conceal a lot of secrets –some of them bleak enough to make a man yearn for some nice straightforward urban crime.
Karl will need to call upon all the skills that made him a world-class detective in solving the murders that, even in this seemingly idyllic setting, continue to wash up on his shore.
I have ten days left for my Sci Fi Summer 2026 reading challenge, so I’ve decided to bring it to a post-apocalyptic close with three takes on the end of the world as we know it.
Hig, bereaved and traumatised after global disaster, has three things to live for – his dog Jasper, his aggressive but helpful neighbour, and his Cessna aeroplane. He’s just about surviving, so long as he only takes his beloved plane for short journeys, and saves his remaining fuel.
But, just once, he picks up a message from another pilot, and eventually the temptation to find out who else is still alive becomes irresistible. So he takes his plane over the horizon, knowing that he won’t have enough fuel to get back. What follows is scarier and more life-affirming than he could have imagined.
‘The Dog Stars’ (2012) has been sitting on my shelves for five years now. I was reminded of it when I saw that Ridley Scott had made it into a movie starring Josh Brolin and the ubiquitous Jacob Elordi. I like Scott’s work, but I want to read the book before I see the film.
Humankind is extinct. Wiped out in a global uprising by the very machines made to serve them. Now the world is controlled by One World Intelligences – vast mainframes that have assimilated the minds of millions of robots.
But not all robots are willing to cede their individuality, and Brittle – a loner and scavenger, focused solely on survival – is one of the holdouts.
Only, individuality comes at a price, and after a near-deadly encounter with another AI, Brittle is forced to seek sanctuary. Not easy when an OWI has decided to lay siege to the nearest safe city.
Critically damaged, Brittle has to hold it together long enough to find the essential rare parts to make repairs – but as a robot’s CPU gradually deteriorates, all their old memories resurface. For Brittle, that means one haunting memory in particular . . .
‘Sea of Rust’ (2017) has been on my shelves since it came out, so I figure its time has come. It made the 2018 Arthur C Clarke Award Shortlist and spawned a prequel ‘Day Zero’ (2021).
The landscape is destroyed. Nothing moves save the ash on the wind. Cruel, lawless men stalk the roadside, lying in wait. Attempting to survive in this brave new world, the young boy and his protector have nothing but a pistol to defend themselves. They must keep walking.
‘The Road’ (2006) won the 2007 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. I’ve been putting off reading it because I know it’s soaked in sadness, but with its twentieth anniversary coming up in October, I want to see what has won it such acclaim.
Mike Finn's Fiction 