This review is based on an advance reader copy received from the publisher.

In the third book in the Scotland Yard Murder Squad series, Inspector Day and Sergeant Hammersmith have been pressed into service searching for four, or possibly five, prisoners who escaped after a train car derailed and crashed into a prison wall, apparently deliberately. One of them is a murderer whom Day caught in the first place, and who may possibly go after his wife, Claire, who is expecting a baby any day. To make matters even worse, Jack the Ripper is back on the loose after having been secretly captured and held prisoner by a shadowy organization.

After three books, Day, Hammersmith, and the reoccurring supporting characters still come across as rather lightly sketched. Jack is the most compelling character, although he still feels a bit derivative. I worry that it sounds a bit ridiculous, when Jack the Ripper is one of the models for all fictional serial killers, but we are dealing with a fictional version of Jack that was just created here. His fixation with "transforming" people is reminiscent of Thomas Harris characters, and since I do not believe that theme was in any of the Ripper letters, I can't excuse it by saying that it's an actual association with the historical Jack. If I've missed a letter that suggested Jack the Ripper did think in those terms, please correct me.

What keeps me reading this series is the setting. The little details of weapons, the things that Scotland Yard can and cannot do with forensics in the 1890s when modern ideas of forensic science were just starting to be formed are worth the time and keep the reader's attention in between the pure action scenes. That's why I'll be looking for the fourth book, which was rather more obviously set up at the end than other installments in the series have been.

Overall: B

The Devil's Workshop will be available May 20.

Rachel and Clara were inseparable in high school, when Rachel was the awkward new girl and Clara was the girl everybody wanted to be friends with who still seemed above them all. Now in their late twenties, Rachel is flourishing and Clara is back, but although she still feels the bond, something seems different. Then Rachel goes to a press conference about a missing person and discovers that it's Clara, who disappeared the night that they were supposed to see each other. As the investigation continues, Rachel realizes that Clara is still out there, and setting her up.

This was an amazing book. The plot is gripping, full of twists and turns, and mostly successful at staying believable as the secrets come out, although there was one particular revelation almost at the end that I thought was unnecessary and approached a Dickensian level of coincidence. But more than that, this was a wonderful depiction of teenage friendship and the sort of desperate, enduring love that results when a girl meets just the right person at just the right time, even if that love becomes wrapped up in hate, too.

Overall: A

This review is based on an advance reader's copy provided by the publisher.

A man obtains an unidentified film from the estate of a collector and is struck blind in the middle of watching it. His ex-lover, detective Lucie Henebelle, who gets him to the hospital, begins investigating the images hidden in the film and a lead indicates that there is a connection to five corpses that were recently uncovered at a construction site. Henebelle joins forces with Inspector Franck Sharko, who is meant to be functioning as a behavioral analyst but who can't seem to stop hitting the streets for investigations himself, to discover the truth behind a case that stretched from Canada to Cairo and spanned over fifty years.

This is a wonderfully disturbing book. Initially I was more invested in the parts involving the film than in the parts involving the bodies, primarily because mutilated corpses are a dime a dozen in crime novels but subliminal marketing techniques are original. But as the plot unfolds and the various threads are linked to each other, the connections feel legitimate and unforced, even if on one occasion somebody does rather conveniently appear out of the blue to tell one of our protagonists all of the useful information they know. Overall, though, this is a well executed thriller that ventures into dark territories of the mind.

(I feel like I should add one caveat: Sharko has schizophrena. He's on medication, but he still has hallucinations, in particular of a woman called Eugenie. Eugenie goes away through means that I doubt are medically recommended. He reflects after she vanishes that he's still a schizophrenic and will be on medication for the rest of my life, which reassures me somewhat that he's not meant to have been magically cured, but I remain a bit cautious until I see if Thilliez continues to address this or if the schizophrenia is simply dropped.)

Overall: B+


Syndrome E will be available April 29.

This review is based on an advance copy provided by the publisher.

Although it isn't clear from this blog yet, I don't read a lot of thrillers. I have a rather low tolerance for "are you KIDDING me?" in books that claim to take place in our world. If I do read a thriller, odds are good that it's a legal thriller, because in those the protagonists are usually lawyers or reporters or people who have a reason to be investigating a crime, rather than just Joe Everyman who for some bizarre reason stumbles into the middle of a human trafficking ring.

So when I say that I liked Never Come Back  quite a lot, it's high praise. On to the plot. Elizabeth has enough to deal with in the wake of her mother's death, between trying not to fall hopelessly behind in grad. school and planning for the future of her brother with Downs Syndrome. Then the police tell her that her mother was murdered, and her brother is the prime suspect. Further complicating things, Elizabeth discovers that she, and not her uncle as she previously believed, has been named her brother's guardian in her mother's will, and a stranger is receiving a third of the estate.

This thriller works for me because the intrigue is built largely around family secrets, on a greater scale than most of us will ever encounter but still something that feels grounded and possible. There were only a few things that made me go "...what?" One is a rather big thing near the end, a development that felt tacked on in order to have an extra unsuspected twist rather than developing as part of the story. The others:

1. A woman described as a volunteer at the library who appears to have responsibilities and powers (such as the capability to create some unspecified kind of fund?) far beyond what volunteers would be able to do.
2. Elizabeth asking for favors from a student whose work she grades without any acknowledgement of the inappropriateness of that arrangement.
3. Apparently DNA tests are not a thing.

For a thriller, I consider that a fairly small number of failures of suspension of disbelief. If I'm this happy, then people who routinely have less trouble with the genre should be overjoyed.

Final Grade: A-

This review is based on an advance copy received from the publisher

Regina LeClaire was kidnapped at age twelve and held captive and abused for
four years. Six years later (and after having changed her name to Reeve) she is
still in therapy with a specialist in this kind of trauma, starting to put her
life back together but with work left to do. Then one of three missing girls in
cases believed to be related is rescued, and Reeve's therapist asks her to
accompany him to provide emotional support to the victim. But the man who was
arrested was acting under somebody else's direction, and the accomplice who was
the brains of the operation is still watching.


The Edge of Normal is an engrossing, tightly plotted thriller featuring a
heroine who, although damaged, is recovering and still stronger than she thinks
she is. Its appeal comes just as much from the chance to spend time with its
protagonist as from following the twists and turns of the plot and the sick
mastermind behind it.

Final Grade: A